The House of Sleep (6 page)

In any case she was excited, there was no denying it: for they had just made an important discovery. They had stumbled upon an explanation for something which had been baffling Sarah for the last five years or more. They had discovered, that very morning, that she could not tell the difference between her dreams and her memories of real life.

‘Tell me about these dreams,’ Gregory was saying. ‘Tell me how long this has been happening.’

And so Sarah took a deep breath, and told him.

∗

It had started, she said, when she was fourteen or fifteen years old. She was unhappy at school, had frequent problems
finishing her homework, and lived in particular fear of her History teacher, one Mr Mountjoy. At the end of one difficult evening, having found herself completely incapable of writing an essay on the causes of the Franco-Prussian War – an essay which she was supposed to read out in class the next day –she had gone to bed in tears, resolved in her desperation either to bunk off school the next morning or to feign illness of some sort. But instead she awoke to an immediate sensation of light-heartedness, with a pristine memory of having written the essay, and having written it, she knew, to a high standard: she could visualize it in her exercise book, four and a half sides long, several crossings-out on page three but otherwise neat and presentable, the title double-underlined in red ink and with even a few footnotes thrown in at the end to give it a scholarly sheen. And it was not until almost half past eleven that same day, the first period after break, when she opened her exercise book just before being called up to address the class, that she discovered that this essay, incredibly, did not exist. That was the conclusion she finally came to, at any rate: at first she thought she must have made some foolish mistake and written it in another book, and she searched frantically through her briefcase, looking at her English, Geography and French books, her panic mounting so visibly and audibly that Mr Mountjoy had to interrupt the current reader in mid-flow and ask what was the matter. She explained that she must have left the essay in her locker and asked permission to go and fetch it: which was granted; but a search of her Maths, German, Physics and Biology books in the unaccustomed silence of the deserted locker-room still failed to produce the vital essay; and then, seized by a bewilderment bordering on hysteria, she had fled the school building altogether and run to the municipal park where, head in hands, she had tried in vain to make sense of this sequence of events and began to wonder seriously, for the first time, whether she was going mad. The essay never turned up and she was put in detention that week (Mr Mountjoy not believing a word of her story):
and while everybody else forgot the incident, Sarah did not forget it, and never spoke about it to anyone, even though she went on to experience other, similar misadventures at irregular intervals over the next few years. Once, a few terms later, she had bitterly reproved her best friend Angela for failing to meet her at a prearranged time outside the swimming baths: Angela denied that such a rendezvous had ever been suggested, and the argument led to a rift between them which was never quite healed. There was another occasion, too, when Sarah baffled her family by stopping off at the chemist’s on her way home from school, and bringing back-in response, she insisted, to a specific request from her mother – six tubes of smoker’s toothpaste, ten sachets of pot pourri and at least a year’s supply of suppositories.

Although too ashamed to admit it even to her closest friends or family, Sarah became convinced that she was the victim of delusions: vivid, uncontrollable flights of the imagination which at first she had no reason to connect with her dreams (since the dreams she could remember usually had little to do with reality, but tended, like everyone else’s, towards the grotesque and fantastic: she often had nightmares about snakes, for instance, and even worse ones about frogs). It was only that morning on the terrace, with Gregory’s help, that the truth had suddenly come to light. And although Sarah had been upset by their argument the night before, in another sense she was grateful for it: because it was this argument, and its strange consequences, that had finally unlocked the door of the mystery.

The trouble had begun the previous afternoon, when Gregory told Sarah that they were both invited out to a birthday dinner being given at a local restaurant (yet to be decided upon) by a fellow medical student: someone called Ralph, whom Gregory himself did not, it seemed, know particularly well. Sarah asked if she had been included in this invitation by name, and Gregory was forced to admit that she hadn’t: as far as he was aware, Ralph didn’t know that they
were lovers, and had merely told Gregory that he could bring along a friend, if he wished. That figures, said Sarah. Gregory asked her to explain this remark: and she told him that she used to be friendly with Ralph until an embarrassing episode that had taken place a few months ago, following which they hadn’t spoken.

