“Cheers!” I said, offering a toast. “Happy Valentine’s Day!”
Excerpt from the next Chloe Boston Mystery: Viva Lost Vegas
Alex poured me a glass of wine as soon as I walked through the door.
“So,” he said nervously. “Gwen called today. She’s been talking to Mom.”
“No,” I said, refusing his request and the wine. “No. I don’t want her to be a bridesmaid.”
“But—”
“No.” I turned, picked up my purse, called Blue and then left. About two blocks later I stopped running and called the house.
“Chloe!”
“I’ve had it. I don’t want a polka band. I don’t want fruitcake. I don’t want to release a hundred white doves to poop on my guests. I don’t want to wear a dress that is bigger than the entire church and weighs more than I do. And I really, really don’t want people picking my bridesmaids!”
The last part was shouted and Blue was looking alarmed.
“I’m sorry. I—”
“The wedding is off.”
“What?” he sounded as stunned as I was at this blurted announcement. I clutched at Blue and rolled the words around my head. They were horrible, but they were right.
“Here are the options. One, we continue to live in sin. Two, it’s you, me and the courthouse— with maybe our parents. Three, we elope to Las Vegas and let Elvis marry us.” I paused, feeling faint but forcing out the next words. “Or you can leave, of course.”
“No! God, no! I’ve been driven crazy by wedding stuff, but not that crazy.”
“Okay then.” I inhaled and exhaled slowly. “So what’s it to be?”
And that was how we ended up in the car, in the dead of night, during a rainstorm, heading for border with a duffle bag, my dog, a sack of kibble and reservations at a one-star, pet friendly motel.
The only person I had called was my boss, Randy Wallace, and he had only asked me if this was vacation or sick leave.
“Do they have mental health days?” I asked.
“No. Not without a visit to a shrink.”
“Then mark me down as sick and tired. I’ll be back by the weekend.”
I should have known that it is never that easy when you are having a wedding.
Excerpt from The First Book of Dreams: Metropolis
‘Frae ghosties and ghoulies and long-legged beasties and things that gae bump in the night, O Lord, deliver us.’
— 14th century Scottish Prayer
I dream.
And so do you, of course. Animals too. But dreaming is my job. Or rather, the policing of dangerous sleep, being the guardian of dreamers gone awry, that is the task that has devolved upon me.
You may have met me in the Narcoscape, a silent shadow at the edge of your imaginings as I went about my business. Perhaps you saw me as an angel, if you believe in such things. You probably did not fear me when we passed, for you knew that I was not one of the creatures that go bump in the night. Chances are good we may meet again some night because I get around.
Sleep can be many things. It is the calling of the sweet daydreams of the parted lovers, or the longing of the child stuck in a classroom on a fine May day. It can be the refuge where we see to the knitting up of the raveled sleeve of care left tattered by daily life. It is the place visited by mystics and swamis, and the destination for deep meditation and prayer. It is a tapestry embroidered with our unconscious thoughts. Without it, we would die.
It is other things, too, many of them dangerous and predatory. It is the place where infants are so beguiled by visions that they do not wake in the morning. It is the shadowy realm where the coma patients live—sometimes by choice but sometimes because they have become weak in mind and soul, and other darker things have begun to prey on them. It is often the last stop for the drunks and drug-users who come one too many times to the arms of Morpheus and Hypnos seeking oblivion. This is also the kingdom of schizophrenics, paranoids and other members of the insane fraternity whose grasp on waking reality has slipped. For them monsters abideth here.
Most people come and go from the Narcoscape without incident, but once in a while something goes wrong on the dreamside. If it goes a little wrong and the victim’s kin are ignorant, the family will have to wait for the Dream Police—aka the NarcoNazis—to sort it out. When it goes very wrong, if loved ones are in the know, they call me. I’m the retrieval expert, the ghost hunter, the slayer of night terrors who won’t negotiate with the Dream Police.
