Daniel's Dream

by Peter Michael Rosenberg

  Just before he reached the beach he saw the taverna off to the left, with its open, canopied patio. Like everywhere else, it appeared deserted. He continued to the beach, and soon found himself walking along a wide, clean and uninterrupted stretch of white and gold sand that swept around in a huge, shallow bay that seemed to go on for miles. It was, without doubt, the loveliest beach he had ever seen. It was also completely empty.

  Daniel took off his sandals and allowed the warm, white grains of sand to slip between his toes. The sand felt soft and comforting, and the simple pleasures of walking on such a surface, with all its associations of holidays and foreign affairs, brought a smile to his face. The beach stretched about fifty metres down to where the sea lapped against the shoreline, and seemed to continue for miles in both directions.

  The sun was still blisteringly hot, although it had fallen from its zenith and could now be viewed above the horizon, a part of the general aspect. The sea was still sparkling, an ocean of white diamonds and silver glitter.

  With the sweat still heavy on his brow and the sand now starting to burn the soles of his feet, the water could not have looked more inviting. He walked swiftly to the shoreline and, fearing for a moment that the sudden contrast of hot skin and cool sea might trigger some unwanted response and send him hurling back to his other, waking life, he stood by the edge of the water, hesitating.

  But his will abandoned him, and, more in faith than certainty, he took off his shirt, shorts and - ascertaining that he was still quite alone - slipped off his underpants and took a few tentative steps into the shallows.

  The luxurious blue waters were refreshingly cool. Tiny fish swam around his ankles as he stepped out into deeper waters, and the gentle sea breeze blew his hair around. He ventured a little further, wading in up to his thighs. The water was crystal-clear and quite motionless, like liquid glass, and when he stood still he could see his feet quite clearly and without distortion, gleaming white against the warmer tones of the yellow sands.

  He wandered in further still, until the water lapped gently around his waist. He turned slowly so that his back was towards the sea and looked towards the beach. From this position he could see the wide expanse of gleaming sand, the tavema directly in front of him, a few more similar buildings scattered at intervals along the beach, and, behind all this, the surprisingly verdant hills with their groves of olive trees and rocky precipices: an impressive backdrop.

  This must be paradise, thought Daniel, scooping up handfuls of shimmering sea-water and allowing it to pour in crystalline rivulets down his forearms. Paradise, or something close.

  And then, just as he was beginning to lose himself in wistful day-dreaming, a movement on the sand distracted him.

  Way off to the right, a figure, dressed in white, was walking slowly along the beach, Daniel couldn’t tell whether it was a man or woman from so far away, although as the figure came closer the small, swaying motions of the walk suggested not just femaleness, but femininity.

  Daniel made his way back to dry land, never taking his eyes off the apparition in white. He dried himself brusquely with his shirt and quickly pulled on his underwear and shorts. By the time he had finished making himself presentable the mysterious figure was close enough to be seen clearly. She was perhaps twenty-five years old, her most prominent feature a mane of dark-blond hair, thick and full-bodied, that hung down her back in a cascade of waves and curls.

  As she came closer, Daniel noted other things about her. She was not particularly tall, neither was she slim, although it was difficult to be certain, as she was wearing a white wrap which covered her from her breasts to her knees, leaving her bronzed shoulders and calves bare. He was struck by her appearance, not least because she was the first person he had seen since leaving the Pumphouse. He hoped that she spoke English, that she was friendly, that she wanted to talk; he had so many questions, so many things that he wanted to ask, that he needed to know.

  Daniel walked up the beach to meet her; he noticed the way she regarded him, slowing her pace as he neared her. Good, he thought, she wants to talk. He walked up to her slowly and waited for her to speak.

  ‘Hi,’ said the girl, and smiled. She nodded towards the sea. ‘Warm, was it?’

  ‘Yes, very,’ said Daniel haltingly.

  ‘Usually is this time of day. You’re new here, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes I... I arrived today... sort of.’

  ‘Then welcome,’ said the girl, and smiled. ‘I’m Kate,’ she said, holding out her hand. Daniel took her tanned hand in his, and, just as he had done when clasping Barry’s hand for the first time, suddenly felt strangely out of phase with everything around him.

  ‘Pleased to...’ he began, his head starting to spin. Oh God, no, thought Daniel as the skies above him started to darken and the horizon began to shift and skew as if he were drunk. My name’s...’

  ‘Daniel,’ said the girl, just before she vanished into nothingness.

  Chapter 6

  Daniel reached for the pen and notepad, found a clean sheet of paper and started scribbling furiously: Greece, waiter, coffee, baklava, taverna... Even as he wrote, the pictures began to fade. He concentrated harder; more words came to him: ... Berry, Barry, beach, blonde...

  The final images faded, leaving him frustrated once again, with just an aftertaste of the experience, the merest hint that something extraordinary - the nature of which was still indeterminate - had happened during the night.

  Lisanne was not beside him. Daniel looked at the clock. Half past eight; she had already left for work.

