by Drew Hayes
“So how long does this last?”
“In my experience, the head fuzziness usually goes away after a day or so. The part I had trouble shaking was the dreams.”
A ketchup-covered chicken tender froze halfway to Vince’s mouth, his hunger forgotten as a single word of Mary’s sentence stole precedence from all the others.
“Dreams?”
“Oh yeah. I don’t know if it was just me or what, but man, I had some doozies after a few of my falls. Complex, detailed, somehow almost as real as my own life. In fact, after some of the really intense ones I even had trouble sorting out what was real and what had been part of my unconscious theatre,” Mary explained, her own appetite unhindered by the conversation.
A warm sense of relief washed over Vince and the interrupted chicken tender finally met its inevitable fate. He wasn’t going crazy. This was all just part of dealing with a head injury.
“I see. I think I had one of those last night,” Vince eventually replied. “Did the sense of not quite keeping things straight go away with the general disorientation?”
“Actually, no,” Mary told him. “I had to be a bit more proactive with those.”
“By all means, please elaborate.”
“It’s hard to explain,” she said, setting down the veggie wrap that was already halfway consumed. “I guess I’d say that talking about it helped me a lot. For whatever reason, things were sticky in my brain, and talking to the people involved usually helped me sort things out. Especially in the cases where I couldn’t understand why I’d cast someone in seemingly strange roles. Like when I had one where I was a princess in a fairytale land, I got kidnapped by an evil dragon who talked and kind of looked a lot like Hershel. Not a usual role for the boy I secretly had a crush on.”
“Agreed, I have no idea what that means.”
“Me neither,” Mary said with a shrug. “But when I told him about it, we wound up talking for a long time, and in the course of that I was able to sort out which Hershel was the real one.” She paused to look over at her boyfriend, busily scribbling in a notebook while cramming a hamburger down his gullet. The two had been sitting apart so he could cram for his big Biology final this week. Hershel was the kind of guy who couldn’t focus if his girlfriend even sat down beside him. Mary thought it was endearing.
“Huh. I’ll keep that in mind,” Vince said.
“So what did you dream about?”
“Oh... um, well, we were all people with super powers, only we weren’t supposed to be, sort of, and we were going to college to try and become super heroes,” Vince explained, the tips of his ears turning red as he realized how crazy that sounded.
“Sounds a lot like our actual life, just if you blended it together with comic books,” Mary pointed out.
“There were a few key differences,” Vince said. “For one thing, I cast my dad as the villain.”
“Ohhhh. So that’s the part that’s bothering you.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Vince, you adore your father. No one here looks up to a parent more than you. I can see how your subconscious sticking him in a role like that would bother you a lot.”
Vince started to protest; he’d gotten over it this morning. Hadn’t he? The more he turned Mary’s words over in his head, the more he realized that the general sense of anxiety he was feeling seemed to be inevitably tethered back to those moments just before he woke up. Everyone watching as the father he’d thought he lost helped the man who’d kidnapped Mary escape from jail.
“What was my power?”
“Huh?”
“I was trying to blatantly change the subject since you seemed uncomfortable. What was my power?” Mary repeated.
“You were telepathic and telekinetic,” Vince informed her. “Alice could fly, Nick had control over luck, Roy and Hershel were weirdly the same person, and I absorbed energy.”
“Wow, you did not half-ass this dream.”
“That’s barely even scratching the surface,” Vince told her. “Most of the people from the football team were there, along with a good portion of the cheerleaders, not to mention Will, Jill, Stella, and even that quiet girl who hangs around with Violet. Camille. That last mix-up got me in trouble earlier today.”
Mary’s look of gentle interest turned into one of puzzlement. “How so?”
“In the dream we were friends, but apparently in this world she really kind of hates me.”
“That’s... very peculiar,” Mary said; however, Vince’s attention had drifted rapidly away from her. Instead he was focused on the place in the dining hall where trays were returned and trash was thrown away. Or rather, what he saw there.
It was only a glimpse, but he knew his eyes hadn’t deceived him. He was up from the table in seconds, damn near sprinting across the room. It took all the self-control he had not to go vaulting over tables. Vince spun around the corner to find the area empty, save for a stack of red plastic trays. Slowly sanity restored itself and he realized he must have looked like an idiot dashing through the dining hall like that. He couldn’t help it. A girl with a familiar figure and a mane of tangled dark curls had gone in here, he was sure of it, and for whatever reason he’d needed to see her. To talk with her. To touch her. She was gone; maybe she hadn’t even been here to begin with. Just another phantom from his concussion.
Vince turned and headed back to do some explaining at his table. It seemed that was the theme of his day.
163.
Several more classes, an evening study session, more than a few gaffes, and one death-courting car ride found Vince finally back at home as the sun began to dip below the horizon. The lights from the kitchen twinkled in dusk’s fading glow, illuminating his father scurrying about and getting dinner ready. He would have gotten off shift about an hour ago; during non-finals time Vince would have beaten him home. He knew that to be true, yet he also knew that his father had seemingly died in a fire when Vince was thirteen. It didn’t matter that one was a dream anymore. Something in it still felt real, which meant Vince needed to deal with it.
