1

Cinnamon. The air smelled of cinnamon.

Jessica’s eyes were closed, but she could tell that wherever she was, it was brightly lit. The brightness shone behind her eyes, and there were shapes moving around, shadows coming between her and the brightness. She could hear very little, only an occasional faint whisper, like cloth brushing past bare skin. It was peaceful here. A faint scent of cinnamon hung in the air, sweetly delicious and making her feel peaceful and calm.

She was lying on her back on a floor or a bed made of metal, cold and hard against her bare skin, but not uncomfortable. Nothing was uncomfortable here; not the temperature which was cold or the hardness of the surface she was lying on. Nor the smell of cinnamon, which she usually hated.

She didn’t know where she was, and she didn’t seem to care. She remembered having gone to bed, right after watching Communion with Alexander, drunk and tired and freaked, and feeling the air from the fan moving across her. Then waking up here. Wherever here was. As if she cared.

Sounds closer by all of a sudden. Clicking sounds and louder whispers, almost like words but Jessica could make no sense of them. They were calm, though, and she wasn’t worried.

Then she felt something touching her. Startled, she drew in a breath, but the touch was gentle and soft, and she relaxed quickly, feeling sure that there was no harm there. Still she did not open her eyes.

The touching continued, on her face, on her arms, legs, and chest. Soft pats, something that felt like cool, soft skin rubbing against her own skin.

Suddenly a sharp pain to her belly just above her hips, like something stabbing her. She cried out, opening her eyes and sitting up –

2

Water was falling on her. Jessica opened her eyes and saw that she was standing in a parking lot, the one across the street from the Ramada Inn and next to the train tracks. It was raining and her T-shirt and sweat pants were getting soaked through. The chill and the rain raised goosebumps on her skin. Water ran down her face, her wet hair hung before her eyes.

Suddenly to her left there was a bright light, and a sound, something like a scream, something like an explosion, and Jessica screamed and covered her eyes…

3

“Jessica I gotta puke!”

Alexander was outside the bathroom, pounding on the door. Jessica found herself lying in the bathtub, fully clothed, the shower running and soaking her clothes through. The water was cold.

“Shit,” Jessica moaned. It had happened again, the dream, waking up in some strange place. Last time the dream had come she had woken up in the backyard, completely naked, looking up at the China silk tree; she was grateful that the fence was too high and solid for any of the neighbors to see into her yard. And the time before that, back in the middle of a melting hot Davis summer, she had awakened in the kitchen, wearing her thick black duffel jacket and her house mate Diana staring at her and asking her if everything was okay.

Alexander kept pounding on the door. “Jessica!” he shouted again.

“Hold on,” Jessica shouted back.

She reached up, and turned off the water. She looked down at her wet clothes and sighed. “Fuck it,” she said, taking her clothes off and hanging them over the shower curtain rod. She wrapped her towel around herself and opened the door. Alexander pushed his way past her and crouched before the toilet; she sounds of him retching started immediately.

From the other door in the bathroom, the one that led to Diana’s room, there was a pounding. “Shut the fuck up you guys!” Diana screamed.

“Fuck you,” Jessica muttered under her breath, making her way past Alexander’s black-clad form. She made her way back to her bedroom, fought past the mess of dirty clothes and books and papers, and got to her bed, to find that she bowl of ice cream she hadn’t quite finished and had left on the covers had attracted a thick swarm of ants.

Just friggin’ lovely.

4

Alexander had rented Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead, two of his favorite movies. At least, Jessica assumed they were his favorite, since he spent so many hours watching them over and over again. When she came home from work, smelling like tomato sauce and onions and pizza grease she found Alexander laying on the couch in the living room as usual, several empty beer bottles surrounding him and a box from Kentucky Fried Chicken on the floor. The box from yesterday’s KFC meal was right next to tonight’s, bits of bone and crumbs still surrounding it. Alexander was snoring. Jessica saw dried mucus on his face, and tears coming from the corners of his eyes. Yeah right; same shit as yesterday and the day before and every single god damned day for the entire month.

