Is That you Diane?

I am in a restaurant. It is a nice restaurant, modest and conservative in decor - it is not at all in the league of the upscale, fashionable restaurants that I prefer. The menu is very basic. It's good basic american food - like Joe's American Bar and Grill. I am there with Colin. Just COlin. We are geting a bite to eat - I think it's lunch time. THe restaurant is a little dark - like pub style. We are seated in a corner booth. There is a large trunk?? behind our booth - it is wooden...heavily varnished, golden colored...oak? Colin is climbing all over it and all long the corner shaped bench. I order us some drinks. I order orange juice for COlin. I order milk for myself (I never order milk - I always order a ginger ale or a glass of wine in the evening). When the waitress comes back there is no table. There is a ramp of wood going down from the top of the corner of the bench to the floor - it surprises me that COlin isn't clinbing it. I don't want to be troublesome for the waitress so I say we can just use this as a table. I put the wood up horizontally in the coprner of our table and pull up a chair. She sets our drinks on it.

I see someone I once knew talking flirtatiously with the bartender and the fellow at the bar. I think it's her. She is working here. She is the hostess. SHe looks happy and cocky. She is not that way in real life. In real life she was very sweet and naieve and beautiful - really beautiful. But she was stupid - particularly stupidly naieve. She was a secretary at the firm I worked in before I had Alex. For some reason she latched onto me. I was always embarressed to be seen with her because she was slightly cheesy (she was a Medfor - pronounced by townies "Mh-Fah") and a secretary - I was a rising star - the youngest analyst on the block and I had CEOs making multi-biollion dollare decision based on what I said. Diane looked up to me - she emulated me in every way...particularly the way I dressed - but she was townie so she never quite got it right...she hung on my every word and advice. And I treated her shamefully. I took advantage of her naievity and her absolute adoration of me and toyed with her mind...made her doubt herself and made her feel her small-towness just for my own pleasure. She never knew I did this on purpose. She always thought it was all her. Anyways. I'm not sure it's her...she seemes so cocky...and thin...she's still so thin. She must have kids by now. She is wearing a black wrap dress. Her hair is long and dark (in real life she had long, curly, fiery red hair that after she got married she chopped it all off and wore it super short and let it go back to it';s natural dark brown color) , curls, parted off lightly off center. I think she glanced at me for a millisecond. When she walks near me I jump up from my seat and run over to her. As I'm jumping up, I think that I shouldn't be jumping up and leaving COlin alone at the table...he;ll be fine. I hope he's good. I'l just right here. It's fine. I grab her arm and say, Diane. She stops and says, Hi. Then she sees me and for a second I think she isn't Diane - I made an idiot of myself. I say, oh, sorry, as I let go of her arm...are you Diane...no you're not DIane, are you? Is that you Diane? Diane Privatera? She hesitates as if realizing she can back out of this if she wants...but she says Ya, I'm Diane. How are you EIleen? I said, fine, I'm eating here with my son. I can see in her eyes that she thinks - oh, EIleen eats here, I'm doing well to be working here...but I am thinking, I don't usually eat here...it is below me...but I do eat in these types of places when I'm with my kids. We chat a bit. I ask her where she's living now because this restaurant is in Andoiver...and last I knew she lived in Mansfield - an hour and a half away from here. She said where she lived - I don't know if she still lived in Mansfield or if she now lived closer. I asked her if she was still wtih Darren. She said yes - but I got the feeling he was only there in body - they were not spiritually together anymore...she was just using him for security. At this she mentions she knows Diane Brita - as if she is using it as psychological ammo. I say oh. and I wonder if Diane B told her about our misconducts in high school...and also about the scandoulous rumor (and they were just rumour not truths at all - I don't know why but in HS people watched me all the time. Girls were jealous and threatened by me and I think guys were secretly lustful of me...anyways, people made up all sorts of ridiculous, nasty rumour about me that if they took a moment to think about they would have realised the absolute impossibility and ridiculousness of the rumours...but people believe what they want to believe). Anyways, She looks like she knows something. She also says she knows Kim Miller and Angela Gardener. These three girls are a small group of slightly rebellious girls that were true friends to me in high school. I was not a rebel but being one of a very few non-white people, I was slightly outcasted - always on the ouside of the inside cirlce, never quite being truly accepted. Anyways, I haven't spoken to these girls since high school. Diane is called away...she's on duty...she feels important and struts away arrogantly. I go back to my table. The food has arrived. Now there is a table. A big woddon table. It is round, dark wood, like in a pub. When the waitress comes back with our order Colin's drink is gone. She cleared it away at some point but it was still full. I ask the waitress what happened to Colin's drink. She looks at my milk. I tell her this isn't his drink. She says our waitress didn't put it out with our food so now she has to go back to get it (annoyed). I realize at this point this is not our waitress, just a server. I tell her that we already got the drink - that it disappeared. She said, our waitress must have cleared it away - she will tell her to bring another. She calls our waitress on her cell phone. I don't really recall what exactly the food was but it was pubby looking, lots of fries, the crinkly kind, fried looking food and I see lettuce, pickle, onions, pickle on the side like when you order a burger. I am eating my food. I am sitting in a chair, back to the "camera" and COlin is being good, walking around on the corner bench while he eats the food he is holding in his fist. I am talking to someone now. I don't know who. I think in my dream I knew this person...but I can't remember who it was now. We are talking about Diane. I tell my "friend?" that Diane knows Diane Brito, Angela and Kim. We discuss how they could know each other. The other person says, did you hear her say she spent $1000 on 5 dresses?! I say, yeah, apparently she is trying to become an actress or a model. She is really into beauty pageants. And we talk about how ridiculous Diane is. Diane returns to my table to chat. She is cocky. She is acting like she is all that. I am still trying to figure out how/why she is here and how/why she knows my HS friends and what they told her about my days. I am nervous. I am casually eating everything in sight...I have just about finished my plate and look over to see Colin's plate is still quite full. There is a quarter of a steak left, french fries and a baked potato skin looking thing. I reach over and pull it near and start picking off of his plate as I finish my plate. I look over to see another plate of food with more french fries and some other foods. I pull it over and begin picking off of that as well. I finish my plate and finish the other plate and the waitress comes to clear away the dishes. I say to leave Colin's plate. And I chow on it - all the while Diane is talking and threateneing me with what she seems to know. She is stupid and talking about nothing important yet she THINKS she is so important and gorgeous and smart and successful. I am thinking yeah, you are still gorgeous, but you're personality has changed and it is ugly...and you are still stupid and you are still frivolous and being a hostess in a restauranty is not success.

This is about where I wake up.