A Thousand Sleepless Nights

by Teri Harman

  Every book he bought as an adult was not only a pleasure to read but also a way to erase some of that childhood disappointment and affirm his freedom from that time of his life.

  Stacks of books were sanity.

  Of course, all those books were gone. He didn’t have the library he’d collected over the years before 1992. He had no idea where all his books had gone in those lost six years. The loss made him suffer, and so he needed this small box of books bought at the used bookstore on his way to Silent Fields, and he needed more. He needed the therapy of buying books. Now that he had a steady paycheck, he needed to find the bookstore.

  He bent and sifted through the box, pulling out a copy of The Silence of the Lambs. Did it mean something that this was one of the books he’d found at that used bookstore? Of the few books he had now, this was one? Matilda’s soda-stained copy sat on his desk—its presence loud in the quiet room—next to the uninvited typewriter. True to her word, Abby had hauled the machine up the stairs and placed it on his new simple wooden desk. The two combined, Matilda’s book and the typewriter, would never allow him to rest easy.

  He dropped his copy of The Silence of the Lambs back in the box. Crossing his arms, he leaned against the window frame and stared with gritty eyes over the tops of the shadowy buildings. A few raindrops hit the glass, the beginning of another spring storm. In the distance, the open country loomed, a black swath. He couldn’t erase Matilda’s face from his mind, couldn’t shake the odd tremor of emotions that had lingered since The Mad Hash. Both terrified and intrigued, he wished the moment of returning her book would hurry up and come. The waiting was a torture of questions and speculations. He needed to look her in the eyes and see what he felt.

  Henry shuffled over to his small desk. His hand twitched to pick up her book, but he kept his arms tightly folded against his chest; he’d held it an embarrassing amount already. He lowered himself into the old wooden swivel chair found at the thrift shop, the joints squeaking loudly in the hushed morning. He moved his eyes from her book to the handsome black Remington Rand from 1937. Tipping his body forward, he released his arms and ran his fingertips lightly over the cool keys.

  Words erupted in his head. Her face, her dark eyes and curvy, compact body flooded his mind. There were words all around her; seeing her had awakened a breed of words he wasn’t accustomed to. The craving to write was agonizing. No way to fight it. Not now in the thin, treacherous hours of dawn.

  Henry closed his eyes.

  His fingers depressed the keys.

  The perilous words flew out.

  Matilda

  Exhaustion kindly started to pull Matilda down into sleep. She’d spent most of the night too caught up in her troubled mind to rest, but now her body relaxed into the softness of the bed, her hands loosening on the quilt. A heavy spring rain poured outside, the sound of the raindrops a soothing lullaby.

  Sleep was seconds away …

  Clack. Clack. Clack.

  Matilda sat up, heart pounding.

  ClackClackClackClackClackClack. DING!

  Her head whipped side to side, eyes moving around the room. This was not the rain. She stiffened, body eager to fight or fly.

  The noise came again. She strained her ears. “What is that?” she asked the windows. Matilda crept out of bed, listening hard. She stuck her head out the door and looked down the shadowy stairs. The noise came from downstairs. “No,” she whispered. She stepped out into the hall. Am I dreaming? I have to be dreaming.

  One cold stair under her bare feet. Two. Three. Four. Matilda stood at the bottom, near the front door and looked back at the stairs. I’m dreaming. A new nightmare.

  ClackClackClackClackClackClack. DING!

  Matilda moved into the living room, her pulse racing, her hands gripping the skirt of her pink-striped nightgown. The charming room lay washed in fractured shadows, the water drenched windows playing tricks with the soggy light. Matilda thought it looked like the inside of an aquarium. Her feet slid along the wood floor toward the source of the noise. She stopped behind the couch, keeping it between her and the room.

  Between her and the typewriter working itself.

  Matilda blinked, stared hard. A piece of paper had appeared in the paper table, rolled under the platen. The typebars snapped into the ribbon at top speed. The keys depressing.

