Dangerous Dreams: A Novel

by Mike Rhynard

  Emily sniffled, rubbed her eyes. “Thank you, Lieutenant. I doubt I look like an angel at the moment, but thank you.” I know not what to do. How could they protect Virginia? Without that, they can’t help me. No one can help me. Must bear this alone.

  “You are wrong in your doubt, Mistress.” He held his eyes on hers, seemed unable to move them. “I apologize if I’ve upset you; I should leave now.”

  She smiled faintly. “Lieutenant Waters, you have not upset me. My plight upsets me, and I know not what to do about it, for ’tis too late for anyone to help me.” She again rubbed her eyes. “But thank you. I shall consider what you’ve said. You’re a good, kind man for seeing my distress and trying to help. And if you’ve an intended one back home, she is a fortunate lady.”

  He gave her a deep, questioning look, his eyes inviting an explanation of her plight; but when none came, he smiled. “Her name is Rebecca Roberts; I pray my eyes behold her again someday. And I pray the time soon comes when you’ll permit me to help you.” He bowed, took his leave.

  Elyoner said, “Praise God and the saints, lass. You’re free of him, and—”

  “Ellie, I’m not free of him. I—”

  “What do you mean?” Elyoner slammed her hand on the table then shook her finger at Emily. “What does he demand? You must tell me. Enough of this mystery! I’m going to Baylye and Waters.”

  Emily paled. “No, Ellie. Please.”

  Elyoner threw her towel on the floor. “Why not, Em? Sit down; you look pale again. In the name of the saints, what does he hold over you? What can it matter if he’s already done what I suspect he’s done? And what can it matter if the worst that could result from that has already come to pass? None of it matters in the end. All that matters is that you are the most wonderful, kind, and courageous of young ladies and that you will rise above the outrage that’s been done you. You cannot allow yourself to be menaced by him. So tell me now why we should not go to the governor.”

  Emily stared at her, pleaded with her eyes and urgent tone. “ Pleeeease, Ellie, listen to me. Do not do this. I beg you, trust me. I cannot tell you why, but please say nothing. Please.”

  Elyoner’s face was a sketch of frustration; she stared at Emily then shook her head, sighed. “As you wish, Em, but know that the time approaches when I shall no longer abide the pain of watching you suffer so.”

  Emily stared at her, lowered her gaze to the floor, closed her eyes. “I understand.” And what will you and I do when that time comes?

  Elyoner went to her, held her close for nearly a minute before Emily eased back, looked into her eyes. “Thank you, Ellie. I’d better go now.”

  “Well, Em, prithee tell me your secret soon. ’Twill be the first step in the rebirth of Emily Colman, the beautiful young lass Isna and I adore.” She helped Emily don her cape. “Oh . . . Em . . . I nearly forgot.” She reached into her apron pocket, removed a kerchief. “Is this yours? I seem to remember you embroidering it back at Roanoke. It bears a very nice sentiment, indeed.”

  Emily snatched the kerchief from Elyoner, looked at the words: Savor Each Day the Lord Provides. “Where did you find this?”

  “ ’Twas in Virginia’s crib. I thought you might have dropped it there by accident.”

  Chapter 20

  “Ooooh . . . feel horrible . . . like I partied all night—no headache but wiped out, queasy stomach, groggy and sluggish. Whewwww.” Allie reached over, turned off the equipment, looked at the clock: 5:03 a.m. Like getting up for a cattle drive, but a little late. Her mind jumped back to May; the entire family had already been in the saddle gathering cattle for half an hour when the first timid glimmer of light appeared like a dim candle glowing just below the eastern horizon.

  When the mother cows had seen the riders approaching, they’d frantically searched for their babies, some of whom had drifted away from them in the early morning darkness. Those old mamas knew the sight of riders meant a long, hard day, probably all uphill to summer range; they also knew the fresh, lush mountain grass was worth the trip. The older ones knew the route well enough to walk it on their own if the riders simply gave them a start. And all of them knew they’d better find their calves quickly before the shouting, whistling, and whoopla began. No question, the calves would all fall to the back of the herd once underway, so best to make sure now they weren’t left behind—still too young to go long without milk.

