by Zion's Fiction- A Treasury of Israeli Speculative Literature (retail) (epub)
“It nearly killed you.” She looked at him sternly.
“Maybe it was something else.”
Rina went back to the kitchen. Yair went back to watching the show. The cook was now on to soaking beans in water. It was fascinating.
By one o’clock in the morning, with an inhalation mask strapped onto his mouth, Yair regretted taking the pill. His lungs relaxed after a long and terrifying struggle, and his breathing settled. The doctor Rina had called determined it was an acute allergic reaction to the pills, which could potentially be fatal.
“Thirty percent of the population is allergic to this pill,” the doctor told Rina. “There have been quite a few reported deaths. Allergies can develop even after a certain amount of time. They give the pill only in cases in which the dreaming becomes a danger to the dreamer’s life.”
“And what if it puts someone else’s life in jeopardy?” Rina asked.
“Next time the attack will kill him,” the doctor said.
Yair removed the mask from his face and asked, “And what if I keep an inhaler or this inhalator, and use it right after I take the pill?”
He felt the pressure in his lungs again and quickly put the mask back to his nose.
The doctor looked at him as if he was mad. “It doesn’t work that way,” he said.
Yair managed to remain awake until six o’clock in the morning by reading a book. Rina slept next to him. He wondered what she was dreaming about. Was she dreaming about other men but not realizing them? He switched off the bedside lamp because the light coming in through the window was sufficient to prevent him from falling asleep, and he stared at his wife, trying to think only about her and not anyone else. For him there was nobody else. Just Rina. He looked at her dark, lifeless hair and at the slightly low angle of her eyes, her nose with the tiny protrusion and her thin, pursed lips.
“Yair, Wake up!” shouted Rina.
Yair woke up to find Galia sitting naked on the bed next to him, screaming. Judging by the light from outside, it was already late in the morning.
Rina was standing next to the bed.
“What are you doing sleeping in the morning, you moron?” Galia screamed. “I have a meeting with Ossem’s CEO in an hour. I was just sitting with my boss to go over the final details. I don’t know what I’ll do if they fire me because of you.”
She grabbed a pillow and started beating him with it in a rage. He flinched away from her and fell off the other side of the bed.
“Galia, I’ll take you home quickly,” said Rina, “and then to work. Come on, Hurry.”
Galia got off the bed and opened the closet to take out a robe. Her face was distorted, on the verge of crying.
“I was wearing my best suit. It cost me more than a thousand shekels. I spent half an hour this morning doing my makeup; I was at the hair dresser. And now because of your stupid husband I’ll look like some market girl at the meeting.”
She covered herself with the robe and turned to Yair.
“If you fall asleep again, I swear I’ll kill you! At least sleep at night, so that you don’t completely screw up my job.”
She left the room with Rina following her in silence. Yair got up from the floor, rubbing his aching back, and went to the bathroom.
Galia called her boss to explain what had happened. When she hung up she looked like she was going to put her fist through a windshield.
“He’s furious,” she said. “I was holding some very important document in my hands and they disappeared. Now they’re making more copies, and he’s trying to postpone the meeting, but it’s Ossem’s CEO. It’s not simple. I hope I’ll make it on time. You’ll have to take me to work and then to Ossem, too.”
“No problem, I’ll take you.”
“Oh my god, what am I going to wear? My other suit is at the cleaners. And the third one is for winter.”
“I’ll go upstairs with you and we’ll find you something nice to wear.”
“And then do me a favor and go home to keep an eye on him so he doesn’t fall back to sleep. Just because he is unemployed doesn’t mean he should sleep during the day. He should show some consideration.”
“He does. He’s afraid of sleeping at night because he doesn’t want to dream about you.”
Galia moaned. “It’s better he dreams about me at night than during the day when I’m trying to live a little. Try and get that retarded monkey husband of yours to get it into his head!”
“I’ll watch over him. Look, we’re doing everything we can. Honest.”
“I know you’re doing everything, but I don’t know how much more of this I can take. I really don’t want anything bad to happen to Yair. I know he’s not doing this on purpose and that you’re good people, but this is ruining my life. One day I will have no choice but to file a complaint against him.”
Rina drove through a red light and turned into Galia’s street. She parked the car near her house.
“Yesterday he tried to take that pill that stops the dreams again. But he got a terrible asthma attack and I had to call a doctor. The doctor said that another pill might kill him.”
Galia went out of the car and hurried up the stairs.
When Rina got back home she found Yair in front of the television watching the Fashion Channel.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Trying to stop dreaming about Galia.”
“Galia at least lives here. What would we do if you brought some American model here? Not everybody is as patient as Galia.”
Yair pressed the remote. “You’re right” he said.
“So is Galia. It’s not wise for you not to sleep at night. When you fall asleep during the day you’re destroying her job, too.”
Yair let out a moan and stretched on the sofa.
“No,” Rina said. “Don’t you dare. You will not fall asleep today and ruin the girl’s career. No! Get dressed. We’re going on a trip.”
Yair got up from the couch with a moan. He looked at Rina and saw that her face was pale.
