The Experiment of Dreams

by Brandon Zenner

  His shirt came off, and she pushed him back on the bed with a soft touch. She slipped the shoulder bands of her dress off each shoulder, slowly, and the dress slid to the floor like a silk cloth falling in a breeze, gracing her curves as it fell. He stared upward, looking at her body framed in shadow, licking his lips, wanting to take a huge gulp from the glass of wine on the bedside table—but not daring to move.

  She stood before him wearing nothing more than dark lacy lingerie, nearly transparent. Her stomach was flat and smooth, and he desperately wanted to touch her soft pale skin with his hands and feel the heat of her body against his. He realized she wore this lingerie for him—just for him. She must have put it on before she left Paris, or earlier when she freshened up. The thought made his heart race. He wanted to speak but couldn’t. Slowly, she crawled on her knees over the mattress until she hovered above him, her long black hair circling his face and smelling so sweet, so incredibly sweet. He grabbed handfuls of it in his palms and squeezed it lightly.

  ***

  They lay naked on the bed, a thin sheet barely covering their bodies. They sipped wine from the water glasses and picked from the box of desserts, feeding each other bites of the tiny pastries.

  A great stress had lifted from Ben’s chest. His body tingled: his head, his hands, his feet, and his mind. His whole body absorbed each breath that he breathed, bringing new life to the far regions of his mind and body, as if a million tiny galaxies inside him had just felt a warm breeze after decades of frozen nights.

  “Are you okay?” She rubbed his hand, resting her head on his shoulder.

  “Yes, Sophia,” he looked at her. “I’m the best that I’ve been in a very, very, long time.”

  She smiled and he smiled, and they started kissing again. They made love a second time, moving with a degree of fierceness, wanting to see and experience each other’s bodies in entirety. She was breathing deep and fast, in and out, exhaling warm breath on his neck as she squeezed him close to her, making the little hairs on his neck stand on end.

  He felt like a teenager. He could do this all night.

  God, how I’ve missed this. How I’ve missed having a person to hold, to feel their warmth against my skin.

  ***

  All the days of planning, of scheduling, and booking the flight and waiting day after day—it all ended in a flash. Ben took Sophia to the airport, and they walked hand in hand to the gate, waiting for her flight to be announced. Sophia motioned toward a bench and they sat, just like when they had first met, only this time she rested her head on his shoulder, and their hands folded together at the fingers. Her eyes were closed. Ben sat in comfortable silence, tired and wishing desperately they were still in bed, fooling around under the sheets and sleeping together under the same warm blanket, body against body.

  When the flight began boarding, he nudged her awake and they stood, yawning and stretching.

  Her eyes were puffy with sleep and wine, and she was holding back tears.

  “I don’t want to go,” she said.

  “I don’t want you to go.”

  “Call me when you get back to the States.”

  “Call me tonight when you land in Paris.”

  She smiled. “I will.”

  They kissed. Ben wanted to roll around on the floor with her right then and there, but she stepped away and joined the line. He waited and watched, and right before she disappeared down the long corridor, she turned and waved. He smiled and waved back.

  Chapter 12

  Ben woke with a start.

  The mattress was wet beneath him, and the sheets were plastered to his body like plastic wrap.

  Since returning from Italy the week before, his dreams had been strange, intense, and uncontrollable. Not all of them, but many. In these mesmerizing dreams, the scenery and people all around him were disjointed and random.

  One dream in particular stuck in his memory. Castles appeared on a street full of regular houses in a fairly suburban American town—real medieval castles—towering into the air at unrealistic heights, into the clouds. The walls were covered with carved statues and engraved with the writings of an indecipherable script, the likes of which belonged in a Tolkien fantasy.

  These castles sprouted from the ground like weeds. A flock of enormous birds the size of dinosaurs blackened the sky, their wings the length of Mac Trucks. Battles erupted, raging down every street. Men wearing chainmail with axes and swords clashed with one another alongside modern soldiers in olive drab uniforms holding M16’s and AK47’s. Helicopters flew with the giant birds, and tanks rumbled over the streets. Castle walls exploded out and toppled over, raining down piles of rock and debris. Houses caught fire, blazing and spreading flames from one to the other. Ben stood in the dream, watching the events unfold, fearful for his life as explosions rang out and large men crushed each other with massive maces and war hammers.

