Dreamside

EIGHT



MERCY: I was a-dreaming that I sat all alone in a

solitary place and was bemoaning of the hardness

of my heart

—John Bunyan



"Is this the best you can do?" Ella, in her WWII flying jacket, stood framed in the shadowy doorway. She looked to Brad like a modern Valkyrie, or some other messenger of the gods, come to peck at his liver.

"You look great," he said, "the crow's feet under your eyes give you character, though your breasts have sagged. Also your jaw has slackened off, which has lifted the venom sacs from under your lip. Really, you look better. Where did you land the Spitfire?"

"I could have landed a small aircraft in your mouth. That hasn't changed."

"Give me one of those godawful poseur's cigarettes you always smoke."

Ella swept newspapers and empty brown ale bottles from a chair on to the floor. She inspected the seat closely before deciding to sit. Expertly hand-rolling one of her liquorice-paper cigarettes, she tossed it to Brad. "This place makes me want to puke."

"Well, we didn't know the princess was coming."

"Thought you said you were expecting me?"

"The servants are away this week."

"You're almost coherent—I'm surprised. That must mean something's wrong. I thought you'd be drunk."

"Dear old Ella; she's very clever. And she'd f*ck anyone for fourpence."

Ella only shrugged. "You can do better than that, a man of your bile."

"Have you really come to peck at my liver?"

"Don't be obscure."

"Never mind. Never you mind, me old princess." He hoisted himself up off the sofa, swaying slightly as he came forward and stood over her, uncomfortably close in his filthy T-shirt and yellow-stained underpants. Lee's graphic descriptions hadn't been exaggerated. His hair was matted and his stubbled chin was stained by something saffron colored he must have eaten recently. The smell of his unwashed body turned Ella's stomach.

He had a bad look in his eye as he stood provocatively near, arms dangling at his side, puffing on his cigarette, waiting for some kind of reaction. She wanted to tell him that he smelled like the carcass of something washed up and rotting on a beach. She thought better of it, taking a pull on her own cigarette and meeting his eyes, but as if with infinite patience. It was always possible he might just smash her in the face.

He snapped his fingers loudly and turned away to find his bottle. "Do you want a drink me old princess me old duchess me old empress? Do you?"

"Oh it's a cocktail bar! And I thought I was in a hovel! I'll pass, but don't let me stop you from getting any further out of focus."

Brad slumped back on the couch with his whisky. "How's your boyfriend? He paid me a courtesy call recently—we go back a long way you know—he wanted me to join his golf club. Had to disappoint him. Don't even know why he came. And a couple of weeks later, here you are. Imagine."

"Imagine. One more and we'd have the full set."

Brad scowled. "But what could Ella want with me, eh? What could the old harpy want with Brad?"

"Still pretending, are we Brad?"

"Pretending? Pretending what?"

"Pretending we're not pretending."

"Gibberish.With a capital ish."

"Why did you call us, Brad?"

He looked at Ella with contempt. "You what?"

"You called us."

"Talk shit."

"I always could out-guess you, Brad. You never liked that, did you? Now that I see you, I'm more certain than ever it was you."

"You don't come here to lecture me; I know what you are. You're dirt. You're diseased! Unhinged!"

Ella went over to Brad and kneeled down beside the sofa. She put her hand into his matted hair. "You're still a boy, aren't you Brad? A big boy, but still a boy."

"Piss off! Get the f*ck out of here!" But he made no attempt to pull back from her.

"You know, Brad, for a long time I thought it was Honora, going back there, shrouded in guilt. But it was you, wasn't it? You started it again. We were all asleep, for years; then you went back there, and you needed us, so you woke us all up. Didn't you, Brad? You called us."

"Just go would you? Just go." Something in Brad's voice had fractured.

"Here I am, Brad."

"No."

"You have to tell me, Brad. You have to."

"No!"

"It can't go on. You know it. You have to tell me."

Brad looked at her. She had never seen such desperation. "She's out there, Ella."

"Who?"

"She's out there. She's hungry."

"Who's out there? Honora?"

"No no no no no. Not her. She."

"But who is she? You must tell me."

"Out there. She's hungry. She wants to eat me . . . the little girl."

"How can a little girl hurt you, Brad?"

