by T. G. Haynes
‘No problem,’ Sylvia said. ‘Must dash, they’re waiting for me on the second tee.’ And with that, she hung up.
The remainder of the day dragged for Kate. Ever since she was a child she had never much cared for Sundays. They always seemed empty and boring for some reason. In order to kill time she went to the gym and did a lengthy strenuous workout. That took care of a couple of hours. A long soak in a hot bath when she got home killed another. Preparing a late afternoon Sunday brunch burnt up even more time, but, in spite of her best efforts, she still ended up with three hours to kill before catching up with Sylvia at seven.
Ordinarily, she would have treated herself to a Sunday paper and lazed away the afternoon reading it on the sun lounger in the back garden, only the lousy British summer was up to its usual tricks. One minute it was bright and sunny, the next it was raining heavily. Cursing the miserable weather she ended up watching a rather lame romantic comedy film on television and tried her best to remain patient.
As the afternoon drew on, the more it seemed to drag. Eventually, she could stand it no longer and she ended up going around to Sylvia’s far too early and sitting in the driveway waiting for Sylvia to return. Mercifully, Sylvia arrived earlier than she expected. After the two girls entered the house, Sylvia threw a pizza into the oven, poured a couple of glasses of wine, then sat down and asked Kate what was troubling her.
‘There’s nothing really the matter.’
‘Kate, it’s me you’re talking to, remember? I can tell.’
Kate paused before replying. She wasn’t entirely sure how to broach the subject. ‘Have you ever had any odd dreams since you started using Dream World?’
‘Is that all that’s worrying you?’ Sylvia laughed. ‘Yes, of course, I get them all the time.’
‘I’m not talking about erotic ones,’ Kate said.
‘Oh.’
‘I mean strange ones, uncanny ones.’
‘What like?’
‘Well, do you remember that chap we saw running across the car park yesterday.’
‘Vaguely. What of him?’
‘He cropped up in the last dream I experienced at the centre.’
‘Did you get intimately acquainted?’ Sylvia asked, innocently.
‘We might have,’ Kate replied. ‘But that’s not the point. The point is, I dreamt about him again last night.’
‘Sounds to me like someone has got a crush on a certain bad boy.’
‘Don’t you think it’s weird?’
‘Not in the slightest.’
‘Honestly?’
‘Look,’ Sylvia said, ‘deep down, most of us are attracted to danger, even if we’re not prepared to admit it. There’s something exciting about it. Now, I’m guessing you don’t know why that chap was being chased across the car park?’
Kate shook her head.
‘Well, what I reckon has happened is, because he was one of the last people you saw before entering the dream centre yesterday, he was still on your mind when you started to dream, so he was probably a short odds candidate for your sub-conscious to select. Now, and I’m only guessing here, but I bet the scenario you created in your dream was one in which he was a dangerous figure, maybe a criminal or a gangster or on the run from the law.’
‘Yes, he was, kind of,’ Kate admitted.
‘There you go. Basic psychology. That’ll be three hundred pounds for the diagnosis, thank you very much.’
‘I wish I hadn’t bothered asking now!’
‘You know your trouble, Ms Phillips.’
‘What’s that, Doctor Simmons?’
‘You worry too much.’
‘Maybe you’re right.’ Kate took a sip of wine and lapsed into silence as she thought through Sylvia’s explanation.
‘Was there anything else you haven’t mentioned?’ Sylvia asked.
‘Actually, there was one other thing.’
‘What’s that?’
‘I don’t suppose you know anything about this.’ Kate reached into her handbag, took out the necklace and showed it to her friend.
Sylvia snorted. ‘Don’t tell me that rotten Ex of yours is still trying to win you back.’
‘No, it wasn’t him who gave it to me. I found it lying on my pillow when I woke from the dream yesterday. That’s not the strange part though.’
‘So what is?’
‘Before I woke up, Richard presented it to me in the dream.’
Sylvia ran the necklace through her fingers. ‘It’s expensive, I know that much.’
