The maximum amount of contact for our bodies

I dreamed about you again. 

I'm not sure what it means. Maybe just that you're always there in my subconscious, every bit as much a participant as my own soul. 

The image of the dream was actually a memory: you were scheduled to fly out of Naples, and you said that you thought you'd never see me again. And it was unbearable. I was in your quarters of the BOQ. I said that I was there to help, but I couldn't stop crying. Just unbearable sobbing, and I couldn't stop. 

And you seemed so surprised and so desperate. I think you really didn't let yourself believe how much I really deeply loved you. So you asked me to lie on the bed, and then you lay directly on top of me, your feet tucked around my feet, your arms around my arms, and you looked into my face and said, "There. The maximum amount of contact for our bodies." 

And it was so immensely comforting. To have you cover me like that. 

In my dream, I had this strange realization that closed the loop somehow. That all of the noise I made, the way I fought to keep your integrity and your soul...that was me covering you. 

I don't know how to describe it now, but the feeling was correct. 

While I was doing those things, I didn't really expect to be able to keep you. The second I started being noisy and disruptive, the moment I refused to pretend that I was blind and deaf to everything they had done...that was the moment I was going to be barred from ever being with you. 

But I also remember the urgency I felt: that I was fighting for your soul. And your soul was more important than anything. More important than my life. More important even than being able to keep you. 

Here I am, fifteen years on, and your soul still matters to me. And I wonder if I covered you enough.