Dream King by Elise Knight
5
Iturned around to find the door being slammed in my face, and seconds later, it was gone as though it had never been there at all.
I fell to my bedroom floor, my breath ragged, my nerves surging with electricity. Nothing in my whole life had prepared me for what had just happened, and yet a quick look around my bedroom told me that nothing had changed. The bed was exactly how I’d left it, unmade with a book I’d been reading before I’d fallen asleep a couple of nights ago laid out on the cover. The walls still had the forlorn shabby, flowered wallpaper that I’d been meaning to pull off since the day I’d moved in with David three years ago but hadn’t managed to get around to. In the last few months, it had been money rather than time that had been the excuse for me not decorating. The excuse for me not changing the dresser that I’d bought from a thrift store with the intention of renovating it, though it had accumulated even more chips in the wood that no one could get away with calling shabby chic. Maybe I could invent shitty-chic and get rid of it that way.
Everything was exactly the same, but it wasn’t. I now knew why my mother was sick. Why the world had come to a halt a year ago. All the doctors and epidemiologists in the world hadn’t come close to figuring it out, but I had. I’d had one chance to find out why, and I’d blown it. The door to wherever it was had vanished, and it was the only way I knew to get there. I fell onto my bed and screamed in frustration. The light outside told me it was still daytime. My senses were off-kilter thanks to spending the last half hour in the dark, but a swift check of my clock told me it was dinner time. Stroking my neck, which felt bruised thanks to Asshat, I headed to my kitchen and put a cheap meal in the microwave. It was my last one. While it cooked, I picked up a garbage bag and threw everything I had left of David’s into it. I’d started pulling off the wallpaper in the bedroom when the ting of the microwave alerted me to my last meal. The depressing mess looked about as appetizing as the cardboard box it came in, but beggars can’t be choosers. It was better than I would eat tomorrow. My cupboards were bare. Only some old crackers remained. Wolfing down the meager portion, I then cleaned the guinea pig cage out, ready to give back to my neighbor, and headed out the door for my next shift at work.
It was with apprehension that I pulled up in the parking lot after last night’s disaster. McGee would be there again, no doubt all pissed at me. I didn’t even have Chris to help me get through the night shift, not unless Alexis was having another spa appointment or she’d broken a nail or some other dire emergency.
So it was a surprise to see his car in the parking lot. For a second, I wondered if my luck was changing, but then Alexis pulled in, in her brand new Ferrari, courtesy of daddy.
My stomach twisted as I knew what was about to come. Alexis was a first-class bitch who didn’t miss any opportunity to remind me that she was above me in every way.
“I heard about last night,” she drawled, her pearly white teeth grinning at me in almost a snarl. She was the cat, and I was the mouse, and I fucking hated her for it. She had more money than I would see in a lifetime, and she did nothing to help anyone with it. “Shame I wasn’t there to see it.”
“If you didn’t need so many spa days, you would have,” I spat back. “I mean, how ugly do you have to be to need to see a beautician once a week.”
Once upon a time, she might have started crying and gone running to daddy, but in the six months she’d worked here, she’d learned better ways to hurt me, and she’d gotten good at it too.
“At least I can afford to go to a spa. Maybe if you went to one once in a while, your fiancé wouldn’t be fucking some other woman.”
Fuck shit fuck!
How did she know? I’d deliberately not told her because I knew it would be just one more thing for her to lord over me. One more pile of shit for me to deal with.
She waltzed past me, opening the door of the clinic with fiery red talons, fake just like her boobs, hair, nose, and personality. She slammed it shut behind her just so I’d have to open it again. McGee greeted me with a scowl in the reception area and practically dragged me into his office past his grinning bitch daughter.
“Chris has kindly volunteered to come in tonight,” he said gruffly, perching his hands on his desk. “I don’t want a repeat of last night. Do you understand me?”
I bit back a scathing retort. It was two days until payday, and I couldn’t afford to give him more reason to fire me. “Yes, sir.”
He narrowed his beady eyes, waiting for some smart ass quip, but I buttoned my lip. When he saw that I wasn’t going to add anything, he visibly loosened up.
“Good. Treat the subjects like royalty tonight. I can’t afford any bad reviews.”
Like it mattered. He could have a thousand one-star reviews saying he was a quack and the sleep study was a phony crock of shit, and still, people would be queuing up around the block to get a place.
