In Between Dreams (31 page)

Halene paced, and Sam and Bailey tried to keep their thoughts to themselves as they watched her. Bailey had heard folklore similar to what Halene explained but never believed anything like that could be real. They were living proof of what she had believed was an urban legend.

“People like Albert Einstein and Mahatma Gandhi.” Halene mentioned the familiar names to help them understand. “Chances are they had ordinary shadows of their own.”

Halene motioned to her body: “
This
is my shadow.” She pointed to Bailey, then to Sam: “Those are yours. They resemble your body. But it’s not exactly you. Unlike you, when you are not inside of them, they do not have your same mental abilities. For the mental abilities they lack, though, they have physical abilities. Daniel’s shadow is strong, Bailey’s is agile, Sam’s is flexible, and I am quick.”

Bailey looked down at her tan skin and ran her fingers through her short hair. She thought of Seattle Bailey’s pale skin and her long hair. She looked at Sam, who felt his thin arms. She remembered Seattle Sam’s biceps. There were slight differences, little hints that this wasn’t their body. That this wasn’t actually them.

“Are you saying—” Sam started to speak. He didn’t know exactly what to ask next. There was a shadow of him, another person out there who looked exactly like him. It was a hard thing for him to understand. It didn’t seem normal. But it wasn’t normal. Though no other explanation seemed to exist, either. “So everyone has a shadow?”

“No,” Halene disagreed urgently. “Only people who were born with an extraordinary mental talent. When a person has extreme talent from their birth, nature recognizes it and creates a shadow. A possible loophole to the shadow is that the extraordinary soul, or consciousness, can leap from body to body,” Halene explained. “Or maybe it wasn’t a loophole; maybe the point of the shadow was to always have the possibility,” Halene thought aloud.

“Why can’t we control it?” Sam asked suddenly. He was pulling at his hair in aggravation.

“You can,” Halene explained. “You just need to learn
how
.”

Halene wiped her hand over her face. “Where was I?” she mumbled to herself. “Yes, the point I tried to make was that for people who have gifts like us, nature, whether accidentally or otherwise, has created an outlet for us to help a multitude of people—not just the people in our little corner of the world. Not to mention, when our mental capabilities combine with our shadows physical capabilities, it creates kind of an unstoppable force.”

Bailey’s confusion displayed on her face. She didn’t feel special. There was nothing about her that led her to believe she deserved this
ability. Sure, she could comfort people. But how was that extraordinary? She didn’t think of her gift as anything exceptional.

“Sam,” Halene said, and looked at him, smiling. “You’re interesting, because you’re a gifted linguist. You were able speak in full sentences before the age of one, right?”

Sam nodded slowly, and his eyes widened. He wouldn’t be surprised by anything anymore. Not after everything he had heard. But Halene seemed to continually say something that managed to surprise him. “You were born with this ability—this ability to learn languages and communication skills quicker than anyone else. That is what makes you extraordinary.”

“Bailey,” Halene looked at her friend, her mentor, the comfort. “You don’t even realize that just your presence calms a person. You walk into a room, and everyone in it breathes a sigh of relief. Your ability is more than comfort: it’s an energy. It’s almost mystical. It’s not the words you choose, it’s how you say the things you say. I bet, even as a baby, you could calm the other babies’ cries with only a look.”

Bailey didn’t know what to say. Her mom had always said Bailey had a gift. Ann had asked Bailey to become a therapist, use her obscure gift for good.
“When your friends would cry, their moms would rush to their side, and they would scream and ask for you,”
Ann would tell Bailey.

“For me,” Halene stated almost dully, as if it bored her to speak about herself. “I’ve always known the best way to do something, from puzzles to math problems. I know what should be done next. I always have.” Halene smiled shyly. “I’m kind of a child prodigy back home in Georgia. I’ve already graduated high school. I’m taking college classes now.”

This was quite a feat for a girl at the age of twelve. It made so much sense to Bailey that Halene seemed so young yet so smart at the same time. Halene was an exceptional person. There was no doubt about it.

Bailey clapped her hands together in excitement. “Halene!” she squealed. “That’s amazing.”

“Way to go, Haley,” Sam agreed.

Halene giggled bashfully. “It’s nothing. What I love is being part of this group and working these missions with y’all. Using my gift to help
people means so much more to me then graduating high school four years early.”