  It had taken twelve hours to reach the summer range that day. It had started smoothly, gone well for the first hour and a half; but when they’d hit the big timber patch, instead of trailing quietly through it in a thin line, the herd had splintered and split into the thick forest of fir and pine, laced with piles of fallen trees that looked like stacks of pick-up sticks. Such behavior was expected—even nervously anticipated—on a hot day with hordes of flies in the air, but not on a cool, pleasant day like that one. When they’d finally collected the herd and gotten it back on track, the temperature had abruptly dropped twenty-five degrees; and a wave of thick, black clouds had rolled in, parked over them, and dumped a persistent flood of heavy raindrops slightly smaller than peas. Then after two hours of chilly, inescapable soaking, a heavy, wet snow accompanied by a brisk breeze had begun to fall, continued the rest of the day. Yes, it had been miserable—no way to stay dry or warm, no relief for numb toes and fingers—a hypothermia day, all the way. But through it all, Allie and her dad had kept up a lively exchange of humorous, sarcastic quips that had laughed off their unpleasant circumstances and worsening misery. Somehow, making light of a painful situation seemed to lessen the agony of it, helped you keep your sanity and grit long enough to make it through. She wished she could somehow do the same with her depressing, addictive dreams but knew it could not be.

  She took a deep breath, sat up, kicked her legs over the side of the bed. Definitely woozy. Wonder if it’s the sleeping pills or the Mestinon. Also wonder how many REMs I had and how long. Don’t want to be doing the drug if it doesn’t buy more dream time. Whoops, forgot. The data are on a CD with this portable equipment. Won’t see it until the lab prints it out. Hmm. Suppose Steve will ask me why and how I slept seventeen hours . . . and why I maybe have so many long REMs. Oh well, guess I’ll just tell him I was really tired. She began popping electrode cups off her head and body.

  After a shower and a quick breakfast, Allie recorded her dream logs. A wave of nausea hit her as she spoke of James Lassie’s mutilated body, then disgust when she thought of Tayler’s pernicious character. That rotten bastard! Gonna force her to be his mistress, probably use her then toss her. She sniffled, stared at the floor for a moment, felt a pair of warm tears roll down her cheeks; she felt Emily’s guilt, stress, and frustration, her hopeless despair. She rubbed her eyes. At least she’s got Elyoner . . . what a friend. Think she’s got it figured out, which is good because she’s going to be the one who gets her through it . . . somehow. Jeez. Tayler, the Panther, and Isna—all in love or lust with her. And the kerchief in Virginia’s crib. How would I react to that and Tayler’s extortion of sex? Guess I’d take it for real, like Emily’s doing; he’s definitely a credible creep, but I’d probably drill the asshole before he could hurt Virginia. She shook her head. But Emily’s not like me in that way—different times, different world for women. Feel her despair and guilt as if it all happened to me, and I’d feel exactly the same about facing the man I loved if I’d been raped. Hmm. Wonder how she had an orgasm? Need to look that up. She walked to the computer, typed in: Can a woman have an orgasm while being raped. She clicked on a random listing.

  Women may indeed feel pleasure, to the point of orgasm, while being raped—not because they enjoy being raped, but rather because feeling pleasure during sexual intercourse is an automatic response of their bodies. Sadly, this involuntary pleasure can sometimes lead rape victims to the mistaken conclusion that they actually enjoyed the rape, which, of course, can foster deep feelings of guilt and self-doubt within them.

