by E. J. Mellow
“Yes, I did. I think it’s a little unfair that you only got to enjoy my gift for an hour before it got destroyed.” He picks up my uninjured wrist and clasps the bracelet on.
“You even got the Empire State Building charm.” I smile, my heart filling for this man next to me.
“Of course.” He takes my newly adorned wrist and kisses the delicate underside.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
“You’re very welcome.”
Lying back down, I steal a glance at the clock on my bedside table. “Shit! It’s midnight.” Where the freak did the time go? Well—I know where part of it went. “What time do you need to wake up for work?” I ask as I scamper out of the sheets and search for my underwear.
Jared chuckles lightly, watching as I search through the mess we made of our clothes. “I don’t need to be in until nine.” He sits up, resting his back on the headboard.
I throw his underwear at him. “Okay, that’s not too bad. I’ll set the alarm for eight?”
“That works. I have a change of clothes at the gym, and I can hit it up before I go in.” Jared puts on his boxer briefs and walks to where I’m standing in a clean pajama shirt and shorts.
“Jared,” I say in warning as he prowls toward me.
“Molly,” he returns playfully before pulling me into his arms and kissing me. His lips provoke me to go where I know we’ll spend another hour.
“Jared…I know…how grumpy you get…when you don’t…get enough sleep,” I say between his kisses.
“Mmm” is his only response.
I laugh and gently push him away. “Seriously, the last time this happened, I spent a good hour trying to get you out of bed to make it to work in time.”
He lets out a defeated sigh. “Always the responsible one.”
Standing side by side brushing our teeth, we eye one another, amused by the paste that escapes our mouths and slides down over our lips. It’s so comfortable with Jared. I don’t find myself getting any flashes of embarrassment I know I tend to have around some men, like recently with Rae catching me at that bookstore. Why I even decided to go in there is beyond m—
My stomach flips.
My dreams.
I stop midbrush. How could I have forgotten all about what I read today?
“Mols, you’re dripping on the floor.” Jared laughs at my side. I blink at the paste that is indeed dripping from my chin to the floor. Quickly bending over the sink, I wash off my mouth, my thoughts still centered on the fact that I’m about to go to sleep and, from the track record of all my previous nights, will definitely be dreaming of that land again.
Walking to bed, I attempt to rid myself of my sudden nerves. It’s just sleeping, just dreams, I repeat.
This is real. I look at Jared waiting for me.
He’s real.
I climb into bed and snuggle my back up to Jared’s warm chest. He hooks a strong arm around my waist, pulling me closer and kissing my hair.
“Good-night,” he says softly.
“Good-night,” I whisper back, knowing I probably won’t fall asleep any time soon.
This isn’t good. I can’t be scared every time I need rest. My mind turns in circles, searching for a way to get a decent night’s sleep and go back to dreaming of nothing. As soon as I think it, I know it’s a lie; I don’t want to dream of nothing. A part of me is excited to return to the place that is strangely starting to feel like home just as much as this place does. I wonder if the part of me that’s scared is that way only because of a certain person who will be there waiting.
With that last thought, I finally let my eyes close, and the sweet early onset of sleep comes fast.
— 15 —
THE SILHOUETTED MAN stands alone against the velvet dark, a pillar against the gentle breeze that sways the grass around him. Insects chirp, wind rustles, stars streak by.
Here I am. Again.
I study his familiar outline poised a small distance away, his back to me, as his head’s tilted up toward the sky. I was hoping that if I returned to this place, the nervous energy that was rolling around in my stomach would subside, but it has only picked up speed as I remember our last interaction. A wave of guilt accompanies the emotions I’m attempting to push away as I think about Jared, and a small speck of appreciation for what Dev stopped from happening creeps forward. Even though I’m not sure kissing someone else while dreaming constitutes cheating, I decide that avoiding that moral dilemma is in my best interest.
Dev doesn’t move when I step next to him—he doesn’t even take his gaze from the millions of shooting stars overhead.
“I envy them,” he says. His profile rests, smooth and relaxed, allowing a softness to settle over his usually rugged appearance.
“Who?” I ask.
“The Dreamers.”
I look toward the sky, a bit confused, but try keeping up with his thoughts. “Why do you envy them?”
“They can dream.”
“Do you not dream when you sleep?” I ask, knowing a little of that feeling—well, until recently.
He lowers his gaze to the city that always rests in the distance. Calming pulses of light dance around it like a halo. “Nocturna do not sleep,” he says. “Our job is to constantly watch over the Dreamers and our world. We cannot sleep, and have no need.” He finally pulls his blue eyes to mine, and I see that they simmer with faraway thoughts.
“You never sleep?” I say with astonishment, ignoring the hot flutters that dance in my stomach. “Don’t you get tired?”
He laughs lightly. “We get tired in a different sense than I think you’re used to feeling. We gather our strength from you. From the Dreamers.”
How does that work?
Before I can ask, he returns with a question of his own. “What is it like? To dream?”
I’ve never seen Dev like this—so open and vulnerable. He stands exposed, without his usual sarcastic and confident shell, and this has me struggling to keep up the emotional wall that I hastily cobbled together before approaching him. I have a strong urge to hug him.