Bailey smiled at Halene widely. She felt a sense of pride, similar to what a tutor might feel in the success of a student. Even though Bailey knew that she didn’t have anything to do with Halene’s success in school, Bailey felt strongly that she helped people too. They were all helping people. Real people. It made all of her struggles with her sleeping disorder worth it.

She reached over to Sam and squeezed his hand, overwhelmed with love for everyone in that room. She felt love for others that weren’t in that room as well. Daniel. Rodney. The absence of them weighed heavily on Bailey’s heart suddenly. She felt abandoned without them in the room for the discussion. Daniel and Rodney—they were the people who should have been explaining this to her with Halene. That truth seemed to be held above all other truths in those moments.

She swallowed the feeling of sadness. Daniel was in surgery, and she didn’t know where Rodney was. She didn’t know why he stopped going on the missions. Maybe he got too old for it. But she knew she needed to find him. She knew Halene wasn’t the person to ask about him, though. There were some questions Daniel would have to answer for her.

“How do you pull us into these dreams?” Sam asked. The feeling of togetherness seemed to slip out of the room just as quickly as it had appeared. It was still there, only fainter then before.

“I wake up at the mission, like you two do,” Halene said with a shrug. “There are a lot of pieces to this I don’t fully understand.”

“And the movie?” Bailey asked, still thoroughly baffled.

“I don’t understand the movie,” Halene admitted. “It was before my time. But it’s my understanding that if we’re in the middle of a mission, it will help you transfer consciousness. It triggers the passageway for the transference. But I have nothing to do with it. Daniel and I don’t use it.”

Sam put his head in his hands. He stared at the floor in deep concentration. “This is weird. This is all really weird.” Sam couldn’t think of another word to describe it. “Weird” seemed to be the only word that fit.

A doctor with a white coat walked into the room with a clipboard. Sam stood up hastily and walked to where the man stood in two long strides. Sam and the doctor spoke back and forth in Mandarin while Bailey and Halene listened in. Bailey felt her heart tighten in anticipation. Not knowing what the doctor said made her mind race.

Was Daniel okay? Was that even Daniel in surgery? Or his shadow? Who is his shadow? What was happening? What was the doctor saying? He had to be okay, right? He had to be.

Sam turned, his face calm, almost detached.

“What’s he saying?” Halene asked, standing in expectancy. The anxiety froze Bailey to her seat, she unable to move or breath. She willed Sam to say something. Anything.

“Daniel is in the ICU,” Sam explained, his voice soothing. “He’s out of surgery. There were a few complications. Now all we can do is wait.”

“Wait for what, exactly?” Halene asked hesitantly.

“Wait for him to wake up,” Sam said, his eyes on Bailey, gauging her reaction.

Bailey head dipped slowly in a soft nod. “He’ll be okay,” she said. But she also didn’t know if the man lying in the ICU was really Daniel. Bailey turned to Halene. “Are we sure that’s Daniel? He could be home, right? His home?”

“That’s a really good point,” Halene said. She pulled a phone out of her back pocket, dialing a number anxiously.

Bailey woke up in her bed, her eyes opened lightly at first and then they went wide. She sat up in a panic. She looked and saw Sam was still asleep. Why had she woken up
then
?

Tears filled her eyes, and she beat on Sam’s chest for him to wake up. She collapsed in tears over him. She felt like a piece of her was missing. What had happened to Daniel? Halene called him and then, what? She had just woken up? Why? Was the anxiety too much?

Bailey wiped her tears to make room for new ones. She laid her head on Sam’s chest and whimpered, hoping he’d wake and tell her everything was okay.

She took a deep breath, attempting to compose herself and walked into the bathroom. She couldn’t stop herself from crying. She splashed water on her face to stop herself from crying. She couldn’t.

The worry for Daniel was so intense that she couldn’t get a grip of herself.

It was no use. Now that she knew it was all real, she knew Daniel’s life had really been in danger. And even if Daniel was okay, what if his shadow wasn’t? Would she never see him again? She didn’t know how exactly it worked, but she knew that this was a real risk. She couldn’t imagine not seeing Daniel again.