I own and run Hypnos Inc. and have a scary Greek title conferred at birth (my parents said) by gods of sleep and dreams, but you can call me Nic. That’s short for Nicodemus. Yes, that’s traditionally a man’s name. I am called after my paternal grandfather. It’s one of the trials of being an only child in a family with large expectations of offspring to carry on the familial traditions. I’m a little surprised they didn’t stick me with a whole string of my aunts’ and uncles’ middle names while they were at it, but I guess my parents figured that naming a girl Nicodemus was enough of a sacrifice to generational expectations. The other relatives went begging.
My namesake, Grandpa Nic, was the great-great-something-grandson of the first Nicodemus, best know for his psuedepigrapha, The Gospel of Nicodemus. Only according to family legend, there is nothing psuede about it. His visions were real dream visitations and his descendents had been having them ever since, though most of us have escaped the curse of prophecy.
Not too surprisingly, dream consulting is a family calling, a difficult job that few can manage and stay sane, so I haven’t got a lot of competition in this field. Of course, I can’t really advertise in the yellow pages either, so it all kind of evens out. I am not like a dentist or a stylist or an accountant. For one thing, I’m not that well paid. Also, my cases are the kind you can’t schedule for in advance—though certain people keep me on retainer, just in case. When I am needed, I am needed now. That was why I was on my way to Mercy Hospital, driving in the pre-dawn darkness without my usual skinny café-mocha or indulging in the regular Monday morning visit with Aunt Gertrude. The hospital was one of my long-standing clients who keep me on retainer for emergencies. It is also the place where my husband and parents died. Without me. They were gone through Death’s door before I even knew to look for them and there is a hole in my heart that I have never managed to fill.
Most hospital work I can do from home, but proximity helps when it is a fast snatch-and-grab job, which this might well be. It sounded like I wouldn’t have a lot of time for hunting down one Thomas Seymour before the family arrived, so I needed to go into the dreamside close to where he was sleeping. I may have lost my own husband, but I would not lose this man.
As so often happens, the threat on the patient’s life was an impatient family, just like this one. They were already on the way to the hospital to pull the plug on the unlucky Thomas Seymour (whose insurance had run out) and the hospital administrator wanted me to have a last look at their patient, age thirty-four, minor car accident victim with no apparent physical injuries but entering month four of an expensive and unexplainable coma.
It sounded fairly routine.
The hospital contract that had me up and driving at six in the morning had been negotiated by my parents before my birth. As I said, they are dead now and the previous hospital administrator has retired, but the family business lives on anyway. Officially, I am listed as a grief consultant, but what I really do is save the hospital from possible lawsuits for wrongful death and inconvenient reviews by medical ethics boards when it is decided that it is time to turn off life-support. The hospital administrator feels better knowing for certain that there is no mind left in the body and that the soul has actually moved on before they terminate life support. As a bonus, I sometimes rescue lost souls who have just wandered off in the Narcoscape and are in danger of becoming ghosts. When all goes well, which is most of the time, I bring them back to their families with their minds intact.
When the mind isn’t intact… well, we have ghost
s in the Narcoscape too, lost minds who will not go to Death but refuse to return to Life. You recall that horrible feeling when you know you’re in a nightmare but can’t wake up? That’s what this is for the lost. It is a terrible fate, leading to a rapid mental degeneration similar to Alzheimer’s, though much worse because something predatory will almost always find a confused ghost and accidentally—or deliberately— enslave or consume them. I didn’t want this to happen to Mr. Seymour. If possible, I’d bring him back to the wakeside. But if all else failed, I would help him to find Death and move on. And I had to do it before his physical body died or he’d be stuck alone on the dream-side until something stronger ate him up. I can help the dreaming, but not the dead.
Chapter 1
‘Judge of your natural character by what you do in your dreams’.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson
I pushed my way out of the heavy velvet curtains and into the meadow of ruby red grass that swayed gently under the breath of a southern zephyr smelling of Coppertone suntan oil. This time I was sure I’d gotten it right. The wandering one had been located.
