The Case of the Flashing Fashion Queen - A Dix Dodd Mystery

by N.L. Wilson

  Chapter 13

  Okay, here’s the scoop (excuse/justification/explanation) on how Dylan Foreman ended up in my bed at the Underhill Motel.

  For my fortieth birthday, my mother sent me glow-in-the-dark thong panties and matching push-up bra (did I mention Jerry Springer would love her?). My sister Peaches Marie (it’s okay, she likes her name), bless her, sent me tickets to the Stones. I’d taken Rochelle, and Judge Stephanopoulos had been jealous as hell. Jokingly, she’d threatened to throw me in jail and confiscate the tickets. (At least I’d hoped she was joking.) Even Dylan had gotten me a present for the big 4-0—a bottle of wine and a set of two wine glasses. He’d given them to me at the office, just as we were preparing to leave for the night. The wine, he explained, was a 1989 Australian Shiraz. Full-flavored, a little peppery, but luscious. It had gotten better over the years, he’d said, just as I had. (I’d have felt better about that if I hadn’t seen the Museum Wine sticker on the bottle.)

  God, I remember that night so clearly. A weeknight, Dylan had hung around late. No plans, he’d told me. Just kicking around the office. I guess he felt like chatting. Mainly about the wine. Of course, I’m more of a rum cooler gal myself, and all I knew about wine was that I preferred red to white. After listening to him sing the praises of this particular vintage yet again, I’d thanked him effusively, set the bottle and glasses in my bottom desk drawer, and yawned widely. I was anxious to get out of there; there was a new CSI on. But man, I didn’t think Dylan was ever going to leave. So I stretched and yawned a little wider, then stretched and yawned again.

  Finally, with a long sigh, he’d left, and finally I was able to go home to a frozen dinner and murder on the tube. Geez, hard to figure men sometimes. They just do not pick up hints.

  But what did I give myself on my fortieth?

  I gave myself one hell of a sleep disorder. And that’s why Dylan Foreman had landed so unceremoniously in my bed.

  It had been at a particularly stressful time in my life with the new business. Of course, in retrospect, comparing the stress I was under back then with what was going on in my life right now was like comparing pilling a house cat to declawing a Bengal tiger.

  Still, it’s little wonder I started ‘acting out’ in my sleep. Smacking lampshades across the room, ruining mini blinds with karate kicks. I had woken up on more than one occasion with the sheets completely off the bed and my ass on the floor rolled up in them. The wilder my dreams got, the bigger the mess I’d make of my bedroom at nights.

  After weeks of thinking I was going crazy, I finally saw my family doc, who sent me to a sleep specialist who promptly diagnosed me as having REM-Sleep Behavior Disorder, or RBD. He said it was more common in men than women, as if I should be either amazed or proud that I’d managed to develop it. “Yeah well, so are hemorrhoids,” I’d groused. He’d replied that I might prefer hemorrhoids, and went on to explain RBD.

  See, normally when you’re in REM sleep—the period when you dream—you lose muscle tone, resulting in a kind of a paralysis. This is a good thing; it stops you from acting out your dreams and hurting yourself or anyone in your proximity. But with RBD, that’s exactly what you do—act out your dreams. Obviously, that can get pretty intense. (Nightmares, anyone?) I’m told that they see RBD sometimes in people suffering from booze or sedative withdrawal, but it can crop up in anyone, particularly after they’ve reached—you guessed it—middle age. In my particular case, as the stress goes up, my dream mind tries to sort out the details of whatever case I’m working on. I dream more; I act out more.

  It’s usually not a problem. I mean, I’ve knocked over a lamp or two. I’ve woken up on the floor a few times. I buy the cheapest of alarm clocks because I’ve found the expensive ones break just as easily when they hit the far wall of my bedroom. It’s frustrating, of course. And weird, I know. But though I have to replace the odd appliance and apologize to the odd motel desk clerk for the trouble, I can certainly live with it. Nothing too out of the ordinary has ever happened. Nothing too embarrassing.

  That is, until my dream mind caused me to reach out for my blonde nemesis and capture Dylan Foreman instead. Until I’d found myself lying in bed beside him. Lying on red silk sheets, wearing only a housecoat pulled not so tightly around me. Yep, my eyes had been shut tight during all of this. Fast asleep in dreamland.

  But when I kissed Dylan, my eyes had been wide open.

  But you know what else? So were Dylan’s eyes when he kissed me back.