by RABE, JEAN
The troll regained his balance, glaring back at them. But it turned and advanced on Dapple and Brownie, who retreated at the same pace. But as the troll advanced, they heard the sounds of Fog coming down the trail at a fast clip, calling as he ran.
Fog was gray, and big, and male, with horns to prove it. Unlike his name, he came on hard and fast, on sharp hooves, bleating and calling to the others.
Snowdrop and Kavage stood at the far end of the bridge and bleated back, pausing to investigate the ropes wound around the pillars planted deep in the earth. The pillars were strong and sturdy, and the ropes smelled good.
Dapple and Brownie charged the troll, first one then the other, setting the bridge to swaying back and forth. Once again, the troll grabbed for the rope railings in order to steady himself. Dapple charged through, darting under one arm, while Brownie charged a few steps behind, brushing against the troll and forcing his way past.
Fog didn’t bother to stop. His hooves hit the wood of the bridge, sounding tromp-tramp, tromp-tramp as he rammed right into the troll.
The troll yelled then, a high screech as he lost his balance. He fell, his long clawed hands reaching for the ropes and the planks. He caught himself, dangling in midair, making loud noises and glaring at the goats.
Fog snorted, and stomped to the end of the bridge, to gather with his herd.
The troll swung back and forth, trying to get a leg up.
Snowdrop and Kavage started chewing the ropes, one at the base, and the other at the railing.
The troll made angry noises and tried harder to climb up.
Dapple and Brownie started chewing as well, crowding at the edge to get their teeth in the tasty ropes.
The troll cried out, and the noises changed, sounding more like bleating.
Fog struck the rope at the base with his hard sharp hooves. The rope strands parted, even as the railing broke away from the stump on one side.
Snowdrop delicately nipped through the rope on the other side.
With a snap, the ropes broke, and the bridge fell, collapsing against the cliff on the other side.
The troll fell into the rushing waters, screaming.
The goats clustered at the edge, watching the man fall. Then all five lifted their heads to see their humans emerge from the forest on the other side.
“What are you fool goats doing over there?” Asked their woman, dressed in armor and wearing red gloves.
“More to the point, what happened to the bridge?” Their man said, looking down over the edge. “Didn’t the innkeeper say there was some kind of monster guarding it?”
“If there was, it isn’t now.”
The goats milled about, bleating and cavorting, quite pleased with themselves.
Their woman crossed her arms over her chest. “This is all mucked up, what with them over there and us over here.”
“Red,” their man straightened. “Don’t forget, they are—”
Snowdrop and the others gathered on the edge of the chasm, above the rushing waters below, and leaped, disappearing—
—and appeared next to their humans.
“Magic goats,” their man finished with a smile. Snowdrop butted his leg, and he reached down and scratched her ears.
“Magic,” their woman shook her head. “I’ll never get used to that.”
Kavage pushed her head under the man’s fingers and demanded attention. Snowdrop butted their woman’s leg, and she reached down and scratched Snowdrop’s ears with gloved fingers. Fog, Dapple, and Brownie all begged for their fair share of attention.
“Magic goats.” Their woman sighed. “At least they don’t talk.”
“Good thing you love me,” Their man said with a smile, reaching out his arms to pull their woman close to him. The goats watched at their humans pressed their faces together.
Fog grumbled and went to bed down in the grasses along the trail. The others followed, including Snowdrop, the whitest, the smallest and the prettiest.
SOMETHING ABOUT MATTRESSES
Janet Deaver-Pack
Janet Deaver-Pack has also written fiction and nonfiction as Janet Pack. She begins her days before dawn at her computer with a large mug of tea and her cats trying to snuggle in the office chair with her. Janet has written fifty fantasy, science fiction, mystery, and horror short stories. She has written three nonfiction books for children, and her articles appear in magazines and newspapers in southern Wisconsin. She has edited four anthologies based on mythology and cats for DAW, coedited by Martin H. Greenberg. Janet works part-time as an assistant librarian, and does professional editing for Walkabout Press as well as for individuals and businesses. She also knits custom designs under the name Cobweb Creations. In her spare time she leads writing seminars for teens and adults. Janet is an inventive cook. She also reads, walks, enjoys wildlife, and plays with her cats, Tabirika Onyx, Syrannis Moonstone, and Baron Figaro de Shannivere. She’s currently working on a fantasy novel with coauthor Bruce A. Heard.