He dropped his backpack in the front hallway then headed into the kitchen where he was greeted with a symphony of scents, all combining to form the unmistakable odor of baking lasagna.
“Hey, kid,” his father greeted. “Just got it in the oven a few minutes ago, so you’ve got some time before dinner. How’s the head?”
“Tired,” Vince replied, taking a seat at the table. “And a little confused, to be honest.”
“Anything serious?” His father stopped fiddling with the salad bowl he’d been filling full of greens to face his son.
“Not in a medical way, no. I’ve just been having this weird experience where I mix up things from my dream last night.”
“The one where everyone had superpowers?”
“That’s the one.”
“Huh, it would seem like that would be pretty easy to separate from reality.”
“I’ve been getting better at it through the day,” Vince replied. “But it’s more what happened in it that’s bothering me. Or, I mean, the way certain people acted in it. Including you.”
His father set down his tongs and went to the fridge, pulling out a pair of sodas. He placed one in front of Vince and took the other to his seat, directly across from his son.
“Sounds like you need to talk.”
“I do, but it feels crazy trying to sort out how I feel about things that didn’t happen.”
“They happened to you. Even if it wasn’t real, you still have memory of those events,” his father pointed out. “So let’s deal with them. You can talk to me about anything.”
Vince hesitated, then the temptation grew too strong and the words started tumbling out. He didn’t tell his father everything - the dream had been far too expansive and detailed for that - but he made sure to hit the high points involving the faked death, the kidnapping attempt, the accusations about Globe, and the shock of discovering it was all true. He talked halfway through
the lasagna’s cooking time, which he could tell by the slow-moving timer perched atop the stove. When Vince was finally done, his father took a long sip from his soda before responding.
“Man, I sound like kind of a jerk in your dream.”
Vince snorted a laugh, almost spitting some of his own drink in the process.
“So that’s what’s bothering you? That your subconscious would put me in the role of villain?”
“Yeah. I don’t know why it would do that.”
“Well, it didn’t. Not really.” Vince tilted his head in confusion, spurring his father to continue on. “Think about it: in your dream all your actual experiences with me sound a lot like that ones we really have. We talked, shared openly, and had a darn healthy father-son relationship, which I feel like is a good summary of how things really are.”
“I completely agree,” Vince said without hesitation.
“Now, as to all that villain stuff, it seems to me every bit of that came to you second-hand. People told you about the things I’d done, people told you Globe was a bad person, but you never actually saw me do anything particularly evil.”
“I saw you fake your own death,” Vince pointed out. “Plus break the man who kidnapped Mary out of jail.”
“Okay, I’ll give you those are valid points. Doesn’t mean there aren’t possible explanations behind them. If I were a betting man, I’d say your dream was trying to teach you that sometimes you have to make a choice about what you’re going to believe. You can trust what others tell you, or go with the things that you know to be true. Maybe the solution for the dream version of you is to still accept my actions for the crimes they are, but trust that the man committing them is still the same father who took you in from the streets. You know some of what he’s done, but none of the why behind those actions.”
“Doesn’t sound easy.”
“Doesn’t sound like your dream-self does anything the easy way, which matches up pretty well to the real one,” his father said, reaching across the table and squeezing Vince’s hand. “All I can tell you is how I interpret it. If that doesn’t work then keep turning it over in your brain until you find a way to look at it that feels right.”
“Thanks. I know the whole thing makes no sense, but I feel strangely better.” It was true; the continuous weight in his stomach seemed to have been alleviated. In fact, with every passing second, Vince was having more and more trouble remembering what had made him so upset.
“Any time. You know that. Now how about you go grab a shower before dinner? I think a hot water submersion will clear away the last of those mental cobwebs. Also, not to be rude, but I can still smell the fear-sweat on you from riding home with Nick.”
“Sure,” Vince said, heading for the stairs and taking them two at a time.
His father got up and began messing with the salad again, pausing to put a pot of coffee on the burner. He did love a good cup of mud after a heavy Italian meal. The salad was finished by the time he heard a light knock on the front door. Not bothering to take off his apron, he walked to the door and pulled it open, revealing a somewhat awkward Mary.
“Good evening, Mary. What brings you to our home this evening?”
“I just wanted to check on Vince. He still seemed a bit out of sorts at lunch today.”
“Aren’t you a good friend? He’s doing fine, but since you’re here I insist you come have dinner with us.” Vince’s father hustled her into the kitchen and pulled out a seat for her at the table. “Would you care for anything to drink?”
“Tea would be great, if you have it,” she replied distractedly, her focus busy as she looked around the house. It was like it was the first time she’d ever been here.
“If memory serves we should have some of your favorite, lavender tea,” he said, digging about in the cabinet. Discovering the bags, he laid them on the counter and set a teapot on the stove to boil. Before sitting down he poured himself a cup of coffee, then rejoined Mary at the table. The girl he found waiting for him was in a very different mood from the one he’d brought through the door.
