Magical Realism

Despite our differences, Richard and I did fall in love and after the crazy night at the London Palladium, he proposed and we were married.

About a week after the wedding, I had an experience that I have never told everyone.
I had been painting all day and I was going to take a little nap before Richard came home. The painting I had been working on was of my first view of the McGarrigle Hotel and the Scotland landscape. It was going to be a gift to Richard for our first anniversary. I had just finished the basic painting and I was going to rest before I filled in all of the details. I laid down on the couch in my studio and was quickly asleep.
I could see myself in the landscape of Scotland. Naturally, I assumed I was dreaming. But I could see the McGarrigle hotel. Mr. Willie McGarrigle was playing is bagpipes just inside the front doors - the music echoing in the otherwise silent air. I walked slowly toward the hotel and I could see two figures approaching from the other side, trudging through the muddy grass. One was leading slightly, but they were unnaturally close together. As we got closer, I could see the glint of the handcuffs clasped onto their wrists, connecting them. I realized that I was seeing myself and Richard. I was not surprised; I had dreamed of this memory before.
But as I approached the Hotel before them, slipping in unseen, Mr. McGarrigle put down his pipes and Mrs. McGarrigle came around the desk. "Hello! Hello!" I stepped back against the door - the McGarrigles had never approached me in my dreams. I could hear that myself and Richard were almost to the door.
"Do you need a room?" Mrs. McGarrigle asked.
"No!" I searched for an excuse for why I was in the Hotel. I heard Richard call out his first "hello," his voice being carried by the wind. "I just need to use your bathroom."
"Of course!" Mrs. McGarrigle put her arm around my shoulders and led me down a hallway. Mr. McGarrigle picked up his bagpipes and continued playing, just as Richard shouted a second "hello" and burst through the door. As I hid in the bathroom, Mrs. McGarrigle entered the lobby through the hallway, commenting on the dampness of the "poor dears" as myself and Richard stood too close for comfort next to each to hide our handcuffs. I stayed in the bathroom until we had been led down another hallway to our room. I silently walked back to the front door and slipped out unnoticed. I wandered in the direction of which I'd come.
As I walked, I felt lightheaded and as I approached the spot that I'd started in, the field began to dissolve and the ground beneath me was nothing more than my own carpet in my home. I opened my eyes to find my painting as I'd left it, except for a slight shadow on the fields not too far from the Hotel.