by Gareth Otton
Tad glanced up from where he was dishing out the pasta.
“Why did you say it like that?”
Jen giggled. “Oh, come on, dad. It’s clear he’s got a thing for her. That’s why he’s so interested in helping those kids.”
“Maybe he just wanted to do something nice for a change,” Tad protested.
“Maybe it’s both,” Stella said. “You have to admit, he does stare at her a lot when he thinks we’re not looking.”
“This is Tony we’re talking about,” Tad scoffed. He finished dishing up the meal and dropped the pan in the sink. “What else would you expect from him?”
“That’s what I mean, normally he’d be looking at her whether we were watching or not,” Stella said. “That he’s trying to hide it says a lot.”
“Exactly,” Jen agreed. “That’s what I’m talking about. Thank you,” she added as Tad placed her dinner in front of her. Stella repeated the sentiment as she received her own and carried it over to the spot next to Jen. Tad joined them a moment later with his own food and a large salad bowl balanced in his good hand. Stella took that from him and put it in the centre of the table next to the already dished up garlic bread.
“I think you’re making mountains out of molehills,” Tad said.
“Whatever, can we talk about my party now? Is everything set up for it?” Jen asked, eagerly changing topic to her new favourite point of interest.
“Wait… Your party. Damn. With everything that’s been happening I completely forgot,” Tad said with a straight face. “Did you remember, Stella?”
“Denise might have said something, but it completely slipped my mind,” Stella teased, ignoring the sickness that came from telling even that white lie.
“Ha ha, very funny. Seriously, have we got everything ready? We need to make sure we can somehow top the party for Tony’s parents in Dream. My friends still talk about that.” Her words came out in a rush as she got more excited and Tad had to tell her to slow down and not forget about her food while Stella just laughed at how excited she was getting. “Are there any celebrities coming?” Jen asked around a mouthful of pasta and salad. Judging by the way she struggled to even close her mouth afterwards, it was probably too big a mouthful and Stella couldn’t help but laugh.
“Not when you eat like that,” Tad said and was about to say more when the doorbell rang.
“Stay there, I’ll get it,” Stella said, jumping out of her chair before Tad could protest. He smiled at her in thanks and then quickly fell back into conversation with Jen, saying something that Stella missed but made Jen snort around her food.
Again Stella smiled. It had been a few weeks since they’d been able to sit down together like this and she’d forgotten how much she liked it. Even when Tony was here being his usual self, it was often a high point of the day. That she could be a part of it and didn’t feel like a third wheel was something for which the novelty still hadn’t worn off. Therefore, she was still wearing her smile when she opened the door. Her smile quickly faded.
“Trevors, what’s wrong?”
“Stella, thank God it’s you. Can we have a quick chat?”
Stella frowned, staring past Trevors to the four uniformed officers and another woman in plain clothes behind him who were definitely not part of the Dream Team. Stella had never seen them before.
“What’s wrong?” she asked again, more concerned than ever.
Trevors winced and shuffled about, clearly uncomfortable. In fact, she had never seen him so reluctant to speak. Even during that awkward conversation outside the hospital he had not been this bad.
“Um… Look. If we were to give Tad some bad news right now, do you think you could keep him under control?”
That happy feeling Stella had from dinner vanished and her stomach twisted as she sensed that whatever came next really wouldn’t be good.
The kitchen door opened and Stella poked her head inside.
“You were a long time. Who was it?” Tad asked.
“You got a sec. Trevors is in the other room and he needs to speak to us.”
There was something in the way Stella held herself that he didn’t like, but Tad just nodded and pushed that thought aside.
“Of course,” he said, standing and telling Jen there was pie in the fridge and to help herself. Then he followed Stella out of the kitchen toward the living room where he got his second shock. The front door was still open and there were uniformed officers coming inside.