"She's not a little girl. Just pretending. Disguised. She hates me. She wants to eat me. Stop looking at me like that." Brad buried his head in the sofa. "Stop it!"

"Why can't I look at you?"

"Because I'm disgusting. I'm a leper. Don't look at me, Ella."

Ella pulled Brad to her, and cradled his head in her lap, stroking his filthy, matted hair as he cried. It was an hour before his sobbing subsided.



They were standing in the kitchen. "When did you sleep last?"

Ella had salvaged and scoured four of Brad's biggest saucepans. She had filled them with water and they were heating on the front and back plates of the filthy electric cooker. The water began to bubble.

"I haven't slept for three days and nights. I'm too scared to sleep."

"Like the rest of us then. Well? Are you going to bring it in?" Brad shuffled uncomfortably. "Come on, do it," said Ella.

Brad went out of the back door and returned clumsily manoeuvring an old tin bath. "Where shall I put it?" he asked pathetically. Ella wiped the tin bath with a damp rag until she was satisfied that it was as clean as she was going to get it, then poured in the hot water. It amounted to about three inches in the bottom of the bath. This was topped up with cold water, and the four saucepans were immediately refilled and set to boil.

"What are you waiting for?" she said. "I'm certainly not going to undress you."

Brad stared back at her, and eventually began fumbling with his underclothes. Undressed, he climbed into the bath and drew his knees up around him. "It's not very warm," he said sulkily.

Ella produced her leather holdall, from which she withdrew soap, sponge, scrubbing brush, towels, razors, shaving brush, shaving soap, scissors, combs, shampoo, deodorants and cologne. She lined them up on the kitchen table like a surgeon's equipment. Then she set to work, vigorously scrubbing Brad's neck and shoulders.

"Steady!" shouted Brad.

Ella didn't ease up. "It's disgusting."

"You're enjoying this, aren't you!"

"It's what I live for."

She splashed soapy water over his head, and drew the line at washing him below the waist.

"You would have, once."

"Never; and don't forget it." She tossed a jug of cold water over his head by way of emphasis.

The water turned black. She refilled the bath with more hot water from the stove, reheating pans all the time. After washing his hair, she proceeded to cut it none too carefully, telling him that it was fashionable to look like someone from a thirties soup kitchen. He said he doubted it.

"I met someone on the way down here," said Ella as she snipped recklessly close to Brad's ears. "I gave him a lift. He gave me some advice before he got out of the car. He said . . ."

"Watch my ear for chrissake!"

"Sorry ... He said we should undo what was done."

"Big help."

"Do you know what he meant?"

"Christ! Watch my ears will you! That was deliberate!"

"Sorry. This man—at least at first I thought he was a man, then I thought he might be just a phantom, from dreamside—was helping me. He was a friend. At least he seemed to be."

"Other things have happened."

Ella was careful to release only part of the story. If she mentioned the girl at this point, it would all be over. "That's the trouble. Not being able to tell the difference, I mean. That's why it's dangerous."

Brad just stared into the murky water which was turning cold around his genitals. He was pink with scrubbing. His ears were sore from clippings gone wide of the mark, deliberate or otherwise. He was beginning to feel sober and he was beginning to feel ridiculous. Ella whisked up a lather of shaving soap, sculpted it around his jaw and set in with the razor.

"I'm relieved you're doing this with us Brad. It's the only way."

"Did Honora agree to it?"

"She will."

"I don't see what good it can do."

"Just don't change your mind."

"Did you ever tell Lee about us?" he said suddenly.

She didn't stop shaving him. "There was nothing to tell."

"I mean about that one time. Us. On dreamside."

"It never happened, Brad. Not between you and me."

"I know different. We discussed it years ago; you denied it then."

"And I deny it now. Whatever dream you had that time, even if I was in it, I wasn't there."

"You can say that now." He flicked water from his eye.

"You're wrong."

"No, I'm not."

"Careful while I'm holding this razor. I'll say it again: I wasn't there."

Brad went to contradict her; but he saw a cold gleam in her eyes like a reflection of the razor she was wielding. It made him stop. It was so long ago even he couldn't pretend that the contours of truth hadn't folded a little. Lucid or otherwise, it was all dreaming. "I'm getting cold," he said.

