Chapter 78
Chapter 78
I inched forward, staring, but I could not make sense of what my eyes saw. I studied his face, his arms, the scars, then his hands. I studied his chest. Rising. Falling. Measured. I knelt. Afraid. Fearful I’d wake up. Sure the dream would never return.
And something in me that had died began to press against the stone.
I checked again. The chest rose. Fell. Rose again. Then I noticed his temple, a vein pulsating there. Something inside had to be doing that. It couldn’t be a dream. Couldn’t be an illusion. The footprints on the beach? I knew if I moved, if I whispered, if I blinked, the cloud would dissipate and the image would be gone. But what about her? Was she real? Was this place?
Was I losing it? Was my trauma greater than I thought? I closed my eyes, squinted as hard as I could, and then opened my eyes. The bed was still there. Man resting. Chest rising. Falling. One breath. Two. He was still there. Now or never. I gambled. I entered the dream. There in that thin place where heaven kisses earth, where light rises and darkness fades, I slid my hand beneath the man’s and forgot to breathe.
And there in the dream, in that place between here and there, I managed, “I’m sorry. Bones, I’m so sorry. Forgive me. I should have...” I broke off. Tried again. “I should have...” Still no better. I buried my face in the sheets and cried at the top of my lungs. Crying from a place in me that I did not know existed. Below the pain. Down where my love lived.
My shoulders shook, and I didn’t hold back. Whatever it was that I’d been holding, whatever had started on the phone call with Summer, I let it out. All of it. I cried a long time. I wasn’t sure how long. Long enough for the tears to run dry. To soak the sheets. Afraid to look up, afraid I’d lose him again the same way I’d lost his boot prints in the sand, I shook my head and kept my eyes closed. If I stayed there, maybe the illusion would stay. Just a few more minutes, then I could let him go. But this, this was my last goodbye. My apology. My last attempt to tell him that I was sorry, that I loved him, and that I’d never forget him. That he was the best friend I’d ever had and that there was nothing in this life that didn’t point back to him. That I was lost without him. That...
I stayed in that place until my lungs remembered to breathe and I could hear myself again over the wails coming from inside me. It was a painful place. Maybe the most painful of places. But I was making it through. Or maybe not. I could not tell dream from reality, and honestly, I didn’t want to. Didn’t care. Only one more step to take. To let him go for sure. The finality. So I opened my eyes. When I did, would I find myself in a hotel room or on a plane? Reality had slipped away.
Bed. White sheets. A man. Chest rising. Falling. Scars. IV dripping.
I’d not woken from the dream. Somehow, despite entering my own dream, the man was still here. I sat on my heels and rested my head on the bed, closing my eyes. That was when the dream got weird. She knelt alongside me, one hand resting on the man’s arm. I opened my eyes, afraid the dream would stop, but it was stretching the bounds. It wasn’t like other dreams. In this dream, tears and snot smeared the sheets. I tried but couldn’t make words.
Then the dream changed again. What had been an illusion, a woman in a habit, reached across the thin place and put a hand on top of my hand that held his. When her lips moved, I could hear her speak. “He spent several weeks in a coma. When he did wake, infection had set in. We treated him, and given the extent of his internal injuries and loss of blood, I put him back into what you might call a medically induced coma to allow his body to rest.” She stroked his arm. The same forearm that had seen a K bar enter one side and exit the other. “He talks in his sleep.” She nodded. Smiled. “His first words were ‘David Bishop.’” A pause.
Why was she telling me this? That was when it hit me: she wasn’t real. And of course I’d be David Bishop in my dream.
She continued, “So I read to him. Every now and then he’ll wake up. Sometimes he’s aware of what’s going on. Sometimes not. I think he’s healing of more than just physical wounds.”
Now I was sure it was a dream. Earlier she’d called me “Bishop.”
“Please don’t wake me up. Please don’t wake up. Please, just a few minutes more. I won’t tell anyone...”
I buried my face in the sheets and pressed his hand to my face. “I won’t tell...”
Her arm wrapped around my shoulder. It was the first time I’d ever felt warmth in a dream.
“He likes it when you talk to him.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“Talking wakes you up from dreams.”
A chuckle. “So what do you call this?”
She had a good point. “Yeah, but you’re not him.”
Another smile. “Agreed.”
“Are you real?”
“Yes, David, I’m real.”
There it was again. “Prove it.”