The Dream Runner (2 page)

"Hey," I said, walking up. "I hear you're in the market for a dream."

"Really, I just want to go to sleep and never wake up," she said, and I knew what she was thinking. A knife, maybe, or a bottle of pills.

"What's stopping you?"

"I've got a kid. Although God only knows he's probably better off without me at this point."

"Trust me, he's not," I told her. I know.

"You're the dream runner."

It boggles my mind how they always know, but they do. Of all the people I've delivered dreams to, not one has asked me for ID. I tell them I'm here about their dream request and they accept that as readily as if I came bearing take-out pizza or Chinese.

A small spark lit Mia's eyes, growing into a light. Hope. I hate it when they have hope. Her hand grasped my wrist, cold and dry, the fragile bones visible through the skin. "The Dream Merchant sent you."

I nodded, attempting to appear mysterious and wise. Unfortunately I'm neither, and as hard as I've tried cultivating that look, it never really works.

Her forehead puckered and the full on glare of hope faded a little. "You don't look like I expected."

It's not the first time I'd heard this. People expect a dream runner to materialize like an angel or a genie, or some such. Instead, I'm an ordinary human who rides in on a bike, and aside from my hair, which is jet black and poker straight, there's nothing exotic about my looks.

I sighed, wishing I hadn't been picked for this assignment. "I'm just the dream runner. Sort of a conduit. The Merchant uses me to read you for your memories and your deepest desires, and then designs your dream. I'll deliver it in a couple of days if you can hold on that long. If you're going to kill yourself before then, speak up, because then it's just a waste of time and labor for both of us."

"She's real then? I wasn't entirely sure —"

"In your soul you knew, that's why you called on her. And she hears these things, she really does, but she can't be everywhere at once. So here I am, ready to serve."

"I don't understand how it works."

I shrugged. "Faith, right? It's not like you've got anything to lose."

This was an outright lie. She had plenty to lose; she just didn't know it yet. And I was only saying what she already believed, before she started to doubt. She almost smiled when I said that, and I could see that she had been pretty before she got smacked upside the head with this mess. Hell, she probably got the news from a freaking phone call.

"All right. I'm ready. What do I do?"

"One more thing, before we begin. Standard disclaimer. Are you listening? Because this is important."

"I'm listening." But her eyes weren't on me anymore, or on the grave. She was looking out over the valley, at the town hugging the lakeshore, at the water spread out, silver grey, a silken pool of light.

"No you're not. And this is important."

Her eyes came back to me and I wished I'd left well enough alone. So much grief, and in a minute I was going to find out way more than I wanted to know about her emotional landscape.

I took a deep breath and got back to business. "There will be a price exacted at some time in the future. Are you willing to pay?"

"How much?" Her hand went to her purse, as if I were talking cash, as if money could buy this thing she was about to be given.

"The price will be determined at a future date."

"But—"

"You don't get to know. Somewhere down the road—surprise! The bill shows up, and it probably won't be money that's required."

"I'll give everything," she said, and my heart twisted with a sudden dread. I waited, hoping she'd add a caveat. "Anything but my son," for example. That would be good. But she said nothing.

"Sign here." I handed her a piece of paper and a pen, like she was just signing for a package instead of entering into an agreement that should be written in blood. But the Dream Merchant does what the Dream Merchant does, and I was not in a position to argue.

"What next?"

The process of dream collection is never fun for the runner, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't good for my health—evidence that the Dream Merchant was not interested in my wellbeing. I've always figured there should be an easier way, one that doesn't involve me as middle woman—a Pensieve, for example, a la Harry Potter.

But conduit it was, so I held out my hand and Mia, after a visible hesitation, gave me hers. That was it; I was committed. One touch, and images and sensations rocked through me at lightning speed.
Pain. Fear. An open hand smacks first one cheek and then the other. Once, twice, beyond count. I taste blood. The hand twists in my hair, yanking my head back. My eyes burn with tears, blurring the paunchy face inches from mine. The whites of his eyes are yellowed, his breath so thick with beer, I taste it in on my tongue. He yells a lifetime of obscenities and insults: "Loser. Slob. Bitch. Slut. Worthless. Never amount to anything. Nobody will ever love you."