Ella stood him up, poured another pan of cold water over his head and wrapped him in a towel. She gave him sweet-smelling lotions together with instructions for liberal use; and a complete set of clothes belonging to Lee. He disappeared from the kitchen to try them on.

When he returned, with his cropped hair combed back and wearing the oversized clothes, Ella started giggling. Brad retreated angrily, slamming the door, refusing to come out again and threatening not to make the return journey to rejoin the others. But finally she got him into the car. He climbed into the passenger seat and sat with arms crossed and with head bowed.

"I need to tell the others we're on our way," said Ella.

She stopped the car at a telephone kiosk to make a progress report to Lee. Stepping out of the car, she had a second thought, and reached for the keys.

"What's that for?" Brad demanded. It was the first time he had spoken since leaving the cottage.

"Reflex."

"What's the matter with you? Do you think I'd drive off in the car or something?" He was angry.

"Relax. I'm just going to make one phone call."

"You're taking the keys anyway, I see!"

Inside the booth, and away from Brad for the first time in over six hours, she sighed, leaning her head against the dial. Brad's behaviour was still unpredictable, and he was in a suggestible state. So far he had followed, but if he was to have a change of heart she would never be able to bring him back again. If she could keep her own head clear she might do it. She was terrified by the idea of what might happen if he or she experienced an attack en route.

She carefully phoned Lee's number. When the answer came, it was Honora on the line, though her voice could hardly be made out. The line was full of interference, strange electronic chirpings, and innumerable unfathomable ghost conversations, as if a hundred other people were trying to claim the line. Ella put the receiver down and tried again, but got the same results.

"Phone's out of order," she told Brad, back in the car. "It'll have to wait."

Brad only stared sulkily ahead of him. "This car will never make it," he said.

Ella could sense two forces working in Brad. One surrendered him completely to her judgment, and with blind faith asked her to take charge and deliver him from his nightmares. The other was a palpable terror, growing so fast she could smell it on his breath: a fear both of facing the source of his horrors, and of facing his fellow dreamers with whom he had brought the living nightmare into being. This terror, she knew, was already telling him that in coming with her he had made a mistake; and his apprehension of that mistake was increasing with each mile of their journey.

It was beginning to get dark. At a service station half-way up the motorway she stopped and tried to phone again. She got no better results—a line awash with interference, busy with sounds like whispered conversations which changed as soon as you tried to listen in on them. When she returned to the car park, Brad was gone.

She found him in the reception area of the service station, hanging over an electronic arcade machine. A space patrol game. His hand fumbled with the joystick as he peered darkly into the kaleidoscope of shifting pin-lights behind the black glass.

"Time to go," said Ella.

"But I haven't beaten the invaders. The earth's in peril."

"You have to put some money in to do that."

"Oh . . . sure." He released the stick and followed her back to the car.

Shortly after she had turned off the motorway, Brad suddenly seemed to emerge from a daze. "I need a drink," he said.

"Brad; it would be a good idea if you stayed off the pop."

He gripped her wrist hard enough to make her stop the car. "I need a drink."His eyes were almost crazy with fear and lack of sleep.

"Maybe you do. I'll find a pub."

She had to drive for a while along a winding and deserted country road. Dusk was slipping away quickly into darkness. She found a place with a dimly lit sign saying The Corn Man. It had the expectant hush of a pub just opened and too early for most customers. Brad marched up to the bar and ordered himself two large brandies, both of which he drank, leaving Ella to order herself a tonic water. He repeated his order, and the barmaid eyed him quizzically as she nudged his glass under the optic measure.

"Ease up," said Ella. "Lee will bring enough to keep you satisfied."

"Lee Lee Lee. Lee schmee."

Brad kept a hand on one of his brandy glasses, as if someone might want to take it away from him. Ella waited patiently, in silence. At length he got up. "Must take a leak," he said.

Ella sat nursing her tonic water until she realized that he wasn't coming back. She even stood outside the gents' toilets, calling to him, but she knew he wasn't in there. She returned to her car and sat behind the wheel, not knowing what to do. Half an hour had passed before he walked out of the shadow and climbed back in the passenger seat. She thought he had the smell of vomit on him.

"What are we waiting for?" he said.