Cathedral of Dreams

by Terry Persun

  He shook his head and looked up toward the thin strip of sky between the buildings. How had he come to be there? He glanced down at his hands, turning them, looking at them. He was not the same person he was only an hour ago. An hour. How could that be?

  He pushed up from his crouched position and rubbed some of the chill out of his arms. There wasn't anything to do but to enter this new world where he found himself and see where it led. His resolve to go back into the streets came from a place he didn't recognize. The Keith who lived in Newcity would not have stepped into the change so easily – or would he? After all, he had followed the boy into the dark interior of the building, the complex. He had let Nellie stay with him, even though she was not what he'd asked for in a companion. Had he been breaking down for some time now? The last time he had had a feeling of dread, was that the first time? Why couldn't he remember what happened?

  He advanced toward the street, hands in his pockets. Beyond him stood a world that filled him with a feeling of dread. So there it was. It stared back at him in defiance of what he'd awakened from, of what he'd done, his escape into his own fear. That's all it could be. He had been afraid of noise and people if they were around too much, and now he was forced into it. He wasn't escaping anything; he was facing something.

  He glanced at his wrist, but there was no terminal. Time was irrelevant anyway. What order was there now? Where did he have to be?

  He entered the motion of the streets, heard the noises of the machines, the voices of the people. His heart longed for understanding, but his mind went deeper into question. Keith found that the strange new place was not as frightening as he once thought it would be. That was as long as the people ignored him. In that way it was like Newcity.

  He was careful not to bump into anyone, start no confrontation. Instead, he became extremely vigilant in his awareness. He noticed police among the people, who were mostly men and a few women, even fewer children. Stores lined the streets and often had their goods spilling onto the sidewalk under awnings low enough to hit his head if he didn't duck. Even in the rain, products sat on dirty shelves waiting to be sold.

  Keith walked for a long time, aimlessly. He became colder as the light from the sky dimmed and the vendors began to pull their goods back into the hollow eyes of the buildings. One by one, the stores closed and the traffic decreased, both foot traffic and machine traffic, cars, trucks, police vehicles.

  Hunger gripped him with arms of steel. He began to look for another alley to sleep in that night, somewhere closed in, secure from the wind and possibly the rain if it came again, which it looked like it might.

  As the last of the stores locked down, the pedestrians remaining in the streets looked shabbier than ealier. Those with homes departed to them, and those without homes, like Keith, roamed the streets looking for a place to sleep. Many of the alleys were already occupied.

  When he stepped into an alley that looked empty he heard someone shout, “Get out of here.” He bolted away and decided that he could sleep in a doorway of one of the stores if he had to. He'd be more exposed, but it would be out of the rain if he were on the right side of the street.

  As despair set in, Keith continued to lower his standards. Even the doorways were being taken over. He could curl around a parked car or a lamppost.

  Searching the area for the right place to spend the night, he glimpsed what looked like the boy and girl. Amazed that after all this time he could still see them, he ran toward the images. He didn't care if they were an illusion or not, if they could lead him out of his present dilemma, he'd follow them to the edge of the world.

  They weren't looking in his direction, so he advanced as inconspicuously as possible. They scurried across the street up ahead and he jogged along his side of the street until he could cross safely. The girl stood a few feet over the boy's head and reduced her stride to keep pace with the boy. The lump on her back bounced with buoyancy, which caused Keith to wonder what it was. He imagined a fleshy breast-like mound, loose, unrestrained. His face wrinkled at the thought. He could understand why the doctor would be curious about the illusions and how they were being produced inside the Newcity complex. Keith wondered about his two as well. But more importantly, why had they not faded? Why were there two of them?

  Thinking pulled his attention from the issue at hand and he lost sight of them. Stopping, he turned completely around. The sensation of fire shot through his nervous system. He ran a few feet in one direction, then turned and ran a few more feet in another. He focused the best he could, then ran back to where he last recalled seeing them. Rushing around a small group of men, Keith traversed the sidewalk and swiveled around a corner on the balls of his feet. He stopped abruptly. The sky opened into a larger view. Buildings squatted shorter and looked more similar, one after another. He turned back. The change in scenery was abrupt.

  The wider sky made him feel exposed. But he only had a moment to let it affect him, for he saw the boy with the bullet hole in his forehead walk behind a parked car. The girl was there too. Her lips moved and she raised her head to look at Keith.

  He ran toward them. “Wait. Please. I need your help.”

  They stayed where they were. He was shocked that they didn't run ahead, instead feeling relieved and satisfied. When he reached them, his legs were tired. He bent down and panted, “Thank you. Thank you so much. I don't know what to do, where to go. I'm hungry. Tired.”

