A piercing sound rang through his ears as he shot straight up sweating, still covered in that empty bed with the permanent indent where he had always lain. His heart was pounding and there was still the faint sweet smell in the air and on his lips of hope and summer in the breeze. The taste of love existing only in that smell at that moment when you neither seek it nor see it directly, a vicarious experience. He wiped his mouth, the taste of sweaty fingers replaced the smell of summer.

It was real this time this dream this feeling, the touch he felt, the eyes he saw, the harmony that was now denied as he realised he was in the waking dream. A pain hit him in that guttural intuition, the feeling of separation, anguish, the loss. He had told her she could only exist in this dream this imaginary form of existence. A soul vibrating on the same wavelength, playing the same chords he yearned too to hear. The sound of active silence, peace...

Had he fallen in love with the girl from his imagination?