Dave Spenser led his customers through the Cloud City Mattress shop, halting at the most expensive display. “This is a revolutionary design in beds,” he announced, gesturing with a long hand. He hoped his smile was sincere and didn’t droop. He was wiped out.
“Space-age foam, no springs at all,” he continued. “This mattress self-adjusts to your every curve. No more back pain. It’s warm, comfortable, and makes no pressure points. You won’t ever bother your partner if you get up during the night because it doesn’t transfer motion—”
A tug from something he didn’t understand made Dave’s attention shift suddenly up and to the right. A suggestion of exotic spicy-flowery fragrance tickled his nose. He looked into the back corner of the display room. What he saw there between the ceiling and the walls made his jaw drop.
“She’s here!”
The customers twisted their heads, looked at the corner, and saw nothing other than paint and the gleam of recessed lighting. They traded sidelong glances as Dave continued staring.
“Excuse me,” the man said in a loud voice. “You were saying—”
Co-owner Sharron Tucker bounded from the office. Stepping in front of Dave’s tall form, she took over the spiel. “That’s right, this mattress doesn’t transfer motion at all. And it comes with a thirty-day free in-home trial. You’ll love—”
A sharp motion from Sharron’s hip pushed Dave away from the trio. Eyes still transfixed by his vision, he stumbled to another bed across the aisle and sat on the edge.
“Beautiful,” he mumbled. “Just beautiful. She’s closer than before. I can see her burgundy eyes!”
The woman he gazed at stood in a chamber of golden wood and polished stone that looked like marble. She wore floor-length layered robes of deep fuschia trimmed with pink and metallic silver. Her wavy black hair hung past her shoulders and curled a bit at the ends. She carried herself with the natural poise born of long experience dealing with people. Dave pondered her concerned expression for the dozenth time.
“Wonder how tall she is?” he muttered. “Wonder where she’s from?” He sighed, shaking his tawny head. “I’d like to meet her—”
The door to the shop slammed shut. Sharron’s heavy, quick footsteps thundered against the rug. She planted herself in front of Dave, hands on hips, her pale face blotched with anger.
Dave’s vision disappeared. “Wait,” he moaned to the corner, leaping to his feet. “Don’t go.”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Sharron spat. “Those customers will probably go straight to Bennet’s Beds and buy what we could have sold them right here, if you’d just been paying attention! You used to be our best salesman. Do you realize our sales are down twenty percent? That’s twenty whole percent! I don’t know how we’re going to continue to support this store with that big a drop in income.” She shook a finger beneath his nose. “And I think you’re the cause of it. No, I’m sure of it. Have you looked at yourself today?” Her disgust was clear.
Dave blinked at her. “I combed my hair a
nd brushed my teeth. I know I did.”
“That’s not the trouble.” Sharron grabbed his arm and dragged him into the women’s bathroom, which had a large mirror. She snapped on the light. “Now, would you buy a mattress from someone who looks like that?” She pointed to his reflection. “Would you buy anything in the world from him, even if you needed it?”
Dave squinted, almost not recognizing himself. His long angular face was puffy. There were reddened circles beyond the bruise-colored ones surrounding his hazel eyes, and the bloodshot orbs themselves darted to a new focus every few seconds. His hands trembled, and he slapped at unseen things in the air. He’d lost about ten pounds in the past few weeks: his shirt, sports jacket, and slacks drooped like flags in disinterested wind on his six-foot-seven frame. And he hunched, as if his broad shoulders had befriended his ear lobes.
“Good,” he muttered. “I did remember to shave.”
“How long has it been since you slept?” Sharron snapped. “I mean really deep normal sleep?”
“Uh, about three months,” Dave mumbled.
“Uh-huh.” She cocked her head, making her cedar-colored hair swing the same direction. “So, this is serious. Chronic. Been to a doctor?”
He nodded. “Several.”
“And?”