  When Keith looked up, the boy stood in front of him. Hair hung down over the boy's forehead covering the hole. He looked familiar. For the first time, there was something about the boy that made Keith want to vomit. “What is this? Why are you doing this?” He fell to his knees. The rough road surface stabbed at his skin, running pain up his legs. He reached, but the boy stepped out of the way.

  It was like looking into the face of his younger self. The illusion had taken on the appearance of him as a child. Keith whimpered until he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  He rubbed his face with the back of his hand and then pushed the heels of his palms into his eye sockets as if trying to wipe the images away. “This can't be true,” he said while looking up at the girl who stood over him, expecting her to look like him as well, or Nellie, someone familiar. But she didn't take on any of those appearances. She had her own look. But he had been mistaken about her age. Her face was strong and experienced. There were traces of wrinkles around her eyes. It was her small frame that had him believing that she was younger than he was.

  “We need to go,” she said.

  Keith's mind filled with questions, worries, anger at what was happening, but he kept it all inside, and closed it off like lowering the lid of a box. “Who are you?” Keith demanded an answer.

  The girl looked at the boy with the bullet hole in his forehead.

  The boy's mouth opened and the whisper was barely audible. “She's your angel.”

  Chapter 8

  The girl slid her fingers down Keith's arm and took his hand. She waited for the boy to lead. Pulling Keith along behind her, the angel went next.

  He allowed himself to be dragged along. His breathing was labored and his legs became heavy. His eyes closed every few steps. He wanted to stop and rest. Thankfully, the three of them moved slowly now, letting him clomp along behind them, splashing through puddles, the bottoms of his pants legs becoming soaked as they progressed.

  The soft grip of the angel's hand barely made his senses aware that it was even there. The slightest pressure held to him, as though she were just letting go. But it held, it held in that place of not holding. He found that his thoughts went quickly to the two of them, the angel and the boy, as illusions, and how unphysical they were. The physical senses were there, but like memories, they weren't real, and they were flighty.

  They didn't walk far before they turned up a sidewalk toward one of the houses. “They won't find us here,” the angel said.

  Keith gave her a slight grin. “Who's looking for us?”

  “For you. You know,”
she said.

  “Newcity.” He let the word slip out, fall over his lips and into the air.

  The three of them entered the house. The walls and ceiling were painted white, like his apartment in Newcity. Furniture had been strategically placed into a semicircle pointing toward a television. There was something ordinary and familiar about the house. Any anxiety he held had been dispersed through his exhaustion and the comfort he felt standing there.

  “Lie down,” the boy whispered.

  He didn't have to tell Keith a second time. Although he wondered who lived in the house and what would the people think when they saw him sleeping there, his exhaustion permitted him to shelve those thoughts and to lie down as he was told. He pulled a loose cushion from the back of the sofa and placed it under his head.

  Keith's entire body felt as though it had been sucked into the sofa. He had the sensation of falling. His hands and feet felt heavy and tingling. His breathing stretched to uncomfortable lengths then became easier, then easier, then — sleep.

  As he slowly became conscious, he heard someone moving around in the room, a muffled sound of clothes rubbing, the chair adjusting to weight. How long had he been asleep? He didn't stir even though his limbs ached with disuse. His wrists and ankles would crack if he rotated them. And he wanted to, but he didn't move a bit. He hoped that the person making the noise would say something or do something. He hoped that it was someone other than the boy with the bullet hole in his forehead or the angel. He hoped the illusions were gone, that everything had run its course and he was back to normal — as normal as he could be.

  Keith heard breathing and wondered if the illusions breathed. He had not noticed before. He heard motion, as though the person was shifting his legs, crossing one way to another. He sensed that whoever it was, was sitting in a chair adjacent to him at the foot of the sofa, perhaps watching him, or keeping an eye on him so that he didn't go anywhere.

  He remembered, just prior to nodding off, what the boy had said about being safe in the house. He didn't understand why Newcity would want him back, why they'd be after him unless it was to ask more questions, to learn more about the boy and girl. And with those thoughts came the logical concern of, what was happening with Newcity?

  “I know you're awake.” It was a man's voice, and not a whisper. The voice had a strength to it, like it was being pushed out a physical mouth and not through a wall or whispered with your head turned away.

  “Why are you watching me?” Keith said. He didn't open his eyes, but did move his arms and legs. His wrists and ankles cracked as he had expected. He began to lift from the sofa and his back snapped as well. He recognized all the stiffness as being there because he'd slept so deeply. He swung his legs over the sofa's edge and placed his feet on the carpet. He hunched over, his back rounded, his face looking at the floor. Then he opened his eyes and took in the legs and feet of the person sitting in the chair. Tan pants, brown shoes.

  Keith raised his gaze and looked directly into the face of his father. His chest tightened. He knew that man. Not just his features and appearance, but the way he felt, breathed, his presence. More than a physical being, there was an aura of authenticity about him.

