The dream starts out with me sitting in the front passenger’s seat of the ██████████’s white van. Mrs. ██████████ was diving. ████████ was in the back, although I couldn’t see her.

We’re on a picturesque street with Victorian houses on both sides. While driving, Mrs. ██████████ is telling me about how she was once a cat baby sitter. She says “And there was the time I didn’t put a kitten’s seatbelt on,” which made no sense.

The street gets narrower and narrower to the point where it looks like we couldn’t get though without hitting the tiny cars parked on the side. Mrs. ██████████ suddenly says, “Close your eyes ████████,” as the jerks the car to the left to avoid running over a dead kitten. She does this a few times.

We arrive at a very old house that was once beautiful and grand but is now decrepit and abandoned. We walk up to a strange gate and push it. The gate is metal but feels like wood, and the rotted latch breaks when I touch it.

Mrs. ██████████ says there used to be a big tree in front of the fence as we walk in. We walk up the sturdy wrap around porch of the house and ███’s face shows up in my mind, like this was her house and she was dead now.

I get down on my knees and reach my hand down a large crack in the wood. I pull out a mummified kitten.

A pretty cat comes out of nowhere and comes up to us. She’s brown and black striped. Mrs. ██████████ tells us she’s the kitten’s mother, although she should have died off years ago.

The mama cat lays down in front of the outside of the gate and I place the mummy kitten down beside her. The mama cat’s fur is falling off her face, leaving a huge bald spot over her left eye. She sniffs the kitten for a long while before we leave.

We’re back in the van. Mrs. ██████████ is swerving to avoid more dead kittens when all of a sudden, we’re not on the picturesque street and ██████ is behind the wheel of the car. She’s driving like a maniac though an industrial area and suddenly she drives backwards though a parking garage.

She finally turns straight and stops, saying we’re safe.

The dream ends.

notes: the house was real, and i didn't know it until a couple years later when i went to my great aunt's funeral. the funeral home was owned by my mom's cousins on another side of the family, and was located in a neighborhood with victorian houses. the house wasn't abandoned or in as bade shape as it was in my dream, but it was obviously the same house.

also, mrs. ██████████ was not a nice person. she did not like cats in real life. she was not kind enough to make sure her daughter didn't see a dead kitten in the road. the dream version of her was much more kind than she ever was.