“That was crazy,” I breathe.
“That was fun,” Oliver says. “Told you we’d have an adventure.” I love how I feel right now. Like I just had a dream, but I didn’t. It was all real. Oliver doesn’t need the dreamworld to have fun. I think about Max and my mood darkens.
Then I glance to my left and see two gorgeous white swans, real ones, pruning themselves side by side.
“That’s Romeo and Juliet,” Oliver explains when he sees me staring. He gives his hair a quick shake, like a golden retriever that’s just gotten out of the water. “They’re famous. They’ve been together for ten years.”
“They make a cute couple,” I observe.
“They’re also both ladies,” Oliver says with a chuckle. “The parks department didn’t realize when they put them together. They lay eggs every year, but none of them hatch. But they still seem to like each other a lot.”
“There are many different ways to love someone,” I say, observing the swans, and turn to find Oliver gazing at me. Then a shadow falls over his body and we look up to find Sam. He does not look happy.
Needless to say, Oliver is told he is not welcome back at the swan boats again, professionally or otherwise.
That afternoon, sopping wet, I let a soaked Jerry into the foyer of the house and replace the spare key under the urn to the right of the door. My father and I are too forgetful to ever have our keys on us. Before I follow Jerry inside, I glance at the wet paw prints he just left on the stone steps.
They are the size of basketballs. Like they were made by a dog the size of a water buffalo. I remember the image of Jerry from my dream last night, parting the curtain with his giant head, ready to carry me away. Then I look back at the footprint, before walking inside and shutting the door, as though getting it out of my sight will make it disappear.
Something really weird is happening.
17
We Missed Everything
“DID YOU KNOW that every time we dream, we basically just become certifiable lunatics?” Max calls out.
It’s another beautiful fall afternoon, but we can’t see that, because we’re in the Dozing Center, which is kept at a perfect level of dim for optimum comfort. I also can’t see Max, so I crane my head over the top of my sleep pod. The pods are a genius solution that Petermann devised to help his subjects relax and eventually fall asleep. He was so excited when we came in today for our first day of real research that I thought he would short-circuit. “Now is where the real fun begins!” he said as he rubbed his hands together.
Sleep pods, by the way, are exactly what they sound like. Large couches shaped like seashells or the head of the flower in the Bennett greenhouse that looked like it was going to eat me. You wedge yourself right in the middle and it closes around you, submerging your body in total comfort, like lying on a cloud. It’s so comfortable that even claustrophobes like me don’t mind.
“I always say my sleep is where my true crazy comes out,” I reply, then I chuckle.
“What?” Max asks. I like the way he asks, like he’s already excited, like he trusts that whatever I’m going to say, it’s gonna be good.
I pause to explain. “Just that we’re talking about how sleep makes us crazy, while we lie here looking like a couple of hotdogs in buns like it’s totally normal.”
Max lets out a genuine laugh, and I wonder why, after all this time, making him laugh still makes me feel like I just pulled the lever in a slot machine and millions of gold coins are spilling out on top of me.
“I did some reading about it,” Max continues. “It turns out that the five main characteristics of dreaming can also all be attributed to mental illness. One, heavy emotion. Two and three, illogical thought and organization. Four, acceptance that what one sees, however bizarre, is true. And of course five, trouble remembering the experience. All of these things are also the experiences of patients with delirium, dementia, or psychosis. The only reason we accept ourselves as not being insane is because we are asleep at the time and none of it’s voluntary in our minds.”
I try to nod my head in understanding, but the pod doesn’t allow for much movement and it’s not like he can see me anyway. I think about Jerry’s enormous footprints yesterday and wonder what this means for me.
“Sorry about the other night,” Max says then. And it takes me a moment to figure out what he’s talking about.