  She gripped the back of the couch, dizzy and confused. Pulling her eyes from the typewriter, she looked around the room for some kind of clue to explain the impossible. The mantel clocked ticked loudly. Four-fifty-one. The books sat on the shelves. The armchair stood still. The rain pounded on the roof.

  And the typewriter typed.

  Matilda dared to step around the couch. It had to be a dream, so why not explore? She leaned forward and waved her hand over the typewriter to no effect. “Stop that,” she hissed. It did not. By now the page was half filled with words. Typed words—black and blocky on white paper. Her eyes focused on those anomalous words. She dropped to her knees.

  One moment of my life, which should have been insignificant, easily forgotten in the river’s flow of daily moments, has halted my existence.

  I desire you.

  It’s madness.

  I want you.

  But this is so much more than lust. One look at you and I want to know all that you are made of. Your thoughts. Your strengths. Your flaws. I want to listen to you talk of pointless things, of books, of nighttime fears. I want to listen to you laugh, to cry in utter agony. To whisper my name.

  It’s insanity.

  I am insane.

  My insanity brings on the words. They will not stop. I saw your face, and the dangerous words erupted—volcanic.

  So many words. They fall out of my fingertips like rain, flooding my page. Such words!

  They don’t come from me.

  They come from you.

  And you don’t even know me yet.

  Not yet.

  The typewriter stopped, leaving only the sound of the rain. With a shaking hand, Matilda pulled the paper from the platen and dropped onto the couch. She held it between both hands, gripping so hard the edges bent. Silver light from the window spilled over the page in wavy, watery lines. She watched the shadow of raindrops slipping down the glass move over the paper.

  Such words, indeed. If this was a dream, it was crueler than the nightmares of the last two weeks. These words made her feel mournful, as if she had just read her lover’s obituary. Her own, perhaps. These words teased something so deep within her soul and mind that she didn’t even know what to call it. These words existed on another plane. One she had no way to reach or understand.

  Matilda looked from the black typed words to the typewriter. “How did you do that? Why did you do that?”

  The row of typebars grinned silently back.

  Matilda lowered the paper to the coffee table. Released it.

  “Just a dream,” she groaned, forcing herself to stand. She pulled away from the words and went up the stairs, the effort staggering. She dropped onto her bed, pulled the covers over her head. “Just a dream.”

  Henry

  Henry balled his hands into fists and stared at the words he had typed. The room hummed with the power of them. His tongue felt like cotton. He needed a drink of water. He needed to sit and stare at the words forever.

  Not yet.

  Not yet.

  The high of the words pumped in his veins, euphoric. But also depressing. He’d given in to temptation. He’d brought her to life on his page.

  Dangerous. So dangerous.

  Suddenly and heavily sad, Henry stumbled to his bed, burying his face in the pillow.

  Matilda

  Matilda woke before her alarm, the sound of typewriter keys echoing in her head. Groggy, she rolled over to look out the windows. The rain had stopped. Sunlight made the drops of water on the window sparkle brilliantly. She took a slow breath. The words of the letter in her dream filled her head. Such words! Stirring such precarious things inside her, like Lo
uis Winston’s words. Perhaps that was why she’d had the dream. She needed to stop reading that book over and over. She looked at it now, sitting on her nightstand. The cover was facedown. There was no author photo, only a short, unhelpful bio: Louis Winston writes from home in Michigan.

  Matilda rolled to the other side of the bed.

  It had felt so real, this dream of watching the typewriter come to life.

  It was a dream … right?

  A tug of instinct pulled Matilda from her bed. In the cold morning, she walked down the stairs, each creak of the wood loud. Her heart started to beat quickly before she turned the corner to look at the typewriter.

  A piece of paper.

  Words.

  All real.

  Her hand flew to her mouth to stifle a gasp. Diving forward, she snatched the paper off the steamer trunk coffee table. Another sharp intake of breath. Her eyes moved from the blocky letters to the typewriter. She shook her head as she eased down onto the couch. Slowly, she read the bewildering words again. All there, exactly the same. Turning the paper over, she looked for something to identify it. But it was ordinary copy paper.