‘But what does it mean?’
‘That you’ve got an admirer.’
‘Richard?’
‘Well, he’s just about given up on trying to get inside my pants, so it’s a reasonable bet that he’ll try it on with you next,’ Sylvia said.
‘I thought you’d slept with him?’
Sylvia grinned. ‘He wishes.’
‘But he wasn’t around yesterday, he was up in London.’
Sylvia shrugged. ‘Easy enough to get one of his minions to place it on your pillow.’ She handed the necklace back to Kate.
‘I’m not sure I want it,’ Kate said.
‘Never look a gift horse in the mouth.’
‘It’s not the necklace I’m worried about, it’s what he might want in return that’s bothering me.’
Sylvia laughed long and loud. ‘The same thing all men want, silly.’
‘You know your trouble,’ Kate said.
‘What’s that?’
‘You’ve got a one track mind.’
Sylvia wrinkled her nose and retorted, ‘And you know your trouble.’
‘Do tell,’ Kate said. ‘I’m sure you’re going to.’
‘You’re far too innocent for this world.’
‘Ha. You wouldn’t say that if you knew what I’d got up to in my dreams these past couple of days.’
‘Really,’ Sylvia said, her eyes sparkling delightedly. ‘Do tell.’
Determined to prove to her friend that she wasn’t quite so innocent after all, Kate revealed most of the details of the fantasies that she had indulged in. To her surprise, the one thing that she refrained from telling Sylvia was that Dexter had requested that they meet again. Though she knew it wouldn’t do any harm to tell Sylvia, nevertheless, she had promised him that she wouldn’t reveal their planned rendezvous to anyone and a promise was a promise, even if it was only made inside a dream.
Whereas the day had dragged interminably for Kate, the evening flew by far too quickly for her liking. Good wine and good conversation flowed in equal measure, so much so that she ended up staying the night. The only trouble with this was that it meant she had to get up early the following morning in order to get back to her apartment to shower and change before setting off for work.
To her disappointment, Kate could barely remember her dreams that night. Not that she had any time to reflect upon them. Work was hell that week and, with a quarter of the office off sick, she ended up rushing around like a loon, not only dealing with her own workload, but that of one of her absent colleagues.
The one consolation of work being busy was that the week flew by so quickly, almost before she knew it, Thursday had arrived. When she got up that morning Kate felt a tingle of anticipation because that evening she and Sylvia were due to visit Dream World again. Mundane tasks such as photocopying and restocking the stationary cupboard didn’t seem anywhere near as dull as they had done earlier in the week and every time Kate popped to the coffee machine she dawdled slightly longer than usual as she wondered what fantasies lay in store for her that night.
From four o’clock onwards, Kate found herself counting down the last hour. She tried to tick it off in periods of ten minutes, only that didn’t work, so she tried five minute segments instead.
If anything, this seemed to make the last forty minutes drag even longer. At one minute to five, Kate was all packed up and ready to go. She glared at the phone and willed it not to ring. Glancing up at the digital clock it felt like it had been four fifty nine forever. At last, five o’clock arrived. By ten seconds past, Kate was already out of the door and half way across the car park. She raced home, showered, changed, then drove around to Sylvia’s, a little too fast if truth be told. Alas, Sylvia was in no fit state to go anywhere for she had gone down with a bad case of ‘man-flu’, as she put it.
Never having visited the centre on her own before, Kate was in half a mind to cancel, however she wasn’t sure that she could survive another day at work without indulging in some sort of treat that night and she knew that no treat could match what lay in store for her at Dream World. Without Sylvia at her side, Kate wondered if the security staff would let her enter through the sneaky back door she had been using. Her concerns proved unfounded as the guards let her in without a second glance.
Once inside the centre, Kate headed for the same chamber that she and Sylvia had used previously. Upon opening the door to the room she experienced something of a shock, for it looked as if a bomb had gone off inside, with wires trailing everywhere. Brenda ushered Kate out of the room into a small break out area a little further along the corridor. She invited Kate to help herself to coffee from the machine in the corner, then departed before Kate had a chance to ask her what was going on.