“I’m leaving Alexis in charge. One false move, and she’ll let me know, so do a good job.”
The ‘or you’re fired’ was implied. I opened my mouth, outrage spilling through every pore. I’d worked here for three years. If anyone should be left in charge, it should be me. In the six months Alexis had been here, she’d done nothing but look at her fingernails and post Instagram pictures. The girl didn’t have the first clue how to interpret the readings, and there was no way on this earth she would deign to touch any of the subjects long enough to connect them to the machines.
I knew I should have kept my mouth shut. If there was any trouble to be found, my smart mouth had a way of getting me in it, but I couldn’t help myself. Frustration bubbled up inside me. “I’ve worked here the longest. I’m the one who knows how all the machines work. Don’t you think I should be in charge?”
A low grumble emitted from McGee’s mouth. “You are lucky to still have a job after what happened last night. Now get out of my sight before I change my mind.”
With gritted teeth and my blood boiling, I left his office and stormed down to the sleeping chamber where Chris was already hooking everyone up to the machines. Alexis was nowhere in sight. No doubt, she was watching us do all the hard work from the comfort of the observation room while filing her nails or bitching to her social media followers.
I ignored the mirror and concentrated on my job, attaching the wires to Mr. Collins.
He gave me a bolstering smile. “I’m sorry that last night’s observation wasn’t a success, but I have to admit to being secretly happy to come back. I’m quite lonely since my wife died, you see.”
His wife. The lady in the picture with the red dress. “The two of you must have been very happy together.”
His eyes crinkled up at the edges, and I got the feeling that he had no one to talk about her. “Oh, we were. Forty-three years we were together.”
“You danced with her,” I remarked absentmindedly.
He gave me a curious look, then continued. “We most certainly did. Edith loved to dance. She was a beautiful dancer. Every man in the place wanted to be with her, but she wanted me.”
I gave him a smile. “It sounds like you were lucky to have each other.”
I’d seen his dream, how it kept his memory of her alive. I’d been scared when I’d been there, not understanding, but now I knew. Earlier I’d seen right into Mr. Collins’ dream during his daytime nap, and it had been beautiful.
Looking up, I saw that Mrs. Rose was the only one left. Chris gave me a withering look as I sidled up next to him.
“I’ll do Mrs. Rose. You go and set up the monitors,” I said breezily as though I had no ulterior motive.
“I can do it,” he argued, clearly still pissed at me.
I picked up the wires and gave him a smile. “It’s ok. After last night, I think I should be doing this.”
He mumbled something incoherent then left me to finish wiring up Mrs. Rose.
“I hear it was your fault that I have to be back here,” she sniffed, pulling her covers right up to her neck as I attached the wires to her temples.
“Yes, sorry. I was...PMSing.” God, I really hated myself, echoing McGee’s excuse to her. If I was really PSMing I’d have rammed his pen down his throat.
“Hmmm,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “We didn’t do that in my day and age. We were taught to respect our elders.”
I plastered on a fake smile, wishing I’d not insisted on wiring her up. “I’m awfully sorry. I promise tonight will run smoothly... I was wondering. Did you have any dreams last night? About a man with long dark hair?”
Her eyes narrowed further with suspicion, and I wondered if I’d gone too far.
“Whatever are you talking about, girl?” she snapped as I wrestled the covers down to be able to attach the heart rate monitor to her chest.
“I just wondered.”
She gave me a nasty smile. “Actually, I did dream last night as it happens, but not of a man with long black hair. I dreamed of my vacation in the Caribbean that I’m going on next week and...” she pulled me closer and whispered, “the very nice young waiters that see to my every whim.”
Her cheeks grew rosy with the admission, and her expression softened. I couldn’t help the grin that crept onto my face. The woman was eighty if she was a day. No wonder she had smiled at the dream of some hunky, young, Caribbean waiters.
“And none of them had long black hair?” I questioned her again at this change in mood.
She shook her head and pulled her blanket back up now that I’d finished affixing her to the monitors. “All of them have black hair, but short hair. Except for Lars. He’s Swedish. Blond, you know. It was his first year last year. I hope he’s there again this year.”
I smirked and left her to her thoughts of Caribbean bliss. After another apology and the usual speech, I lowered the lights and headed out of the room.
