Dreamside

F I F T E E N



There is no law to judge of the lawless,

or canon by which a dream may be criticized

—Charles Lamb




Harmony and security were restored to dreamside, at least for a while. Brad had demonstrated, and the others were able to reproduce, the powers that would keep the frightening encroachment of those elemental forces at bay. Lee and Ella were free to persist with their "orgasm project": the sexual adventure of making it happen on dreamside. But they had difficulty with sustaining the dream long enough to contain such a high pitch of excitement. The dream always seemed to crack at a crucial moment.

This left Brad to look on, and Honora to resist. It wasn't long before Brad decided that just being on dreamside wasn't enough.

—Know what they're doing, Honora?—

—Of course. Enjoying it, I hope—

—Doesn't it make you curious?—

—About them? No—

—No, not about them. I mean about it. It. It must be different here. Incredible. Different. The end of the world—

—I wouldn't know—

—No, you wouldn't would you? Maybe you should watch them, find out how it's done—

—I don't think they'd like to be watched; any more than I would—

—C'mon. There's just you and me here—

—Perceptive—

—Know what? I want you badly—

—Don't start—

—Don't start? It never stops! What am I supposed to do? What about me?—

—Poor Brad; he isn't getting any—

They had rehearsed this discussion before, both on dreamside and in waking time.

—Am I so obnoxious?—

—I prefer you as a friend—

—I hate people who say that—

—So if you hate me you can't want me—

Uninterested as she was, Honora knew anyway that Brad's real feelings were for Ella. She could see what Ella would have dismissed out of hand; what Lee preferred not to see; and what Brad could never admit. Yet there was no question. Brad was secretly in love with Ella, and because he had no chance of getting close he made a mask of perpetual antagonism towards her. He was the only one suffering from this conspiracy to deny the obvious.

Honora felt some sympathy for him, if only because she alone could see what was burning him up. Brad could only vent his feelings destructively. When Ella was around, he would mock or goad or challenge her in ways which at least won some form of contact, even if it was negative. He drew strength from the friction. And when Ella disappeared with Lee, he paced around Honora in a froth of agitation. He was a danger to himself.

—Honora, think of what you could be missing!—

—I thought of it—

—And?—

—I'll pass—

—It's an experience denied to other people! It's like being specially chosen for something! It's one of life's great miracles and it's only available to us! Don't throw it away!—

—Still, I'll pass—

—You're a stupid naive silly little country virgin who doesn't know anything—

—Oh I'm not so naive; all the other things maybe—

She got up and moved away from Brad's hot attention, leaning her back against the oak tree. She thought of Lee and Ella, briefly, naked in the long grass.

—I'm not that naive—she said again.

For Lee and Ella were only a thought away, stretched amid the daisies and the long grass, shivering at each other's hot breath and warm touch. It was as if they had cast off not just their clothes but also their living skin, leaving them a bundle of exposed nerve endings, detonating at every breath of air, kiss, or light caress. Achingly sensitive to subtle changes in the air currents around them, Ella leaned across Lee and pressed her tongue on his stiffened penis, flicking at the dome with her tongue, here is the church, her lips settling and lifting and resettling on him like a butterfly's beating wings, here is the steeple, Lee in an agony of tumescence, the unstoppable swelling, the ecstatic unknowable voice in his ears until he thought the whole thing would explode, not just his cock but his brain, his head, his body, the dream, life outside the dream, life beyond that, until Ella brought him sharply back under control, coaxing and reminding him to hold it together.

—Slow it—she said.—Slow. Breathe deep. Imagine I've got a knife at your throat and I'm making you do this, now do it, put it inside me—



—Prove it—said Brad.

—What?—said Honora.

—Prove that you're not. Not naive—

Brad stood up. His gaze locked on her and she felt unable to look away, mesmerized, as if he were holding her head so that she couldn't turn away. The air around was absolutely still, not a whisper of wind in the air, but she felt a strange shift in the currents, something akin to a breeze lift gently at the nut-brown curls nestling on her neck. Although he stood fully ten feet away, she knew it was some force that Brad was exerting.

—What are you doing?—

—Prove it to me—Brad said again.

—Don't—said Honora, unable to take her eyes from his.

Brad didn't take a single step closer, but he continued to fix her with his gaze. She was unable to move. She felt the silver buckle of the patent leather belt around her skirt open, the belt passing itself through the loops of her skirt, moving off her like a live thing, like a snake which dropped at her feet. Then she felt a button of her blouse gently popping open above her breasts, followed by the next, and the next down to her waist, and the blouse being lifted back from her shoulders exposing her breasts to him.

—Don't—Honora said again, her arms fallen at her side, held down by a strange paralysis, not knowing how to resist, wanting to fight back and reverse what was happening, think it back as with the elementals, but not finding the strength.

—You can stop it any time you want—he said.

—God, I just can't move! Don't you see I don't want this?—

—Any time you want—

Was he right? Could she stop it? She tried, but couldn't. There was nothing she could do. Then she felt the button go at the side of her skirt and heard the tooth rasp of the zip opening, and the skirt fell around her legs, lying in a hoop at her feet. At last she felt the elastic of her panties being rolled down her thighs and falling to her feet.

Brad stepped forward.



Control. Lee fought for control, imagining that Ella's sharp fingernails on his throat were indeed a knife, until in the dream it was the gleaming blade she would plunge into his neck if he failed to please her; open the door, I love you for ever, he pushed inside her and she squeezed him to her, laying her head back on the grass. It was unbearable this dreamside sex, like making love on a live cable of electric wire. Stay with it, she was whispering, stay with it, but he knew it would have to finish or stop or the dream must break. He was clenching handfuls of her hair in his fists and the grass and daisies growing at the side of her head were mixed up in her hair, and she became a human shape of glittering white-hot energy, pulsating and glittering and burning. He felt they were making love astride a howling wind and over a rushing current and then when he felt her coming he gave in to the current and the wind and felt his body spurting light from every pore of his body as the dream imploded and was over.



The next morning Lee woke up next to Ella, feeling strange, dislocated and energized. She was still sleeping. He kissed her, and in her hair he found a daisy head, two daisy heads, and torn blades of grass. He woke Ella to show them to her.

Grass and daisy heads on the pillow: evidence in the day's eye of what had been transported from dreamside.

Honora Brennan woke up alone in her bed and pushed back the bedcovers to inspect the speckled crimson stains on the sheets, as if a pressed flower had been squeezed into the linen.

Honora felt inside herself for the blood of the broken hymen.