Chapter 2

My second recollection of Riley was in the form of a recurring dream that I had many times as a child. At least, I'm assuming it was Riley in the dream.
In the dream, I was still maybe 5 or 6 years old. When I was little, I had
this dress that I loved - it was red, with a white collar, black buttons and pleats - it reminds me of Little Orphan Annie (God, I'm dating myself here).
Anyway, in the dream I'm wearing the dress. I'm being chased around the block by a cowboy riding a horse. I run out the front door, down the front sidewalk and run to the left, heading around the block. As I come back to the front of the house, the cowboy is still chasing me. I run inside, into the living room, and hide behind a chair that is right inside the door. It's an odd place to hide, as you can see behind the chair when you come in the front
door. Anyway, while I am hiding there, hoping and praying that the cowboy doesn't find me, a hand reaches to me from the other side...the other side of the chair, not the other side. It's the same Indian boy that I'd seen in the dining room. The second I take his hand, I feel safe. I guess I should be using "Native American" instead of "Indian" to be more PC, but "Indian" was the term used back then. Why I dreamed about a cowboy chasing me, I'm not
sure, since we lived in a populated suburb and I didn't know any cowboys, other than from television and movies. It must have had something to do with "cowboys and Indians".