Been a while since I’ve dreamed about houses. Such dreams are always in conjunction with family.

I was visiting my wife’s family house. It no longer exists, as it was torn down after her mother was moved to assisted living. That was a sad thing in itself, to have a dwelling lived in for almost fifty years broken down and hauled away. She died about seven years ago.

In this dream, I knew it was her parents’ house even though it wasn’t like the real place. My wife and I were both young and visiting. Two women I didn’t know were there but nobody else.

The four of us were bored. I opened a drawer and found a deck of cards. We decided to play ‘King on the corner’. After we drew our cards, the person with the highest card would go first. I announced I had the king of diamonds. Someone else announced they had the king of spades. I then saw that I also had the ace of diamonds. Everyone agreed I should go first.

I took my turn, drawing a card. Play progressed and I realized that I’d screwed up because I hadn’t put down my cards. Someone put a king on the corner. I saw it was a king of diamonds. That couldn’t be because I had that card, which I pointed out. We realized that we had more than one deck. Upset with that, we abandoned the card playing.

Then we were just talking when the phone rang. I thought it could be my father-in-law calling. He’d passed away back in December of 1991.

It was him on the phone. He said, “Tell them I’m on my way home.”

I asked, “When do you think you’ll be here?”

But the line was dead. I told the others what had happened. They responded, “We need to clean up.” They jumped up and left the room to go down the hall.

I followed them. The rest of the house wasn’t anything like her parents’ house and I said so. Then we came to a part of it where there were two businesses on the right-hand side. That blew me away. Businesses in the house? That made no sense.

I gathered the businesses were an ice cream stand and a coffee and sandwich shop. Young women were at serving windows in both. I didn’t know either. My wife spoke to one. She revealed we’d gone to school with them. I didn’t remember her, but she claimed she remembered me.

The others had gone off. I walked around on my own and discovered my mother-in-law’s room. I went in and knew it but also knew it was different. My wife called out, “Mom’s here.” I eagerly went to greet her.

Instead of my MIL, another man entered, arms out with a large smile. “Good to see you again,” he said.

Although I didn’t recognize him, I said, “Good to see you, too.”

We hugged. Then he said, “I notice you looking at my feet.”

I’d not noticed his feet, but he continued, “They’re new, but they screwed them up.”

I looked at his feet. They were sticking straight out to the sides. I also noticed puddles of pee on the floor and realized that he’d peed himself.

He said, “Can you tell me where the bathroom is? I need to take a dump.”

I pointed him in the right direction and rushed off.

I joined up with my wife, her older sister, and my neice. We continued to the house’s front. It was wildly different than before. The front porch, driveway, big oak tree, and flowering rhododendrons were gone. It was now more like a Monet painting. Amazed and staring, I said, “This is completely different. When did this happen?”

Oh, a long time ago, the others replied, dismissing it. They went out of the house to a little shop, flooring me that a little shop was there and that they were aware of it. This place was where the long driveway used to be, and sold purses and jewelry. My wife and the others knew the owner and went in and talked to them and looked around.

I went off to explore the new place. As I did, a long, gleaming gold car with bright chrome wheels arrive. I thought, that can’t be my father-in-law.

It wasn’t. It was some stranger who parked and walked away in a different direction. Beyond the parked car was a raging muddy river. I picked my way across it to see what was on the other side. A scarlet rooster began following me around. As I went to go back, the rooster jumped on my lower leg and hung on.

It was starting to get dark. I kicked the rooster off my leg and heard it land in the water but couldn’t see it because it had become so dark. Now I worried that I wouldn’t be able to cross because of the light. Hearing splashing, I realized the rooster had made it safely back, which relieved me.

The darkness suddenly lifted enough that I could see where I was. I hurried back across the river.

End.