Sleepless (Bird of Stone), page 10
“She was a girl he met at a bar that let him have sex with her after knowing him for only two hours.” Campbell supplies casually, taking a sip of the sports drink he must have gone out for. “Our boy’s not an idiot, Walters, no matter how drunk he was. Of course he wrapped it.”
“Then why is she calling you? And why aren’t you answering, if that’s what she has your number for?”
“I didn’t tell her that’s why I gave her my number.” I reply honestly, though not entirely shamelessly.
Walters rolls his eyes at me and goes back to his book.
“You suck.” he repeats.
He ignores Campbell and I both for the rest of the evening.
Walters being annoyed with me really shouldn’t bother me. Ask me a few months ago if I would lose any sleep over his opinion and I’d laugh in your face. Absolutely not. Now, though, I don’t know. His annoyance sits ugly in my gut and I can’t shake it. He’s a moral compass pointing due North and standing beside him I’m made acutely aware of how skewed my sense of direction is. I didn’t lie to anyone. I haven’t done anything outright deceitful and if Melody had asked me point blank why I wanted her to have my number, I would have told her honestly.
So why do I still feel like a tool?
Chapter Fifteen
Alex
He’s sitting at the end of the dock as he always is. I approach him hesitantly, unsure of how exactly the last dream went and wary of my failed memories of it. He knows I’m here, knows I’m walking toward him, but he doesn’t turn or acknowledge me in any way. Not until I’m moving to sit down beside him, putting the maximum distance between us.
“You look like you’re feeling better.” he says, his voice neutral.
“Yeah, I am.” I almost add ‘thanks’ and I have no idea why as it was an observation, not a compliment.
“Did you make it home?”
I freeze. “What?”
He cocks his head at me, taking in my alarmed expression. I didn’t tell him about Slipping. Did I?
“Did you make it home?” he repeats slowly, suddenly paying close attention to me. “You said you wanted your bed. That you were done camping.”
“Oh.” I reply brilliantly. “Yeah, I did. I did make it home. From camping.”
“Good.” He nods but continues to eye me and his stare compels me to speak.
“Saw my birds. That was nice.”
“Your bird pictures.”
It’s not a question and I don’t know what to do with it. Did he just correct me on my own narrative? I think he did. It reminds me, though, and I reach into the pockets of my jeans, feeling around for the stone bird I shaped a couple dreams ago.
“What are you looking for?”
I wish he’d look away for a minute, let me get settled. His stare is intense and it sometimes makes me uneasy.
“Uh, the bird rock thing.”
His stare also makes me stupid, apparently.
“The bird rock thing.” he repeats distinctly. “You mean the one you made?”
“Yeah, I was hoping to find it here again but I guess it’s gone.”
He studies me a second longer then rifles through his own pockets. I watch as he searches and it’s not long before he’s holding his hand out to me. When I tentatively put my palm beneath his, he deftly drops a warm, black stone into my hand. I gasp.
It’s my bird.
“How did you do that?” I ask, holding the bird up to my face to see for certain that it is the one I created. As far as I can tell this is it.
“Same way I do anything here.”
I stay silent and admire my bird, happy to see it again and proud beyond reason. He made it, I have to remind myself, and I just molded it, but that simple act is still amazing to me. The little stone means so much. It means a beginning.
“Can’t do it without you.”
“What?” I ask, startled into looking at him. “What do you mean?”
He’s watching me sideways, eyeing the bird in my hand and the look on my face. He seems pleased. Satisfied.
“I don’t believe I can change or make things without you here. Or without you strong.”
“What do you mean by strong?”
He reaches out and takes the bird gently from my hand, turning it over in his fingers. Examining it.
“I tried last time to create stones like this when I was waiting for you. You were late. I couldn’t do it. I tried to create another jacket after I gave you mine, but again I couldn’t do it. I think it’s because you were weak.”
“Sorry.” I mutter, not entirely sure what I’m sorry for. Stealing his jacket? Being weak?
He shakes his head in dismissal of my apology. “No, it’s fine. It’s good. It showed me the boundaries.” He smiles to himself and absently says, “I’m all about knowing my limits.”
“Do you want it?” I ask, watching his large hands dwarf my bird as he rolls it around in his palm.
“What?” he asks, glancing up in surprise.
“Do you want to keep it? The bird?”
“Why would I?” His tone is matter of fact. He really doesn’t get why he would keep it.
“I have no idea.” I lie, but my reasons for him keeping it are obviously outside his realm of understanding and I have to ask myself why I want him to want it.
He looks at me, looks at the rock, then slips the bird into his pocket. He’s keeping it, but I think we’re both confused about why.
His right palm fills with round pebbles that he begins tossing one by one into the water. He isn’t skipping them like last time. Now he’s simply letting them drop and create rings that ripple out and roll over each other. There’s a pattern forming of ascending sizes, of circles that interlock and obscure each other turning some areas into a watery blur. He’s precise about his placement of each stone, dropping one where the rings are beginning to die out and keeping up a continual flow of movement. It’s hypnotic, like watching fire dance.
