last night's dream

i know the dream took place in a mall of some sort
but the levels were confusing and maze-like
i was working at the coffee shop
and j. was there again
everything seemed fine, busy
there were televisions blaring a little too loudly
and the subject matter was somehow inappropriate
someone from the mall offices came and complained
but the man i love was there
i don't know if he was talking to me at all
but he was around and that made me happy
it was near closing time
and i was wrapping up these sandwiches
they were, i want to say, fish sandwiches of some sort
and i was wrapping them in pastry bags
and wax paper
but i know there had been a debate about it
whether saran wrap was better

and then, before he left
because, like i said it was closing time
and i had a bunch of work to do
he came over and gave me that kiss
and it was so beautiful in the dream
it was so natural
so like we had been together for a long time

i've dreamed other kisses
i've imagined still others
but this one was so not like something i'd imagine
because it was not a new kiss
not a fist kiss
it was like
nothing else i've dreamed
i could feel the skin of his lips
brushing across the skin of my lips
in direct contrast to the other night
when our skin never touched at all
that's why i'll never forget it
it was so real
but so, i don't know, so everyday, maybe

then he walked away
but then i saw him
wrapping these things around his legs, just below the knee
they had this sort of tribal warrior look to them
and they had eggs hanging off
i don't know what any of this means
i took it as all being good
but maybe that's just because the kiss was so beautiful

i just thought how much i love him and continued with my work
which, at that moment was wrapping up the sandwiches
but then
after it seemed like everyone had left
i realized that i didn't have the alarm codes
so i'm freaking out
j. opened so she's got the codes

and i'm not sure of the sequencing of these next parts
i was trying and trying to remember
because i thought it might be really important, somehow
but i was talking to people
and i think the man i love was one of them
and while i was talking to them
i was cleaning the walls
it seemed very important
they had something on them
something like honey or syrup or something
sticky
and the other thing
that i can't remember the order of
i was trying to use my laptop
and it kept crumpling in on itself
like it was made of elastic
the computer worked just fine
but i couldn't see the screen
and i couldn't touch the keys
and it was freaking me out

so i was trying to close up
and i couldn't reach j.
so i went out to look for somebody
and the doors were like a giant version
of safe doors
except they were shaped like a stop sign
and i couldn't find my way around
i kept walking through hallways that sloped up or down
then i came to a black guy who worked for or in the mall, somehow
he gave me directions
and he told me that the coffee shop was in a part of the mall
where people were not allowed to roam when the mall was closed
but i got turned around
and i ended up outside
and i didn't want to shut the door all the way
because i was afraid it would lock behind me
and i thought i was going right back in as soon as i figured out
what i was doing
and i started to walk
and everything was huge
and it all went straight up
but i seemed to cover the ground pretty quickly
i stopped and asked for directions
and the guy i asked
pointed me in exactly the opposite direction
and then i wasn't sure what to do
and then i woke up