  “There, that wasn't so bad was it?” the man said.

  Keith shook his head in disbelief. He didn't know what emotions he was supposed to have, but a sadness ran through his veins like he had never known before. The loss of a loved one was his first thought about the feeling. And it was true. His second thought was a memory of being told that his father had died. With that thought, the room fell into a new space, that of despair and loss.

  “I don't understand,” Keith said.

  His father laughed. “I'm not surprised. How could you understand? You've just recently arrived.”

  “Are you an illusion too?”

  “Too?”

  “Like the boy with the bullet hole in his forehead and the angel?” Keith meant to be specific. He stared. His father struck him to be real. There was a few days' stubble on his face and his gray eyes appeared moist, like someone living. The man's hair was graying along the sides, short, but full and thick. His hands rested on the armrests of the chair and his legs were placed squarely in front of him.

  “I'd rather be called a spirit, or at worst an apparition,” his father said.

  Keith fingered where the chip had been in his arm. The area around the stitches bulged red and itched. “Shouldn't I be through with the illusions?” The thought brought back feelings of fatigue, then disbelief. He looked down. His pants had dried. His shoes felt stiff and his feet clammy. “Am I still in Newcity? Did I go crazy? The more I think about it…”

  “Just listen,” his father interrupted.

  Keith stopped. He started to stand.

  “Stay where you are.”

  “All right, but you've got to tell me what's going on.” Keith tried on his firmest voice, his most assertive look, but his father didn't flinch.

  The man leaned forward. “I don't know what's going on with you. But, I do know that somehow you can see me and hear me. Son,” the man's voice softened, “I died nearly thirty years ago. Things are different for me now. It's something I can't explain, so I won't try. It's ineffable. Think of it as an ineffable goodness. I'm here to warn you to be careful. It's going to be difficult for you to know who to trust.”

  “I don't understand any of this. If it's so good for you now, why do I feel such sadness being here with you?”

  “You feel sadness, I don't. But listen, things are about to change. They're coming for you.”

  Keith's eyes widened and he began to rise again.

  His father held out his hand and motioned for him to stay seated. “Not Newcity, but the people who live out here. They know when someone goes free. But rest assured there are always those who are happy to go inside.” He shook his head in disbelief. “Just like there are those who would rather sleep than be in the world. Even in this world, most have remained asleep to what's truly here, the beauty, the multitude of senses.”

  Keith waited for his father to speak again, but a knock came to the door. The sound caused his father, the most physical of the three illusions, to waver and shift.

  “When I'm needed, call me,” he said as he disappeared.

  Keith didn't know what to do, so he rose to his feet and started to walk around the sofa. But those who were behind the door opened it and rushed inside. Five men and women came at him and he cowered in fear, pulling his hands close to his chest and tucking his chin in. His first thought was to wonder how these people could find him when the Newcity police could not, but he didn't ask. He waited to find out what they wanted.

  From behind the first few people came a familiar voice, a woman who broke through the others and wrapped her arms around him and held him. His mother's completely gray hair stopped at her shoulders. Her clothes were rumpled and old. Her eyes sagged. Her frame felt frail and weak.

  Keith didn't know how to react. She didn't feel as familiar as his father, yet she was the most real. She was real. He checked himself, and there was no sense of sadness. “Then…” he looked around at the others.

  His mother shook her head. “No, your brother and sister are in there,” she pointed toward the outside city he had just left, but Keith knew what she meant — Newcity.

  She reached for the closest man. “This is Roger.” She pointed to the others one at a time. “William. And this is Sam.” She switched to the other woman, “And Sandra.” Everyone nodded as they were introduced. They all looked older than Keith by at least ten years, his mother by much more than that. But Keith had seen so few older people that he couldn't guess at her age, not that it mattered.

  “Come with us,” Roger said, “we'd better go. There's a lot to be done.”

  “Where are we going? Is there food?” Even in the excitement, Keith's hunger had returned as a burning, almost nauseating fact.

  “Of course,” William said. “And you can meet the others.”

  �
�The others?” Keith wasn't used to so many people gathered around him, touching him as though he had asked them to. As he was ushered outside into the night and down the sidewalk toward a large van, he felt himself get angry.

  “Not many,” William said. “Most of those who get out of the complex don't make it past the doctor before they're re-chipped and back in service.”

  “In service?” Keith questioned.

  Roger opened the van door and Keith edged in between Sam and William. His mother rode in the front with Roger, and Sandra sat in a broad seat behind the three men.

  “Could you not sit so close?” Keith asked.

  “Still doesn't want to be touched,” Sandra said. “That'll change soon enough.”

  Keith didn't know what she meant, but the two men scooted away to give him more room. His anger abated and he relaxed for the ride. Since he had never been inside a motor vehicle before, he eased into the motion except when there was a jolt or bounce.