  And this was just one dream in many.

  What bothered Ben—not just in this dream but in all of them—were the people he encountered. His imaginary society was full of random people and faces he came across at some time or another: a man on a bus ten years ago, a girl on a busy street playing on the sidewalk last month, an elderly gentleman driving a taxicab last week. Every face in every dream was one already seen in real life—a hypothesis Dr. Stuart Wright had shared with Ben many years ago.

  A few of the people in these dreams reacted to his presence with fear and hostility. They shrieked and ran, cowered and hid. An old man came out of nowhere, running to attack Ben, then punching and kicking him, all the while wailing as if he had seen a ghost. His eyes were crazed, looking beyond Ben, focused on something far away. The pain from the attack was just as real and vivid as if it were happening in real life, and when Ben woke with a start, the places on his body where the man had struck him in the dream felt momentarily numb and throbbed with his pulse.

  These people were out of his control, and their faces were not as blurry and forgettable as the countless other random characters in a normal dream. Their faces were crisp, features recognizable. Ben could have sworn that the old grey-haired man who attacked him was his downstairs neighbor, Mr. Levy. The dream was so real, so vivid, that when he passed Mr. Levy in the hall the next day he felt uncomfortable, as if Mr. Levy shared the same dream—their minds meeting in some astral field, and that Mr. Levy was again going to scream and attack him—but the old man smiled his normal full-denture grin. Ben felt relieved.

  That night, before waking in his sweat-soaked bed, Ben had another dream involving his grandmother. It was just like the first dream, only this time they were in his apartment, not her house. The boxed wine sat on the counter, flooding the floor with the red liquid—gallon upon gallon flowing from the open tap. Ben tried his best to close the spout, but it was impossible. The box stuck to the counter as if cemented there. His grandmother stood in the center of the room, not moving, yet she followed him with her eyes wherever he went. She shook her head in disappointment all the while, saying things like, “He would never approve, your father. He would never approve,” and, “This is all your fault. I did my best, I tried my hardest.”

  It was nonsense, pure nonsense.

  Ben peeled back the wet sheets. The clock on the side of the bed said 9:37. In two hours, Sophia would be home from work, and if he timed things right, he might get a chance to call her before leaving for the lab.

  ***

  The driver opened Ben’s door and he stepped out onto the gravel driveway. The tinted-windows in the back mislead what a beautiful day it was outside. He thanked the driver and started walking toward the lab.

  This was the day Ben was going to demand some answers. It was time to see some of the test results and learn what was going on; if not for himself, then for Sophia—he owed her an explanation. He promised her that he was safe, and if he planned to stay on the project, he needed to be kept better informed.

  The door to the lab suddenly opened, and Iain Marcus stepped outside, meeting Ben i
n the parking lot.

  “Ben, how are you?” He extended his hand to shake.

  “Good, Iain. Yourself?”

  “Very good. Here, come with me. We’re not going to the lab just yet.”

  Iain started to walk, waving him forward, while going up the driveway in the direction that Dr. Wulfric told Ben was the main house.

  “Are we going to the house?”

  “Just follow me.”

  The driveway curved through rolling hills and sandy soil covered with tall grasses, trees, and scraggly brush normally found near a beach. After a few twists, the path straightened, and the ground flattened to expose Stone Hollow Estate in all of its glory. The property was massive—acres of land, slightly wooded on either side of the sandy soil. Off in the distance, the ocean glimmered in the sunlight, stretching along the horizon straight as an arrow, and as far as the eye could see.

  Directly before Ben was the house itself, similar to the lab in that the shingles were light blue and a portion of the facade used the same round stone veneer. The houses were similar in style and color; however, the proportion and size were nowhere in comparison. Five labs could fit in the main house, with room to spare.