“How did you know that?” Mary asked, her usually cheerful face suddenly quite severe.
“My dear girl, you’ve lived four houses down since you were a child. I think I can at least remember your favorite tea.”
“Except that until a few months ago I drank oolong, and I doubt Vince ever knew that. I’m positive I didn’t tell him that I made the switch to lavender.”
“Well, my boy might not be very perceptive on the details; however, I make it a point to be,” he replied, sipping a bit of his coffee.
“That’s not the point. The point is that Vince didn’t know that bit of information, so there’s no way some assembled memory of his father could access it.” Mary’s hands were growing numb from gripping the table, a rising sense of uneasiness making the temptation to panic increasingly stronger.
“Oh, come now, Mary, I wouldn’t be a very good father if I didn’t do a little research on the people my son spent all his time with.” Globe set the mug of still-steaming coffee on the table and treated her to another small smile. “And as to the question you’re trying so hard not to ask, don’t tell me it never occurred to you that you’re not the only one with the power to travel into someone’s dreams?”
164.
Mary stayed calm. She’d been working hard on keeping a cool head during stressful situations so as not to let her level of precision slip. So she very calmly unleashed a blast of telekinetic force designed to send the man across the table through at least three houses before he slowed down. Mary was somewhat less calm when not even a slight shove seemed to manifest.
“No super powers in this world,” Vince’s father helpfully reminded her. “Given the surprise on your face I’m guessing you tried something pretty ostentatious. It’s built right into the framework. I’m afraid no ability other than the ones that allow you to enter and exit will function. Now, I’ll go see about your tea.” He stood up and walked over to the teapot, which Mary had failed to notice whistling. “Of course, you could still yell for Vince and tell him everything; however, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t. This experience will help him greatly in dealing with my recent activities. I’d hate to see it ruined.”
Mary stayed quiet as he set the cup of hot water and the bags down on a small plate, along with a small spoon, a packet of sugar, and a bottle of honey. He slid them across, making sure to keep his distance non-threatening. The cup was steaming freely as Mary looked into its clear depths.
“You don’t really expect me to drink something you handed me, do you?”
“No, I suppose I don’t, but it seemed impolite not to at least offer.”
“I could still attack you, even without my powers.”
“You certainly could, however seeing as neither of us is here physically, I’m not sure what you would be aiming to accomplish.” He took a swig of his coffee before continuing. “I am glad for this opportunity, at least. I’ve wanted to apologize for the incident with George and Persephone since it happened.”
“Sure, and next you’re going to tell me how this whole thing is a set up and you’re not really to blame for any of it.”
“No, I won’t be telling you that,” he said, the polite happiness on his face suddenly overshadowed by some ancient ache from deep within. “Are things more complex than you realize? Almost always. But I will not claim false innocence. Make no mistake, Mary, the death of Intra, your kidnapping, and much of what is to come, it is all my fault.”
She hadn’t quite expected that. The man was so open and upfront, it was like, well, it was like talking to Vince. Absentmindedly she began dunking the teabag in her cup. “How are you here, anyway? I just saw you getting chased on the news.”
“What you saw was footage, footage that had been reviewed, censored, and reviewed again before it was ever cleared to broadcast to the general public. We’ve been holed up for over two hours. The limits on what media can report regarding Heroes cause
some pretty glaring gaps in efficiency. We’ve only got a little bit before Vince returns; I’d suggest asking me things you actually care about.”
“Fine. Why did you break out George? And why did he try to kidnap me in the first place?”
“For the first, it is because George is a friend who was only following orders. I won’t let anyone suffer on my account when I can help it. As to the second, I’m afraid I won’t answer that yet. Suffice it to say that there was a preferred Plan A and a more realistic Plan B. We are now well within the depths of B.” The coffee was finished off in a single final gulp and he rose to get more. While up he stopped to check on the lasagna. “I’m guessing you’re the one who will tell them when to wake Vince up?”
“I’ll go back to my own brain and give the signal. Rich left me still able to communicate,” Mary confirmed.
“Quite a useful power that boy has. Don’t suppose I could convince you to wait until after dinner? Vince and I haven’t gotten to spend any time together for a long while.”
“That happens when you fake your own death to get away from him.”
“Given what you know about me, that should be the easiest motivation in the world to figure out,” he said, sitting back down at the table. “Some people knew I was still alive. I kept thinking I could keep him safe, but after a particularly close call... let’s just say I pray you never have to make the kind of decision I made that day.”
Mary dearly missed her telepathy right now, because she was having a hard time not believing the sadness and concern in Globe’s eyes. She could barely even think of him that way. In fairness, not many people are able to look intimidating while wearing a frilly apron.
“I don’t understand you,” Mary admitted after a moment. “This isn’t what I ever expected talking to you would be like.”
“To your credit, you’re handling it much better than most people would.”
“No, I mean, how can you act so concerned about Vince? You’re a damn criminal, you just admitted that, and yet you still are asking me to give you time to have dinner with him?”