  Daniel got up, showered, dressed, made himself a strong cup of instant coffee, smoked his first cigarette of the day, then fell, as usual, into depression. One thing was clear; he had to talk to someone about his dream, or else he felt sure he would go mad. Daniel reached for the phone and tried Vince’s number again. Vince was probably not the most empathetic person in Daniel’s world, neither was he, intellectually, the best equipped for a discussion of esoterica, but he would at least be prepared to listen to what Daniel had to say without automatically dismissing it all as the rantings of a lunatic.

  The telephone rang twice before it was answered: a familiar voice. Daniel smiled.

  ‘Vince? It’s Daniel.’ There was a pause, which although only momentary was rather longer than Daniel felt comfortable with. Had his best friend forgotten who he was?

  ‘Danny? Shit... sorry Danny boy, only you were just about the last person I expected to... hold on a sec, will you?’ There was a noise like someone smothering the telephone, accompanied by the distant, muffled hubbub of voices followed swiftly by the sound of a door being slammed shut. ‘Sorry ’bout that old son; just had to shift a few bodies.’

  ‘Is this a bad time?’

  ‘Not at all, not at all. I was looking for an excuse to get them out the office. You couldn’t have timed it better. Now then, is this a social call or are you looking to order half a hundredweight of animal feedstuff?’

  Daniel smiled. Just hearing Vince’s north-London wide-boy intonation again lifted his spirits.

  ‘You guessed it; Lisanne says I’m eating like a pig these days so why not eat as a pig? What sort of discount can you do me?’ He heard Vince laugh, more out of politeness than genuine amusement, but still it put him at his ease.

  ‘I always look after my friends, Danny, you know that,’ said Vince.

  ‘I know,’ said Daniel. ‘How’s tricks?’

  ‘Can’t complain Danny, can’t complain.’

  ‘And Janice?’

  ‘She’s well... busy as ever, no time for yours truly since she snagged that promotion. Between you and me I think she’s letting that greasy boss of hers give her a length now and then. What do you reckon?’

  ‘Well she always was a tart, Vince.’

  Vince laughed loudly. ‘I’ll tell her you said that.’

  Daniel grinned. Janice was one of the most refined women Daniel had ever known, which made her marriage to Vince all the mo
re extraordinary. In truth, Vince should probably have ended up with some fellow East Ender, but the lovely and elegant Janice had fallen for his rough and rather dubious charms when they met at a wedding. They hit it off in a big way and within six months were on their own honeymoon, somewhere in the Caribbean, where Vince had enjoyed the rum cocktails but had not thought much of the food. Six years on they were, to all appearances, a happy and loving couple. Vince had lost little of the rough edge that had attracted her in the first instance, and Janice had - despite the new culture and morality that Vince had brought to the marriage - survived with scruples, ethics and charm intact.

  Which was why, of course, they could both joke about her in this way.

  ‘So,’ said Vince, sensing Daniel’s need to get down to the matter in hand, ‘if you’ve quite finished insulting my wife, what can I do for you?’

  Daniel took a deep breath. ‘I’d really like to see you, Vince. Perhaps over a drink or something?’

  ‘We can do better than that. Why don’t you and Lisanne come over for dinner one night? I’ll give Jan a call and -’

  ‘Actually,’ said Daniel, cutting Vince off as swiftly as he could, ‘I was thinking that... well, perhaps just the two of us could meet. I kind of need to talk.’

  ‘Of course, old son. Say no more.’

  ‘It’s not about Lisanne,’ said Daniel hurriedly, fearful that Vince might get the wrong idea and say something to Janice who, being close to Lisanne, would be on the phone quick as a flash to find out what the trouble was. ‘I mean, everything with Lisanne is fine, I just need to talk to a mate without the distractions of having the women around.’

  ‘Message received and understood. Now then, when and where did you have in mind?’

  They arranged to meet at the White Horse near Covent Garden the following evening; it was close to where Vince worked and was relatively quiet for a central London pub; they’d be able to talk in peace. Vince asked no more questions, for which Daniel was thankful. Neither did he ask about Lisanne, perhaps sensing that, despite what Daniel had said, there was grief on the home front.

  Daniel replaced the handset, lit another cigarette and inhaled deeply, drawing the volatile nicotine, the vaporised tars, the noxious gases and myriad pollutants deep into his lungs. The drug made his head spin; he did not want to think about the other, unseen effects that the smoke was having on his body.

  He had stopped smoking years ago, had reformed and become one of those virulent, holier-than-thou ex-smokers that he had once despised. But after the accident he found some sort of solace in cigarettes, and was soon back to his pre-reformation pack-a-day consumption.

  He stared mindlessly at the cigarette smoke as it ascended into the still air in a continuous, barely wavering plume before breaking up chaotically at about head height into countless streamers and spirals of cloudy grey. If he did not find some sort of motivation soon, he knew, he risked descending into a static, meaningless limbo in which his existence, previously active and adventure-filled, would come to resemble the life-cycle of the average houseplant.

  Fortunately, his recent exposure - real or imagined - to the clean, fragrant air and bright, hot sun of his dream world had induced a kind of temporary claustrophobia, so that whereas he had previously been prepared to spend the whole day indoors doing nothing, he now found the four walls around him oppressive, the atmosphere inside the house stifling.

