by Shayn Bloom
the needle. You just have to push down here,” he said, showing me. I nodded, feeling nervous but knowing I would do anything for my brother. I was a big sister now, after all. Dr. Boliers and I administered the vaccine. Alexi didn’t protest but his smile died in a flicker of grace.
Dr. Boliers rewrapped Alexi in his blankets before depositing him into my waiting arms. Sitting down, I stared at my baby brother. I wanted to hold him forever. My vision blurred as the tears welled in my eyes. I didn’t bother to wipe them. Gazing down at the tiny person in my arms, I realized that I had never loved anything or anybody so much and with such abandon of all sense and sanity.
I had a baby brother.
I would never be alone again.
I rocked him gently in my arms.
One of my tears fell to Alexi’s cheek. It trickled down his face as though it were his own. He continued to slumber peacefully in my arms. “Your Mommy and Daddy work a lot,” I whispered. “They work all the time but don’t you worry. I will love you. I will be there for you. You will never be alone, Alexi. You will never be alone.”
Hours were seconds with Alexi in my arms. Later, Mom came to stand beside me. She put her hand on my shoulder. “He needs to go to the baby station for some checkups,” she said. “Come on, let’s go.” I didn’t want to give him up, not even for a few minutes, but Mom persisted and finally I stood up.
I felt dead weight in my arms.
“Alexi?” I touched his cheek where my tear had left a moisture trail.
It was stone cold.
“ALEXI!” I screamed. “WAKE UP!”
Mom tried to take him but I batted her away, holding my brother tight.
I would never let go.
“DOCTOR BOLIERS! IT’S ALEXI!
HE WON’T WAKE UP! HE WON’T WAKE UP!
HELP! HELP! HE WON’T WAKE UP!”
Mom was screaming.
I was screaming louder.
I was screaming a dream.
I was screaming a life.
And I was screaming as I awoke, my sweat on fire, burning a hole in my soul.
4. The Appalachian
Rain pummeled Score’s windshield as I pulled into the parking lot at Carroll Community College. The sun had yielded in favor of a wet, grey day. Adia had her back turned when I entered the classroom. Taking my seat, I shook the rain water from the bottom of my boot cut jeans.
The seat beside me was empty. My brain fumbled. Where was Ash? What if he had dropped the class? It was still within the drop/add period. That possibility was too painful to fathom.
Adia was less animated than she had been on Monday. Regardless, she was wearing a purple pantsuit today and heels to match. Her chest was covered over now, the black undershirt of her suit rising to her neckline. I stared at the spot where I knew the dreamcatcher to be as though willing it to show itself.
“What’s a hallucination?” Adia asked. “Someone tell me.” The room was silent. “Thank you, Ms. McGallagher,” she continued. “What’s a hallucination?”
Startled, I looked up. I hadn’t raised my hand. “What?”
Everyone was looking at me. A few girls were giggling, their attempts to conceal the noise the laziest ever. “I asked you, Ms. McGallagher,” Adia repeated. “What are psychologists talking about when they refer to hallucinations?”
“Oh,” I responded. “That’s when you see your hand raise to answer a question when it didn’t.” The girls stopped giggling and a boy in the back piped a long, drawn out whistle.
“Stay after class, Ms. McGallagher,” Adia instructed. Refraining from asking another question, Adia instead had the class copy notes from the blackboard for the remaining two and a half hours.
While copying notes on olfactory hallucinations, I realized that psychology wasn’t exciting anymore without Ash. The remainder of term was going to be a long, tiring slur of anti-climax.
“We’ll finish talking about hallucinations on Friday,” Adia called at last, dismissing the class. I watched as the class filtered out of the door, a few stragglers stopping to ask a question. Soon Adia and I were alone.
She closed the door behind the last to depart. My stomach jumped unpleasantly. Adia went back to her desk and started to shuffle through some papers. “Come here, Ms. McGallagher.” Grabbing my backpack, I walked up to her. “Ms. McGallagher,” Adia began. I braced myself. “Where is Ash Wildecore?”
I stared at her. Was she serious? Her eyes were. “How should I know?”
Frowning, Adia tossed her hair over her shoulder. “You left my classroom on Monday in the company of Mr. Wildecore,” she said, her tone factual. “He hasn’t dropped this class. Where is he?”
“I don’t know,” I replied.
“Has he been asking you personal questions?” Adia asked.
“What do you… no,” I stammered.