When Jessica had first met Alexander, the darkness inside of him, the melancholy, had been somewhat attractive in a mysterious way. She had thought that maybe if she could heal him, she might have been able to ease the wounds inside her own soul. Instead, his melancholy had gone from the mysterious and tortured to the stupidly pathetic, and Jessica no longer felt like trying to save him. Not when she was so lost inside of her self that her own misery blinded everything else.

On the television screen, zombies dressed like hookers, nuns, ordinary suburban folks, tried to get to the soldiers to eat them. Jessica stood and watched for a few moments, but she had seen it before. Alexander had shown her all of Romero’s films, and they were all alike. Zombies and shit. She turned off the TV.

“Hey!” Alexander called to her in his drunken, congested voice. “I was watching that!”

“Oh,” Jessica said. “Sorry.” She went out of the living room, not bothering to turn the television back on.

In her room, the ants were still having a picnic on the ice cream bowl. Wincing — she hated ants — Jessica picked up the bowl and tossed it across the room so that it landed on top of a pile of her work clothes — Pizza Hut, yeah. Red shirt, black slacks, like a wage slave from Star Trek. On top of her clothes, the stupid baseball cap she had to wear.

In the living room, the television went back on. Jessica stretched out on the sleeping bag she had lay on her floor the previous night in order to avoid having to sleep with the ants, and closed her eyes.

Before she could really start relaxing, though, there was a knocking at her door. “Who’s there?” she called.

“Jessica?” said the other, a woman. “It’s me, Diana.”

Shit. Diana. Jessica hated talking to Diana. Not that Diana was a bad person, but Jessica frankly admitted to herself that Diana intimidated her. Diana with her perfect classes and great job, her expensive car she bought herself… Jessica always felt like such a loser around Diana. Jessica herself had dropped out of school — actually, had been placed on academic probation for so long that continuing at Davis had seemed utterly pointless — and had been unable to keep any sort of job going for any length of time at all, except for the driving job at Pizza Hut.

“Jessica, are you there?” Diana called.

“Of course I’m here,” Jessica said. “Hang on.”

She stood up, brushed herself off a little, and opened the door to her room, noticing as she did so that there was a little look of revulsion on Diana’s perfect face. Of course, Diana said nothing about the smell that came from Jessica’s room, the smell that Jessica herself was perfectly aware of.

“What’s up, Diana?” Jessica said.

“Um,” Diana started. She suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Is something wrong with Alexander?”

Jessica shook her head. “I don’t think so. Why?”

“Well, just because he never does anything but sit in that couch watching those movies and drinking. Is he depressed or something?”

Jessica shrugged. “He never talks to me anymore,” she said.

“Oh.” Diana paused. “Listen,” she said at last, “I was thinking about going to dinner at Caffe Italia and I was wondering if you wanted to go along.”

Jessica was stunned. Diana never asked her to go do anything with her. “What?” she said, stupidly.

Diana shrugged. “We never do anything together,” she said by way of explanation.

“You’re never home,” Jessica returned. “You’re always off with Adam or in class or at work or something.”

“Well,” Diana said, “I’d like to do something with you tonight, okay?”

Jessica shrugged. “Sure. Um, I don’t have a lot of money, could we go someplace cheaper? Taco Bell?”

“It’s my treat,” Diana said.

“Oh. Okay. Let me change.”

“Okay.”

Diana retreated, and Jessica closed her bedroom door.

Jessica found some clothes in her closet that looked sort of nice — or at least clean — and changed into them, donning a grey T-shirt, jeans, and a pair of black tennis shoes. Diana had been wearing a business outfit, white blouse with a black jacket and a short black skirt, black stockings and black pumps. Jessica had nothing to match that kind of outfit.

When she came out of her room, she saw Diana waiting for her, seated at the dining room table. Diana hadn’t changed out of her work clothes. “Are you ready to go?” she asked cheerfully.

Jessica nodded, feeling low and strangely dirty. “Let’s go,” she said, grabbing her jacket from the back of the sofa.

5

Dinner with Diana was miserable. Neither of them had said much at all during the entire meal, and Diana had looked slightly uncomfortable all night long. Jessica had eaten a lot; she rarely had a chance to eat that much. She was still working on her pasta long after Diana had finished her own cup of soup and green salad.