“What were you two chatting about?” Chris asked as soon as I walked into the observation room. “I saw you having a very nice chinwag with Mrs. Rose. You even got her to smile. What did you do? Tell her the night was free?”
It was good to see that Chris had forgiven me for leaving him the lurch.
“She was telling me about some hot Caribbean studs, actually,” I said, sitting in my chair and turning my monitor on. Usually, I’d give it a perfunctory glance to check it was all set up, but after the disaster last night, I double-checked everything carefully to make sure it was working properly.
“Lucky lady.” Chris mused. “Do you know where Alexis is? McGee said she would be coming in tonight.”
I turned to him. “I thought she’d be in here with you, to be honest. I saw her in the parking lot where she decided to remind me how rich she was and how poor I am, then told me it was no wonder David left me for someone else.”
Chris picked up the waste paper basket and mimed puking. “She’s probably in the ladies, plastering on her make-up.”
“Probably,” I agreed. “McGee told me she is in charge of us tonight, so no messing about and no stories about your love life.”
Chris’s eyes widened as he put the waste paper basket down. “He didn’t? What an asshole!” Everyone knows you could run this place with your eyes closed. She can barely find the entrance to the observation room. It wouldn’t surprise me if she was outside in the corridor now trying to figure out where to go.”
I laughed as the door opened, and Alexis waltzed in. She eyed the two of us suspiciously. “What are you two laughing about?”
“Nothing,” we chorused like a couple of schoolgirls. Chris caught my eye and smirked as Alexis took her seat next to his and pulled out a fashion magazine.
“I’m not sticking around tonight,” she announced from behind the pages. “Once Daddy goes, I’m going out on a date. I expect neither of you to tell him.” She lowered the magazine and stared directly at me, daring me to go against her.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Chris about to pipe up, so I rested my hand on his arm to stop him. “We wouldn’t dream of it, would we, Chris?” Chris gave me a questioning look but answered in the negative.
Alexis broadened her red lip-sticked smile and disappeared once again behind her magazine. With any luck, she’d be out of here by ten-thirty, and I wouldn’t have to put up with her scathing remarks and bitchy attitude.
“Why?” Chris mouthed at me, giving Alexis the side-eye.
I shrugged my shoulders. The truth was, I had a plan. A plan that I knew Chris wouldn’t like, and I needed Alexis out of the way to do it.
* * *
The clock struck one-thirty,and Alexis and McGee had both been gone for hours. I doubted I’d see either of them before dawn which was fine with me. I’d spent the last hour listening to Chris wax rhapsodic about some guy he was seeing and watching the second hand tick round on the clock. I had a theory. Last night, the freak show had jumped into Mrs. Rose. Later, when I followed him, I somehow managed to go into Mr. Collins’ dream. He’d gone in from the outside, I’d gone in from the inside, but both of us had ended up in a similar place. Mrs. Rose had dreamed about her hunky waiters, but I had no doubt freakshow was there, just as I had been in Mr. Collins’ dream. He’d not seen me, only his dead wife. If I was right and he was going into people’s dreams, there was a chance he’d do it again. It was the longest of long shots, but it was the only shot I had. That’s why I’d been making hmmming noises to appear interested in Chris’s tawdry conversation while watching both the clock and the readouts.
With each tick of the clock, my heart pounded. The waiting for something to happen was excruciating. And yet, despite all my wishing and waiting, the readouts appeared normal. At one-fifty, I turned the speakers on. The sounds of heavy breathing and the occasional snore filled my ears.
“Sorry if my story isn’t good enough for you,” Chris sniffed. “Is my boyfriend not hot enough for your ears to hear about?”
I turned to my oldest friend and shot back with the truth. “You’ve slept with him twice. You can’t remember his name, and you’ve been waffling on about him for over an hour.”
“And your problem with that is?” Chris huffed back, folding his arms in a petulant manner.
I shrugged my shoulders nonchalantly. “And my problem is, I just thought I’d see how they are doing in there.”
Chris narrowed his eyes and sat forward in his chair. “You want to go back in there! Something did happen last night. I knew it! It wasn’t just a bird, was it? Oh.Em.Gee, please tell me that the hot guy is your secret boyfriend and had come for a hookup but got the wrong room.” His grin almost reached his ears.
I shot him a withering look. “Hardly.”