She gritted her teeth together, angry at herself for crying over Daniel, especially while Sam was in her bed. But she couldn’t help it. She cared for them both so much. She couldn’t imagine losing either of them.

When she made her way back into the bedroom, her crying had slowed. She looked up and saw Sam sitting up. She ran to him and threw her arms around him. “Sam,” she uttered.

He pulled her into a tight hug. “He’s okay,” Sam said knowingly. “He answered when Halene called. He’s home. He wanted to call her but couldn’t remember the number of the burner phone she used.”

Bailey breathed out a weakened breath and pulled him closer. The feeling of accomplishment pulsed through her veins like adrenaline. Mei was safe. Daniel was safe. For the moment, that’s all she could ask for.

twenty-two.

“I
t’s nice not having to deal with sleep attacks,” Sam noted as Bailey closed her laptop. “I know it’s only been a month. But now that we know when they’re coming we can plan for them.”

Bailey thought about Sam’s words. She gazed toward the window, thinking about Daniel. She still hadn’t heard from him since she and Sam had woke in Seattle. Sam and Halene had spoken multiple times, but Daniel was MIA. The idea of being able to contact Halene was still strange to Bailey. She left the contact up to Sam. Sam and Halene would speak on the phone at least once a week. Whenever he had a new question or just wanted to see how she was doing, he’d give her a call. Bailey hadn’t gotten used to it quite yet.

As for Daniel, Bailey knew he had made it through surgery. Or Daniel’s shadow had. But as for hearing from Daniel, there hadn’t been much. Halene told them Daniel would call when he was ready. The stress of their time in China had gotten to him in a way that she had never seen before. Halene said he had quit his drinking or at least slowed it down. That was a sign he was shaken up according to Halene. Daniel also told Halene he needed time to process; he needed to put together his thoughts before he could tell Bailey and Sam everything that he knew. What upset Bailey the most about the situation was the whys. Why had she been kept in the dark for so long? Why keep it a secret? Why did Daniel need time to “process.” She felt like the questions could eat her up from the inside out.

Sam had the worst situation in his Seattle life. He went on missions less then the other members because he was a translator, which wasn’t a job that was needed for every mission. And unlike Bailey, he wasn’t able to overcome his sleeping disorder with as much ease. He had never had a career or any lasting relationships, and his family was beginning to think he was faking the whole thing. He needed an account of why he was left out. He needed to know what the point was of the secrecy. His time of working in menial jobs without purpose felt like an open wound.

Bailey stood from her small desk in her studio apartment and walked over to the kitchen. She leaned against the counter and watched Sam as he stirred pasta into boiling water. “Seriously, this would have been nice to know years ago,” Bailey mentioned.

Sam’s jaw tightened in an obvious sign of controlled anger. Bailey could see a mild crease in his cheek denoting the tension over this raw subject. Sam shook some salt into the pot and put a wooden spoon into another pot. He stirred briefly before bringing the spoon to Bailey’s mouth. “Open up,” he said, changing the subject.

Bailey couldn’t help but smile at Sam. He was so cute when he was cooking. She opened her mouth to taste Sam’s specialty sauce. Her face lit up as it touched her tongue. “You’ve outdone yourself,” she said after swallowing. She opened her mouth for more, and Sam shook his head. She pouted playfully until he brought another spoonful to her mouth. “What is the secret, Mr. Morris?” she asked in her best reporter voice. “The people of Seattle are dying to know.”

“Shallots instead of onions,” he said dryly. “Any good chef knows that.”

She bumped her shoulder into his and he put his arm around her waist. “I would attempt to remember that if I knew or wanted to know how to cook,” Bailey teased.

“So that’s why you keep me around?” he said with his eyebrow arched. “So you’ll get fed?”

“I would starve without you,” she said. She turned to him and pulled on his waist, prompting him to mirror her stance. She ran her hand through his hair and stood on her toes so she was at his height. She was
done joking with him. Bailey knew that Sam was so much more than the man who cooked for her. “You sleeping over tonight?”

“I was planning on it,” Sam answered causally, a light content smile on his face. Their comfort level had increased in the months since they’d met. Sam stayed over at her house a couple times a week. They both loved that they having someone to share their nights with. A concept that was foreign to both of them. Bailey had never felt comfortable enough with a boyfriend to have him stay the night.