On the way home, Diana told Jessica that she was going to go away on a business trip to Denver for a week, and after that she would probably be getting a promotion. Jessica congratulated her half-heartedly, feeling sad that she herself probably would never have a job that sent her to Denver or gave her great promotions. Maybe Pizza Hut would promote her to shift leader someday, but even that seemed ultimately unlikely.

They stopped at Baskin Robbins’, across the street from Cafe Roma, and had sundaes, again Diana’s treat. They ate their ice cream in silence, and then Diana drove home.

At home, Alexander was still on the couch, having finished another couple of beers, and was watching Day of the Dead. Army soldiers fought zombies. Diana thanked Jessica for the company, then left again, saying that she had some business to take care of.

Jessica sat on the other couch in the living room, watching the movie for a few minutes and feeling lonely and isolated. The loneliness had been building inside of her for almost two years now, ever since she had decided to give up on college, had taken the job at Pizza Hut (but only after spending three months looking for something better-paying) and moving in with Alexander. Jessica had originally felt that Diana’s moving in had been a godsend, because finally there would be someone else in the house who wasn’t full of depression and morbidness, like Alexander, someone she could finally talk to. But it became pretty clear pretty soon that Diana and Jessica weren’t going to be friends, and Jessica suspected that Diana had just moved in as a last-minute emergency choice and if she had really had a chance to look around, Diana would never have chosen to move with in Jessica.

Alexander moaned; Jessica looked over and saw that he was crying. Again. Shit, Jessica thought, and went to her room to lie down.

6

The glowing blue numbers of the VCR in Jessica’s room glowed 2:58 AM when Jessica awoke. Music was playing on the radio, something a little too loud and obnoxious to let Jessica sleep very well.

She tried to move her arm to shut the radio off but found she was unable to move. She tried again but her body wouldn’t respond at all to any of her commands. Fear began to rise within her like a wave and she began to panic, terrified that she would never be able to move again.

She tried to call out Diana’s name, knowing that Diana was probably more capable to helping her than Alexander, and found that the only thing that would come out of her mouth was a faint whisper.

The bedroom window faced the porch. Her windows were open, and the curtains moved gently in the breeze. Jessica was facing the window and she could see that the porch light was on and shining directly into her bedroom, on her face. The light was comforting, it was something to focus on as she lay gripped in fear, paralyzed and unable to move, almost unable to breathe.

She noticed, then, that the light was starting to grow brighter, the breeze that blew the curtains was blowing a bit stronger. Something was moving outside just outside her window, she could see it. For some reason she was scared — terrified, in fact. Something was outside her bedroom window, shining a bright light into her room, and she couldn’t move, couldn’t even breathe.

A black shape loomed outside of her window, something like a person; smaller, actually, like a child, very slender.

She tried to scream again: Alexander’s name, Diana’s name, anyone, but she was unable to make a single sound.

The shape outside the window reached inside, pushing aside the curtain with a slender grey hand. It pushed aside the curtain and started to crawl into the window. Jessica saw a small, oval shaped head with huge, slanted black eyes, atop an absurdly slender body, with perfectly smooth skin. The creature’s face showed no expression as it came into her bedroom through her window and approached her, moving so smoothly that it almost appeared to be floating.

Still Jessica was unable to scream or to move. As the thing came closer, though, she found that she was finally able to at least close her eyes…

7

“Jessica, wake up man.”

Someone was shaking her. Jessica moaned and opened her eyes. She found herself staring right up into Alexander’s dirty, unshaven face. He was shaking her shoulder, gently. “Are you okay?”

Jessica nodded, and coughed. There was something warm and sticky on her face, and she brushed it with her hand. He hand came away bloody.

“You’ve got a bad nosebleed,” Alexander said. “What were you doing in the coat closet with a nosebleed?”

“I… I don’t know,” Jessica replied. “Was I in the coat closet?”

“Yeah.” Alexander belched, and fumes like rotten fruit wafted from his mouth. “I heard you thumping in there a couple of minutes ago. I didn’t see you go in, though. Of course,” he added, grinning sickly, “I am pretty shitfaced. I probably won’t even remember this.”

Jessica sat up, noticing that most of her joints ached. Alexander sat back, fell onto his rear. “Anything I can do?” he asked sheepishly.