“I’m probably not the best one to ask.” I hardly remembered any of my dreams before I conjured up this place.
He turns away, disappointment apparent.
“But…” I begin to add in haste, strangely not wanting to be the cause of his sadness. “From what I can recollect, it can feel like many things and then like nothing you’ve ever experienced, all at the same time.” I try to draw on images and emotions I’ve had in this world and what I can remember Becca telling me about her dreams.
“Go on,” Dev coaxes, his eyes slightly glossy with curiosity.
I watch the sky, figuring out how to describe what he’s wanting to hear. “Well, sometimes dreaming is like being submerged underwater. You can feel weightless, and things change and morph all around you. Sometimes colors are vivid, and other times everything is in black and white.
“Sometimes people you know are the star players in your dreams and do the craziest things, but it all feels quite normal at the time.” I smile, thinking of some of the dreams Becca has shared with me where I’m behaving bizarrely, but it always seems justifiable in the moment. “Then there are other types of dreams that never really materialize, or maybe they do but you don’t quite remember the details. They seem hazy, like they’re happening behind a veil.
“There are the bad dreams, the ones that leave you in a cold sweat, and when you finally wake up you’re almost certain those nightmares can crawl out and get you.” I shiver, remembering the particularly unpleasant experience of being pushed to my death into a canyon.
My gaze roams the field and I breathe in the sweet night air, reveling in the fact that this could all be a dream. I stop on Dev and hold my eyes to his cerulean blue.
“And then there are the dreams that feel as authentic as reality itself, that seem to exist just as your own life does. Where the emotions that you experience there carry over to when you’re awake. They are so real, so genuine,
that you begin to question your own sanity. And you know that when the day comes that you finally stop dreaming them, you will never stop remembering.”
My breathing has grown heavier with each sentence, and I can’t find the strength to look away as Dev’s gaze sears into mine, his body just as paralyzed.
With his wall slightly down, I see someone strong but tired. Someone who carries too many burdens but will never admit that he needs help. I see secrets he wants desperately to share and a hot energy that’s being tied back with a leash, not trusted to be let free. I wonder what he sees when he looks at me.
I find myself taking a step closer and stop short, instantly catching his body stiffen, the mask he dropped once again covering his face. All the things I was able to catch a glimpse of before are gone, vanishing so fast that I’m uncertain if I saw them there in the first place.
He repositions himself away from me. Somewhere during my lecture our bodies must have turned toward each other. I clear my throat, not really understanding what just transpired but desperately looking for a change in conversation. I twist the bottom of my pajama shirt and notice my sleep ensemble and bare feet.
“Uh, do you have any clothes for me to change into?” I ask, suddenly noticing Dev fiddling with something small in one hand. As I speak, he immediately palms it.
“I want to see if something works first.” He faces me, and I arch an eyebrow questioningly. “I want you to try and visualize that you’re wearing the clothes.”
“What?”
He repeats himself.
“Yeah…uh, like I said before, what?” Maybe I’m not the only one who’s lost their mind.
“Trust me on this. Try to imagine that you’re wearing the clothes you had on here last time. Start with the T-shirt and then work your way down.”
I glare at him.
“Close your eyes when you do it. It will help you focus.”
“How do you know what will help me focus?” I ask, skeptical that he’s making me look like a fool and playing some strange joke.
“Molly, please,” he says, slightly exasperated.
Mumbling under my breath about him being insane and that he better not stick something up my nose, I resign to do as he asks. Once my eyes are shut, Dev tells me to relax and take in a breath. I do but still feel stupid.
“Do it for real this time,” he admonishes.
“I am doing it for real. How can I fake breathing?”
“You’re not taking it seriously. This won’t work unless you believe it will. So try again and keep your eyes closed.”
I roll my eyes shut and take in a couple of large breaths, feeling myself grow calm.
“Now, imagine the black T-shirt you wore the other day, and then the pants and the boots. Do you remember what they looked like?”
“Yes.” It’s the only outfit that anyone really wears around here—how could I not remember? I breathe in again and decide to humor him. Picturing the simple black T-shirt, I imagine it being placed over my head and onto my body. As I draw up these images, a strange heat expands in my stomach and travels to my head, cooling as it moves through me. It’s only slightly uncomfortable. Once the cold energy is balled up in my brain, the image of the shirt becomes clearer and the fabric on my body slowly shifts, feeling tighter.
“Good! Good, Molly, keep going,” Dev coaxes, his voice sounding hollow and distant as I concentrate on maintaining the energy that I’ve somehow created in my head.
I bring up the black protective pants next, like I’m picking out clothes from my closet. As soon as I imagine wearing them, I have the sensation of my exposed legs being wrapped up and warmed. I desperately want to open my eyes, but I push on, imagining my bare feet encased in black combat boots, and suddenly the grass I’m standing on shifts to something solid.
Unable to wait any longer, I open my eyes. The cool energy that collected in my body instantly swims away like a scared fish. Glancing down, I gasp. No longer am I in my pajamas—instead, I’m in the exact outfit I imagined myself wearing. I pull at the fabric, trying to convince myself that it’s real.
