Chapter 32
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Sitting in the chair that has become so familiar to me in the prison visiting room, I wait for Valdemar to be brought in. This is our last visit before he’s released, and I wonder what he’ll have to say.
After the experiment with the sedative on Monday night and the horrendous nightmare, I’ve refrained from using them again. Instead, I’ve opted to try and stay awake, which, given the copious amounts of caffeine I’ve been consuming and my insomnia rearing its head like it’d been on holiday these last few weeks, hasn’t been as hard as I thought. Working on the hunch that Valdemar must be asleep for him to infiltrate my dreams, I returned home from work on Tuesday and Wednesday and caught a few hours of sleep from five until ten, which seemed to work.
But I’m paying for it today. My body feels sluggish, not conforming to what my addled brain wants it to do. My limbs are heavy, my eyes stinging, and no amount of make-up could hide the dark circles.
Valdemar is brought into the room. I avoid his gaze until he’s sat down in front of me and there’s no alternative but to look at him.
Even through my watery vision, I see the mixture of emotions on his face.
“I’m glad you came, angel. I’ve been out of my mind with worry.” His first words belie the anger I can only imagine is simmering beneath his facade.
“Why don’t we cut the niceties,” I say.
His shoulders rise as he examines every inch of my face.
“Okay, what the fuck did you do?” he asks.
He’s angry, yes, but something else hides behind his eyes. Concern?
“On Monday night. How did you…?” His voice trails off as his eyes narrow.
“I had a wake-up call on Monday, a reality check of how fucked up this whole thing is. I feel like I’m losing my mind, and I don’t know what’s happening here, but it needs to stop. Needed to stop.”
“I told you I would stop if that was what you wanted, but instead you…. What did you do?”
“I took a couple of sedatives. It was supposed to knock me out enough that I wouldn’t dream at all, but instead….” I shake my head, not wanting to return to that god-awful nightmare. “Did you see it?” I hadn’t felt him there, not until the end when I’d heard his voice.
“I couldn’t get to you. The sedative must have interfered somehow. But I was there. I know the dream well,” he says.
“What do you mean, you know it well?”
“I know it well, angel, because it’s my dream.”
Staring at him, it’s only now that I see the hurt on his face, his dark beard stark against the sorrow sitting on his brow.
“Yours?” I ask.
“I don’t know how. I still don’t understand it, but yes, it was my nightmare—the one I’ve had every night for the past ten years until you came to see me and I started to visit your dreams. Your dreams have been a welcome break from my own.”
“But how?” Pressing my hand against my forehead, I wonder if I weren’t so tired, I might be able to understand this.
“I don’t know. It isn’t your gift, so I don’t know how you would be able to cross over like you did, but I can’t explain it other than as a fucking fluke, crossed wires, a faulty connection. Who knows? But I do know that I never want you to have to see that again, so promise me that whatever you did, you won’t do it again.” He leans forwards, alerting the guard behind us, who straightens as he peers at us.
“The sedative was the only thing I did differently, and I haven’t taken it since,” I tell him.
“I haven’t seen you for the past two nights.”
“I haven’t slept,” I say.
“At all?” He narrows his eyes.
“I got a few hours yesterday from five until ten. I figured you had to be asleep to be able to visit my dreams, so I slept while I thought you’d be awake.”
There’s a hint of a smile. “You guessed correctly. We both must be asleep at the same time. But you can’t stay awake forever. It’s not safe. How are you even functioning on so little sleep?”
“It’s nothing I’m not used to. I’ve gone ten years without sleeping properly,” I say.
“And long term?” he asks.
“You need to stop visiting me.”
The silence is thick for a moment before he replies.
“Is that what you want?”
“No. But it’s what I need. This isn’t right. It isn’t healthy.” Una’s and Pierre’s faces spring back into my mind, the look they both gave me the other night when I told them I’ve been to see Valdemar, that I’ve been dreaming about him ever since.
“It’s better than the nightmares. It’s better than not sleeping at all. You’ve never slept better than you have in the last few weeks,” Valdemar argues.
“Yeah, but I started not being able to sleep after you killed my brother. You. You did that. And now you’re here trying to help me sleep by seducing me every night. Do you know how fucked up that is?” I snap. The thought of what would have happened to Ed if Valdemar hadn’t shot him has not escaped me. I know it was a mercy killing, but I’ve spent the last ten years knowing this man pulled the trigger, the act of which I was unable to do in Valdemar’s dream. Why couldn’t I do it? Because I love my brother and would never be able to kill someone I love, yet Valdemar managed to shoot Ed despite their Blood Oath.
And I can’t let go of the thought that my brother might have stood a chance of getting away from Fortunato, that he might have been able to escape, to fight back, to kill Fortunato before he bricked him up behind a wall, but because Valdemar shot him, he took that possibility away.
“I know I’m the cause of all of this. I know I am to blame, so you can understand how I want to help, how I want to put things right.” He holds his hands up, then places them flat on the table as if showing me he’s telling me the truth and has nothing to hide.
“But you can’t. You will never be able to put it right. You will never be able to give me what I want.”
“And what do you want?” he asks.
“I want my brother back. I want to be loved the way my brother loved me—unconditionally, irrationally, the way that only twins can love each other. I want the connection we had. I want a family, someone to rely on, and someone to love just as hard as he loved me.”
The air swells as Valdemar runs his hand through his hair.