  Her finger traced the words, feeling the slight indentation of each one and that overwhelming sense of familiarity again. “I don’t understand,” she whispered. She especially didn’t understand that the words brought the face of the man in The Mad Hash to her mind as clear as sunlight. The moment replayed in her mind. She wanted to know what would happen if she saw him again.

  She wanted to know what color his eyes were.

  Matilda looked down at the typewriter. He’d been sitting with Abby, which meant he was probably the new editor, a stranger come to town. What had Abby said his name was? Henry. It’s Henry. She pushed the H key. It snapped into the platen with a deft karate chop. She pushed the M key. Chop.

  She set the paper down. She lifted the antique typewriter, examining it from every angle. Nothing out of place, no suspect modern technology placed to play a trick. Just keys and levers and knobs put together fifty-five years ago. Placing the machine back, she ran her eyes over the words again.

  This can’t be real.

  Matilda stood quickly, stumbling a little as she backed away from the typewriter. “No more of that, understood?” she whispered, feeling foolish, but also flushed with fear. “No more!”

  n

  “What is wrong with you today?” Thea asked, standing next to Matilda as they shelved books in the fiction stacks.

  “Nothing.” Matilda didn’t look up.

  “Liar. You’re in a mood. And you look terrible.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “No, I just mean—you look tired or sick or … something. Like that first day you were back.”

  Matilda groaned. “I’m just not sleeping well.”

  Thea nodded sympathetically. “You and me both, sister.” She paused to rub her swollen belly. “But it’s more than that, isn’t it?”

  Matilda sighed and turned to Thea. “Just … stuff. I’m fine.”

  Thea was quiet for a moment. And then, “Why won’t you tell me the real reason?” she asked quietly. “You can, you know. Whatever it is.”

  Matilda wondered what Thea would say if she told her about the nightmares and the typewriter and how she’d felt in The Mad Hash and the love letter from a ghost. Not to mention six years she couldn’t remember and scars she didn’t know the source of. These were things she could have told Jetty, who actually believed in ghosts and inexplicable things. But Thea … “You’re so sweet, Thea. Thank you, really. I’m just getting used to being back here. And the whispers and dagger eyes of everyone in town isn’t easy to take. You know?”

  “They’ll move on to something else soon enough. But yeah, I’m sorry about that.” Thea’s eyes softened. “Something really bad happened to you, didn’t it?”

  Matilda looked away.

  Thea accepted the silence as answer enough.

  They wheeled the cart back to the circulation desk where Beverly sat perusing a stack of files. Without looking up, she said, “Miss White, the second floor needs dusting.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Matilda and Thea exchanged eye rolls.

  “And Mrs. Reynolds,” Beverly added. “The card catalogue needs to be wiped down.”

  Thea made a stink face, and Matilda shrugged in sympathy. The two librarians parted ways, off to complete their individual drudgery. Large feather duster in hand, Matilda climbed the grand staircase.

  The second floor housed mostly reference and town history books. She started her dusting in the science section. Lost in the repetitive motion and casually reading the book spines in an effort to forget the typewriter and its words, Matilda didn’t hear someone approach from behind. When the feeling of being watched pricked up the hairs on her neck and arms, she spun around, wielding the duster like a weapon.

  At the sight of him she lost her breath.

  Tall as a tree, dressed in easy-going jeans and a sage-green button-down shirt, the man with the freckled face stared back at her, her copy of The Silence of the Lambs locked in a tight grip in his long-fingered, strong-looking hands. Henry. Much like in the diner, her body reacted strangely: heart racing, limbs tingling, muscles ready to act. She wanted to fling herself forward and touch him. The impulse shocked her, scared her. Thrilled her.

  He opened his mouth as if to say something, but didn’t.

  Matilda took a step back, lowered the duster and lifted her chin. “What are you doing here?”