“How did this…how did I…” I stutter, turning to Dev, who has on the smuggest and most excited face I’ve ever seen on another human being.
“Amazing,” he says between a wide-lipped grin. “Okay, I want you to imagine you’re wearing a quiver just like mine, with the Arcus in it.” He speaks quickly, turning around to show me the object on his back.
“But Dev, how could I just do that?” My heart beats frantically. This is so strange, like the time that island appeared out of nowhere. I read in one of those books about controlling events and objects in your dreams—the author called it lucid dreaming. Is that what I’m doing now?
“Try to imagine yourself wearing one of these, and then I’ll explain everything,” Dev says, turning back to face me. “But this time keep your eyes open.”
I sense him watching me as I study what he asked me to, imagining what it would feel like if that strap were around my chest and that tube hugged tight to my back. As I hold these thoughts, the heat I felt before expands in my belly, traveling again to my head and cooling down to a near-freezing temperature. My face scrunches at the slight pain, the sensation similar to a brain freeze when you drink something cold too fast.
Something presses between my chest, and a hard surface aligns with my spine. A voice shouts, snapping me back to the present. Once again the energy dissipates in the blink of an eye, traveling back to somewhere inside me.
“This is amazing!” Dev holds my arms, looking like he wants to twirl me around and hug me tight. Peering down, the very strap I was imagining is now wrapped around my body. Dev lets go as I touch the object on my back. A hard, cool cylinder sits securely against me. I know my eyes must be popping out of their sockets, because Dev is chuckling, watching me. My hands frantically and delicately touch the fabric of my clothes and the strap around my chest again and again and again.
“This is insane,” I whisper. “I did this?” I know I’m dreaming, but it all feels so real.
“You have a gift.”
“A gift? What do you mean? Can you do this?”
“No. I can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
Dev waves his hand dismissively. “I’ll explain later. There’s one more thing I want to try.” He begins to walk away.
“Wait!” I stumble to follow him, aware of how natural this outfit and device feel against my body. “You said you’d explain everything after whatever I just did with this quiver.”
Stopping about fifteen paces away, Dev disregards me and bends down, searching for something in the tall grass. Picking up a heavy object, he stands.
I squint at what he now holds. It looks like a rock. It is a rock. I suck in air. “Dev…what are you going to do with that?” Cautiously, I take a few steps back. He displays another one of his crooked grins. I don’t like that grin. “Seriously, I need you to explain what’s going on.”
“I know, but…I really think the best way to test all this is to really push you. Pull the rug out from under you, as they say. See how strong you are without any real instruction first.” He throws the nicely sized rock up in the air and catches it again, reminding me of a malicious mobster flicking a quarter over and over, except this quarter could crack my skull.
“Um, I think I have to disagree. I don’t know what you’re going to do with that, but I truly believe there’s a better way of handling this. No, I guarantee there’s a better way of handling this.” I continue to back away, my flight instinct kicking in over my fight.
He takes a couple of steps forward, closing the safe distance I’m attempting to create.
“All you need to do is to think hard that you don’t want to get hit by this.” He displays his murder weapon.
“I can promise you, I don’t need to think hard about that one.” He’s gone crazy. He’s going to kill me! This dream has officially turned into a nightmare. “Dev, seriously, let’s think about this
.” I hold my hands up when he moves his shoulder around like he’s warming up to throw. Good Lord. “You’re going to hurt me!”
“No, I don’t think I will,” he says. “Imagine it’s something harmless.”
Before I can protest, he launches the rock straight at me.
— 16 —
I’VE HEARD THERE are three main reactions humans experience in the face of imminent danger. One: the sense to flee. Two: aggravation that they are placed in danger to begin with. And three: becoming motionless with shock. I, unfortunately, am experiencing number three.
Time slows as the rock comes shooting forward, and I stand perfectly, idiotically still as it does. But then something happens—without really thinking about it, I imagine the rock as nothing but sand, no longer joined together but instead scattered into mere grains. Like an urgent prayer, my mind repeats this desire over and over, and in that same moment, a quick heat unfolds and shoots out like a flash to my brain.
When I blink, the rock is gone and small fragments of sand dust my face. Cautiously, I open my eyes, spitting out the debris that found its way into my mouth.
I can’t believe he actually threw that rock at me!
Glaring at Dev, I clean myself off before stopping midswipe. The rock never actually hit me. It turned to sand just as I imagined it would. What the fuck?
Dev’s suddenly by my side, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the city at a jog. “Come on!” he says, looking like a child who just woke up on Christmas morning. I have no choice but to follow as he tugs me along, my mind trying to wrap itself around what just happened. I changed that rock to sand. What does that mean? What kind of gift is this?
Reaching the edge of the city where the fortified wall stands, Dev searches for the platform as I stare at my hands. He says he can’t do this, so why can I?
“Dev, what’s going on?” I ask again in a whisper.
He shoots out the grapple from his Arcus and it sticks to its target. “That’s what we’re going to find out,” he says as he holds out his hand for me to take.
