by MJ Rodgers
“You said your brothers died young. Did your father’s leaving have anything to do with that?”
“Pretty much everything. He couldn’t handle their deaths. Wasn’t strong enough. So he just up and left my mother, who was six months pregnant with me. So she lost her husband, as well as her sons.”
Michael was amazed at how evenly and calmly Briana had said those words. “Do you hate your father for what he did?”
“No, Hazel wouldn’t allow hate in the house. She praised the strength of my mother, her ability to survive and keep going, despite incredible loss. She felt sorry for my father. His failure at being both a husband and father was something she said he’d have to live with for the rest of his life.”
“Do you ever think of finding him?”
She shook her head. “I forgave him in my heart long ago. Why should I push myself into his life? I’d only embarrass him and shame him by forcing him to face the child he walked away from.”
“You sound incredibly sane for someone who’s crazy,” Michael said, touched by the bedrock of tolerance she displayed. “I wonder if Natalie Newcastle is as forgiving.”
Her eyes clouded as she considered his words. “You talk about Natalie as though she were definitely a part of me. Are you really that sure?”
“You tell me, Briana. We flew over the house that you described in your dream. You met the people. They spoke about events that you described in your dream. If you aren’t Natalie Newcastle, what other explanation can there be?”
Briana shook her head on a long exhale. “I don’t know. A part of me still can’t accept I’m sitting here with you in this lovely restaurant, dressed in this incredibly expensive outfit. Do you know that it was handmade, and that even my bra and panties have the exact same shade of jade ribbon?”
Michael looked into his coffee cup, trying very hard not to picture Briana wearing what she was describing so innocently.
“The dozen outfits that Carlie brought over are all like this,” she continued. “Perfectly coordinated. Perfectly fitted. Each with different shoes and handbags to match. I look in the mirror, and I just can’t believe what I see. I keep thinking I’m going to be waking up back in Washington any minute now.”
“What if you wake up instead to realize you’re Natalie Newcastle?” he asked. It was a thought that continued to haunt him.
“If she’s inside me, how can I not know? Nothing Carlie or Ginny or Gene has said about her has rung the right memory bell.”
“Then maybe we need to try ringing a new one.”
“What bell would that be, Michael?”
“Her doorbell. Let’s go to Louisiana tomorrow to see this estate of hers. The address is printed out on the Dun and Bradstreet financial report I requested. One of the keys you found in that purse should fit it.”
“You think I might remember something of her if I were in her home?”
“It’s worth a try. I’m as curious about her as you must be. I’m particularly interested in finding out why Natalie Newcastle would decide she needed to become Briana Berry.”
“Carlie implied it was because she felt lonely and unloved as a child.”
“I may not be a specialist in the phenomenon of multiple personalities, but I know that it takes an enormous amount of emotional and physical abuse for a child to resort to such a method of escape. I doubt simply feeling lonely and unloved would be sufficient.”
“You’re saying Natalie was abused.”
“If she weren’t severely abused, Briana, she would not have had to create another personality into which she had to retreat Kids who are ignored and lonely may use their imagination to visit fantasy worlds, but they always have a roundtrip ticket.”
“Did you use your imagination when you were lonely, Michael?”
“Until I got lucky and had my first lucid dream.”
“What is a lucid dream?”
“One in which you become conscious.”
“Conscious? As in awake?”
“But you’re not awake. You’re dreaming. And yet, you’re conscious of yourself within the dream. I’m still awed by them. I had my first spontaneous lucid dream when I was ten. Ever since then, I have been learning how to lucid-dream at will.”
“What was your first lucid dream?”
“It stemmed from a real-life situation. My parents were gone on another scientific expedition that would keep them out of touch for months. They had hired this woman to come into our home to take care of me. She turned out to be a drunk. She moved in her two teenage sons, both of whom were drug addicts. They were hocking my parents’ paintings, silver, crystal, TVs, VCRs, stereos, everything to get the money to feed their habit”
“Couldn’t you tell someone?”