“Can you get me some paper towels for my nose?” she asked. She was pinching her nose shut, trying to stop the bleeding. There was no pain in her nose; she had no idea why it would be bleeding. She had thought that she might be sleepwalking, and that she had hit her nose on a wall or a door or something, but if that was what had happened, why didn’t she feel any pain?

Alexander tried to stand up, failed, tried again, and failed again. “Sorry,” he said.

“Fine,” Jessica said, feeling irritated. She stood up, still keeping her nose pinched, and started to walk towards the bathroom.

“Hey,” Alexander called as she walked away, stopping her. “How’d you get that bruise on your back?”

The back of her shirt had ridden up somehow. Jessica reached around and found a spot on her back which was tender to the touch. When she got into the bathroom she saw a bruise there, large and deeply colored, very nasty-looking. Jessica had no memory of hurting her back and had no idea where this bruise might have come from.

Her nose was still bleeding badly, and she grabbed some toilet paper and pressed it up against her nostrils, trying to stop the flow of blood.

What had happened? Had someone in a costume come into her room last night dressed in a costume and hurt her? Why had she been paralyzed? The more she thought abut it, the more frightened Jessica became.

She sat down on the toilet, waiting for her nose to stop bleeding. The sleepwalking frightened her, especially since she’d been sleepwalking just the other night and had wound up in the shower, with the cold water on and fully clothed. And now tonight: somehow she’d sneaked into the closet, hurt her nose enough to make it bleed pretty heavily (even though there was no pain now), and hit her back hard enough to raise a pretty large, tender bruise.

The bleeding finally stopped. Jessica rolled up some tissue and put it into her nose and went back to her bedroom. Alexander was passed out again on the couch. The fact that he always slept on the couch and never in his own bedroom faintly annoyed Jessica; it was as though he had claimed that room for himself and so prevented anyone else from being in the living room. There was a bright light and faint sounds of conversation coming from under the door to Diana’s room.

Jessica checked the clock radio in her bedroom and saw that it was just past four o’clock in the morning. Whatever had happened to her had taken two hours or so.

She went back out of her room and knocked gently on Diana’s door. After a moment, the door opened and Diana peered out.

“Jessica?” she said wonderingly. “Is something wrong?”

“Someone came into my room through the window,” Jessica said.

Diana looked alarmed. “What? Are you okay? What happened to your nose?”

“I was sleepwalking,” Jessica explained. “I think I hit my nose on something.”

“Does it hurt?”

“No.”

Diana looked puzzled. “That’s odd. Um, do you want to come in? You could sleep on the floor, if you like.”

Jessica hesitated, suddenly feeling very shy. “Don’t you think we should call the police or something?”

Diana looked thoughtful. “How did they come in to your room?” she asked.

“Through the window.”

“Did they take the screen out?”

“I guess they had to. I wasn’t really thinking about it. I couldn’t move at the time.”

“You couldn’t move? Why not?”

“I don’t know! Maybe they used a gas or something. I could hardly breathe.” Jessica’s voice started to break, and Diana stood silently.

“Why don’t we take a look at your window,” Diana said at last.”

Jessica nodded. “Okay.”

Together, they went into Jessica’s room. Everything looked perfectly normal. The window was shut and the screen was back in place. Diana went over to the window and tried it. “It’s locked,” she said. “They must have left through the door.”

“How did they get past Alexander, though? He’s been out in the living room this whole time.”

Diana sneered. “Give me a break. Alexander’s so drunk he could sleep through a hurricane.” She inspected the room, a little curl of disgust at the must touching the side of her mouth. “Did you get a good look at the person who came in? What did he look like?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know?” Diana said. “Didn’t you say you saw him come in?”

“I did, but he was wearing a mask or something. I didn’t see his face.”

“A mask? What kind of mask?”

Jessica shook her head. “I don’t know. Like one of the aliens from The X-Files or something. Grey, huge black eyes.”

Diana looked incredulously at Jessica, and was silent for a long moment. Jessica felt even more embarrassed and turned away. She looked over her room, at the mess, at the fresh swarm of ants that had taken over the ice cream bowl.

