The Dreamstalker

by Barbara Steiner

  “Perhaps it would be healthier not to dwell on all you’ve told me, Karen.” Dr. McArthur walked her to the door. “Now that you’ve unloaded, try to forget about it. Try to get on with your life. I know losing two friends seems impossible to live with, but you have to do that.”

  Karen nodded, not trusting her voice. They left the tearoom together, then Dr. McArthur headed up the hill to his car. Karen had parked across and down the street at the market.

  She headed that way, only to stop abruptly. There stood Kerr, leaning on a mail box, grinning at her. Unreasonable anger blazed through her. Had he followed her to town? Or come down here after Mom told him where she’d gone? How dare he?

  It was none of his or anyone else’s business that she had talked to Dr. McArthur. She would tell Captain Martin what she’d found out, of course, but otherwise, she planned to keep it a secret.

  Chapter 15

  Kerr swung into step with her. “What were you doing talking to Old Coke-bottle Eyes?”

  “Kerr, it’s really not any of your business.”

  “Is it a secret?”

  “No, I just don’t like your following me.”

  “I wasn’t following you. Mom said you came to the store, and I thought you might want help with the groceries.”

  “If you weren’t following me, how did you know I was in the tearoom instead of the market?” Karen cooled off a little. It didn’t matter that Kerr had come looking for her, but she did feel he was watching her.

  “I saw him go in and guessed, since you weren’t at school. You okay?”

  “Not really. Kerr, I think something strange is going on, but I don’t know what it is.”

  “Like how, strange?” Kerr held open the front door at the City Market for Karen. They were welcomed with the smells of fruit and coffee and baking bread.

  “I think there’s some connection with the three deaths—you know, of people in our psychology class recently.” She tried to talk about this as if she didn’t even know the people who had died. “And one connection is that I’ve dreamed about all three of them before they died. You know how I never remember my dreams, but I remembered these three—too well. It scares me.”

  “Did you tell Dr. McArthur all this?” Kerr grabbed a wire basket and pushed it ahead of them. “You think he had something to do with it? Maybe he’s carrying on some kind of experiments with us. If he is, it might not have been a good idea for you to tell him everything. Jeez, I’ve heard of kids wanting to murder teachers, but a teacher who bumps off members of his class one by one? Sounds like a horror movie.”

  “Kerr, that’s ridiculous. And don’t be so flip about it. This is serious. I don’t think Dr. McArthur has anything to do with all this, but I did tell him all I know. I had to talk to someone. I told him everything I could think of that might relate to the deaths. Then he asked a lot of stuff about me, about you and me, about our family. But maybe that was because I told him the police had some suspicions about me.”

  “The police suspect you of murder?” Kerr laughed and laughed, as if that was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard of. And of course, it was.

  “This is hard to talk about, Kerr. You don’t understand.”

  “I do understand, Karen. You know what hurts you hurts me.” Kerr stopped right in the aisle next to baked beans and catsup and gave her a hug, a big bear hug. Then he stood holding her for a few seconds longer.

  She fought back tears, fought breaking down completely. What would she do without Kerr? At least there was one person who really cared about her. “Thanks, Kerr. I needed that.” She grabbed some salad dressing, a bottle of vinegar, then hurried on to the dairy case in the back of the store. Blinking back tears, she sniffed and swallowed, taking deep breaths.

  “What does the professor plan to do about the things you told him? Did he have any ideas?”

  “He said he’d think it all over. I don’t really expect him to come up with any answers, but who else could I tell all this? Most people would think I was nuts. He didn’t think that. He seemed intrigued, in fact. It’s all rather weird. Probably the kind of story that psychology professors love studying.”

  “He lives in Evergreen, doesn’t he?”

  “Yeah. It’s probably the only reason he volunteered to teach the class. No one would drive up here and back every day from Denver.”

  By the time they had gathered up the things on the list and checked out, it was snowing again. Kerr helped her load some of the sacks in the trunk of the Skylark, and put two in his jeep.

  “You think it’ll ever stop snowing?” Karen stared at the fine mist of icy pellets.

