Following My Toes Read Free Page A

seems, and
    b: I am sure that in my dream Matt was meant to be symbolic of something, like an emotion or a fear. Really!)
    So Matt came up to us, and instead of asking me to dance, he slunk up right in front of me, really slow. Then he took my face in both his hands, and he kissed me as if he were going to devour my mouth. But when he pulled away, he had turned into Peter. Peter took one look at me, said, “You are so selfish,” and walked away. Then I looked out on the dance floor, and I saw Lacey was now dancing/making out with Matt Kendel.
    Suddenly I wasn’t a student anymore. I was a chaperone, and I knew their behavior was inappropriate, so I went to break it up. But when I tried, Lacey turned to me and said, “You don’t understand. You never have. Nobody is as blind as you, Faith.” Then everyone on the dance floor turned and started laughing at me.
    So I woke up disoriented, but I had not forgotten what happened with Peter. I also had that “Eww, I dreamt I kissed a student” feeling, but in light of recent, more important events, I pushed that to the back of my mind. Instead I got up. My head was throbbing and my eyelids fought to stay open. It was like I was hung over—I must have been dehydrated from crying so much.
    Once at school I gave my students busy work to do, and avoided conversation and eye contact with anyone who approached me. It wasn’t until lunch that I had time to call Lacey, and only then I remembered her role in my dream. But I didn’t mention it to her, I just told her something bad had happened, and we agreed to meet at her place that evening.
    This felt natural. Growing up Lacey and I had shared every-thing—clothes, crushes, class notes, and all our secrets. She was more of a sister to me than my real sister Margaret was. But lately things between us hadn’t been quite normal.
    It began with a telephone conversation we had one night. I called her because she hadn’t called me for several days. Fifteen minutes into the call she dropped the bomb.
    “Oh, you should probably know, my dad was diagnosed with liver cancer. The doctors say he only has a few months to live.”
    She described his condition as if she were describing an uninteresting book she had read—she sounded detached even as she admitted to being devastated. I didn’t know what to say, or how to crack her demeanor. And I never figured it out, not that I didn’t try. Four and a half months later I stood next to her at her father’s funeral on a cold March morning. The tears were streaming down my face, but Lacey’s eyes were dry.
    “Faith!” she whispered fiercely, “Don’t be so dramatic. You didn’t even know him that well.”
    That was the only thing she said to me all day, and she apologized later. I told her an apology wasn’t necessary, and explained I had been crying out of sadness for her. I didn’t tell her my tears had also been out of frustration. For the first time in our friendship I didn’t know how to help her. And that separated us.
    She was in a slump for a while, but then started to find ways to make herself feel better. She redecorated her apartment, using this feng shui book a friend of hers from work had given her. She got into yoga and Buddhist philosophy, and started talking about fate and the paths we take. According to her, everything that happens, happens for a reason, and we have to trust ourselves and the universe.
    It all would have been great if she weren’t also taking a lot of anti-depressants without going to therapy as well. In my humble opinion, she needed to talk to someone. But I knew she would lose her temper if I told her that, and I was too much of a wimp to risk it.
    Anyway, the afternoon after Peter had broken up with me, I admit I was focused not on her, but on myself. Yet, once I remembered that dream, I also couldn’t stop thinking about her role in it. What did she have to do with the whole thing, why was she even there? (I might mention at this point, I