“Why don’t you get rid of that?” Diana asked, and it took Jessica a moment to realize that Diana was talking about the bowl.

Jessica shrugged. “I’m lazy, I guess.”

“Christ, this is gross,” Diana said. “I’ll clean this up. You look around and see if you can tell if anything is missing.”

Looking faintly repulsed, Diana picked up the ant-infested bowl gingerly with two fingers and carried it out of Jessica’s bedroom and into the kitchen. A moment later, Jessica heard water running in the kitchen sink.

She looked around her room, but everything seemed to be here. Even her most valuable possession, her expensive Walkman, lay in its normal place by the pillow of her sleeping bag. All of her clothes and books were in place. Nothing was gone.

Diana came back in a moment later carrying a can of insecticide. “You spray,” she commanded. “I’m going to go get the dustbuster.” She handed the spray can to Jessica, who took it gingerly. She started spraying over the ants that were still on the floor, then went over and started spraying her sheets where the bowl had been. When all of the ants were dead, she took the sheets off her bed and put them into her dirty clothes basket. Then she lay her sleeping bag out over the mattress.

Diana came back in a moment later and started vacuuming up the dead ants on the floor. “This room really needs a good cleaning,” she observed, “and the carpet has to be steam-cleaned at this point. The insecticide will probably stay in for a long time.”

Jessica didn’t answer, just sat on her bed and watched Diana cleaning up.

“Was anything missing?” Diana asked.

“No,” Jessica said.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

Jessica nodded.

“Because we could call the police, if you want.”

“Let’s check outside, first.”

“Why outside?”

“He was standing right outside my window, in the flower bed,” Jessica replied. “He would have left footprints.”

They passed Alexander, who was still asleep in front of the television, which had nothing on but snow at the moment. Outside, the flower bed looked as though it were undisturbed, even though Diana had watered it just that evening and it was still muddy.

“He could have stepped over it,” Jessica said.

“I doubt it,” Diana said. “Come on, let’s go back inside.”

Inside, they went back to Jessica’s room and looked around one last time. There was still no sign of any intruder.

“I think it might have been a dream,” Diana said at last.

“A dream?” Jessica asked. “How could it have been a dream? I was wide awake.”

“Well, I took a class in sleep psychology and dreaming,” Diana said. “I remember we learned that when you sleep your body becomes paralyzed so that you don’t actually out your dreams out, because that could be dangerous. I heard about a man in the Midwest who actually shot and killed some people in his sleep, because his brain hadn’t shut down his body like it was supposed to.”

Jessica was impressed. “That’s weird,” she said.

“Right. So anyway, there are some times when your mind starts to wake up before your body does, so your body is still paralyzed. You think you’re awake, but you can’t move.”

“That’s what happened to me.”

“I know. What often happens to people in that situation is that they feel like they can’t breathe, and they get scared. Then they start dreaming.”

“Dreaming?”

“Well, hallucinating, I guess. It’s called a hypnogogic hallucination. They also call it an ‘Old Hag’ experience.”

“Oh.” Jessica wasn’t sure what to make of all of that. Still, it felt better than the idea that someone had broken into her bedroom and given her a gas to make her paralyzed. It didn’t explain the sleepwalking, though. Jessica supposed that was probably a different problem entirely.

“I know you’ve been having trouble sleeping,” Diana said to Jessica. “Alexander told me that you’ve been sleepwalking. That you were in the shower just the other night, with your clothes on.”

Jessica nodded.

“I think you might need to talk to someone. A counselor or something.”

Jessica shrugged. “What good will that do?”

Diana paused. “I don’t know. I’ve been worried about you, that’s all.”

Jessica didn’t know how to take that. “I’m going back to sleep,” she said. “Good night.”

“Good night,” said Diana.

8

Jessica didn’t have to work the next day, but she was sick of hanging out at home, so she decided to spend most of the day wandering around Davis. She was low on money, which limited her options. No movies, no new books, maybe some video games, a cup of coffee at Roma. That seemed like a good plan. She grabbed her jacket and shrugged it on; she also picked up her backpack and stuffed it with her notebook and the book she was reading: Magic’s Pawn by Mercedes Lackey. Diana was in class already and Alexander was asleep on the couch in the living room as usual. Jessica did not struggle too hard to leave quietly; she let the door slam behind her as she went out. It probably wouldn’t disturb Alexander one bit.