“They threatened to kill me if I did. I have no doubt they would have.”
“What a nightmare.”
Michael rested his hand on hers, gave it a quick, reassuring squeeze. “That night I dreamed I was begging my parents to tell me why they kept leaving me and letting people who were cruel have control over me. My parents said they didn’t have time to talk about it because they were too busy. And then, suddenly, I became lucid. I knew I was dreaming.”
“How did you know you were dreaming?”
“My father’s hat had wet seaweed hanging off of it My mother’s raincoat was wet with salt spray. A part of my mind recognized that if my parents were still off on their ocean voyage, they couldn’t be standing in the house, talking to me.”
“What did you do?”
“I decided that since this was my dream, I was going to do something I always wanted to. I walked to the front door, opened it and told my parents to leave, that I didn’t have time for them. When they obeyed me and left, I was filled with this incredible, inexpressible feeling of total freedom. I awoke and knew that the dream had told me what I needed to know.”
“Which was?”
“That I had to stop counting on others to make my life what I wanted it to be. My future was in my hands. That lucid dream was a powerful turning point in my life.”
“What happened with the woman and her sons?”
“I waited until all three of them were passed out one morning. Then I took one of the guns they kept around and started firing it out the window. The noise barely stirred them. I set the gun next to one of them and slipped out to school. The neighbors called the police. When they broke down the door, they found the three of them passed out, with the guns and drugs strewn all around. They were arrested on a number of charges.”
“And you planned all that at ten?”
“And loved doing it. That lucid dream had given me a wonderful sense of control. I knew from then on that my life was going to be great And it was—it is. I got everything I went for—and more.”
Briana smiled at Michael with so much warmth that his palms began to perspire.
“I thought I was going to feel sad after hearing what you endured as a youngster, Michael. But I don’t. I feel heartened. You gave yourself your own happy ending.”
Michael had visions of the happy ending he’d like to be having with Briana about now. He once again forcibly reminded himself that he was a doctor and the lovely woman sitting across from him was his patient Very reluctantly, and with a lot more effort than should have been necessary, he redressed her in his mind and put on his most professional tone.
“The secret is to follow the lead we find in our dreams. And in a lucid one, you can even take a few trips off the beaten path.”
“Do you always control a dream when you become lucid in it?”
“Not…always,” he admitted, with more than a little discomfort, as he thought of his racy dreams with Briana as the star. “Come on, we’d best get back. We’ll have to be up early tomorrow to make the flight to Louisiana.”
IT WAS a beautiful December night, filled with a full moon and crisp cool air. Michael dived deep beneath the warm blue waters of the institute’s pool and let his body’s own buoyancy bring him back
up. He was just breaking the surface when he saw Briana.
She was diving into the pool at the other end. He watched as her arms pumped and her feet kicked up a steady spray. Despite the fact that she’d said she hadn’t exercised in a while, she seemed to be a strong swimmer. She didn’t stop until after five complete laps. An impressive performance.
And then he forgot all about her performance as she stepped out of the pool and into the moonlight.
For she was naked.
And that was the instant Michael knew he was dreaming.
She gave her long, wet hair a shake, and the drops danced over her shoulders, her arms, her breasts. He already knew her slim figure was first-rate. But seeing the bare perfection of its glistening pale smoothness had his heart pumping hard.
She hadn’t come into his dreams naked before.
He reminded himself that he was her doctor, a professional. He was determined to use this lucid dream to hone his control—so that he could better handle being around her when awake.
Only then she began to walk toward him, and Michael knew he was far from handling anything.
He had never seen a woman move the way Briana moved, with such an elemental sensuality. It carried no calculation, no artifice, just an inborn come-hither grace that was irresistible.
He steadied himself and gave the order firmly.
I’m changing this dream, Briana. Jump back into the pool.