  Far to the left of the property, away from the house, Ben saw something bright yellow through the trees and bushes. Heavy machinery, maybe a dozen excavators, backhoes and tractors, sitting in rows with their engines idle. The land, almost twice as large as a football field, was stripped bare of trees and brush. The metal skeleton of a very large tent jutted out of the ground in a domed arch in the exact center of the clearing. Ben had seen similar tents when he drove past forts and army bases, typically hangers to house small aircraft. A bright white tarp would later be stretched over the metal frame, tight, like skin on bones.

  “What’s going on over there?” Ben asked.

  “Mr. Kalispell is doing some work. This way.”

  Iain led Ben to the side of the house, to a small door hidden from the front. They entered a mudroom, quite similar to the one in the lab. A Persian rug ran the length of the room with glimmering old hardwood floors visible along the sides. They brushed their feet on a mat, and Iain opened the next door. A long hallway lay before them, lit along the way by colorful sconces, larger and casting more yellow than those in the lab. Ben followed Iain down the hallway, and they stopped before a great intricately carved wooden door—quite old, and held up by massive bronze hinges. The door would be fitting in an old Greek church, Ben thought. Iain put a key in the lock and turned the handle.

  “After you, Ben.” He opened the doors and stepped back.

  Ben stepped inside a long and narrow room; the ceiling had to be two stories high and was vaulted in the center.

  “My god,” he said.

  The room was an art gallery. The walls were lined on either side with paintings—his paintings—the very same paintings Ben had studied and spent countless hours focusing on with Dr. Wulfric. They were all there—St. John the Baptist, Salvator Mundi, Evening Landscape with an Aqueduct, Baptism of Christ, the Raft of the Medusa—all of them; the list went on.

  The room was dim and cool, with the lingering presence of oil paint and varnish in the air. Small overhead lights illuminated each painting individually, casting shadows over the dark hardwood floor and the plank benches in the center of the room.

  A man stood at the far end of the gallery, his hands clasped behind his back as he studied the work of artist Martin Schongauer, a sketch of a man wearing a hat and gazing upward, which also happened to be the title of the piece: Man in a Hat Gazing Upwards. The man broke his concentration and began strolling toward Ben. He was older than Ben, in his fifties maybe, stocky and a little chubby around the waist, with graying blonde hair combed neatly to the side, cut as meticulously as Iain’s. He wore a light-tan suit and a white button-down shirt open at the collar. A baby-blue silk handkerchief stuck out from the breast pocket. He stopped before Ben, smiling, and extended a hand.

  “Mr. Walker, it is a pleasure to finally meet you. I’m Timothy Kalispell. I’m a huge fan of your work.”

  Ben followed Mr. Kalispell down the gallery, contemplating the art on the walls.

  “I must apologize, Ben. You’ve been an employee of mine for some time now, and I haven’t had the opportunity to formally introduce myself. I am truly sorry for that. I only just arrived in town today. I assure you, I’ve been following your progress with the greatest of interest and admiration. I could not be more enthusiastic with the results we are seeing. Dr. Wulfric and Mr. Marcus have kept me abreast of all developments.”

  “Thank you. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you as well. I understand that you’re a very busy man. Are these paintings … are they, I mean, where did they come from?”

  “All of these paintings, these masterpieces …” He looked up, his hands wide, gesturing at the room as a whole. “These paintings—they came from you, Ben. I’ll explain, but please, let me show you my gallery. I understand that this is all very strange, and I am sure you have a myriad of questions, but trust me, before the day is done you will have a clear understanding as to why I’ve had you examine all of these masterpieces, and why you were selected to do it. Now, there’s a lot to see, so come. Follow me, and please, take your time. Enjoy these wonderful pieces of art. They wouldn’t be here if not for you.”

  Ben was desperate to cast a volley of questions at Mr. Kalispell—like, how was this possible? Why are you doing this? But he just nodded, remained silent, and followed Mr. Kalispell, whose eyes trailed each piece of art adoringly in turn, his hands clasped behind his back again.