  “I hope not. I love it.” Kerr gave Karen a pat on the shoulder. “Drive carefully. I’ll see you at home.”

  The back roads were a mess. The Buick slid and slithered. Karen fought to keep it on the road. It wasn’t a very good snow car. No wonder her mother hated to drive it on bad roads. Dad should get her a new four-wheel drive. He could afford it. What was Mom going to do next year when Karen and Kerr were gone?

  A lot of people in Evergreen lived close to town, around the lake or the downtown area. But there were houses and subdivisions nestled all in the mountain area. Little roads took off in all directions, some leading to a cluster of houses, some leading to only one or two. Sometimes Karen swore at her father for getting them as isolated as possible. If he liked mountain living so well, why didn’t he come home more?

  Kerr had beat her to the house. He had a fire started in the fireplace, frozen pizzas in the oven, and ingredients for a big salad piled on the counter. But he was searching the phone book.

  “Who are you calling?” There was a list of their immediate friends on the wall by the phone.

  “Do you have Danah’s phone number? I forgot to write down the pages we were supposed to do in algebra.”

  “It’s right there by the phone. Remember I added all the people in the psych class because we started running around together?”

  “Oh, yeah. I forgot.”

  Karen washed her hands and started tearing lettuce and chopping tomatoes. She had gotten some of the little Romas, since they were the only ones with any flavor in the winter. They were expensive, but worth it. She hated cardboard vegetables.

  “Nasty roads,” said their father at dinner. “I wasn’t sure whether or not to try to get home or stay in Denver. I think I’ll get a new couch that makes a bed for the office. Sleeping on that soft piece of furniture I have is giving me a backache.”

  “How come you wanted to live up here when you worked in Denver, Dad?” Karen asked. She’d see if he had a reason.

  “It seemed a healthier place for you two to grow up. I always wanted to live in a small town.”

  “You don’t live up here very much.” Kerr reached for another slice of pizza. “And a bed in your office sounds pretty convenient.” He grinned at Karen.

  “It’s not my fault I don’t get home. Damndest winter I’ve ever seen. And by the way, Kerr, that remark you made on the phone the other day was totally uncalled for. I would say you owe me an apology. I work really hard to support this family.”

  “What remark?” asked Mrs. Newton.

  “Never mind, Mom.” To distract her, Karen handed her mother the salad bowl.

  “Living up here hasn’t been so healthy for some of our friends,” Kerr continued. “Or haven’t you noticed?”

  “Kerr, you know I’m aware that you and Karen have lost two of your best friends. I’m sorry, but there’s not a lot I can do about it.” Mr. Newton sipped his coffee.

  “No, I wouldn’t expect you to do anything.” Kerr kept saying things to provoke their dad. Karen wished he’d stop. Arguing didn’t do any good.

  “Let’s not fight.” Mom picked at her salad. “I like it here. It’s quiet.”

  “How would you know? You never go outside. It’s not quiet in front of that television set.” Kerr was in one of his picking-on-parents moods. Karen frowned at him. He smiled back. He loved this. />
  “Kerr—” Mr. Newton started to react to Kerr’s remarks, which, Karen knew, was just what Kerr had wanted.

  “Edwin, leave him alone. He’s right. I don’t go outside much in the winter, but how can I?”

  “Well, for one thing, your car isn’t exactly a snow plow. I had a terrible time getting home from the store. Why don’t you buy Mom a new four-wheeler, Dad?” Karen put him on the spot for something he could certainly do.

  “We can’t afford a new car right now. You should know that. You two are getting ready to go to college. That will keep us broke for four years.”

  “You could disinherit us.” Kerr leaned back and stretched. “Or maybe Karen will get a mess of scholarships.”

  “What about your grades, Kerr? You certainly aren’t trying to win any prizes.” Mr. Newton glared at Kerr.

  “I can’t handle this.” Karen pushed back her chair, making it turn over with a whack. She snatched it to its feet and headed upstairs.