“What’s going on?” he asked, about to follow them as they headed toward the kitchen. Stella told him not to worry about it and asked him to follow her into the living room. Still not happy but deciding to trust her, he followed her and was greeted with a grumpy Trevors and a stern-faced woman with steel grey hair sitting on his sofa.
“Okay, what’s going on,” Tad said, suddenly sure he wouldn’t like this. He didn’t miss the fact that Trevors stepped between him and the door, trying to look casual but making Tad feel like he was being penned in.
“Tad, this is Andrea Heartman,” Stella explained. “She’s from social services and she’s here to talk to you about Jen.”
“Excuse me?” Tad asked.
“Please sit down, Mr Holcroft,” Andrea said, not a hint of warmth in her voice.
“Not until someone tells me what’s going on,” Tad snapped, growing angry.
“I’m here to talk to you about the adoption of Jennifer Larson four years ago.”
“What about it?” Tad asked, glaring at Stella as he tried to work out her part in this.
“We received an anonymous tip this afternoon, and we’ve found some anomalies that we would like to talk to you about.”
The bottom dropped out of Tad’s stomach as he realised exactly what was happening. Suddenly he felt a desperate need to get back to the kitchen, but again Stella stopped him, this time with both hands on his chest as she forced him to look her in the eyes.
“Please, Tad. Don’t do anything stupid. There are right ways to deal with this and what you’re thinking will only get you into trouble.”
“Then get those policemen out of my house and let’s talk,” Tad snapped. “What are they doing here, anyway?”
“They are taking Miss Larson to a safe location while we figure this out.”
“Stop calling her that. Her name is Jen Holcroft now.”
“No, it’s not,” the woman snapped, her tone ice cold. “And you know that, don’t you, Mr Holcroft? As I said, I’ve been looking into the adoption of Jennifer. I know you lied in pre-adoption interviews, that the papers you provided proving kinship to Jennifer are false, as were the documents pertaining to the wishes of Jen’s parents.”
“No, they weren’t false. Her parents wanted me to have Jen,” Tad snapped.
“But they did not sign those documents, did they?” the woman asked, unfazed by Tad’s anger. When Tad didn’t answer straight away, she leaned back and wrote on the clipboard in her hand. “I thought not.”
“Her parents were dead,” Tad said. “They were ghosts when they made those wishes clear to me. They are their wishes, though.”
“The system doesn’t work that way, Mr Holcroft. Was anyone else witness to their wishes when they made them?”
“You know they weren’t,” Tad snapped. “No one but a Proxy could see ghosts at the time.”
“I see. And when you claimed kinship to Jennifer—”
“This is bullshit,” Tad snapped, interrupting the woman. “I did what was right and took her in when she had nowhere to go. You weren’t equipped to deal with a young Proxy who’d just played host to her parents for six months while she helped solve their murder. She needed another Proxy to guide her.”
“That is not your place to decide,” Andrea said, writing something else on her stupid clipboard. Then she put her pen down and looked up. “I think it would be in everyone’s best interest that Jennifer be removed from your custody immediately, and you need to come in for further questioning.”
> “You’re fucking arresting me?” Tad asked, incredulous and turning to Stella. “You brought me in here for this? Really?”
“Tad I—”
She said more but Tad didn’t hear it as a noise from the other room became more important, something that sounded suspiciously like Jen shouting. There was no thought about what action to take, Tad just suddenly headed for the door and completely ignored Stella’s call to come back.
“Tad, I can’t let you go in there,” Trevors said, holding out an arm. “In fact, I need to take you into—”
Tad didn’t wait to hear what he had to say, he simply shoved Trevor’s aside. A man of Tad’s stature needed a little help to move a man Trevor’s size anywhere and in Tad’s state of mind he might have been a little less reserved than he could have been when he called for Dream.
Trevors flew like a train had struck him, not touching the floor until he hit the wall on the other side of the room. Tad didn’t wait to see if he was alright. He was already in the hallway where he saw two men dragging Jen from the kitchen while two more had a snarling puppy each and were struggling with them.