“What’s wrong?”
“Galia said something about filing a complaint. She said she didn’t want to do it, but soon she won’t have a choice.”
“What good will that do her? The psychiatrist knows about it, the police know about it, nobody cares.”
“There are rumors about a new special unit that’s supposed to deal with Dreamers. It scares me.”
“Nonsense. I haven’t committed any crime. I’m not doing this on purpose.”
“If this doesn’t stop, someone might do something. Let’s go on a trip so you don’t fall asleep on me.”
They got into the car and drove up north. The sunlight was bright but not unpleasant, and a light breeze was blowing. They went up to Mount Carmel and took a walk in the reserve. The weather was excellent, and everything around was green. Yair held Rina’s hand like he used to do when they were young and had only started dating. He looked at her and noticed for the first time that her black hair was not dyed like that of most women her age. And her face was gentle and almost without wrinkles. She also put on a beautiful red lipstick that made her lips look thicker. Rina smiled and said that maybe instead of continuing the futile search for a job they should open their own business. Yair thought it was a good idea. He had good hands. He could work doing carpentry or take a course in electricity.
In the afternoon they went further north to Acre and found a hummus place in the old city. They used to do it often during the first few years after their marriage. Yair watched Rina sipping her coffee. There was a light on her face, and for a moment she looked as beautiful as she did when they got married.
“I’m going to the bathroom,” he told her.
He went out the back door of the restaurant, hurried to a flower shop down the market, and bought the most beautiful bouquet they had. When he came back, he crept up behind her, raised the bouquet and said, “Flowers for my flower.”
She smiled, and her smile was like a rainbow after the rain.
“What’s the occasion?”
“The occasion is that I love you.”
On the way back he started singing along with the music from the radio. Rina joined him. They kept singing even when they got stuck in traffic. Only the sound of Rina’s phone stopped the singing.
“Hello.”
Rina listened, her face went pale.
“What’s wrong, honey?”
“Who is it?” Yair asked. But Rina hushed him with her hand and turned off the radio.
The cars in front started moving again and Yair focused on the driving.
“I understand…. Yes, do you want me to talk to them?”
She listened again for a long time.
“Don’t cry sweetie … there’s no problem getting you a permit.”
She stared at the glove compartment and didn’t move her eyes from there.
“They have to. There are laws in this country….”
“Is it Galia?” Yair asked.
Rina nodded.
“Do you want us to come there right now? Do you want me to come alone?”
She listened without moving so much as a muscle in her face.
“Look, we won’t make it today. We’re near Hadera now, and the traffic is jammed. But tomorrow we will straighten this out first thing in the morning. I promise…. It’s going to be alright, sweetie. We’ll see you tomorrow.” She hung up.
“What happened?” Yair asked. “Did they fire her?”
“No. She got arrested.”
“What? Why?” He lost his concentration and the car drifted to the right. He turned his eyes back on the road and went back to the lane.
“After the meeting this morning she discovered that her ID was gone, probably along with her clothes and her documents. She went to the Ministry of Interior at noon to get a new one. But because it was the fourth time in the past two months, they arrested her on suspicion that she’s selling them to criminals.”
“Are they nuts? It was a dreaming accident.”
He glanced quickly at Rina. She was still sitting frozen in the same position, the phone resting in her lap.
“We won’t be able to bail her out until tomorrow. So first thing in the morning we’ll head to the psychiatrist and issue a new permit for your dreaming disorder, and then we’ll go and get her out of there as soon as possible.”
“But why can’t we get her out today?”
“They want to make sure that she’s not a Dreamer herself. That’s the procedure.”
“But I’m a known Dreamer. They should arrest me, why her?”
“Because it isn’t your ID that keeps disappearing.”
Yair punched the steering wheel. “Why? Why is this happening to me? When will they find a normal cure for this thing? All my life I’ve never smoked, never drunk…. Why me?”
They hardly exchanged a glance during dinner. Yair had planned a romantic evening, something to bring back the lost flame, but neither of them were in the mood. They went to bed early.
Rina woke up feeling cramped. The first rays of sun were already coming through the window, and she found herself pressed to the edge of the bed, next to a feminine body. Galia was fast asleep between her and Yair, who was also sleeping.
“Yair!” She screamed.
Yair woke up in second, and so did Galia. She sat up and looked at them in surprise with her mouth slightly ajar, just as she had looked the first time Yair dreamt about her in his bed.
“I don’t believe this,” she said. “You pulled me out of the detention center. Now they’ll be sure I’m a Dreamer. That’s it. I’ll be fired. No one will believe I’m not guilty now, no matter how many permits you two give!”
Galia burst into tears. She fell on the pillow and started to sob. Rina got out of the bed and took out a robe. Yair also got up and went into the bathroom.
“Come on, get dressed,” said Rina. “We’ll get the permit and go to the police together. We’ll bang on some tables. They’ll understand.”
Galia went on crying.
“Now my whole life will be ruined. I’m sick and tired of this!”
“Come on, get dressed. I’ll make you a cup of tea.”