David had been gorgeous, but not even he could touch the splendor or the dangerous sex appeal of the Freakshow. I paused, wondering if I should tell Chris the truth. He was the only person I could talk to, and if I couldn’t tell him about Freakshow, who could I tell?
I glanced to the door to make sure we were alone. Alexis probably wouldn’t be back for hours, but I didn’t want to take the chance that she would come back suddenly and overhear. When I was sure that the door was well and truly closed, I took a deep breath and began my story. “I saw the man you are talking about. The one you saw last night.”
Chris bounced up and down in his seat and clapped his hands together. “I knew it, I knew it!”
“I’m not sleeping with him. I don’t even know him,” I cautioned before Chris rocketed off his chair in excitement. “I went in to see what he was doing. He had a bird with him. The raven I told you about.”
I thought back to the night before. How confused I’d felt, but how excited I’d been too.
Chris calmed down a little. “Oooh, mysterious. So who was he?”
I hesitated, knowing how ridiculous it was going to sound. “He disappeared. Just like that.” I clicked my fingers. “I took his bird and hot-footed it out of there.”
I looked Chris in the eye, waiting to see what his response would be. If he’d just told me the same thing, it would be an invite to mockery. As it was, I had to hope he was a better friend to me than I was to him.
He stared at me open-mouthed with a hint of confusion. “He disappeared? Where? You mean he ran past you into the corridor?”
I shook my head, almost bemused by Chris’s shocked expression. “No. He just disappeared. Right into Mrs. Rose’s chest.” I pointed through the window to where Mrs. Rose was sleeping. My voice was full of an emotion I didn’t think I possessed. I needed Chris to believe me so I could believe it myself and know I wasn’t crazy.
Chris was saved having to answer by my computer beeping. Turning quickly on the swivel chair, I saw one of the patient’s readouts running riot. He was either having a heart attack, or the freakshow was in him. It looked just like Mrs. Rose’s weird readout from last night. A quick look told me all was quiet in the sleep chamber. I scanned the beds until I found the man with the weird reading. He looked perfectly normal.
“What’s going on?” Chris asked, peering at the readout over my shoulder. “That’s not right.”
“No, it isn’t.” I leapt up and raced past Chris, pulling my door pass from my pocket. Seconds later, I was in the sleep chamber with Chris pulling up behind me.
Nothing was out of place. Nothing was wrong. From here, I couldn’t hear the sounds of the computer beeping wildly, but I knew it was. By some miracle, our dash into the room hadn’t disturbed anyone.
The man in question was asleep. As far as I could tell, his breathing was normal. Nothing was out of place. Chris grabbed my arm, fear in his eyes. He didn’t know what was going on any more than I did.
“Let’s get out of here,” Chris whispered, pulling urgently at my sleeve.
I pulled back sharply. This was my one chance. I’d seen freakshow do it. “Tell McGee I’m sorry,” I whispered to Chris, and with a leap, I jumped right into the middle of the sleeping man.
Expectation had led me to believe I’d somehow magically appear in the dark forest again. What I hadn’t expected, and probably should have, was the man to open his eyes and let out a roaring bellow.
“What in the blazes do you think you are doing?” He gripped his midriff and groaned as Chris dragged me from the bed. All around me, the subjects were waking up. Someone screamed, more than likely Mrs. Rose. And I couldn’t blame them. The enormity of my mistake hit me like a truck. I’d fucked up. Fucked up so badly. My job was gone after this. McGee wouldn’t hesitate to show me the door. And the man I’d jumped on. He would sue for sure. That was if I hadn’t killed him. His red face glared at me as he shouted more cuss words than even I knew, so he’d probably live, but that was little consolation.
“I’m sorry,” I babbled, feeling sick to my stomach. What a complete and utter fuck up.
I gasped for breath as Chris spun me around. I’d never forget the pity in his eyes as I looked at him then. All I could hope for now was that McGee didn’t fire Chris too in a fit of spite. I was about to say as much when two arms grabbed me forcefully from behind and pulled me back.
The same sensation of being squeezed happened again, and when it stopped, I found myself back in the dark forest. And there, looking down at me, was Freakshow. And he didn’t look happy. In fact, he looked like he wanted to devour my soul and rip my body to pieces with his teeth.
Oh, fuckety-fuck!