She didn’t jump back into the pool. She continued to walk straight toward him, her lovely eyes looking straight at him.
Stay there, Briana. Don’t come any closer.
She ignored him and kept right on coming. Her autumnhoney voice filled his head.
Michael, there’s no reason to worry.
Stay back, Briana!
But she didn’t stay back. She stepped right up to him.
Michael, I was meant for you. And you were meant for me. She raised her arms to circle them around his neck.
Before her dream body could touch his, Michael yanked himself awake. He lay on the crumpled sheets of his bed, sweating and panting and so damn aroused he felt the pain of it. Damn. Why couldn’t he ever control his dreams when she was in them?
Michael rose from his bed and grabbed a towel on the way out to the pool. Moderate exercise promoted dream recall. But heavy exercise—the kind that led to physical exhaustion— was often a guarantee of no dream recall.
Which was why Michael dived into the pool and did twenty laps, hard and fast. And then did twenty more.
BRIANA’S FIRST IMPRESSION of the Louisiana estate of Natalie Newcastle was that it was indeed an estate, over one hundred acres of rolling land and more than four-thousand feet of waterfront, all located on the Bogue Chitto River. The bridge that took them across was one of two that led to the property.
Once on the other side, Briana was immediately taken with the beautifully landscaped grounds, the three-acre pond full of ducks and the copious gardens full of hybrid dayhlies, azaleas, dogwood, camellias and native hardwoods.
It was green and lush and lovely as it sat beneath a warm, breezy sky of rolling clouds. There was a sense of the past in the mature trees and shrubbery, and a sense of the modern in the large in-ground pool, a seamless expanse of brilliant blue tile.
“What do you think of the house, Briana?” Michael asked.
Briana directed her gaze to the imposing pristine white two-story home.
“It’s a mid-nineteenth century vintage, with a mixture of styles. Its door and porch and those classical columns were borrowed from Greek Revival. The bracketed cornice, on the other hand, is definitely Italianate. Both the flattened arch and the jigsaw-cut wood detailing the upstairs porch sport a Gothic Revival influence.”
“Spoken just like an architect.”
“This wasn’t another test?”
“No, I was looking more for a feeling of recognition than a recitation of physical structure.”
“Sorry. It doesn’t look familiar at all.” Briana paused to sift through the keys in her purse. “I hope I don’t trigger some security alarm when I try one of these in the lock.”
As they walked up the stone steps to the front, Briana saw a head through the drapes near a front window. By the time they had reached the door, it was opening.
“Natalie, you’ve come home!” a short, sturdy-looking woman called as she swung the door open wide. She was in her late fifties, her mostly gray hair tied at the back of her neck in a neat twist, her light eyes misty with ready emotion.
She wrapped her short, stubby arms around Briana’s waist and squeezed her tight
Briana endured the hug, at a loss about what else to do.
“It is so good to see you, child! Your mama were calling here all frantic-like looking for you two days ago. She told me you disappeared from your wedding reception. I was so worried!”
“It’s okay,” Briana assured. “I’m okay.”
After a moment, the woman let Briana go and reached into her apron for a tissue to dab at her eyes. “When your mama rung me yesterday to say they’d found you and you were safe, she never told me you were coming home.”
“It was a spur-of-the-moment decision.”
The woman put away her damp tissue and hustled them inside, closing the door.
She paused in the foyer to look up at Briana with concerned eyes. “What nonsense is this I hear about your not knowing your own mama or that new husband of yours?”
“It’s true. I don’t even know who you are.”
The woman shook her gray head, and her eyes grew sad.
“Lord have mercy, child. What has happened to you?”
“I’m Dr. Sands,” Michael said as he stepped forward quickly, holding out his hand.
The woman looked Michael up and down before taking his hand for the briefest of shakes.
“Lou-May Lestel.”
“How long have you known Natalie Newcastle, Ms. Lestel?” Michael asked.