  His face flushed and his eyes dropped to the book in his hands. “I just wanted to return your book. I picked it up after you …”

  She frowned, resisting the urge to step closer. Why hadn’t he left it at the diner? She was going to pick it up at lunch, assuming Pearl had put it in the lost and found. She inhaled quietly. “You could have left it down at the desk,” she said curtly. “Or at the diner.”

  He looked confused, like the ideas had never occurred to him. “Umm … yes. I guess I should have. I just …” He looked around the small hallway of bookshelves, uncertain energy bouncing between them. Was it always his habit to leave sentences unfinished? “Well, I … I wanted to thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “The pie. It was … delicious.”

  “Oh. You’re welcome.”

  Matilda watched him carefully, unsure what to do or say. Henry was the new editor of the town newspaper, which meant his office was on this floor, in the back. Henry. The man she’d brought pies to when he stayed with Abby. The man she’d fled The Mad Hash for because looking at him made her want things she wasn’t sure existed. He was even taller than she’d imagined—well over six feet—and built like a runner: sinewy muscles stretched over long limbs. A sting of guilt for being rude to him tried to convince her to step closer, to smile, but she didn’t like the feelings he stirred in her.

  She held out her hand for the book. He stepped closer and placed it into her waiting fingers. His eyes searched her face, flickering with the words of his unfinished sentences. She noticed with a zing of excitement (which she instantly resented) that his eyes were the color of lake water: green, brown, and silver all at once. Involuntarily, she stepped slightly closer. His cheeks burned red under his handsome freckles, his posture shy, but eyes still boldly locked on her face.

  When he dropped his hand, she tucked the book into her body with a desperate grip. “Thank you,” she mumbled.

  He nodded once, slipped his hands into the pockets of his loose-fitting jeans and turned. He was limping. Matilda noticed for the first time the big black cast on his foot. From the accident that brought him to Abby. At the sight of his back, she had the sudden urge to stop him, to hurry forward and place her hand on his arm. Her grip on the book tightened as she watched him disappear beyond the shelves. Matilda’s breath rushed out of her lungs as she leaned her shoulder into a shelf. Her eyes dropped to the book. There she found a blue Post-it note stuck to the cover that she hadn’t noticed before. It read, simply, “I hope you
are enjoying this book as much as I did.”

  She looked back up, her bottom lip trapped in her teeth, heart taking off again.

  It was signed Henry.

  Henry

  Henry hurried to the back of the second floor, cursing the awkward drag of his boot cast. By the time he made it to his office, he was starting to perspire and his lungs burned. But not from the rush to escape his own awkwardness. It had taken a great deal of will power to leave Matilda, even after her cold reception.

  Dressed in a flattering pink dress that fell to the floor, the color deepening her skin tone, she was as resplendent as she’d been at the diner. Her short stature did nothing to take away from her powerful presence. Something about seeing her standing among all those books felt disturbingly right.

  It had taken a couple hours of pep talks before he’d had the courage to leave his office to find her. Once on his way, he’d nearly turned and fled at least a dozen times. But then there she was, standing in the stacks. The sight of her reaching up on her tiptoes, hair swishing across her back as she dusted the books had lit a fire in his gut. A fire of longing and pleasure he couldn’t explain and that terrified him to no end. Words rushed to the surface of his mind, gorgeous words about love and beauty and skin. The sight of her was like the wind: powerful, noisy, and dangerous. The sound of typewriter keys filled his head.

  Henry had stood for nearly a whole minute, watching her, mesmerized and fighting back more words, before she’d sensed him.

  Now, he went to his office window and leaned his forehead against the hot glass. The emotions of seeing her again were far worse than the first time. I should have left the book at The Mad Hash. More confusing than his own reaction was hers: her bitter hesitance and defensive stance. It wasn’t shyness—he could recognize that—it was more like fear, apprehension. There was energy in her eyes and there’d been that one tiny moment when she’d stepped toward him instead of away. What was she thinking and feeling when she looked at him?