The selection of drinks on offer wasn’t overly inspiring. Kate eventually settled upon a cup of hot chocolate. The consistency was so weak she ended up pouring it away down the sink. She was just deliberating whether to risk trying another drink when Richard entered the breakout area.
‘Hi, Kate. Brenda told me that you’d arrived. I’m sorry about you usual room. We’re just making a few alterations to our equipment. Upgrading our security.’
‘Security?’ she said, puzzled.
‘Why sound so surprised, we take it very seriously here.’
‘I’m not sure I follow. What could possibly go wrong in a dream?’
‘Well, for starters, I’m guessing you wouldn’t want anyone to hack into your sub-conscious.’
‘Is that possible?’ she asked, trying her best to quell the feeling of unease that was growing in the pit of her stomach.
‘Highly unlikely,’ he said, assuaging her fears, ‘But we’re not prepared to take the risk that someone out there might develop that ability. We want to stay one step ahead of the game at all times, hence the upgrade.’
‘I guess that means no dreaming for me tonight then,’ she sighed.
‘On the contrary, I was going to invite you to try out one of our brand new chambers, so long as you don’t mind being a bit of a guinea pig.’
‘You mean, I’d be the first?’ she said.
Richard nodded.
Kate wasn’t sure she had been the first at anything since winning the egg and spoon race back at primary school when she was seven years old, so she agreed.
The new room that Richard ushered her into was much smaller than the dream chamber that she and Sylvia had used previously and there were only three beds. Kate had been hoping to take a trip alone, but she was fairly sure that Richard would suggest joining her. To her slight surprise, not to mention relief, Richard explained that he would monitor her as she fell asleep, but then have to leave in order to supervise the work that was going on around the centre. Feigning disappointment, Kate tried to sound sincere as she said, ‘Maybe next time.’
‘Maybe,’ he said, as she lay down and attached the pads to her temples. Along with the two wires that hooked into the pads, there was a third, which Kate wasn’t sure what to do with.
Ah, that’s one of the other differences,’ he explained. ‘We’ve dispensed with the sleep inducing tablets in favour of an alternative method.’
‘How does it work?’ she asked.
‘Similar to a hospital drip. I simply attach a tiny needle to the end, thus, then feed it into your arm, if I may.’
Though she wasn’t entirely happy about this, Kate decided that it would be silly to back out now, so she presented her left forearm to him. Taking hold of it, Richard massaged a smidgen of ointment onto the skin of her inner elbow. Kate then felt a tiny prick. Though it didn’t really hurt, she couldn’t help flinching.
‘Sweet dreams,’ he said.
Kate didn’t hear him. The feed worked instantly. She was already fast asleep.
Inside the dream, Kate pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. Whether it was the new method of inducing sleep, she couldn’t be sure, but she felt ever so slightly woozy, as if she had taken some really strong medication. She certainly didn’t remember conjuring up the scenario she found herself in the midst of. She was seated at the table of an outdoor café on Monmartre looking out over Paris. Was it an extension of the last dream she had experienced at the centre? It certainly felt like it. A waiter came and placed an espresso on her table, before bustling away to deal with another order. Kate drank the coffee gratefully, hoping that it might help to clear her head. Her thought processes felt hazy though and she didn’t feel fully in charge of the dream.
Before trying anything grand, she decided to experiment on a small scale. Closing her eyes she imagined her cup refilling. Upon opening her eyes, to her delight, she found another miniature cup of steaming coffee waiting for her. As she reached for it she noticed two gentlemen in dark suits sitting at the table next to hers staring at her. Conjuring the cup of coffee out of nowhere had drawn unwelcome attention to herself.