“How do you do this stuff?” I ask him enviously.
“Do what?”
“The things that you do in here? The rocks and now the ripples.”
“I’m not making the ripples happen other than throwing the rocks in. I could do this awake. Here,” he says, trying to hand me stones. “You can do it right now.”
I shake my head, declining his offer because I’m perfectly content to watch.
“But you made the stones. You made them the perfect size and shape to do what you’re doing, just like the skipping stones the other night. How do you do it?”
“I don’t know. I want it so I imagine it. Then it’s there.” he says, shrugging.
“Alright, so if you wanted the sky to be green, it would be?”
“Probably.”
I watch him, waiting, but the sky remains the same. He continues tossing his pebbles in the water, completely oblivious. He is killing me.
“Okay… could you try?”
He glances at me, confused. “Why?”
“Because I want to see if you can do it.”
And then I want you to show me how to do it. Ass.
Nick cocks his head to the side. He considers the stones in his hand, then throws another one in the water. I think he’s ignoring me again and I’m opening my mouth to let loose my frustrations when the entire lake turns green. Not murky, swampy, natural green, but more like St. Patrick’s Day, leprechaun, shamrock green.
“Whoa.” I say.
He tosses another pebble in. The water changes again, this time more slowly. The yellow color bleeds out from where his pebble broke the surface. It overtakes the green color with patient ripples that expand farther than they ever naturally could. It will take time, but eventually they will overtake the entire lake, turning it bright yellow. Before it can, Nick throws in another pebble, sending out orange ripples to chase down the yellows. Then a blue, a purple and, finally, a red. The entire lake is now a moving mass of color that looks like a jumbled rainbow.
“How are you so good at this?” I ask again.
“I don’t know.” he says, watching the red undulate and branch out, attempting to overtake the lake. He frowns. “Looks like blood. That’s kind of disturbing.”
“Really? I think it’s actually…” I trail off, realizing I’ve seen this before. Not this specifically, but this shade of red. This exact shade of red. On a river.
“Actually what?”
“Kind of pretty.” I say slowly. “It reminds me of something I saw in another dream once. A river in a forest. A strange forest.”
He’s watching me now, put on alert by my seriousness.
“Your recurring dream?” he asks. I nod. His eyes become more alert, more penetrating. “What’s your dream about?”
“A dragon.” I answer.
A muscle in his jaw flexes, clenching and letting go. I know I’ve hit a nerve.
“What’s yours about?”
“A cave.”
His answer is so immediate and willing that it throws me for a loop.
“How long have you been having it? This dream?” I ask.
“A long time. Since I was a kid.”
I nod slowly. “Me too. Since I was four years old. You’re a year older than me, aren’t you?”
He nods as well.
“Were you five when you started having your dream?” He doesn’t answer. He only watches me intently, his face hard. “It’s just you in a cave?” I ask, gently prodding. “Nothing else?”
He blinks but holds my gaze. I’m so uncomfortable from the length of this staring contest that it’s taking all of my willpower not to squirm.
“I don’t talk about it.” he warns me, his tone dropping.
“There’s a dragon in it, isn’t there?”
“It’s not a dragon.” he says firmly. But he’s screwed up and my pulse leaps.
He didn’t say there wasn’t a dragon, he said it isn’t a dragon.
Cursing Cara, I take a chance. “Have you ever read Alice In Wonderland Through the Looking Glass?”
His jaw doesn’t flex this time. This time it clenches and stays clenched. I imagine his teeth are grinding together into a gritty powder of anger, ready to ignite.
“I told you,” he says tightly. “I don’t talk about it.”
I know that and I understand that but I’m no quitter, not even when I should be. Like an idiot, I keep right on poking the bear.
“Do you dream of the Jabberwocky, Nick?”
He abandons the dream. I knew he would. But I had to ask and it’s not the fact that he leaves, confirming what I’ve asked, that has my head spinning. It’s the look in his eyes when I said the J-word. It’s something I would never have imagined in him, something so human and raw and heartbreaking I almost regret asking him anything ever.
In his eyes, mixed with the rage and frustration, was fear.
Chapter Sixteen
Nick
Do you dream of the Jabberwocky, Nick?
That’s the last thing I want to talk about with her. It’s the last thing I’ll ever talk about with anyone. I’ll willingly discuss my father’s death before I’ll talk about that dream. It’s the biggest chink in my extensive armor, maybe the only one, and the fewer people aware of it the better. I’m worried I’m going to have the nightmare now. She needs to drop it. She needs to leave this one alone.
I roll the bird, her bird, around in my palm, watching the sunlight glint off it. It was in my pocket when I got here tonight. I could feel the shape of it against my leg the second I arrived. While I’m surprised I still have the bird, I’m not surprised I’m here again so soon. I thought about her and the nightmare all day. I was either going to dream of her or have the nightmare and, given the choice, I’d rather dream of her.
“Can I say something without you getting pissed and leaving?” she calls from behind me.
