“Come here,” I say. And he does. And that’s how the papers end up a scattered mess on the floor.
* * *
At breakfast, we eat reconstituted eggs with toast off a conveyor belt and drink the burnt, watered-down coffee, dumping in extra plastic cups of creamer to try to cover the taste. We spend the morning sweating through the landscaped acres of Grounds for Sculpture; the afternoon, swimming in the motel pool, the cool water a balm to the hot day. And then, the chemical scent of chlorine still clinging to our skin and hair, we go to dinner. A local pizza joint.
“Oh my god.” I’m savoring my first bite—the perfect blend of tomato sauce, chewy crust and warm, melty cheese. “I wish this place delivered to Hope Springs.”
“Really? But we’ve got that amazing gas station pizza,” he says solemnly, until he can’t hold it anymore, and his face cracks. “God, I miss Philly.”
My head snaps up. “You do?”
“Of course. The food, at least. Especially Paesano’s. I would literally kill for one of their sandwiches right now.”
I study him. “Do you think . . . would you ever want to move back?”
His face clouds over. “No. I couldn’t.”
I’m about to counter, ask why, when my cell buzzes. It’s Oliver. “Sorry,” I say lamely to Harrison, before checking the message.
I AM THAT GUY.
What do you mean?
Grown man. In amusement park. Alone. Might as well be driving a white van and offering candy to children.
I grin.
Also, not sure what I was expecting to find, but feeling a little stupid about my theory now.
Not the same park, then?
Not the same park.
“Is that Oliver?” Harrison asks and I look up at him.
“Yeah.” I put my cell back down next to my plate, and he clears his throat.
“So, don’t you want to hear my theory about your dreams?”
“You have one?”
“It’s toward the end of that stack of research. We just didn’t quite get to it last night.”
I hold his gaze for a beat, a half grin on my lips. “Hit me with it.”
He sets his pizza down on the plate, wipes his hands with a napkin. “So one of the things I kept finding and coming back to over and over is this fact that our brains don’t make up faces. Experts seem pretty unified in believing that people who appear in our dreams are only those we’ve seen before—even if it’s just someone you’ve passed on the street or subway that you didn’t even necessarily take note of, but your brain did.”
“Right.” I’d come across that fact as well. “And we’ve discussed that. I mean it’s not out of the question that I’ve seen him somewhere before—we did both live in Philly.”
“Right.”
“But then, why—”
“Hold on, I’m not done yet. A lot of psychotherapists also agree that it’s the emotions in your dream that are important—not who’s in them or what’s happening, but the way you feel. So, simply put, if you’re scared or anxious in a dream, then there’s something in your life that’s making you feel scared or anxious. So I think that maybe you’ve seen Oliver in passing and your brain just locked onto his face for whatever reason. And instead of focusing on him, you should focus on how you feel in your dreams and what insights you might gain from that in your life.”
He sits back, and I take it as the cue that he’s finished. It’s so very logical, so banal, so Harrison, that I almost laugh. “So . . . basically you don’t think it means anything.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“And you’re completely dismissing the fact that he dreams about me, too—that we’ve had the same dream, even. Or what, you think it’s just a weird coincidence? That he saw me in passing as well, and that his brain happened to lock onto my face to use in his dreams to teach him what . . . lessons about himself or whatever?”
He sighs and his eyes won’t meet mine. And I know.
“You still don’t believe it. You don’t think he’s telling the truth.”
He glances at me and then back down at the half-eaten slice of pizza, the grease collecting in the shallow cups of pepperoni. “It’s not that.” He hesitates. “Or maybe it is. I mean, come on—if the tables were turned, wouldn’t you be suspect?”
I study Harrison’s face. Consider this. And I know he’s right at least on that point. I would be more than suspect. But this is not something that’s happening to him. It’s happening to me.
“I’m just saying,” he continues, “the only thing connecting you to this guy is these supposed dreams. He isn’t really part of your life—or doesn’t have to be.”
“But maybe he’s supposed to be.”
Harrison’s head jerks up; a wild look flashes in his eyes. “What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.” I drop my gaze, realizing what it sounded like. And I don’t know what I meant, really. I didn’t even know I was going to say it—I only know that it felt like I hit on the truth, somehow. And that it’s impossible to explain it to my husband, when I can’t even explain it to myself.
I feel Harrison’s eyes on me. Finally, he takes a long pull of his beer and then a deep breath. “Listen, I understand that this has been—tough for you, confusing, I don’t know what to call it. But you haven’t been yourself since this all started. You’ve been distracted, almost to the point of obsession—”
“Yeah,” I say emphatically, all the muscles in my body tensing as if to underline the point. “I have been obsessing over it. It’s only the most bizarre, inexplicable thing that’s ever happened to me in my entire life.”
“I know, I know.” Harrison holds up a hand in deference. “I just feel like it’s holding you back or something.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, like the house. You were so excited when we moved in. You had all these plans to decorate and wouldn’t let me so much as pick out a coatrack, so I didn’t mess up your—what did you call it—design vision. And all you’ve really done is buy a new couch.”
He’s right, of course. I was excited all the way up until the moving truck pulled into the driveway, and then, I don’t know if it was my feelings of failure about my art, or just the shock of the change from our bustling city life—but I was struck with the deepest sense of ennui. And then: “We lost a baby, Harrison. Sorry if I’m not painting rooms and buying rugs.”