Lair of Dreams

“Good eee-ve-ning,” she said to the operator, the alcohol suddenly thickening her tongue so that she had to work to sober up her speech. “I’d liiike to place a caaall to Bradford… eight-ohhh-five-niiine, pleeease.”


Evie wrapped the telephone cord around her index finger as the operator made the connection. Probably Jericho was sleeping, or perhaps he was out with another girl having the time of his life, not thinking about her at all. What if Uncle Will answered the phone?

What was she doing?

Evie slurred into the receiver, “Nev’r mind, op’rator. Cancel this call, please,” and quickly hung up.

A collection of spent bootleg bottles, half-spilled cups, and overflowing ashtrays covered the top of the bed. Evie was too tired to clean it up. Instead, she grabbed the silk coverlet from the chaise and curled up on the floor like a child. She’d lied to Theta about the dreams. They still came, bewildering, stained in horror. The soldiers. The explosions. The strange eye symbol. And on the worst nights, Evie dreamed she was still trapped in that house of horrors with John Hobbes whistling down the stairs while the wraiths of the Brethren poured from the walls.

“Ghosts. Hate ghosts. They are terrible… terrible people,” Evie mumbled sleepily, her head spinning as it rested on the rug. For a moment, her hand strayed to her neck again, searching for a comfort that was no longer there.





After leaving the Grant, Henry had found a little club, where he played piano until the wee hours. It was inching toward three by the time Henry let himself into the tiny flat he shared with Theta at the Bennington Apartments. He peeked through the crack in Theta’s bedroom door and saw that she was fast asleep with her silk mask over her eyes to block out the haze of city bright that crept through the windows despite the shades. Henry shut her door and made his way to the small card table awash in onionskin sheet music filled with his blotchy notations and unfinished lyrics. In the center of the table was an old coffee can marked HENRY’S PIANO FUND. For well over a year, Theta had been stuffing it with every dollar and bit of change she could spare to pay Henry back for taking care of her when she had needed it most. He stared at the song he’d been trying to get right for the better part of a week, then slumped into his chair.

“This is a sorry affair,” he grumbled, crumpling the page and tossing it onto the floor, which was already littered with his previous attempts.

Back in New Orleans, on the riverboat, when someone played a wrong note, Louis would grin and say, “What that cat ever do to you, you gotta make it cry like that?”

Louis.

Henry pushed aside the music and set a metronome in the center of the table. Then he wound the arm of his alarm clock and placed the clock on the windowsill, dangerously close to the edge. Henry released the metronome’s pendulum and settled his lanky frame into a worn chair beside a hissing radiator. For comfort, he put his straw boater on his head. The metronome’s steady ticking grew louder, drowning out the soft bleating of New York City street life, lulling Henry into a hypnotic state. His eyelids fluttered—once, twice.

“Please,” he said softly. And then he was under.

Henry came alive inside the dream world with a choking gasp, as if he’d been holding his breath underwater. For the first few seconds, there was only panic as his confused brain sought to make sense of what was happening. Slowly, his heartbeat settled. His breathing relaxed. Henry blinked, allowing his eyes time to adjust to the dream light. Sharp and unforgiving, it rendered ordinary objects—a haystack, a wagon, a face—starkly beautiful or, at times, slightly ghoulish.

Right now, that strange brightness caught the faces of a herd of buffalo whose deep, dark eyes watched Henry impassively.

“Hello,” Henry said to the majestic beasts. The buffalo opened their mouths, and music poured out as from a radio.

Henry grinned. “Shall we dance? No? Next time.”

Stretching behind Henry was a tall, snowy hillside whose top disappeared into a cloud bank. Theta sat on a rock nearby, watching the village below, where ropes of smoke twisted up from a row of floating, houseless chimneys.

“Hey, darlin’,” Henry said, standing beside her. The brightness of the dream gave her cheekbones a cliff’s-edge sharpness, like a German film star. She seemed agitated. “Bad dream?”

“Yes,” Theta said in an eerily flat voice. “I don’t like the looks of those red flowers over there.”

Henry followed Theta’s gaze. Where the buffalo had been was now a field of poppies. As he watched, the flowers trembled into flames and melted into thick red pools. Theta’s breathing quickened, signaling the descent into nightmare.

Henry’s voice was soothing. “Listen, Theta, why don’t you have another dream? How about the circus? You like the circus, don’t you?”

“Sure,” Theta said, smiling slightly. When Henry looked again, the flames had been transformed into a funny little juggler who kept dropping his pins on purpose.

“I gotta look for Louis now, Theta.”