  Despite the self-generated inertia that frequently kept him pinned to the spot, sitting in the same armchair hour after hour watching daytime television, his discomfort at being indoors now pushed him to his feet and out into the street. Daniel decided to make another attempt to head for the West End. He would have a hunt around the record stores, search out some new music; something, anything, to get him out of the house.

  Determined this time to complete his journey, Daniel set off with false confidence. He bought his ticket and clutched it tightly in his hand. He kept his eyes from straying to the advertisements as he descended the escalator, and when he reached the platform and sat down he closed his eyes until the train arrived. No tramps, no strange messages shouting at him from the posters on the wall, no fear.

  A couple of minutes later a nearly empty train pulled up and Daniel got on board. As it pulled away, he considered that he was perhaps being unnecessarily cautious. All the omens and portents that had risen up before him yesterday were - could only be - figments of his imagination, over-active and over-zealous as a result of being kept dormant for so long. Words and symbols were just that, and could be interpreted any way the observer wished. If he wanted to see doom, despair and warnings, then that was what he would see. It was all down to mood and there was, in truth, nothing to fear.

  Daniel took a deep breath, relaxed into his seat and allowed himself to look around. After all, what was there to be afraid of?

  He did not have to wait long to find out. As he gazed around the carriage he saw, in quick succession: a poster above the window opposite advertising holidays in Greece; another wretch in filthy clothes drinking noisily from a brown bottle; and a piece of graffiti on the carriage door which read, ‘What do you suppose you did to deserve all this?

  Daniel looked away and flinched. Was he losing his mind? These were all just coincidences, surely? The world did not work that way, slipping arcane messages to you through public media. It was ridiculous to think that every sight, every sound, every vision was directed towards one person, a cosmic conspiracy in which every message was loaded with meanings or warnings or worse. It was absurd: the world did not revolve around him.

  The train lurched suddenly and came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the tunnel. The interior lights dimmed and, despite his attempts to remain calm, Daniel’s heart began to beat faster, and he felt the tell-tale dampness in the palms of his hands. Oh great, this is just what I need, he thought, hoping that an attempt at ironic commentary, albeit strictly internalised, would help keep panic at bay.

  From the other end of the compartment the drunk leered at him and starting making loud, unpleasant noises like a cross between a dog barking and a machine-gun being fired. Daniel shuffled around uncomfortably. This wasn’t what was supposed to happen, this wasn’t how it was supposed to be. It wasn’t as if he was asking for much; just a chance to head into town, to get out of the house, to reacquaint himself with the once familiar metropolis... for Chrissake, it wasn’t as if he was asking for the moon and the sun and the stars. So why all these difficulties, all these obstacles? It was truly as if someone or something didn’t want him to make the journey.

  The lights dimmed further. The drunk was still staring in his direction, making him feel more uncomfortable by the moment. What was wrong with the blasted train? Why wasn’t it moving? The drunk’s peculiar rant became louder and now seemed to be directed at him. Daniel looked away and, out of nervous habit, started whistling noisily and rather tunelessly, oblivious of the other passengers, who studiously avoided looking at him.

  Not that Daniel could have cared less; he just wanted to drown out the tramp’s awful, insane racket.

  A minute passed slowly. The tramp stopped making his gut-churning noises and collapsed into insensibility, but Daniel was unable to calm down. He was no longer sure what he was whistling, and began repeating over and over the eight-note melody that preceeded the chimes of Big Ben. He sensed that this was starting to irritate the other passengers even more than the tramp had done, but he could not stop himself.

  A tall, thickset young man dressed in dirty jeans and a leather jacket started eyeing him up, and Daniel sensed he had better quieten down or else he might have to deal with more than just imaginary messages and harmless, noisy drunks.

  Just then the carriage vibrated into life, the lights flickered and then burst into full brightness, and the train pulled off, picked up speed for about thirty seconds and then decelerated swiftly as it approached the next station.

  With an intense feeling of both relief and gratitude, directed at no one
in particular, Daniel rose quickly to his feet and, as soon as the carriage doors had opened, leapt from the train and on to the platform, almost flooring two elderly ladies in the process. He pushed his way through the crowds waiting to embark, putting as much distance as possible between himself and the train, then stood with his back to the wall, waiting impatiently for the carriage doors to close and for the train, with all its intimations of foreboding, to move on.

  It seemed to take for ever, and all the time Daniel feared that the drunken vagrant might suddenly take it into his head to leap out of the carriage and attack him.

  Eventually the doors slammed shut and the train began to gather momentum, but Daniel did not feel safe until it had attained full speed and had disappeared into the black hole at the far end. He looked up and down the platform. Other passengers had disembarked and were now heading for the escalators, and within seconds Daniel found himself alone.

  Although he was feeling calmer, he could still feel his heart beating frantically in his chest, and his palms were soaked with perspiration. Jesus, he thought, I can’t carry on like this: one short train journey and I break into a nervous panic.