  “As you’ve probably guessed, I’m a bit of an art enthusiast,” he chuckled. “For years I’ve been collecting the rarest pieces of art that I could get my hands on, no matter the cost. However, the majority of art in the world can not be bought, no matter how much money you are willing to spend. They belong to galleries; they belong to the public, and will never be available for sale. Never.

  I could easily find another artist to reproduce these paintings, and in the end I would have a collection of amazing reproductions—near exact copies. But that is all they would ever be—reproductions and nothing more. Forgeries.

  “I assure you, the work you’ve done is not merely replicating a few pieces of art; it is creating the originals a second time—as close to the originals as humanly possible. Your mind, your dreams—you’re capable of memorizing these paintings in such unbelievable detail that every shade is correct; each brush stroke is exact, as though from the hands of the masters themselves. With the help of Lucy, we can transfer copies of the images in your mind to a digital format. Yes, in the end they are only reproductions, but they are extraordinary reproductions. This gallery has been a way for me to fulfill my love of the arts, all the while further testing Lucy. This might be considered overkill for most, but not for me. As you’ve probably been told, I am a bit of an eccentric. However, human advancement cannot further progress if not for eccentrics like me. And Lucy is just that: an advancement for all of mankind.”

  “Is this …” Ben leaned in close to The Baptism of Christ. “This is real paint.”

  “Yes, and each and every brush stroke matches the original down to the smallest of detail.”

  “How—”

  “I’ll get to that later. This machine, Lucy, has such amazing potential that the applications are nearly limitless. Every psychologist in the world will get a glimpse into the mind of their patients, get an accurate depiction of their suffering—sufferings the patients themselves may not be fully aware of. The inner depths of a serial killer’s mind will be analyzed in ways never before thought possible. Being able to explore a person’s dreams—their deepest and most intimate and coveted thoughts—is on the verge of becoming a reality. Completely new fields of science will be introduced and their mysteries unlocked. Secrets of the human mind will play out before our very eyes, and answers to questions we never thought possible will be assembled like jigsaw puzzles. This, Ben—all of t
his art—is research. Amazing research. And it’s all thanks to you.”

  “It’s-it’s incredible. I don’t understand how it’s possible.”

  “Follow me.”

  They stopped before the Raft of the Medusa, the painting Ben was quite fond when he stood before it in the Louvre. After hours studying every inch, every detail, he thought he would never again be able to enjoy it like he once had; but now he could see it in a new light. Ben remembered every inch by heart—every crest of paint, jagged edge, swirl of shadow, and clean brush stroke. This reproduction was a flawless copy of the original.

  “Come with me, Ben.” Mr. Kalispell led Ben to the far end of the room, to a second set of double doors. “As you can see, most of the walls are still blank.” He waved his hand in the air. “There’s a lot of work still to be done.” Mr. Kalispell opened the doors and let Ben walk through. Iain Marcus stayed a few steps behind, locking the first set of doors behind him.

  Ben stood in the room. “I’ll be damned,” he said.

  “It’s a work in progress, but you can see where it’s going.” Mr. Kalispell’s face beamed. “This room used to be a greenhouse. The glass walls have been replaced, and the measurements done to exacting proportions.”

  Large floodlights filled the room, tilting upward to the walls and ceiling. Canvas sheets covered the floor and scaffolding ran along the far wall, extending from floor to ceiling. The room was barren, but it was clear to Ben what was being constructed: the room was an exact duplicate of the Sistine Chapel. Behind the scaffolding, small sections of the altarpiece were already in place. Ben could see a portion of the image of Christ high in the air. He walked closer. At the base sat a dozen ceramic tiles, neatly arranged, each maybe a half-inch thick and three-feet square. Each tile was painted with a different section of the altarpiece, so that they would fit together like a puzzle once mortared to the wall. He looked at the already finished portion high above him. It was flawless, beautiful—each tile fitting seamlessly with the others, so that it was impossible to tell that it had been assembled in sections. The bright floodlights illuminated the blues, whites, and flesh tones. The robes and clothes of the various saints, angels, and people were crisp greens, blues, and reds. The creased flayed skin of Saint Bartholomew hung from his clenched hand, his hair and hollow eye sockets dark against the brightly colored flesh.