Dreamland (15 page)

Connor picked a direction and started driving. When Dea judged it was safe, she wiggled out of her hiding space, her legs dull and heavy, feeling a little bit like something jostled out of a drain. She was glad, in a way, that Connor didn't stop so she could take shotgun. It was easier to talk from the backseat, easier when she didn't have to look at him and wonder what he was thinking.

She told him everything: how she had learned to walk dreams, how her mother had taught her, how she got sick when she didn't walk for a while. She told him some of the basic rules, how birds were harbingers and dreamers unconsciously responded to intruders and worlds fell apart when the dream
was ending. How if you weren't careful, you might become trapped.

She told him she believed that's what had happened to her mom: she had become trapped, somehow, in one of Connor's nightmares.

It was the only explanation that made any kind of sense. Dea's mom was
with
Connor's monsters. That meant she'd found a way into his dreams.

But Dea wasn't ready to tell Connor about the monsters. Not yet. She wasn't ready to tell him that her mother had warned her away from mirrors and water and that she suspected, now, that those substances served as doorways between the two worlds. That because Dea had allowed Connor's monsters to spot her, they had followed her, pursued her to a country road in the real world.

After she ran out of story, he was quiet for a bit. The only sound was the gentle shush of the highway under the tires. It was completely dark—she couldn't tell where the road ended and the fields began, and didn't even know where they were headed—except for intermittent and unexpected bursts of civilization, a sudden cluster of lights off in the distance, or a billboard rearing out of the dark, featuring some plastic-looking girl with fat lips and fake boobs perching on six-inch heels, or an advertisement for a family-planning clinic. It wasn't until she saw a sign for
PRIVATE EYES: OHIO'S PRETTIEST GIRLS
that she even realized they'd headed east and had made it across the border. They passed a billboard, stripped bare, on which someone had graffitied:
Jesus Saves.
The words flared briefly in Connor's headlights, as if they were burning. Dea felt a squeeze
of sadness. She wished it were true. She wished it were as simple as that.

“I knew it,” he said at last. “You were
there
. I knew I wasn't just dreaming you. It felt different. . . .” He went silent again. Dea didn't want to say anything. She was so relieved that he didn't sound angry—or worse, disgusted—she was afraid to ruin it by making a sound. “And you've always . . . been this way? You've always walked?”

She nodded, then remembered he couldn't see her. “Yeah.”

“So what changed? Why did everything go to shit all of a sudden?”

You
, she almost said. As soon as she thought it, she knew it was true. Things had gone to hell because when she met Connor, her whole world had lit up, and she wanted to be close to him, to know his secrets, to know every dark, twisty corner of his mind.

Because she was in love with him. She knew that was true, too—all at once, with total clarity. She was in love with him because of the almost-dimple in his chin and the way he could make everyone, even strangers, laugh; she loved him because of how soft his T-shirts were and the fact that he pronounced her name as if it were a lyric in a song he knew by heart. Because he was loyal and funny and smart and had gone through hell and hadn't been broken, hadn't turned hateful and mean.

And now she was going to have to ask him to go through hell again, and he would have every right to hate her.

She said, “I broke the rules.”

They were coming up on a town—Wapachee Falls, according to the sign. Dea had never heard of it, but she'd never heard of
any of the towns they'd passed so far. From the highway, Dea could make out a blur of gas stations and motels, a sudden blaze of neon signage against the night.

She was surprised when Connor turned the car off the road.

“What are you doing?” she said.

“I'm tired,” he said. “Hungry, too.”

She looked at the dashboard clock and realized they'd been driving for almost three hours. It was after eleven. She was exhausted, and weak, and hungry. But she was worried about stopping.

“Do you think it's safe?” she said.

“There must be five hundred motels between here and Fielding,” he said. “It's safe. At least for tonight.”

“For tonight?” Dea repeated. “Don't you have to go home?”

“God, Dea.” Connor sounded tired, but not angry. There was even a hint of a smile in his voice. “You really are an idiot sometimes, do you know that?”