Each insult cuts a little deeper into my soul and something inside curls up to die. And then there is another face, younger. A smile that just might save me. With the lingering part of myself that stays separate I think of the grave and see where this is going but I can't make it stop. I'm dragged into a loss so deep and devastating it's all I can do to get myself out of bed in the morning.
 

When the reading finally ended it took a minute to put the bits of myself back together, to redraw the line where Mia ended and I began. We were still linked, my hand clamped around hers so hard that her face twisted with pain. Her eyes were closed and I could see the blue shadows under them, the network of veins beneath her skin. I tasted salt and realized there were tears on my face. I'm not much for tears. I never cried at my father's funeral. Nor when my mother's attorney called to tell me she was dead. But I couldn't shake this particular reading. I felt vulnerable and unloved. Even my bones were wrong. My skin crawled with self-hate; if I could have shredded it off with my fingernails to find something lovely beneath, I might have done so, but it wouldn't be enough.

Her reality. Not mine.

For the first time I noticed the thin white lines that marked the underside of her wrist. Scars. Not the deep, lengthwise marks of suicide attempts, but hatch marks of despair and the hatred of her own flesh.

Disengaging my hand from hers, I managed to avoid wiping it on my jeans and stepped back, reclaiming parts of myself as I did so. My own strong bones. Muscles that did what I needed them to do, most of the time. Enough curves to get by with. I've never suffered from that body hate so many girls fall victim to, and living it through Mia had left me shaken. My voice still seemed to be in working condition, no quavers or wobbles, and I delivered my pre-approved spiel.

"Your dream will be ready within a day or two, depending on current demand. I will deliver it in person, into your hands alone. You must promise to keep it to yourself—to share it with no one, and to return it to me when you are through with it. Understood?"

She nodded, her face still so quiet, so empty. "You know where to find my house?"

I didn't. Yet. But by the time the dream was ready to deliver, a file would show up on my phone with information that would make her queasy if she knew I had it. Not just this address, but her previous one. Employers. Family members. Friends. All of the things that would help me track her down if she decided to run. Because dreams are a dangerous business and must be reclaimed when the customer is done with them.

"Well, I should go…" Mia glanced up at me, and away. It's a weird thing being read for a dream, an invasion of the private places in your mind. One of the natural reactions is to put some immediate space between yourself and the person who read you. I've been there. I know.

She opened her mouth to say something else, and then didn't. Head bowed, she stumbled to her car and drove away, leaving me alone with the dead. Since my dead don't rest quietly, they immediately began clamoring for my attention.

Here's the thing about memories: try as I might to resist them, they always get me. Sloshed to the gills or high as a kite; in the middle of sex; driving down a road on a perfect day; waking or sleeping, anytime and anywhere. There is no escape.

I'm sixteen. As the only surviving (or at least present) family member, I'm standing all by myself on one side of a gaping hole in the ground, a coffin poised above it on a contraption of straps and pulleys designed to lower it smoothly into the ground when it's time. Inside the shiny box lies my father, or at least this is what they tell me and I pretty much have to believe. I saw him lying in the box, before they closed the lid. The undertaker, Mr. Jones, didn't want to let me look, but as I pointed out, I'd already seen him dead and mangled, so there was really nothing left to protect me from.

I had thought that was true, until the ridiculous reality of a strong man at rest on satin cushions backhanded me and the tears got me for a minute despite all of my best intentions.

Across from me now the whole town is gathered, or at least it seems so. Their eyes are on me, not the coffin. Watching. Full of questions. What will she do? Why isn't she weeping? Will she collapse when the coffin is lowered into the grave? They whisper and stand hunched in the expected posture of grief, while I throw my shoulders back and hold my head high. Not one of them is going to see tears from me; not today. Grief is a private thing and none of their business.