Dave shrugged. His eyes felt gritty and fatigued, as though he’d been standing in a sandstorm of bright light for several hours. “None of them offered much of a reason. They can’t find the little pellet in my lower back that keeps me awake and hurting, so they’re no better at explaining it than I am. Except for one thing.”
“What’s that?” Sharron asked.
“Every doctor I’ve been to said my condition sounds exactly the same as the one in the kid’s story called ‘The Princess and the Pea’.” He pushed past Sharron into the store, rounded the partition to the office, and flomped down at his desk.
“One doctor thinks it’s displaced pain,” Dave continued as she followed him, “possibly because of my height. But I’ve never had problems before, except with growing pains. Another doctor asked me if I’ve been in the military, or was injured in some bar brawl. She seemed disappointed when I said no to both. I’ve already tried everything she recommended, such as flipping the mattress, vacuuming it daily, and buying a new pillow top pad for it. Twice. Or more, I can’t remember. Oh yeah, and I’ve had a CAT scan, too. They couldn’t find anything, except that I don’t have sinus problems. The doctors seemed to think that was remarkable.” He looked into the display room. “Do you think I could find a mattress I can sleep on out there?”
“Are you nuts?” she spluttered. “This is our display room—it’s for customers!”
“I was just considering the possibility,” Dave tried to mollify her. “After all, no one looks at the mattresses after we close. I could test each one, add my comments to the advertising spins, put up a Hot List of recommendations. People might like that. It would let them know we’re personally involved in choosing our products.”
He scrubbed a hand through his hair, over his face.
Sharron’s impossibly turquoise eyes, made so by contact lenses, didn’t waver from his face. “Tell me what this—this thing is that you were looking at in the back corner. Why is it so important that it took your attention away from customers?”
Dave couldn’t help himself: he almost smiled, remembering the gorgeous face that had been regarding him only minutes ago. “I’m getting . . . I have . . . well, I call them visions.”
“Visions! Visions of the Second Coming?” He’d triggered Sharron’s sarcastic mode. “Predictions of Nostradamus? Sight of Armageddon?”
“No.” Dave didn’t want to tell his co-owner about the beautiful lady, but his mind was too foggy at the moment to come up with another explanation. “A . . . it’s a woman.”
Sharron’s eyes widened, and she sat. “You’re a twenty-nine-year-old man fixating on a woman in a vision. Oh, I get it. What dating service is she from?”
“No, no,” Dave protested. “You’ve got it all wrong. I haven’t joined a dating service. She just . . . she just appears. We can see each other. I think. She reacts to me, but she doesn’t talk, and . . . and—”
“How long?”
“Have I had the visions? Ah, about two weeks, maybe three.”
Sharron’s eyes slid away from his to stare into the beach scene on the screen saver.
Right, he thought. Now I’ve really blown it. What would I think if I heard this story? Sharron is a conservative church-going Midwestern entrepreneur with a husband, a dog, and two kids. I can just imagine how she’s mixing the details of my situation into something bigger. Something uglier. I shouldn’t have told her. I should have made something up.
The round gold clock on Sharron’s desk discarded seconds with each tick. To Dave’s ears, every one sounded louder than the last. They seemed to be collecting somewhere behind his eyes. His head ached, and his shoulders tightened with tension. He wanted to beat that clock into tiny shards.
“So,” Sharron’s voice startled him. Her tone wasn’t sarcastic any more, it was concerned. “You’re not sleeping, you look like you’ve been a month in hell, and you’re seeing visions. The next two things I’d consider are acupuncture and some intensive psychotherapy. How long has it been since you ate? Not nibbles—I mean a solid meal?”
“I don’t know. I think I had a breakfast sandwich yesterday.” Dave frowned and swiped at something in his peripheral vision. He missed. “Or was that the day before? I’m not hungry. Lack of sleep is doing a number on my appetite.”
“If you can’t remember when you last ate, it’s been too long.” Sharron pulled out the bottom drawer on her painted metal desk and rummaged in her three-gallon handbag. “Here,” she poked a twenty at him. “Buy something to eat. Take a few days off. Play some racquetball. Exhaust yourself so you CAN sleep. Drink warm milk. Get some serious calories into that bony frame. Check yourself into that sleep clinic on Highway 83 for a few days. Clean yourself up. Then come back.”