  Wow. Didn’t know that. So she has no r
eason whatsoever to feel guilty, totally not her fault—the rape or the orgasm. Damn it, wish I could tell her. She saved the piece to her desktop then opened her chart on Ian. Gotta get to the bottom of this with Mom, find out what she’s hiding—could be germane to the analysis. She glanced at the picture of her family on the night stand, felt the now-familiar gust of guilt blow into her mind. Spent my whole life being a mostly good, honest, straightforward person, built a relationship of instinctive trust with Mom and Dad; and I’ve now betrayed it by being a fraud, thief, and drug addict. Nice job, Allie. True, she’d bent the truth a few times and withheld certain things from her parents, but she’d never had the touch for real lying; it had always upset her stomach and overwhelmed her with guilt. She simply couldn’t live with it and had never wondered why. She shook her head, remembered one of the few times she’d really lied to her parents. When she was eight years old, she’d told her mother a fib about something, thought she’d gotten away with it. Though she hadn’t said anything, her mother’s doubting look had hung in her mind like a movie scene on pause until, after three days, she’d gone to her, head humbly bowed, burst into tears, wrapped her arms around her waist, and told her the truth. Her mother had then told her how happy she was that Allie felt better telling the truth than lying and that she was unspeakably proud of her for doing so. The experience had stayed with Allie as permanently as her butterfly birthmark. She shook her head. I hate it, but I have to dream, can’t resist it, worse than hooked. The dreams are part of my life now, and Emily’s life’s becoming my life. Oh well. She looked at the Ian list, focused on the Don’t Know section. Okay, I’m going to pin her down on this stuff, and—

  The phone rang. “Hi, Mom.”

  “Hi, Allie. It’s Dad. Wanted to see how you’re doing, kiddo. How’s my girl?”

  Allie melted as she always did when her dad spoke to her. She’d never understood why; but it was like meeting a guy she didn’t know and falling instantly in love with him, complete with flushed, mushy brain, and shaky legs. She’d concluded it was because she so admired him—to the point that she’d subsumed his persona into her vision of what the man she’d ultimately love and marry would be like. “I’m okay, Dad. How are you and Mom?”

  “We’re good; and we were just thinking how cool it would be if you could get a couple days off and come hang out at the ranch with us, like maybe a four-day weekend. Got a few cattle to move around—nothing big—and a few other things to do. Would really love your company if you can pull it off. Been a long time, Allie.”

  Allie’s heart pumped furiously. Nothing pleased her more than a few days at the ranch with her family. But how can I look them in the eye? It’s kind of like Emily and Isna. Damn it, I’ll find a way. “Sure, Dad. I’d love that. Let me talk to Steve and see if I can skip a few days of data.” She lightly slapped her cheek. That’s wrong! I can bring the equipment with me and do my reports there; gonna dream regardless of where I am. But how will I do the sleeping pills and Mestinon? They’ll get suspicious if I’m out for half the day and all night. But I sure need a break, and maybe nothing big will happen with Emily for a while. “Yeah, that’d be awesome. I’ll ask and get back to you.”

  “Great. We’re really looking forward to it. Hope to see you Friday. Here’s Mom.”

  “Bye, Dad. Love you.”

  “Hi, Allie. Can’t wait to see you, Hon.”

  “Me too, Mom . . . hey, Mom. I really need to ask you some questions about Ian. It’ll really help Steve and me with the analysis if you can level with me. I know you’ve been holding things back, probably because you’re worried about me, but I can handle it, and it’s really important that I know everything.” Wrong, Allie, it’s not at all likely you can handle it. Another lie; and once they start, they just keep coming, don’t they?

  Nancy remained silent.

  “Mom?”

  Nancy sighed. “You’re right, Allie. I am afraid because some really awful things happened . . . but you’re also right that since the dreams are happening to you now, maybe knowing what’s happened to others will help you deal with them better than Ian and some others did.”

  “Others? You know about other dreamers besides Ian?”

  “A little.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Mom. It’ll really help me. So first—and this is a pure curiosity question—what was Ian’s real name?”

  “Don’t know. Because it was too complicated for me to say, I never learned it. But I know where I can find out, and I’ll check it out before you come home. You know, Ian was—”

  “Great. So the next question is how did Ian and the other dreamers keep the dreams from dominating or ruining their lives?”

  Long silence. “They didn’t.”

  A sudden chill trickled down Allie’s neck and back. “They didn’t?”

  “No.”

  “What happened to them?”

  Another long silence. “My mother told me Ian’s great-great-grandmother killed herself. Don’t know how, or even if it was because of the dreams. It was back in the early 1800s.”

  Allie swallowed hard. I knew it! What a great thing to look forward to. “And what about Ian?”