‘You know that fish restaurant down by the harbour?’ she said. ‘The Planetarium?’ (It was called that because of the domed ceiling over the main dining-room, on to which a local artist had recently painted a large nocturnal skyscape.) ‘Well, he invited me there once. Just me and his parents, who were down for the weekend. God knows why I was singled out for this honour: I think he may have had a bit of a crush on me. Anyway, it was a Saturday night, and it was very crowded, and towards the end of the meal, just as we were having coffee, I started to feel really ill. I mean
really
ill. I think it must have been the mussels. I went to the loo and thought I was going to be sick but nothing happened: so then I went back upstairs and everyone was getting ready to leave, and I was still feeling really terrible, but still, we got our coats and then we all stood on the restaurant steps saying goodbye. His parents were going back to their hotel in town, you see. Anyway, there we all were, chatting and saying goodbye, and then suddenly I
knew
I was going to be sick. Any second. And sure enough, right in the middle of the conversation, without any warning, I just buckled over and threw up all over the steps and the pavement. There it was, my entire meal, splashed all over the steps of the restaurant for everyone to see. And the amazing thing was, Ralph and his parents
never stopped talking.
I mean, that’s real breeding for you, isn’t it? They just carried on as if nothing had happened. The only thing Ralph’s mother did was to pass me a Kleenex, so I could wipe my mouth. And then they just chatted on for a couple more minutes, arranging what they were going to do the next day, and then they kissed him goodnight, and then his father leaned over to kiss
me
goodnight, and just as he did that it happened
again, I suddenly felt sick and before I knew what was happening I was throwing up all over the steps again, only this time half of it went over his father’s trousers and shoes as well. And still, you know, they never batted an eyelid. Never said a word. And then his parents thanked him for a lovely evening, or something, and off they went in one direction, and we went off in another, and all he said to me was, “Are you O K now?” in this really cold tone of voice. So then we got into a taxi and went back on to campus, and we didn’t even kiss goodnight or anything. I got the impression he thought the whole thing was quite funny, in a nasty sort of way, because his parents were posh, and I wasn’t, and he thought I’d given an amusing demonstration of how the lower orders behaved in front of their betters.’

‘No, you’re doing him an injustice,’ said Gregory. ‘I don’t know Ralph very well, but I’m sure he’d never take that kind of attitude.’

‘Then why has he never spoken to me since?’

Gregory had no answer for this, but spent most of the next few hours reassuring Sarah that it was safe for her to come out to the dinner. At a quarter to eight, all the same, when they arrived outside Ralph’s hall of residence on campus, she was still expressing doubts.

‘What if he’s taking everyone to the same restaurant?’

‘What if he is?’

‘Well, that would just be so embarrassing, wouldn’t it?’

‘I can’t help thinking you’re making a bit much of this, Sarah.’ They were climbing the staircase by now.

‘That’s easy for you to say. The point is that I know, I just
know,
that this whole thing has become a big joke with his friends. I can just imagine him telling them all that story and having a big laugh about it. It’ll be a standing joke with them.’

‘That is nonsense,’ said Gregory emphatically. They had arrived in Ralph’s corridor. ‘I am training to be a psychiatrist, Sarah. A specialist in the workings of the human mind. And if I know anything at all about human nature, I can guarantee
that he won’t have mentioned the matter to another soul. All this is just another example of your paranoia and persecution complex.’ Stopping outside Ralph’s room, he snatched down a note that had been pinned to the door, and read it aloud. ‘Ralph’s friends,’ he read. ‘Meet eight-thirty, at The Vomitarium.’

And it was at this point that Gregory’s and Sarah’s versions of events started to diverge; although it only became apparent the next morning, when Sarah awoke, quite early, to find that Gregory was no longer lying in bed beside her. She got up and drew back the curtains. Looking down, she saw him sitting on the terrace, staring out to sea, wearing his thick blue greatcoat which he had buttoned up tightly.

Sarah pulled on some clothes and went down to the kitchen, where she made two mugs of coffee. She carried them outside, gaining access to the terrace through the French windows in the television room.