But he didn't say it meanly, and she let it drop. She was just glad she didn't have to say good-bye yet.

Wapachee Falls was even smaller than downtown Fielding, but it consisted entirely of chains: McDonald's, Burger King, Taco Bell. Motel 6, Holiday Inn, Quality Inn, Super 8. BP and Texaco. There wasn't a single business that catered to locals: just places where nameless strangers could pass out, pass the time, pass through. It was perfect.

At the Burger King drive-through she moved into the front seat. Connor ordered them double of everything, and Dea paid with a twenty she found rubber-banded at the back of the envelope, behind the fifties. For a minute they could have been
anyone, going anywhere, two kids with the munchies and a craving for fries.

They ate in the parking lot, the bags pooling with grease resting on their thighs. Dea was so hungry, she barely tasted the food, burning her fingers and tongue. She'd been on hospital food for more than a week. She licked the salt and grease off her fingers and swallowed her burger in three bites. By the time she stopped eating, her stomach was cramping and she was nauseous. But it was better than being hungry. She had money. She was with Connor. Best of all: she'd told the truth, and he was still talking to her.

They scouted the motels next, looking for the darkest, dingiest, and least likely-looking place. They settled on a no-name motel on the very end of the commercial strip, painted a bleak shade of gray that looked more suited to an internment camp. Half the letters on the neon sign were burnt out, so it read simply:
VAC CY
.

“This looks like a place where people go to die,” Dea said.

Connor angled the car into a parking space as far from the street as possible, where it would be roughly concealed behind an industrial-size Dumpster. “This looks like a place where people leave you alone,” he said. He jerked his chin toward one of the few illuminated windows.

Through a narrow gap in the curtains, Dea caught a quick glimpse of naked skin—a man and woman together. She looked quickly away, her face burning. It hadn't fully occurred to Dea until she and Connor were walking together, through the slicing air, that she would be sharing a room with Connor. Maybe even a bed. Even though this was by necessity and not by choice, she
was both excited and terrified. She thought of the moment on the Ferris wheel and wondered whether he might try to kiss her again.

But no. Their relationship had changed. She'd ruined everything. He hadn't looked at her that way again—it had probably been temporary insanity.

For the briefest second, she thought of the vision she'd seen in the gap between the curtains and wondered what it would be like. With Connor.

The lobby was painted the same dingy gray as the exterior. It was hardly larger than Dea's hospital room had been, and it stank of burned coffee. There were holes in the carpet. A guy, maybe twenty or twenty-one, his face an explosion of pimples and scars, was sitting behind the desk, hunched over his phone. He barely looked up when Connor and Dea entered.

“What's up?” he said.

“We need a room.” Connor was trying to sound assertive, but Dea could tell he was nervous. Dea leaned on the counter, partly because she was trying to look casual, partly because she was still troubled by dizziness that overtook her in waves, rolling the floor out from underneath her, tugging at her knees and telling her to fall.

The guy squinted at Connor. “How old are you?”

“Old enough,” Connor said. Dea hoped that was true. She had no idea how old you had to be.

The guy sighed, like they were being a big pain in the ass. “IDs?”

Connor hesitated. The last thing they wanted to do was give over their IDs—besides, Dea didn't have one.

Dea jumped in, “Look, we just want to get in and get out. All cash. No trouble.” She'd seen her mom do this hundreds of times.
No trouble, please, will you make an exception? Just for us, just this once.
And a fifty would pass hands, palm to sweaty palm, and that would be that. Dea had tucked the envelope of cash into the waistband of her leggings, under her sweatshirt. She removed it now, making sure that the guy behind the desk was looking. He was. His expression shifted, turned eager, calculating.

“Cash?” he said. He licked his lips, which were very thin. Dea nodded. “It's gonna be sixty bucks for the night,” he said quickly. Dea was sure he was lying, doubling the price at least, but she didn't care. “Plus a twenty-buck deposit,” he added, when he saw Dea thumbing through her money. “Because of no ID.” He was a terrible liar.