One face stands out among them all, maybe because he's half a head taller, even at sixteen. His eyes are the only ones I meet and the rush of love and hatred that collide in that moment are a force that nearly drops me. He shouldn't be here, and I'm not sure whether it's relief or anger that I feel.

I won't think about it. Not now. I'm not going to fall apart, not with everybody watching, so I look away, back to the coffin. There are flowers. A wreath of red roses, the color of blood. Some of the petals have fallen off, looking like large blood drops.

Blood.

No. Enough was enough. I pulled myself out of the memories, but an inexorable compulsion, half grief, half guilt, drove me up the hill toward one of the few trees in the place. A landmark. Numb, unfeeling, like an automaton wound up and set in motion, I stumbled between the mounds that marked death and loss and heartache until I found myself stilled in front of a well-tended grave. Somebody had filled the vase—sunflowers, bright and bold, mixed with a few white daisies. The stone was simple, not polished or lacquered, thank all the powers that be, and bore the inscription:

Arthur Vincent Davison

1958-2003

That was it. No
rest in peace
or other platitude, just the bare facts. Something welled up inside me, wanting to get loose. A thick, choking black cloud of heartbreak and rage, clogging my throat, blurring my vision, causing a pain so intense I thought I might break apart if I let it escape. And so, breath by breath, minute by minute, I swallowed it back down where it lay heavy and dangerous in my gut. And then I turned and ran, out of the place that threatened to break me, back to my wheels and my freedom.

Red is my true link to my father. I don't know how he came by a classic Indian in the backwaters where we lived; I had never thought to ask. But all through my childhood, she was there. On Sundays he took her out for rides, polishing her down when he got back before putting her carefully away to wait for their next run. Sometimes he'd take me with him, around the lake, or up into the mountains where the road wound itself in tight curves and we leaned hard around the corners.

She was getting elderly and a little worse for wear, and I felt a twinge of guilt. I'd never coddled her the way my father did. She needed a bath and a tune up, but not as much as I needed to ride. The minute she rumbled into life my skin became truly my own again. I left my helmet off and drove fast, letting the wind cleanse me. It was a wild ride, too fast around the curves, the threat of imminent death and disaster reminding me that I was alive.

 

 

H
alf an hour later,
without any intention of going there, I found myself on the south side of the lake where the curves are sharp and the road is narrow and there is very little traffic. This was the place where it happened, where my whole world fell apart in a single night. The place where the hate and rage took root for the very first time.

Red had betrayed me by bringing me here, joining the hometown conspiracy to make me feel, make me remember.

I stopped on the gravel pullout, my mouth desert dry, my insides quaking. The bike continued to rumble and shake and all I had to do was hit the throttle and release the clutch and keep moving. Over and over again, I played out this scenario in my mind, telling myself to get out of here.
Go. Just go
. But instead I turned off the engine, flipped down the kickstand and dismounted.

No signs remained of that fatal night. No skid marks on either concrete or gravel. Willows grow fast, and there was no lingering sign of the space cleared through the undergrowth by a vehicle hurtling over the edge of the pullout and down into the lake.

Fear nearly immobilized me, and that's when my anger kicked back in. One of the things about me, for good or evil, is that if I'm scared to do something I'm pretty much guaranteed to give it a try. So I took some deep breaths and forced my feet to move, even though my heart was carrying on as if I was eighty-five and about to die of a heart attack.

The bank was steep and I grabbed onto a willow branch to avoid sliding down on my ass, using half exposed roots as footholds. Branch to branch, I managed to make my way down to a small expanse of gravel at the edge of the lake. There was just enough wind to rumple the surface and send small waves plashing up against the shore. A blackbird trilled, and I could see him swaying on a cattail off to the right. The lake smell was stronger here, as much sensation as scent, reminiscent of long sun filled days in and out of the water.