‘Here you are,’ she said, putting his mug down on the table next to the notebook in which he had been writing. ‘You look freezing. Is anything the matter?’

‘I couldn’t sleep,’ he said, sipping the coffee gratefully. ‘In fact, I had a terrible night’s sleep last night.’

‘Oh?’

‘Yes. You kept waking me up.’

‘How do you mean?’ said Sarah.

‘You kept me awake. You were somniloquizing.’

‘I was what?’

‘Somniloquizing. Talking in your sleep.’

‘I don’t do that.’

‘Well, last night you did.’

‘Really? What was I saying?’

‘Oh, I don’t know.’ He gave a massive, elongated yawn, and frowned. ‘Something about a cottage by a river, I think.’

‘How peculiar.’

‘Very.’ Slowly, the coffee began to revive him, and he asked: ‘So, how did you enjoy yourself yesterday, in the end?’

‘It was all right,’ said Sarah, after a rather surprised pause.

‘I liked Harriet, I must say,’ Gregory prompted.

‘Harriet?’

‘Yes. Amusing girl, I thought. Made the evening go with a bit of a swing.’

‘Who is she?’

Gregory glanced at her; an impatient look. ‘Harriet. Ralph’s new girlfriend. You were sitting next to her all evening.’

‘Sitting next to her? Where?’

‘At the restaurant.’

Sarah blew along the surface of her coffee. She decided that he was playing some boring game. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Look,’ said Gregory, exasperated. ‘It was just a remark. I don’t have to be punished for it, do I – just for saying something complimentary about another woman?’

‘Well, since I’ve never met the woman in question, I’m scarcely in a position to comment.’

Gregory turned on her. ‘I’m talking about
last night,
Sarah. I’m talking about the woman you sat next to, and had a conversation with,
all evening.’

Without another word Sarah stood up, turned, and disappeared from the terrace, leaving Gregory to glower and sip his coffee, sulkily assuming that he had breached some unspoken piece of boyfriend-girlfriend protocol. When she came back about ten minutes later, she looked worried and apologetic. She slid carefully into the seat beside him and said:

‘This is going to sound very strange, I know, but I have no memory at all of going to the restaurant with you last night. I have my own memory of what happened, and it’s completely different.’

Gregory watched her intently.

‘For the last few years, ever since I was a teenager, every now and again I’ve had these peculiar experiences. I remember things differently from how they happened. I imagine things.
I make things up. I don’t know how it happens. I’ve never told anybody about it. You’re the first person. I’m telling you now’ – she looked at him, and her voice began to quiver –‘because I trust you. Because I love you.’

Gregory pursed his lips: for a moment she thought he was going to kiss her. Instead he picked up his pen, then opened his notebook again and flicked eagerly to the first blank page.

‘But this is
fascinating,’
he said. ‘You mean you have no recollection of coming to the restaurant? Sitting next to Harriet? Singing “Happy Birthday”? Ordering monkfish?’

Sarah’s brow began to furrow. ‘I don’t know… It’s familiar… Faintly familiar… But there’s another memory – a much stronger one.’

‘A kind of alternative memory?’

‘Yes. Yes, I suppose so.’

‘This,’ said Gregory, scribbling furiously, ‘is
fucking
brilliant. Something like this doesn’t fall into your lap every day of the week. So what do
you
think happened last night?’

Sarah’s recollection coincided with Gregory’s only as far as the moment when they discovered the note pinned to Ralph’s door. After that, she claimed, they had had a violent argument, at the end of which she had refused to come with him to the birthday meal: Gregory had gone alone, while Sarah had made her way to Jonah’s, which was a popular self-service restaurant on campus.

‘When did you get there?’ asked Gregory, still writing everything down.

‘I don’t know – about eight?’

‘And how long did you stay?’

‘Quite a while. There was nothing else to do. About an hour.’

‘And what did you eat?’

‘Is any of this really necessary? Does it have any relevance?’

‘Everything is relevant. It’s vital that we establish just how
specific this… hallucination was. Now, what did you eat?’