Hang on a minute, she thought, this is my dream and if they don’t like it I can just ‘pop’ them out of existence, surely. Kate turned and stared at them brazenly. She was about to dispel the two men when they got up and left the café of their own accord, although as they walked off down the Rue Foyatier, one of them glanced back over his shoulder at her. Kate felt like thumbing her nose at him, but resisted the urge and concentrated on more important matters instead.
Perhaps, she reflected, she had ended up in Paris because that was where she had parted from Dexter, thus making it the obvious choice for their next meeting. The only thing was, he had intimated that the next time they meet, the location should be a secret one. Kate drummed her fingers on the table top. Where would be the perfect venue for a dangerous liaison? She clicked her fingers; she’d got it. Closing her eyes she thought of another European capital. One that she had seen many times on TV as a very young child as it had featured on the news every time the Cold War had been mentioned.
When she opened her eyes she found a green door in front of her. Opening the door, Kate stepped through into Red Square. The sun was setting behind the Kremlin. She shivered slightly. The temperature was much cooler than it had been in Paris. She half thought about changing the season - the conditions were very autumnal - but that would mean dispensing with the fabulous fake mink coat that she was wearing. Beneath the coat, she was dressed all in black. It felt appropriate somehow. A chill wind blew across the empty square. Now, what she really needed was somewhere to meet Dexter. Initially, she considered conjuring up a bar, but that didn’t strike her as classy enough, so she settled upon a five star restaurant instead.
Closing her eyes Kate decided that the restaurant should be located next to St Basil’s. Feeling lazy, she couldn’t be bothered to walk the few yards across the Square and so she imagined herself seated inside the restaurant, waiting for her lover to turn up. Before opening her eyes she put the final touches to the scenario. She pictured herself sitting alone in the far corner of the restaurant, a bottle of finest Russian vodka on the table in front of her. No, hang on, that wasn’t right. Needing to keep a clear head, she exchanged the bottle of vodka for a cup of black coffee. Opening her eyelids the scene unfolded in front of her exactly how she had envisaged it.
Actually, not quite exactly. Unwittingly, her sub-conscious had added a couple of minor details. Two members of staff hung around behind the bar casting occasional admiring glances in her direction. Pretending that she hadn’t noticed, Kate deliberately crossed her legs, allowing the skirt that she was wearing to ride up her right thigh just far enough to flash a glimpse of stocking top. One of the young barmen nudged his colleague as if to say, ‘Did you just see that?’
Kate fought back the faint smile tugging at the corners of her lips. There was no way that the dark, mysterious character she envisaged herself to be at that moment would give in to such frivolity. Keeping her eyes firmly focussed upon the entrance of the restaurant, she willed Dexter into her dream and was confident that he would appear at any moment.
Half an hour later and still no sign of Dexter, Kate began to wonder what on earth was wrong. A faint feeling of unease grew within her. Did his absence indicate that she wasn’t fully in control of the dream? Just as she was about to give up on the scenario and change it for another, the red door to the café opened. So, her concerns were unfounded, he was simply making her wait. Right, she thought, two can play at that game. Eager to convey her dissatisfaction, she picked up a drinks menu and refused to look up at him, burying her head in the wine list instead.
The person who had just entered the restaurant didn’t cross over to her table immediately, but kept her in suspense by ordering something to drink from the bar. Kate’s heart pounded in her chest and she felt her pulse rate quicken. So that’s why he had kept her waiting, to heighten the feeling of anticipation. Finally, and not before time, footsteps approached her table. Oddly enough, the noise they made didn’t sound like a man’s shoes. They sounded much more like a pair of high heels. Dexter wouldn’t be wearing stilettos, would he? Not unless he had gone in for a naughty bit of cross dressing! Still refusing to look up, Kate heard her companion pull up a chair and sit down opposite her. Her heart raced faster than ever. Then she heard the distinctive sound of a cigarette being lit. That couldn’t be right, there was no way she would have imagined him to be a smoker. Finally, she looked across at her companion. Kate found herself staring at one of the most beautiful women she had ever seen.