Adia stared at me. Finally, she removed her gaze and started packing her bag.
“I wanted to thank you, Ms. McGallagher,” Adia continued. “For dinner the other night. Todd also enjoyed the visit.”
My phone beeped loudly in my pocket. Adia tossed her bag over her shoulder. “Tell him to be here on Friday,” she said, and before I could respond she had swept from the room.
I retrieved my phone. Ash’s name had appeared in the textbox. Feeling blood rush past my ears, I opened the text. Meet me outside the LAB, the text read. I’m under the awning.
Nearly skipping with excitement, I ran down the hallway in a blaze of speed. The main atrium was packed. Students were gathered near the exit and waiting for the rain to stop. The rain was light, however, and so I walked outside.
Ash was nowhere in sight. My heart sinking, I stood paralyzed amid the flecks of water that that hit my face as though laughing at me. Feeling like I needed to sit down, I turned to go back inside.
“Over here, Annie!”
I whipped around.
Ash was strolling toward me from the parking lot, his features draped in a smile. I sighed inwardly. He reflected even a dispatched sun. His skin was smoothed honey, his face glazed gold.
“What’s up?” Ash said.
“Not much,” I said, grinning to recover myself. “Lots of water.”
“Go back to my car?” Ash offered. “We could dry off.”
“Where did you park?” I asked.
“I’ll show you,” he replied, signaling for me to follow him.
I matched his pace. “So where are we going?”
“Do you like to hike?” The rain sprinkled Ash’s face like cherry blossoms.
“I guess,” I replied, gesturing to the sky. “It’s raining, you know.”
“It’s supposed to stop,” he countered. “Anyway, hiking in the rain is beautiful. Nature is beautiful in the rain.” I agreed that hiking with Ash in the woods and rain would be beautiful, but not because of the woods or the rain.
“Okay, let’s go hiking,” I said. Though Ash had missed my retort to Adia, he would at least see me hiking in the rain. He would see my inner daredevil one way or another.
“Hooray!” Ash exclaimed, smiling happily. “And I have some food in my car if you’re hungry. I’ve been snacking all morning. I had to occupy myself somehow while I was skipping class!”
“Why’d you skip?” I asked.
“Uh,” Ash grimaced.
“Were you sick?”
“Yes,” he answered. “Sick of Adia!”
I laughed. “Where’s your car?”
“Right there,” he said, pointing.
My eyes fell on a toy bus. The lower half was painted yellow and the upper half a bright, dazzling white. My attention, however, was already riveted on the tire hooked to the front. Etched on the tire in weeping watercolor, its feathers and blue beads caught in a frozen breeze, was a dreamcatcher.
“This is your car?” I asked in surprise.
“Yup!” Ash replied. “She’s a ’68 Westphalia,” he added, correctly interpreting my ignorance. “A beauty, isn’t she?”
“She’s cool,”
I agreed.
Ash opened the passenger side door and I got in, bouncing up and down momentarily on the squashy seat. “She’s a camper too!” Ash had jumped in beside me. “Look back!”
The backseat was an upholstered bench and between it and the front were a table, a stovetop, a sink, and a tiny refrigerator. From what I could gather the toy bus also had a pop up roof bed.
“This is so neat,” I breathed. “Does she have a name?”
Ash had already started the engine. Flooring the clutch, he shifted while turning the elephantine steering wheel. Soon we were ripping out of the parking lot. “Yes,” he answered. “I call her Magic.”
“Like the school bus?”
“That’s the one,” he replied, smiling to the road.
I gazed at the passing scenery. “Where are we hiking, anyway?”
“The Appalachian,” he said. “On the Appalachian Trail. I brought an extra pair of galoshes for you.”
Grey skies were turning white in the direction we were driving. I prayed for the clouds to clear. I wanted my first date with Ash to be perfect and perfect meant less rain. Fate found my prayer. The sky was white by the time we parked in a dirt lot.
“Luc–ky!” Ash said. “See, I was right!” I thought my prayer deserved the credit. Sliding the backdoor open, Ash jumped inside. “I’ve got trail mix, apples, and energy bars.” Sitting on the sliding door threshold, we ate our way through three apples and a few energy bars. The trail mix sat between us, its plastic top unzipped.
Questions began buzzing inside me. So many strange things seemed to be happening recently. For one thing, Adia was on Ash’s tail for some reason. For another, the dream had returned after months of my routine holding the line. And finally, I was seeing dreamcatchers everywhere.