“My mother died giving birth to me and Ed. Do you know what it’s like to grow up knowing you killed your mother?” I let this hang before I continue. “Her death left my dad broken, unable to bond with us, so he threw himself into his work, his friends, his hobbies—anything to avoid spending time with the children who killed his one true love. And when he deemed us old enough to take care of ourselves, he moved abroad for his job.” I swallow hard. I’ve never spoken to anyone about my past before, so these words, although old in my head, feel alien now they’re out in the open.
“Ed was all I had, and that was fine, as we had each other. But then you took him, and now I have no one except the ghost of my dead mother who sits in my apartment day after day, smiling at me without having a single word to say. And I can’t even take comfort in the fact that I can see ghosts by seeing my dead brother, because he took some stupid fucking Blood Oath that’s now bound him to you even in his death. How fucking ironic is that? So, forgive me if I don’t relish the thought of falling into your arms every night in your effort to make me sleep better.”
Loss closes in on me, the loneliness that my life has been these past few years, and I can’t change that. Sleep won’t change it. Nothing will.
As if tasting my words, Valdemar sucks the air between his teeth. “There is something we could try.”
My neck jars as I straighten up as if on high alert. “What?”
“I could try to bring Ed into a dream.”
My eyes widen. The last thing I want is Ed standing there while Valdemar touches me.
As if reading my thoughts, he continues. “Not in the sense of our normal dreams, angel. That would be fucked up. I could try to bring him into a dream so you could talk to him.”
“How?” I blink, attempting to understand what he’s suggesting.
“I don’t know. I haven’t done anything like this before, but for you, angel, I will do anything. But you’ll have to let me in. No more sedatives or sleeping when I’m awake.”
This might be my one chance to talk to my brother. The only chance.
I nod.
“I can’t promise anything. The dead don’t sleep, so I’ll have to talk to him and see how we can make this work.”
My insides tighten at the thought of him being able to talk to Ed. I know he said he can’t just dial him up, but even so, the idea that he can speak to him at all fills me with jealousy.
The last thing I want to do is get emotional, so I change the subject. “This is our last visit. Monday is your release day, right?”
“Yes. It doesn’t feel real even though it’s only days away. Ten years is a long time to be locked up. It feels like forever, yet at the same time like the blink of an eye.”
“What will you do when you get out?” The note springs to my mind, and I wonder how long he’ll last before someone tries to kill him, his enemies vast and plentiful.
My lips part to tell him about the note, but before I can say anything, Valdemar answers my question.
“I haven’t thought much past Monday. I know the Raven Hands are throwing me a party. It’s in very poor taste and not exactly how I want to spend my first night of freedom, but they’ve insisted on marking the occasion.”
My fists clench at the thought of them throwing him a lavish party, celebrating the fact that he’s survived his years behind bars for pulling the trigger and killing my brother. At this thought, my desire to disclose the note shrivels up. And I refuse to get drawn into some old feud. The last thing I need is to be drawn into a gang war.
“I was going to ask if you’d be willing to attend,” he says.
“Are you fucking serious? You want me to come and party with you for doing your time for killing my brother? Christ, you are insane,” I spit.
“I take that as a no.” He sits back.
“Absolutely not. Why would I want to be there when they let you out? What would the other Raven Hands think?”
“I don’t care what they think,” he says.
“I do. How weird would it look when I walk through the door while they’re all celebrating your release? And I don’t think it would be very safe.”
“Safe?” He cocks his head.
“I’m sure they would all think I was there to enact my revenge. Jupiter certainly doesn’t trust me.” I’m not sure I trust myself.
“It doesn’t matter whether Jupiter trusts you. It’s whether I trust you,” Valdemar argues.
“And do you?”
“I wouldn’t be inviting you otherwise. And I’ve enjoyed your company over these last few weeks. It would be nice to speak freely, without such restraints.” He pushes at the table that’s kept us apart during these visits.
The note is still pricking at my brain. The danger he could be walking into on release day. And not just from his old enemies. Do I trust myself to be alone with this man? The dreams are one thing, but in the cold light of day, will I be able to hold back my anger at him taking my brother from me?
“You’ve grown too comfortable in here.” I throw my eyes around the room. These walls that have kept him contained for ten years have also kept the real world out.
“Maybe you’re right,” he says.
“Either that, or you know the hold you have on me.”
“And what hold is that?” he asks, his gaze fixed on me.
“You’re the only link I have left to my brother.”
“And if the dream doesn’t work?”
“That remains to be seen,” I tell him, not wanting to think about the fact that it might not work and what would happen if that’s the case.
“Time, people. Let’s wrap things up,” the guard calls from the back of the room as another guard begins to collect the inmates.
“Don’t sleep before ten tonight,” Valdemar tells me. “We have four nights to try this before Monday. Please don’t give up hope.”
“Okay.”
“And I’ll send a car for you Monday night at seven, as I’m sure we’ll need to discuss things,” he adds.
I want to tell him to go fuck himself, but the guard arrives behind Valdemar and ushers him out of his chair.
“I said I’m not coming.” I push my hair behind my ears. “Wait. How do you know where I live?”
“Just think about it, please. The offer will be there.”
And with that, he’s led to the back of the room and out the door with the rest of the inmates.
I’m not sure how I feel about the thought of seeing him outside this room. My feelings on this are as tangled as my conflicted feelings for him. I need him—he’s my only link to my brother—and he knows this. But if I do attend his party, there will be a whole new set of eyes on us, no table separating us, and no one calling time.