  More silence, then a sigh. “They said she died from . . . from a sleeping pill overdose, but no one knew for sure if it was accidental or planned. You see, most of them thought she was crazy because she talked about the dreams, and they didn’t believe they were real. But I know they were real because she told me so. I’m also convinced—with no proof, mind you— that if she did die from an overdose, it was accidental, but I can’t be sure because . . . because there’s a part of me that fears the dreams are so severely debilitating they actually could lead to suicide. You know, my mother told me Ian was quite addicted to the dreams. And, Allie, that’s what scares the hell out of me now. ”

  Allie stared at the desktop for a moment. “Me too, Mom.”

  “Oh, Allie, don’t tell me that.”

  “It’s true, Mom; they’re very addictive, like a TV series you just can’t miss, but don’t get me wrong. I’m not thinking about bad endings. I’m only saying I see how it could happen. It’s probably like working with terminally ill people day after day—you probably get depressed, but you can’t escape. Then you either go crazy or . . .”

  “Allie, I’m worried about you.”

  Allie heard her mother crying softly. “Mom, don’t cry. I’m not saying I’m there, only that I can see how someone could get there. And as far as the sleeping pills go, if I had to guess, I’d say that Ian overdosed; because before she ever got to the point of suicide, she’d be addicted to the dreams to the point that she had to do everything possible to dream more. And I doubt there was much savvy about the dangers of sleeping pills in those early days.” Damn it. Said too much. Now she’ll think I’m doing pills and worry all the more. Dummy!

  “Well, that makes sense; but you aren’t taking pills are you, Allie?”

  “Like I said the other day, only enough to fall asleep if I can’t get there on my own.” Another lie, Allie Girl. “Enough on that. What more can you tell me about how the dreams end?”

  “Only that Ian told me they sometimes end badly, very badly. But she said some end happily. She never said how far into a character’s life they go. I mean, if you dream of someone long enough, they’re eventually going to die; but maybe, like real life, it doesn’t get you down as much when they’re real old and had a full life.”

  “That fits. So have you had any more thoughts about how Ian knew the dreams were real and that they were about our ancestors?” She heard a call-waiting beep, glanced at the caller ID. Steve. Better get back to him.

  “Nope. She never told me; but when I look through the box of her stuff, maybe I’ll find the answer.”

  “You have a box of her stuff?”

  “Yeah. My mother put it away after Ian died, and frankly, I forgot about it until this very moment. Don’t know why I haven’t thought of it, but there might be some interesting things in there. Maybe we ca
n do that together when you’re here.”

  Allie pulsed with excitement, but her hands trembled with latent fear of what they might find. “That’d be awesome, Mom. Let’s do it. Might even find something about Emily.” But what if we do, and what if it’s bad? She sighed. Toughen up, kid.

  “Great. I’ll dig it out before you get here.”

  “Thanks, Mom. I know you’re afraid for me; but honestly, I can handle it. Like I said, working with Steve and getting to the bottom of the dreams will be a big help, something my predecessors didn’t have going for them. And it’ll tell me a lot about how to deal with them, no matter what we find.”

  “Well, I’m not going to lie to you, Allie. This is scary stuff, and I’m right there in the middle of the fear department. But what you say makes sense. So let’s get into that box. Should be interesting, at the least.”

  Maybe scary as hell, too. “Great, Mom. See you Friday. I’ll let you know in a bit if it’s okay with Steve.”

  Dressler picked up the phone. “Hi, Allie. How’d it go last night?”

  “Pretty good. Must’ve been really tired because I slept a long time, but got a lot of dreaming in.”

  “And how are things with Emily?”

  “Bad and getting worse. A long story, but I got it all on the recorder. Was getting ready to head in for the debrief.”

  “Well, that’s why I called. Had a meeting pop up for our debrief time. So why don’t you drop the disc and the recorder off with Ginger and meet me for lunch at Reed’s Bar and Grill around noon. It’s a nice, quiet place, and we can hang out there for a couple hours while you tell me about Emily and we talk a little more theory. Will that work?”

  “Sure.” At least he won’t see the long sleep and REM times yet . . . unless Ginger calls him. Don’t do it, Ginger.

  “Great. See you then. Oh, make sure you pick up another recorder from Ginger, so you have one tonight.”