"The Last Dream of my Soul" was my final project for my first-level Fiction writing class last semester. There were no specific criteria; just to write a short story. Please find the links to the other parts at the bottom as they are released.
We met at a bookstore, like every perfect love story starts for a bibliophile. We were sifting through opposite sides of the Classics shelf when all of the sudden there was an empty space and we locked eyes. We smiled and laughed awkwardly.
He had the bluest eyes I had ever seen, like a faded "Great Gatsby" cover. As he smiled at me, his crow’s feet crinkled and his eyes sparkled.
We said our first hellos through the empty space on the shelf. We talked about how the owner should really fix that, because it’s bad enough to have one empty spot, but two?
“The world needs more books for this reason,” he said.
He had a thick Boston accent that made me wonder just how long he’d been in Washington State for.
“You couldn’t be more right,” I replied.
We talked through the shelf for a minute or so until he finally joined me on the A-F side of the Classics. We talked about what brought us here today and what books we were looking for. He was looking for another copy of Catcher in the Rye; I was looking for A Tale of Two Cities because I somehow hadn’t read it before.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Carson.”
He stuck his hand out to me, and as I shook it he said, “Jason. My name is Jason.”
From there, he asked me if I wanted to grab a cup of coffee with him. My response was that he knew exactly how to get to know a girl: a good book and a cup of coffee. He said that they usually go hand in hand with each other, so it was an easy guess.
We both considered that cup of coffee our first date even though we didn’t learn each other’s last names until a few days later. On that date, Jason told me he had just moved to Seattle because he was bored of living in Boston for 31 years; he needed a fresh start.
Jason was a doctor at a hospital. Not an MD that diagnosed basic health problems like high blood pressure or the flu, but an MD that helped people become happier with their lives and themselves. He didn’t want to own his own practice, but instead, he wanted to work in a fast-paced area with many guaranteed patients. He liked making more of a difference in peoples’ lives, like one of his new patients who was just brought in and who he was very hopeful for. He was a workaholic with an extreme caffeine addiction who read in his free time. I couldn’t ask for anything more.
We moved forward very quickly, seeing each other almost every night a week for three weeks before we said we were exclusive. We stayed the night at each other’s apartments, cooked our favorite foods, went Downtown for drinks, and saw an off-Broadway show. We loved to spend every moment together and learn more and more about each other. We also loved to simply lie in bed together in silence and read.
We couldn’t keep our hands off of each other. He loved to keep his hand on my thigh when we were together—we were that couple that sat on the same side of the booth at dinner — and he loved to kiss my neck no matter what we were doing. We made love for the first time on the fourth date.
We said we loved each other for the first time after two months. It was raining, it was right outside of his work — I had stopped by on his lunch break — and he said it right after he quickly kissed me on the cheek and as he was turning away to go back to work. I don’t think he was expecting himself to say it, but when he did, he was elated. He said it again, I told him that I loved him, too, and we kissed in the rain for everyone to see.
We moved in with each other five months after we started dating. After all, we were both a little older and looking to finally settle down. He was set in his career, and I loved my job as a kindergarten teacher. Jason made enough money to rent a nice townhome for the two of us on the outskirts of the city and still comfortably afford extravagant dinners, weekly theatre dates, and enough books to fill our built-in bookshelf wall in the second bedroom that served as an office.
We never got tired of talking about literature. We each read a new book a week and we would talk about how it made us felt each week; sort of like our own personal book club. Each Saturday morning we would grab coffee at our favorite local shop and then go on a hunt for new (or old) books — sort of like how some people did yard sales on Saturday mornings. We loved the book world that we lived in, and it was even more special because it was what brought us together.
Around the eight month mark, he asked me about our future.
“Would you like to get married one day?” he asked. “Whether it is to me, or another fellow…would you like to?”