My linen skirt rustled as it moved through the field and I had to keep a hand on my sunhat because the playful breeze was determined to whisk it away. I found myself wishing that I had time for some kite-flying.
The man sitting on a camp stool at a large easel put down his paintbrush and smiled at me in a vague, distracted way.
“Hello, Thomas,” I said in my calmest voice. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“Hello,” he said back, brow wrinkling as he tried to recall my name and face. “Do I know you?”
“We’ve never been formally introduced. My name is Nicodemus Smith.” I didn’t offer my hand.
“Oh.” A line appeared between his sandy colored brows. “You’re my first visitor today. I came out here to paint the meadow. I always thought that grass would look like this over here.”
I nodded. Thomas’ medical records said that he was colorblind. It was probably this ailment that prevented him from noticing that the traffic light he ran was red instead of green.
“Do you know what that building over there is?” he asked, pointing a paint-smeared finger over my right shoulder. “It’s really pretty and I keep thinking that I’ve seen it before.”
I turned to look.
The poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, was a frequent visitor to the Narcoscape in the nineteenth century. Little is permanent dreamside and only rarely will some construct survive the death of its creator. But Coleridge’s Xanadu is still there, the pleasure domes still shining brightly in the sun. Most drug-users dream of pink elephants and melting faces, but Coleridge’s opium-induced dreams had been beautiful and the remnants were still a joy to everyone who saw them. Enough high school and college age kids still read his poems that Kubla Khan’s Pleasure Dome was actually something of a tourist attraction on the dreamside at the start of the Fall semester.
There are other vestiges of extinct cultures in the Narcoscape. There is a fine Incan temple brought into existence by the collective will of a people so strong and sincere in their beliefs that it survives even today. The Greeks have a place too—a sort of artistic ruin of the Parthenon. There is a sacred pagan grove that had gone feral for centuries, but is now once again tame and the place where neo-druids come to worship at the solstices and equinoxes. The Hindus and Buddhists have their places too.
And there is an enormous Egyptian pyramid that overlooks almost everything in the Narcoscape. Unlike the Greek temple, this one shows no sign of erosion. Of course, worship of the old gods was never completely abandoned even with the birth and ascendance of Allah. Understandable when these old gods are still accessible to anyone who wishes to worship them.
“That’s The Pleasure Dome,” I said. “Would you like to go see it?” We didn’t really have time but it was important to build trust before I asked him to follow me.
“No thank you,” he said. “I have to wait here.”
“Why is that?” I asked, glad that he had broached the subject. Things generally go better when the client is ready to discuss matters.
“I have to be here when my wife comes.”
“Ah. Do you think she’ll be coming soon?” My question was mild.
“I’m not sure.” Thomas looked suddenly sad. “I think I killed her,” he confessed.
“Killed her?”
“Yes, we were having an argument. In the car. And I wasn’t paying attention and all of sudden there was this truck coming at us. It hit her door.”
“That’s what they told me at the hospital,” I answered. “But I have some good news for you. Your wife didn’t die in the accident. She only broke her arm. She’s fine and so are you.”
“Really?” For a moment I thought he looked a little disappointed. “This isn’t heaven then?”
“No. You’re in a coma and this is the place where people wait when they are uncertain about whether they want to live or die.” I was simplifying but this wasn’t a moment for a lecture about the nature of the Narcoscape.
“Oh. It seemed kind of empty.” He thought about this. I was glad that he didn’t appear disbelieving of what I’d said. “Where would I go if I wanted to die?” he finally asked.
I pointed to the left where a great cloud wall marked the edge of the Narcoscape. As always, the Egyptian temple was nearby.
“That looks… ominous.” It did. It should. It was death. “I don’t think I want to go there.”
“Okay. I can take you back to your wife then.”