“Ash?”
“Huh?”
“The dreamcatcher on your front tire,” I began slowly. “Did you do that?”
Ash blinked. “No,” he said. “I didn’t make it.”
“But you put it there?” I interjected.
“In a manner of speaking,” he said. “It was a peace sign when I bought the bus. It’s still a peace sign, in a way. Wayfara, my brother, adapted it into a dreamcatcher.” Stretching, Ash stood up. “Ready to hit the trail?”
Five minutes later we were in the woods, having cleared away the food and pulled on our galoshes. Ash’s extra pair had been my exact size. The trail was muddy but not completely miserable. Now that the rain had stopped, I could appreciate what Ash had been talking about. After the downpour, the surrounding foliage was refreshed and shiny with moisture.
“It’s so untarnished,” Ash commented, gazing around.
“It’s beautiful,” I agreed.
Ash turned suddenly. “When do your parents expect you home?”
I shrugged. “It really doesn’t matter.”
“Why’s that?”
“My parents work all the time,” I replied. “They are both psychologists. Mom has a practice and Dad teaches and writes textbooks and stuff. They will be home late tonight like usual.”
Ash was watching me closely. “You must spend a lot of time alone.”
I shook my head. “I have my dog, Oscar.” We walked in silence for several minutes, finding distraction in the surrounding loam. Leaves, their bellies covered in rain, splashed us playfully when we came too close. “Ash?”
“Yeah?”
“Tell me about the dreamcatchers.”
His words came too quickly. “What about them?”
“They’re everywhere!” I said. “I see them all the time!”
“Alright,” he said cautiously. “Like where?”
“The tire on your bus!” I exclaimed. “On your chest! On Adia’s chest!”
“Anywhere else?”
“Everywhere,” I sighed.
Ash smiled. “Are you imagining them?”
“No!” I couldn’t believe him. “Yours is real, isn’t it?”
He nodded silently.
“You owe me this,” I pressured. “Remember last Monday? I asked you about your dreamcatcher and you never answered.”
“I did answer,” Ash defended. “You just didn’t believe me.”
“Your answer sucked.”
“Perhaps it did,” Ash allowed.
“I want to know, Ash,” I continued. “I’m seeing them everywhere and they’re driving me insane.” Ash’s face was blank, but I could see his resolve was in ill health, fighting for life. Catching a flash of inspiration, I read the speech bubble above my head. “Ash, I will tell you my secret if you tell me yours.”
Ash stopped. “For real?”
“For real,” I promised. Ash continued walking. I followed him in a frenzy of excitement. I was smiling to myself. “This is our first date, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” His response was distracted, the cogs of his brain working around other gears. “Do you,” he began and then stopped, hesitating. “Do you believe in the subconscious mind?”
I stared at him.
Ash rephrased the question. “Do you believe such a thing exists?”
“I suppose,” I answered. Was he trying to distract me? “This does have something to do with the dreamcatchers, right?”
Ash, ignoring my question, continued. “Do you believe there exist creatures that can walk the subconscious mind?” I gazed at him, drinking in his honeyed skin and those startlingly hazel eyes that sat above the huge smile now splashed across his face. Was he kidding?
“Should I?” I asked.
“Perhaps.”
I frowned. “What are you saying?”
“You wanted my secret,” he said. “There it is.”
“What’s your secret?”
“That is my secret,” Ash said. “The dreamcatchers.”
“What about them?” I asked.
“I was talking about me,” he said. “They’re me. That’s what my dreamcatcher means.”
I shook my head. “They’re a, you’re a –”
“Dreamdrifter!” The word bounced around the surrounding trees before settling amid the rain drenched leaves. Ash’s smile had withdrawn. “Dreamdrifter,” he repeated softly.
“What’s a Dreamdrifter?” I asked.
“Me,” Ash explained.
“That doesn’t help,” I said.
“It should,” he countered. “I already told you.”
I thought back. “You can walk the subconscious mind?”
He nodded.
“Whose subconscious mind?”
“Anyone’s,” he answered. “Everyone’s.”
“And I’m supposed to believe that?”
“Yup,” he said.
I stared at him. “Why should I?”
“Because it’s the truth,” he responded. “And I think you already believe it.”
I folded my arms. “I’ve heard crazier stories.”
“So you’re a believer?”
I bit my lip. “Not entirely.”