She tossed her backpack into her car, her old ‘81 Honda Accord, and drove away.

. . .

A cup of coffee cost just about a dollar at Cafe Roma, and Jessica sat at one of the outside tables, her notebook and pens spread before her and her novel in her hand. The weather, though, was too distracting for her to read. The air was warm but humid. It was the middle of July but grey clouds hung thick over the valley, threatening a hot and uncomfortable rain. A couple of shops across the breezeway still had their 4th of July decorations up, which depressed Jessica; it reminded her of spending Independence Day with her family, who were all over 150 miles away and not on speaking terms with her.

She tried reading again, about how George Orr’s attempts to dream of world peace had brought aliens down to invade the earth, but it was too hard for her to concentrate. Her mind kept going in a million different directions: her dinner with Diana, her experience — dream? — of the previous night, her family. With the sleepwalking, the dreaming, the depression, she had started to worry that she was going crazy. She had a sudden desire to talk to Diana, to tell her everything, but she was afraid that Diana really would think that she was crazy.

And why should she even want to talk to Diana anyway? She and Diana had never been really close, as last night’s awkward dinner date had really shown.

Shit, Jessica said to herself.

She looked back to her book again, but was again distracted by something else. Out on the street a large black car, a Cadillac or a Lincoln, had stopped just in front of the cafe. As Jessica watched, the tinted window on the driver side slid down and a man peered out at her. His face was long and gaunt, and very pale. Jessica could see that he was wearing a black suit with a narrow black tie, as well as a black hat of some sort. Dark sunglasses hid his eyes, but Jessica could tell that he was staring straight at her. It made her terribly nervous, and she wanted to look away, but the stranger’s face was hypnotic, and kept her gaze. She stared at him, and he mouthed some words at her — what they were, she couldn’t tell.

“Are they after you, too?” said a voice behind Jessica.

Jessica started, startled out of her locked gaze with the man in the black car. She turned and saw a young woman standing behind her, very thin, with long red hair and dark green eyes. She was wearing a thick army jacket and was clutching a wrinkled wad of newspapers before her protectively.

The woman nodded towards the street. Jessica looked back and saw that the black car and its pale driver had gone. She turned back and saw that the woman had seated herself at Jessica’s table.

“Did you say something to me?” Jessica asked.

The woman nodded. She had put her newspapers on the table in front of her, and had her arms folded before her. It was nearly 100 degrees out, and humid, and this woman was wearing this thick jacket. “What’s your name?’ she asked Jessica, not taking her eyes away from her papers.

“Um,” Jessica began, “Jessica Wiley.”

“Cool,” said the woman.

There was a moment of silence. The woman leaned forward and began looking over the newspapers.

“What’s your name?” Jessica asked after a few moments.

“Kimberly,” the other said. The she looked Jessica straight in the eye. “Can I borrow a buck for some coffee?”

Jessica shrugged and handed Kimberly a wrinkled dollar bill from the pocket of her jeans. Kimberly went inside the cafe and returned a moment later with a tall glass of coffee.

“Why are they after you?” Kimberly asked Jessica.

“Who?”

“The men in the car,” Kimberly explained. “The men in black.”

“What men in black?”

“Like the one who told you to keep quiet just now.”

Jessica shrugged. “Are they after me?” she asked.

“Have you seen a UFO?” Kimberly asked. “Have you spoken to a dragon?”

Jessica had no idea how to respond to such an odd question. “I haven’t seen any UFO’s,” she said. “I don’t even know any dragons.”

Kimberly stared into the blackness of her coffee. “They’re there,” she said.

“Who are?”

“The dragons. Out there. Behind the world.”

“What?”

“Have you been having any weird dreams?”

Jessica was thoroughly confused by now. “What kind of dreams?” she asked.

“Timothy said it was all about dreams,” Kimberly said.

“Who was–?”

“Timothy Hammond, Doctor Timothy Hammond!” Kimberly said forcefully. Then, more calmly, she added, “He’s gone now. He went behind, I think.”