“Do you really think any of that will help?” Dave asked.
“Maybe mattresses have been your life for too long,” his co-owner stated, refusing to look at him. “There are other things to make money at. You might be happier. Maybe you need a change to get all this weirdness out of your system.” She finally swung her face toward him. “Bottom line, Dave. I’d hate to lose you as a partner: You’re good. But we need both of us consistently at top form to make money in this place. So you get yourself right or let me buy you out.” She slammed her desk drawer closed. The sound was the period to her speech even though there was a great deal she’d obviously left unsaid.
Dave sucked in a lungfull of air. “Well, is it all right with you if I try sleeping here?”
He heard the irritation in her voice, but Sharron managed to control most of it. “If you have to. I can’t really stop you.” One of her eyebrows rose. “You’re not going to sleep nude, are you?”
As if that would make any difference to the mattresses! Dave thought. But it might startle the cleaning crew. “No,” he replied. “I’ve been carrying pajama bottoms and a toothbrush in my car for a while.”
“Good. Now get out of here. Get something to eat.” Her sigh was a gust. “Let me try and repair some of this crap you’ve caused.” She picked up the phone, beginning the follow-up calls that Dave had ignored because of fatigue.
He rose, stretched, loosened his tie, and headed for the door. “See you,” he called just to end the conversation. Sharron didn’t reply.
Sighing, Dave slouched across the small parking lot Cloud City shared with a kitchen design shop and a thriving sushi bar.
Maybe Sharron was right: I’ve been staring at mattresses too long. The warm air of early summer stirring through his hair felt good. Traffic and hurrying pedestrians filled the area around the lot and the larger mall beyond with color and noise. He allowed his mind to wander toward the gorgeous woman he’d seen twice recently in his—
Visions, Dave admitted. They couldn’t have been dreams. I can’t sleep. Unless it was a waking dream.
He turned toward the sidewalk dividing the mall from the eight-lane highway.
I wonder if she’s tall enough for me? he asked himself. But that really doesn’t matter—if I could get a woman like her interested, I’d marry her in a split second. Dave found her enticing and quite disturbing. He smiled at the combination. Smiling instead of yawning felt good.
Like I have a real chance of meeting her. She’s just a vision. He sighed. But she seems so real! And the edges around her are more substantial than at first, almost like a picture frame.
“Come on, Dave,” he mumbled to himself. “Get over it! You’re hallucinating big time!”
Enticing smells wafted from somewhere nearby; his stomach reacted with a roar. Checking the money in his pocket, Dave grinned.
“I can get a really good meal at a Thai restaurant for less than twenty,” he said. He found the restaurant, went in, ordered Mongolian Beef, and ate until he was stuffed.
Feeling more normal than he had in weeks, Dave left the restaurant and continued walking. He decided to cross the highway at Westmere Avenue. The intersection had the only pedestrian lights for blocks. Dave hit the silver button to activate the walk light and waited, for the first time he could remember enjoying the cacophony of passing traffic. Other people gathered around him, waiting to cross.
He strode into the intersection as the human outline on the pedestrian light glowed. Then he tripped over nothing, flailed the air, recovered his balance, and looked up.
“Holy sweet Moses, she’s here!” Dave stopped, and stared.
The man behind him bumped into his back, splashing coffee on his sports jacket. “Watch it, ass!”
“You’re an idiot to stop in the middle of this street,” snapped a woman.
“C’mon, buddy, this is a short light!”
Their comments were lost on Dave. Enraptured, he gazed at the lovely woman featured in the midst of a dark cloud hanging at the same height as the stop-lights. This time she was sitting at a desk, her hands holding a peculiar book. A silvery light glowed from a nearby lamp. Dave swore its head angled automatically as she shifted position. Her clothes were more subtle in color than the fuschias and pinks she’d worn in his first visions, and she had pulled her hair back from her face. It was tied with a metallic ribbon at the nape of her neck. There was a steaming cup of something within reach of her long fingers. The cup looked like fine porcelain, painted with a delicate scrollwork design bordering animal figures that played with one another.