Ash considered me. “And what would it take for your answer to be entirely?”
I spoke the first word to enter my brain. “Experience.”
“Experience?” Ash looked surprised.
“I want to see it,” I said. “The subconscious mind.”
Ash blinked. “That’s – that’s very…”
“Unexpected?” I offered.
He nodded. “Unexpected.”
“Can I see it?” I was serious.
Ash bit his own lip. “I’d have to check with the Holan. If she’s fine with it then I don’t see –”
“What’s a Holan?” I interrupted, unable to stop myself.
Ash still appeared surprised by my desire to play sidekick in the subconscious mind, but regardless he answered my question readily. “Holan is the title given to a chieftain of Dreamdrifters.”
“Are there many of you?”
“Oh yes,” he said. “You already know another besides me.”
“Who’s that?” I asked excitedly.
; Ash looked incredulous. “Adia, of course!” My brain reeled. That meant that Todd was also a Dreamdrifter. “So that is my secret,” he concluded. “Are you satisfied?”
“Not entirely,” I repeated.
Taking a step closer, Ash took my hand. He closed his fingers around it, squeezing once. His hand was warm and his eyes warmer as they gazed into my own. “Are you entirely satisfied now?”
“I… yes,” I breathed.
Ash squeezed my hand again. “Do you want to meet them?”
“Who?” I gasped.
The hazel of his eyes smiled. “The other Dreamdrifters.”
“Oh!” I exclaimed. “Yes! Can I?”
“Tomorrow we’ll get on that,” Ash said, turning around on the path. His hand was still in mine. “But I should get you home. Not to mention…”
“Not to mention what?” I asked.
“You have to deliver your half of the bargain,” Ash said. “I told you my secret and now you must tell me yours. It’s a nice walk back and you won’t have any interruptions from me.”
Knowing there was no escape, I did the only thing that scared me more than telling Ash about the dream. Swiftly, before he had time to realize what I was doing, I lifted my weight onto my toes and kissed him.
“You know,” he said, blushing. “You still have to tell me.”
“I know,” I admitted. And then I told him about Alexi.
5. The Holan
I examined my reflection. The mirror was small, a handheld that had belonged to my grandmother. My acne was in check and the stringy red blouse I had chosen matched the tint in my hair. Overall I wasn’t a complete failure.
Knock! Knock! Knock!
Placing the mirror on my desk, I walked downstairs. I appreciated that Ash hadn’t continued knocking but was waiting patiently. Small things could be all things. I opened the front door.
Ash stood there, an enormous grin stretching his face. He was holding something huge and round hidden in a plastic bag. “Good morning,” he said. “I have a present for you!”
“Yay!” I exclaimed. “What is it?”
“Guess!”
I frowned in mock concentration. “A steering wheel?”
“Not quite.” Ash smiled his encouragement. “Try again.”
“A trashcan lid?”
He looked incredulous. “This is like super, super obvious.”
“A huge Frisbee,” I said, waving my hands in surrender. Ash gently shook the package and feathers on thin leather ropes descended from its bottom, dangling a few feet above the floor. “Oh!”
“I thought this might help,” Ash said. In one sweep he discarded the plastic bag. From beneath it appeared the largest, most beautiful dreamcatcher I had ever seen. Blue beads adorned its webbed center and long feathers hung around them. More feathers fell from the bottom, gracing their magnificent host.
“It’s so beautiful!” I breathed. “And so beautiful of you!”
“My brother deserves the credit,” Ash responded. “He made it.”
“When did he make it?” I asked. “I hope not just last –”
“Yup!” Ash interjected. “Just last night!”
I felt embarrassed. “He shouldn’t have.”
“He did,” Ash said firmly. “At my request. You can’t fear sleep, Annie.”
“I have my routine,” I said defensively. “I told you yesterday.”
Ash averted his eyes. “Your routine hasn’t been working.”
“Maybe not,” I allowed.
Silence spoke for a second.
Ash held the dreamcatcher aloft. “Can I hang it?”
“Sure,” I said. “Follow me.” Oh boy – Ash was going to see my room. I had agreed to his offer too quickly, before I had realized where we’d be heading. Sucking it up, I led him upstairs.
“Holy cracker!” Ash’s exclamation rang around the room. I was reminded of Todd’s recent entrance.
“I know,” I said, hanging my head.
“Sure you need anything else in here?” Ash asked.
“Very