  It was their usual bickering when the whole family got together. Kerr enjoyed keeping it going. But tonight Karen’s nerves were too raw to ignore. Also, she felt so tired. Maybe a hot shower would help, and early bedtime. She wasn’t sleeping well, though. It was too frightening to go into deep sleep, a dream state. She had, in fact, set her watch to alarm every half hour. She wasn’t always conscious of hearing it, but it did keep her in a light sleeping pattern.

  She had crawled into bed and was trying to read a Literature assignment when Kerr knocked on the door. She knew it was him. No one else would bother to check on her.

  “Karen, I have the backgammon board. Want to play a few games?”

  She hesitated. Maybe she should. Kerr was reaching out to her in the only way he knew, just being with her. But she had started to feel drowsy, and she really wanted to be alone.

  “Not tonight, Kerr, thanks. I’ve got homework to catch up on.” He kept standing there. She could feel his presence through the door. She was about to change her mind when he said,

  “Okay. ’Night.”

  “Goodnight, Kerr. Love you.”

  “Love you, too.”

  She stared at the pages in her textbook for a few more minutes, but they shimmered and blurred. It was no use. She couldn’t concentrate on some obscure English poet.

  Turning off the light, she blanked out her mind, lay and drifted for a time. Finally, despite all her efforts, she sank into a deep sleep, dreamless at first, then suddenly vivid and real.

  He gets in the car, starts the engine, shivering, waiting for the heater to warm up. He has pulled a sweater over his pajama top, and striped cuffs brush the steering wheel. He looks not at all fashionable.

  Windshield wiper blades thunk-thunk, thunk-thunk in a sleepy rhythm, trying to keep snow cleared so he can see. He leans forward, peering through his Coke-bottle glasses, cursing the darkness, the weather, his inability to sleep. This is a mistake. I know this is a mistake. But then, living here is a mistake. I’m going to sell out next summer, move to the city.

  As he backs out of the drive, a huge cloud of snow creeps over the car like a white-cottony cocoon. He can see only vague shapes around him as if he were peering through fog. Giant snowmen line the road, waving long fingers at him. “Good-bye, good-bye, good-bye,” they chorus. “Good luck, good luck, good luck,” they call. “Good riddance, good riddance, good riddance.” They bend double, snickering and giggling, sending billows of snow crashing into the windshield.

  The road goes on and on and on, much farther than he remembered to town. Drifts rise higher and higher and higher on either side of him. They close in, making the road narrower and narrower. Soon the road narrows to one lane. Walls of snow hover over him, then lean away on the curves.

  He is driving down a tunnel that will go on forever. He sees no light except what little his headlamps throw directly ahead of him.

  The surface of the road turns into a sheet of ice, shimmering out before him, just when he reaches the steepest hill in town. He has never liked this stretch of road. He always dreads it when the weather is bad. He was insane to leave his warm bed. What did it matter if he slept?

  More trees reach out, push the car from behind. It starts to slide. He twists the wheel back and forth, riding out the skid, trying for control. Faster and faster the car slides. The walls keep him on track like a toboggan run.

  Faster, faster, faster.

  He grips the wheel tighter and tighter until his hands ache.

  Then, immediately ahead, directly in the road, stands a figure. It is dressed all in black and looms up out of the frozen, white landscape like a dead tree. He swerves to miss it. The sudden twist of the steering wheel turns the car completely around. Now he is sliding faster, faster, faster, but backward.

  He is barreling down the icy hill out of control, backward.

  He’ll stay with it. Once before he stayed at the wheel and got the car stopped. He’d do it again.

  But the car gains momentum. Faster and faster, he is pressed back into the seat, his shoulder blades cutting into the rich, leather upholstery.

  At the bottom of the hill the car becomes airborne. Sailing up, up, up and away, it flies over the ravine, over the steep canyon wall. Then it plunges down, down, down until—

  Crash! Karen sat straight up in bed. What was that noise? It sounded as if the roof had fallen in or the house had blown apart. Adrenaline shot through her system, making her want to bolt from the bed and run. Look out all the windows. Call someone, anyone, and ask what had happened.