“At least that moron could dream a normal dream; if he’d dream about me in a big house or something, at least then I’d have some compensation….”
“Galia, we will fix this.”
“You can’t fix this. Why do you think Yair can’t get a job? You’ve seen what they do to Dreamers. Nobody wants to hire them. Everyone is afraid of them. Now I’ll be branded too….”
There was a loud thud from the bathroom.
“Yair?” asked Rina.
Silence.
“Yair?”
She threw the robe at Galia and ran into the bathroom. Yair was lying on the floor letting out gurgling sounds. Next to him she saw the medicine bottle.
“Yair, what have you done?” she screamed.
“What happened?” Galia asked from the bedroom.
“Call an ambulance, quick!” Rina called. She opened the medicine cabinet and searched for the inhaler. It was supposed to be there, but she couldn’t find it.
“Hurry, he’s having an attack,” she screamed.
“I’m dialing.”
“Yair, what did you do with the inhaler?”
She started tossing out the entire contents of the medicine cabinet.
“Where is the inhaler?”
Galina walked into the bathroom dressed in the robe.
“The ambulance is on its way,” she said. “Rina, he’s not breathing!”
Rina looked down and saw that Yair’s chest was not moving.
“Yair, breathe!” She kneeled beside him and put her fingers on his main artery.
“He’s still got a pulse. Do you know CPR?” she asked.
Galia bit her lip.
“Please,” Rina pleaded.
Galia knelt down and started performing CPR. Rina continued to fumble through the cupboard. This time she found the inhaler. “Got it,” she said. She shook it and handed it to Galia, who pushed it into Yair’s mouth and pressed twice.
They went with the ambulance to the hospital. The paramedics already managed to steady his breathing, but he did not wake up. The doctor in the emergency room was not optimistic. His experience taught him that people who developed such an acute allergic reaction to the medicine either died or went into a coma from which they never woke up. Rina was sobbing on the bench outside the emergency room. Galia sat next to her and put her arm around her shoulders.
“This is all my fault,” she said.
Rina wanted to say that it was not true, that it wasn’t her fault, but she cried so hard she could not talk.
“I pushed him into it,” Galia went on in a shaking voice. “I knew he wasn’t doing this to me on purpose. I shouldn’t have talked like that.”
Rina kept crying. Galia stood up. She went to the nurses’ station and talked with them for a while. Then she brought a cup of water from the nearby water fountain.
“Drink,” she told Rina. “You have to drink.”
Rina took the cup from her hand and forced herself to sip a little. The water was cold and made her cough.
“It wasn’t your fault,” she said. “He was probably desperate because….” Her sobs took over again, and she could not complete the sentence. She rubbed her eyes, which started to burn from the tears. Galia hugged her shoulders.
“I asked the nurses to let the police know that I’m here, to explain what happened,” she said. “They’ll probably be here any minute now to take me away, but the minute they let me go, I’ll come right back to help you, okay?”
One of the nurses went up to them to let them know there was no news. Yair was unconscious and the doctors said that these were the familiar symptoms of the coma. They were getting ready to transfer him into a ward. She promised to let them know when the transfer would be done.
Two policewomen approached her.
“Galia Kena’an?�
� asked one of them.
“Yes, it’s me,” Galia sighed. “The doctors will issue a permit that states that this was a Dreaming accident and that I didn’t break out of custody. The man who’s responsible tried to commit suicide, and he’s hospitalized now.”
“We know,” said the officer. “But we still need to get you back into custody. They’ll let you out today.”
“Can’t we wait a little with this?” asked Galia. “This is his wife. I can’t leave her like this.”
One of the officers sat down next to them. The other went into the emergency room.
“Would you like some more water?” Galia asked Rina.
Rina nodded. Galia stood up and started to walk towards the water tank. Then she vanished.
The cop called out.
Rina fell silent. They heard the screams coming from the emergency room. They looked at each other and then stormed into the hall. On Yair’s bed, Galia was sitting naked again and calling out for help. She tried to climb off the bed, but the invisible barrier blocked her. The medical staff started to gather around her.
Rina ran forward and started to shake Yair.
“Yair, Wake up!”
His head tossed from side to side, but his eyes did not open. Galia threw herself at the invisible barrier. She screamed with all her might. The doctors, the nurses, the cops and the patients, all stood and watched the spectacle.
“Yair, wake up!” Rina begged. “Please, wake up! Wake up! Wake up!”
Two Minutes Too Early
Gur Shomron
In retrospect, Tommy knew his suspicions should have been aroused from the very beginning. The deliveryman did not have the respectable appearance of an official representative of World Wide Puzzles and Riddles Organization. The hovercraft that conveyed him, despite the display of the well-known logo, was also rickety and dilapidated. But the most glaring of oddities was the fact that the package was delivered two minutes too early—something strictly forbidden by the rules of the competition. In their haste and enthusiasm they never gave this infraction a second thought and just blessed their good fortune in having those two extra, illegal minutes to try to complete the puzzle. And they opened the package, thereby instigating the sequence of events they could never have foreseen.