“Alright.” He got up slowly. “Can I bring my painting?”
I looked at his canvas. It was good. It had been good when Monet painted it a hundred years ago too.
“Sorry. Nothing from the dreamside can cross over. Maybe you could paint some more when you get back home.”
“No. I’m not any good back there.” He didn’t sound that unhappy.
“Can you clean your hands up a bit?” I asked him.
“What?”
“The paint. Make it go away,” I instructed.
“I can do that?”
“Of course.”
Thomas stared at his hands and then grinned as the blue and green smears disappeared.
“Wow. That’s cool.”
“Very cool. Take my hand, Thomas. We’re going home.”
Using my free hand to set my sunhat on my head, I used the other to anchor Thomas so we could begin our journey back to the wakeside. My internal clock that retains some awareness of the passage of time wakeside said that we needed to hurry, but I said nothing to Thomas as he paused a moment to look a last time at our surroundings and enjoyed the gentle breeze of a fine Spring day. Although the grass was still red, I had to admit that I was beginning to find the color change to be pleasantly unique if not downright appealing. Wakeside, everything was gray and gloomy as November deepened into winter.
Walking across the meadow now thick with wild flowers, I was enjoying the tickling sensation of the foliage on my ankles. I was especially enjoying the awareness that since this was a dream, the grass would probably not be infested with ticks and other forms of parasite. Ah, what a feeling to stroll through a blemish-free world with a man’s hand in mine. Thinking back, I had a hard time remembering the last occasion I’d gone strolling with a man, let alone strolling in such a romantic setting. Too bad Thomas was married and we were on such a short clock. It was a place that invited one to linger. Some days I missed my husband so much that I thought I might die from the emptiness.
Looking up into his face, I found that he could hold my gaze without being self-conscious of his pleasure, so I followed suit and allowed myself to just enjoy the moment. I didn’t let myself think and I didn’t let myself remember. Throwing my head back, I listened to a chorus of red bluebirds happily chirping as they flew across an azure sky. Thank God he at least got the color of the sky right. A green one would have ruined the mood.
We had traversed the majority of the field and were
approaching the tree line that marked the border between Thomas’ dream canvas and our exit when the trouble began. I first sensed its coming as a vibration emanating from the ground and traveling up my legs.
Being from California, Thomas’ first question was: “Is that an earthquake?”
“Shit. Not an earthquake. Something worse.” I saw the earth several feet ahead of us begin to fracture as large stones were pushed up from beneath the ground. It turned out to be a huge stone wall, an impenetrable barrier, being thrust up out of the ground between us and the nearest exit. It rose until it stood twenty feet high and likely a mile wide. Inevitably I heard helicopters coming from behind. Their engines were humming the theme from Apocalypse Now. We weren’t going to be leaving by the direct route.
“The NarcoNazis must have woken up from their nap early today,” I mused as I turned to see twenty black attack-helicopters flying our way from out of the distance. The Dream Police had found us out.
“That’s bad?” Thomas asked as he squinted at the helicopters. He sounded calm.
“It isn’t good, but we’ll manage.” I sounded confident. It was very important that the lost have faith.
As they neared our position, zip lines were dropped to the ground and soldiers, also clad in black and carrying heavy arms, descended those lines in waves. I’d never seen so many Dream Police in one place.
“Thomas, I hope you’re feeling fit and that you’re ready to lead these jerks on a bit of a chase ‘cause I’m not sure they’ll let you go home if they catch us.”
“I’ve never felt better, actually,” Thomas said, looking more fascinated than afraid of the approaching army.
“Good,” I replied as I watched the soldiers pursuing us form a line and point their armaments our way. I concentrated on our opponents as their leader issued the order to fire. Rather than hearing the rattle of automatic weapons and being riddled with bullets, the barrel of each gun in the line ejected a small rolled up flag that unfurled quickly and displaying a single word: BANG!
Cupid's Revenge Page 6