“It’s Lou-May—no Ms. Lestel. I’m the housekeeper here. I were by Carlie’s side when she gave birth to this young’n. Come on into the parlor and we’ll talk over some coffee and a slice of sweet-potato pie.”
The parlor evoked the flavor of a grand Parisian apartment. Eighteenth-century lyre-back chairs set above an enormous French rug fringed in gold braiding. An eighteenth-century musical clock adorned a lacquered Louis XV commode. A parquetry center table was complemented by Louis XVI-style armchairs.
Everything was polished, and gleaming with old Southern money.
Lou-May left them, only to return a few moments later with coffee, smelling strongly of chicory, on a silver serving tray.
“So, what you be a doctor of?” she asked Michael as she proceeded to pour the coffee into beautiful blue-and-gold Frankenthal porcelain cups. She handed a cup each to Briana and Michael and then took the chair across from them.
“I’m trying to retrieve Natalie’s memory,” Michael answered. “Lou-May, you said that you were here when Natalie was born. How long ago was that?”
“Thirty-one years ago come February. I come to this house with Carlie as her personal maid and companion the year afore.”
“Markam Newcastle hired you?” Michael asked.
“No, I were Carlie’s personal choice. He thought I were just a maid. He never knew I were Carlie’s third cousin on her mama’s side. We kept that part ‘tween us.”
“Why?” Briana asked.
“Markam never would have stood for no wife of his having kin working as servants, less’n they were the out-of-sight-and-out-of-mind kind, which he insisted Carlie’s had to be.”
“Carlie’s parents were also servants?” Michael asked.
“Not actual, but might as well have been, since they had no money, learnin’, nor what you’d call social graces. Can you imagine a man telling his wife she had to go visit her kin ‘cause they weren’t fancy enough to be welcome in her own home?”
Lou-May paused to look at Briana.
“When I seen Mark
am treating your mama just like she were one of his servants, well, I got right mad and told her to speak out for herself. Trouble were, she be eighteen and Markam be fifty. She didn’t know how to stand up to him. She were afraid to, I suppose.”
Lou-May took a sip of her coffee as she picked up some pie.
“Tell us about when Natalie was born,” Michael said.
“Markam made no secret about the fact that he wanted a son. When Carlie presented him with a daughter, I saw the way Markam looked at her—as though she’d done something wrong.”
Lou-May sent Briana a mournful look.
“I think that’s when Carlie really started to hate him. She didn’t do much pretending about it, neither. Markam started to stay away more and more.”
Lou-May took a bite of her pie before she went on. “The situation were just ripe for disaster. Then Connor come to take care of a prize stallion that Markam had bought.”
Lou-May shook her head. “Carlie were very young and very foolish. I know’d she were lonely, what with Markam being gone most of the time, and treating her more like a brood mare than a wife when he were here. But she didn’t have no sense at all, spending so much time over at them stables. I know’d one of Markam’s servants were bound to slip a word into his ear about it sooner or later.”
Lou-May let out a heartfelt sigh.
“When he found out, Markam were screaming such oaths as could’ve put hair on a bald man. He got the shotgun and headed on out to the stables. He probably would of killed Connor if I hadn’t of gotten there first to warn him to git. When Markam come for your mama, I stood in front of her and told him he’d have to shoot through me. But he told me he weren’t about to waste no good ammunition on either of us. He told us both to git.”
“You left then, too?” Briana asked.
“Yeah, he kicked out your mama and me and kept you. Your mama couldn’t believe it. But I know’d he’d never let her have you. You were his blood, after all.”
Lou-May’s eyes grew teary. “Your mama were heartbroken to of lost you.”
“Did you stay with her?” Briana asked.
“No. Weren’t no work for me in these parts, on account of everybody know’d I’d stood up for Carlie against the master of the house. Carlie and Connor couldn’t afford to have me do for them. Still, the folks I went to in Mobile were nice enough. And after them, there were other young’ns to raise.”