Again Tad didn’t think, there was no time for that, he simply acted.
He reached for Dream, targeting the officer’s backward momentum as they tugged at Jen and augmenting it a hundred times over. The effect was like the wall behind them had suddenly turned into the world’s largest magnet and they were made entirely of iron. They were pulled into the wall hard enough to leave cracks and Jen tumbled free.
Tad was still rushing down the corridor and before she even had chance to right herself he’d scooped her up and was about to dreamwalk away when suddenly Stella was there again, clinging onto him with all her considerable strength.
“Please Tad, not like this,” she begged, a note of desperation in her voice.
“I’m not letting them take her, Stella,” he snapped.
“I know you won’t. I won’t either,” she said. “I’ll fight with you all the way, help them see the truth that there are extenuating circumstances and you had no other choice but to go about things the way you did. But this isn’t the way, Tad. You run now and you’ll lose any chance of legally keeping Jen for the rest of your life. You’ll be running until they catch you and even if you stay ahead of them, what kind of life will you be giving Jen? She won’t be able to train with Doctor Burman, she’ll won’t be able to go to school, she’ll never be able to relax.”
“This is her home, she’s not going anywhere,” Tad said when he couldn’t think of a logical answer to what she was saying.
“I know it is, and I agree. But you have to see it from their point of view. I know you didn’t have a choice, but you broke the law.”
“The law doesn’t cover ghosts,” Tad argued.
“No, they don’t mention them at all. The truth is that Jen’s parents wanted you to have her, and I bet there’s nothing that says they have to be alive to make their wishes known. We just have to stand aside so we can make that clear legally. It’s the best way, I promise. It’s the only way.”
“No, I’m not going anywhere,” Jen snapped when Tad suddenly couldn’t speak. “I don’t care about Doctor Burman or any of that. I’m staying with dad.”
“Tad, please see reason,” Stella begged, not even trying to deal with Jen.
“No!” Jen shouted.
“She’s right, Jen” Tad said, and they were the hardest sounds he’d ever had to make.
“What? No. I don’t want to go anywhere, please don’t let them take me.”
“Jen, if Tad keeps you he’ll become a criminal. People will hunt him for the rest of his life. Even when you’re old enough that they won’t be able to force you anymore, they’ll still want to arrest your dad. We can’t let that happen.”
“I don’t want to go,” Jen complained, her voice shaking. “Please, I don’t want to go.”
Tad’s legs wobbled as the realisation of what he was about to do washed over him and tears streamed down his face, but he had no choice.
“Jen, she’s right. This is the only way.”
“No,” Jen wailed. “No. Don’t make me go. Please, I don’t want to go.”
“I know, I don’t want you to go either. And no matter what, you won’t be gone long because nothing… Jen, listen to me. Nothing will ever stop me coming for you, you hear that. We have to do what they say for now, but this isn’t forever. I promise.”
Jen stared at him, eyes wide and lip trembling as she struggled to understand what he was saying, to understand why he was giving her away.
“Jen, listen to me. This won’t be forever. You’ve got to believe that. I will fight this until they give you back.” He dipped his head so his forehead touched hers and then, quietly so Stella wouldn’t hear, he added, “Remember. We’re dreamwalkers. There’s nothing any of them can ever do to keep you from me. We’ll try it their way, but if that doesn’t work I’m coming for you. But I need you to be strong until then, can you do that?”
“I don’t want to,” Jen sobbed.
“I know, and I don’t want you to either, but Stella’s right. We don’t have a choice. Please be strong for me. I love you, Jen. I won’t let this be forever, I promise. You just need to be strong.”
Jen sobbed and said nothing for the longest time, but finally he heard her whisper, “I will. I’ll be strong, daddy.”
It almost broke him, but Tad hugged his daughter one last time and almost broke, almost dreamwalked them away. Finally though, before the last of his nerve failed, he did what he knew deep down was the right thing and handed Jen to Stella.