Connor started to object but Dea just shook her head. She laid a hundred-dollar bill on the counter.

“I don't have change,” the guy said. Another lie. His face was the color of ketchup. Even his pimples seemed inflamed.

“Just give us the key,” Connor said, losing patience.

“Seventeen.” The guy slid a small metal key across the counter. “Make a left out the door and go all the way to the end. You'll have lots of privacy,” he added, with a smile Dea didn't like.

She grabbed the key. “Thanks.”

Outside, Dea wobbled a little in her too-small heels and Connor put a hand on her back, then quickly released her. Their breath seized and vanished in the air. Beyond the lights of all the fast food chains and motels, Dea could make out a light sprinkling of stars, like a dusting of sugar.

They had to walk past the room where they'd seen the man
and woman together. The curtain was now totally shut, but as they approached, Dea heard a headboard knocking against the wall and the sound of a woman moaning. She could feel her whole body blush.

“Very theatrical,” was all Connor said. Dea wondered whether he had a large basis for comparison and then felt stupid for being so petty. It was none of her business.

Shockingly, the room was all right. Clean, at least. The TV didn't work and the shower curtain was speckled with mold, but the beds were made with fresh sheets and the smell of cigarette smoke had been mostly obliterated under the acrid tang of bleach and something thick and floral, like the kind of scent people sprayed in public bathrooms. There were two double beds. Dea was relieved and also a teeny, tiny bit disappointed.

Connor sat on the bed nearest the door. He leaned his elbows on his knees. His eyes were bloodshot. Dea wanted to go to him and smooth down his hair. But she stayed where she was, against the door, suddenly paralyzed by awkwardness and the awareness that she hadn't showered and she looked ridiculous and she was alone in a locked room with Connor, the boy she loved.

“Now what?” Connor said. “I'm just supposed to . . . sleep?”

Dea nodded. She had told him in the car that she needed back into his dreams, although she hadn't told him the whole truth: she didn't know how much longer she could make it without walking.

Now, he kicked off his Vans, one at a time, and stretched backward on the bed with his arms folded behind his neck. But he didn't close his eyes, and he didn't turn off the lights. She'd never tried to walk a dream with the knowledge—participation,
even—of the dreamer. She wondered whether it would change things.

Dea forced herself to move away from the door. She felt awkwardly tall, standing in her heels while he was lying down. She went to the second bed and sat. The mattress was flimsy and sagged under her weight. “Do you think your parents will be worried about you?”

Connor shrugged. “My dad will figure it out. My stepmom doesn't care. She doesn't like me.” He said it matter-of-factly. “I think she really believes I did it, you know.” His eyes ticked to hers. “To my mom and little brother. Sometimes she looks at me like I might be two seconds away from grabbing a hatchet.”

She felt guilty that she had ever envied Connor, and assumed his family to be perfect. She had never known her father, but she had also never suffered a loss. And her mom was her best friend. Crazy and infuriating, yes. A massive liar, check. And trapped in a dream. Still—Dea's best friend.

“What about school tomorrow?” It was either Tuesday or Wednesday; Dea knew that. “You'll get in trouble.”

Connor turned to face her. The bare fluorescent bulb above the bed cut his face into hard geometric shapes. “Damn.” For the first time all night, he was smiling, just a little. “You've got your days crossed, don't you?”

“What do you mean?” Dea was sure—sure—it wasn't a weekend. She'd kept track in the hospital as best she could, and she couldn't be that far off.

“It's break,” Connor said. “Tomorrow's Thanksgiving.”

She had completely forgotten. She'd been pulling herself through the hours one by one, like a snail tracking slowly across
asphalt, taking it inch by inch.

“I'm sorry,” she said. She really was.

“For what?”

She looked away. It was nice of him to pretend she didn't have to apologize, which made her feel even guiltier. “For dragging you into this. For getting you in trouble.” She was, too. Sorrier than she could ever say. “I'm sorry you're missing Thanksgiving.”

“That's all right.” Connor shrugged. “I never liked Thanksgiving, anyway. Too much turkey.”