She’s standing about halfway down the long dock, her fingers nervously playing with the zipper on her fleece jacket. She looks good; her skin showing a tan again, her long hair straight and flitting in the breeze. I instinctively close my fist around her bird. I’m uncomfortable with her finding me studying it. She’s unmoving as she waits for my answer so I stand to face her.
“Doesn’t seem like it, does it?”
I mean it as a joke, but when she scowls at me I realize my tone was all wrong.
“I kill it.” she says loudly, making sure her voice carries to me. “Every time, every dream. I grab the sword, I stab it and the dream ends.”
I freeze, staring at her, not knowing how to respond. Is she telling the truth? And if she is, what does that mean? My subconscious slays the Jabberwocky to save me from… what? It? Myself? I have a lot of unanswered questions surrounding the nightmare and she’s adding more.
The thought is comforting, though. Maybe Alex is out there somewhere, able to move and find a way to protect us both. To protect me. The macho in me is annoyed with that thought but the lonely, sad ass who lies crippled in a cave is grinning.
“Anyway,” she says, her voice sounding unsure and uncomfortable. “That’s all I wanted to tell you. I just wanted you to know. I won’t bring it up again, I promise.”
I realize I haven’t responded to her. That I probably should.
“Thank you.” I croak and clear my throat. “Thanks.”
I’m not sure what I’m thanking her for; saving me in the nightmare or promising not to talk about it anymore. Either way, I’m grateful and she looks almost shocked when I express it.
“No problem.” she replies quickly.
We stand there for a while staring at each other. As far as awkward silences go, this one is pretty impressive. I don’t like the gap between us. I think it’s because I’m used to her being so close. With half the expansive dock still between us, she feels a million miles away. It’s making me more uncomfortable than the silence.
“Do you want to…?” My words trail off as I gesture beside me to our usual spot.
“I want to ask you a favor.” she says quickly.
The way the words come tumbling out, it sounds like she wasn’t quite sure she wanted to speak them. So I make her say them again.
“You want what?”
“You heard me.”
“Did I?”
She pauses, breathes, probably counts to ten, and repeats herself. “I’d like to ask you a favor.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “What kind of favor?”
“The easy kind.”
“What do I get in return?”
“Nothing.” she says, rolling her eyes. “That’s what makes it a favor. You’re not supposed to expect anything in return.”
“I don’t do favors.”
“Color me surprised.” she says wryly.
“I’ll make you a deal instead.”
“What do you want?”
“No, no. First, what do you want?”
She pauses again, but this time she holds her breath before speaking. When she finally does, her voice is soft and hesitant. I have trouble catching her words from this distance.
“I want you to teach me.”
“Teach you what exactly?”
“How you do things here.”
I take a couple of steps closer to her and she does the same. When she speaks, her voice is still hushed, like she’s embarrassed by what she’s asking.
“I want you show me how you create things. How you change them.”
“I’ve told you,” I remind her. “I don’t know how I do it. I simply want it and it happens.”
“That doesn’t scare you, does it?”
I unconsciously take a step back from her, surprised. “Why would it scare me?” I ask, my voice hard.
“Because it terrifies me.”
“Why? It’s nothing. You’re creating nothing and changing nothing. It’s just a dream. None of it’s real.”
“What if it becomes real?” she whispers.
I frown at her. “What are you talking about? What if the dream becomes real?”
“Nothing.” she says quickly, her back straightening, her voice gaining strength. “I don’t know what I meant by that. You’re right, it’s all nothing.”
“But you’re afraid of it.” I say, not willing to let this go. There’s something here, something to this that feels important. She slipped up once. Maybe I can make her slip again.
“I’m afraid of… disappearing. Of messing with the dream and making a mistake and then—Poof!”
“Poof?”
Alex meets my eyes. I see the fear in them, the hesitation. Even if I don’t understand it, it’s very real to her.
“Poof—I cease to be. Or poof—I’m lost, maybe forever.”
Please don’t leave me behind.
“Like when you were ‘camping’?” I ask, putting the pieces together.
She nods jerkily. “Yeah, that was bad. That was… it was really bad. I do that sometimes. I go places and I have trouble getting out.”
Her voice is tight, her hands wringing violently in front of her.
“What do you mean you go places? Like other dreams?”
“Kind of, yeah. I can’t control it. It just happens. I Slip somewhere that I don’t want to be then I—I don’t know. I don’t know.” She buries her face in her hands.
“So what do you want me to do?” I don’t understand what the hell she’s talking about, but I do know I want to help her if I can.
She drags her hands down her face and rests her fingertips against her lips. She looks like she’s afraid of what might slip out of her own mouth.
“I want you to teach me control.” she whispers.
“Control over what?”
“The dream.” She drops her hands and takes an urgent step toward me. “If you could teach me control then maybe I won’t Slip anymore. Maybe I won’t have to be afraid all the time. I want you to show me how to do it without dying, I guess.”
I look at her in surprise. “Can that happen? Can we die in a dream?”
“I don’t know for sure. Maybe.”
“If we die in a dream, do we die in real life?”
She shrugs, the perfect summation of all of her knowledge, and says, “I don’t think so. I think it’s an old wives tale. Like cramps from swimming after eating.”