The next fifteen minutes passed in a blur. A sobbing Jen who clutched Hawk as though her life depended on it was put into the back of a car and driven away. Tad watched and hated himself for giving in. He constantly questioned himself about whether he’d done the right thing, whether he’d given in too easily. The only thing that kept him sane was Stella’s constant contact and her softly spoken words telling him this wouldn’t be forever, that it would only be a couple of days at most, then she’d be back.
Soon the car with Jen was gone and the ambulances turned up to deal with the people Tad had injured while trying to get to his daughter. Tad was led to the living room while they were being checked over and he was dimly aware that there was no lasting damage to any of them, but he didn’t really care. He was stuck in that same loop, questioning his decision and already hating himself for it.
“Tad, we’ve got to go.”
Tad looked up and was surprised to see Stella standing over him, an expectant look on her face. How long had she been talking to him?
“Tad, please. Let’s go,” she said again.
He climbed to his feet, accepting the jacket she held out for him and slipping into it. While she did that he was vaguely aware of Trevors, the action hero, staring daggers at him. How many times in his life had Tad looked away from such expressions? How many times had he played the meek history teacher, keeping his head down so he wouldn’t be trouble to anyone?
That felt like so long ago now. He’d had to change to stop King, had to change to get over losing Charles and Miriam, had to change more to stop the nightmares, change even more again to adapt to fame, to the pressure of being caught between dreamwalkers and normal people. Now they’d just taken his daughter, and Trevors had the nerve to stare at him like that.
No, the history teacher was long gone. The man he’d changed into was all that was left. It was that man who stared right back and said, “What the fuck is your problem?”
Stella tensed behind him, but he barely registered it. He just stared the action hero in the eye, refusing to take one more ounce of pain or intimidation from anyone.
“I tell you what, Tad. You get a pass tonight because of what you’re going through,” Trevors said. “But you ever attack me again and I won’t be so forgiving.”
Stella would later tell him he must have dreamwalked, but he didn’t remember it. All he knew was that one moment he w
as on one side of the room with Stella and the next he was on the other, the ridge of his right forearm on Trevors’ neck as he held him off the ground with Dream aided strength that Trevors couldn’t hope to overcome.
“Trevors, your threats mean less than nothing to me. But let me give you some advice back in kind. You ever step between me and my daughter again and there’ll be nothing but ashes left of you before you can even think about raising a hand against me. Do I make myself clear?”
Wide eyed and probably feeling genuine fear for the first time in his life, Trevors did his best to nod his agreement. He didn’t have much luck as he had no leverage to work with.
“Tad,” Stella said, her voice as soft as the touch on his shoulder. “This isn’t helping.”
All at once Tad’s fury left him and he let Trevors go, the bulky man collapsing into a puddle at Tad’s feet, coughing and choking as he tried to catch his breath.
Tad had already forgotten him. He just let Stella lead him out to the waiting police car and he climbed into the open back seat when she asked him to. He didn’t notice how the police flinched as he came close, how the neighbours lined every window watching him get led away, or even the reporters who had somehow got wind of this and shown up with cameras.
He’d already turned his mind inward again, thinking of Jen being led away, sobbing and begging for him to keep her home where she belonged.
“What have I done?” he whispered as Stella climbed in after him, took his hand, and together they were led away into the night.
EPILOGUE
Sunday, 24th July 2016
03:00
Despite the late hour, Kuruk was awake.
How could he not be? The pain was constant. They gave him drugs to deal with it, but at best they took the edge off. So he lay atop the covers of his bed, covered in bandages and wishing there was a breeze at least to caress his horrendously burnt skin. But no such luck. He had only the stuffy hospital air and constant pain.
He didn’t even leave my healing dreamcatcher, he thought bitterly to himself. It was the wrong thought as it brought back the feeling of pain, of humiliation, of helplessness as the Dreamwalker took him apart, one dreamcatcher at a time like he was nothing.