  Grabbing her robe, she slipped out her door and down the stairs. The house was as quiet as a graveyard in winter. Water gargled in the hot water heating system, signaling a drop in the house’s temperature. The thermostat, ever alert, would control it.

  At the front picture window, Karen stared out. The storm had stopped and a sliver of moon sailed the western sky. Two deer in the yard looked up and all around, as if they sensed her presence, even through the double-paned plate glass. Then, used to the spotlight on the corner of the big house, they pawed the lawn, searching for a nibble of grass.

  Nothing seemed wrong. Nothing seemed out of place.

  She must have been dreaming.

  My God, she was dreaming! She remembered the dream all at once, the scene rumbling down on her like an avalanche. Dr. McArthur, in his car. Something had happened to Dr. McArthur. A car crash. He had been in a car crash. He could never survive that. He was surely dead.

  Screams ripped the air in the quiet house into ribbons of icy death shrouds. Cold sheets that covered the body, pulled up over the face that still registered fear.

  Chapter 16

  “Karen, what’s the matter?” Her father dashed into the room and grabbed her. “Stop it, stop screaming.” He shook her, then pulled her into his arms and held her until she became quiet. “Now then, what’s the matter?”

  “Are you sick, Karen?” Her mother stood by, clutching both hands together tightly. “Did you have a bad dream?”

  Did she have a bad dream? Mom, if you only knew. “I—I—dreamed about someone dying. I did that before. And someone died. Dr. McArthur is dead. He was in a car wreck.”

  “What do you mean, Karen? How could you know this? Were you watching television, or listening to the radio? How do you know someone is dead?”

  I dreamed it. I saw it. “I just know, Dad. Listen to me. Call the police. Tell them it was on that steep hill—oh, I don’t know the name of the road. A steep hill near where Dr. McArthur lives. Ask for Captain Martin. He’ll know what to do.”

  “How can I—”

  “Just do it, Dad. Take my word for it. Call the police.”

  Karen pulled her robe tighter and sank into a chair in front of the fireplace. There was no fire, just gray, lifeless ashes. She stared at the black hole where fire belonged and waited.

  She couldn’t say how long, but Captain Martin finally appeared in the living room. He slumped onto the couch opposite her. “Karen, are you all right?”

/>   “Why shouldn’t she be all right?” Karen’s father said, his voice barely controlled. “What’s this all about? What’s going on with my little girl?”

  “We don’t know, sir,” Martin said, his voice appealing to her father not to get huffy about it. “I’d like to talk to Karen. You can stay here if you like, but don’t interrupt us, if you don’t mind.”

  “I mind, but I’ll try. And you can bet your badge I’m going to stay here.” Her father perched on the arm of her chair. It made Karen uncomfortable to have him there. She wasn’t used to his acting like a father.

  “Karen, we found the professor’s car. He went off Lydecker’s Hill, crashed his car over the embankment there.”

  “Is he—is he—?”

  “Yes, he’s dead. Killed instantly, I would guess. I left the investigation to the highway patrol. I’ll piece it together later. Did you have a dream?”

  “Yes, I saw it. It was awful. He was going downhill, out of control, backward. It was something he feared. He had dreamed about it before, but woke up before—before—Then he got the car stopped and the dream never returned. Before tonight.”

  “How do you know he’d had this dream before?”

  “He told us.”

  “Who all knew it?”

  “The class. He told us in class.”

  “So every person in your class knew this. Tell me the whole dream, Karen. Every detail.”

  She didn’t want to think about it again, but she recited the events, trying not to think about them, just tell it. When she had finished, the phone rang.

  “It’s for you, Captain Martin.” Her mother held out the receiver of the kitchen wall phone.

  When Martin returned he reported to Karen. “That was McArthur’s wife. She said he woke her up talking in his sleep. He kept saying, ‘I can’t sleep. I’ve got to go to sleep. I’ll have to take something.’ He got out of bed, pulled on his coat and said, ‘I’ve got to buy some sleeping pills so I can sleep.’ Then he left.”