Jessica decided that she didn’t want to talk to Kimberly any longer: she was obviously crazy. “I’ve got to go,” she said, packing up her book and her notebook.

“Do you think I’m crazy?” Kimberly asked her.

“What?”

“Because I am. I can’t read, you know. I think I killed someone once.”

“Whatever,” Jessica said. The stood up and started to walk away, towards her car.

Kimberly grabbed her. “They’ll be back, you know.”

“Let go of me.”

“The men in the black suits. They’re going to keep looking for you. Because you know too much.”

“I don’t know anything,” Jessica said. She yanked hard and finally managed to pull her arm free from Kimberly’s grip.

“Yes you do!” Kimberly called after her. “They’ll get you where you live!”

Jessica walked away. She had seen Kimberly before at Cafe Roma, just about every time Jessica was there Kimberly was too, usually in the back, with a pile of newspapers. Jessica hurried toward her Honda, threw her backpack inside, and pulled away quickly.

It was only noon on a Tuesday, what the hell was she going to do for the rest of the day? Alexander would be at home, in the living room, and she certainly didn’t want to spend any time with him. Diana was probably in school or at work, but she might be at home, too. And Jessica desperately wanted to have some time to herself right now: time away from noise, people, and distractions. Time to just be.

Sighing, Jessica drove home. Just maybe, she’d get lucky.

9

The week passed slowly and was a lonely time for Jessica. She worked only about twenty hours, just enough for rent. One of the other drivers invited her to a cup of coffee at Lyon’s after their shift, and made a clumsy pass at her under the table.

Diana was gone on a business trip in Denver all that week. One night Jessica came home from work and found that Alexander had left the house. There were a few fresh bottle of beer on the floor near the couch and his car was gone. Which meant, of course, that he had probably gotten himself trashed, then driven somewhere.

There was a message on the answering machine. Jessica pressed “Play,” and Diana’s voice came forth from the speaker: “Hi Alexander, hi Jessica, this is Diana. I’m just calling to let you know that I’m going to be gone a few more days, and I’ll be home next Tuesday. Take care. ‘Bye.”

Jessica slumped into the couch and dropped her backpack on the floor. Finally, some time to herself! She had no idea when Alexander would be home if at all tonight. Still, she was going to enjoy this.

She went into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator and saw that there was a new 6-pack of beer on the middle shelf. There was a note attached to one of the bottles. Jessica opened it and read it.

“Jessica — here’s the beer I owe you. See you later. Alexander.”

Jessica laughed. She had forgotten that Alexander had bummed a 6-pack off of her at some point earlier this year. She took one and opened it and started to drink. It was cold, and bitter, and she could feel that it was very strong.

A fly buzzing around her face became irritating to her. Jessica grabbed the flyswatter from where it hung by a thumbtack on the wall and looked around for the fly. But as she did, she saw a cloud, at least a dozen of flies, circling above the kitchen sink. Her lip curling in disgust, Jessica went over to the sink and found that a pan of ancient hamburger grease, unwashed, had drawn the flies.

“God-damned Alex,” Jessica muttered. Looking around she saw the total disaster area that the kitchen had become. Dirt dishes sat on the counter next to the sink, drawing flies and ants. The only clean dish she saw was the bowl Diana had taken from Jessica’s room. It rested in the light blue plastic dish rack, still waiting to be put away.

Jessica finished off the beer, already feeling the buzz, opened the refrigerator, and grabbed another. She twisted off the cap and began drinking.

“Dammit,” she muttered. The mess in the kitchen was disturbing to her, so she opened the cabinet under the sink, dug out a bottle of dishwashing detergent and a pair of yellow latex gloves. She snapped the gloves on, started the water in the kitchen running on hot, and squirted soap directly onto the pan with the rotting meat. Jessica was tempted to simply throw the pan away, but she knew that there were few enough pans in the house as it were. She grabbed the scouring brush and, ignoring the flies and the smell as much as she could, began cleaning.

. . .

She had a vague memory of finishing off the last beer in the 6-pack Alexander had left for her, and opening the bottle of whiskey she knew he kept in the cupboard above the stove, but her memory beyond that was hazy. She had one memory of looking around the kitchen and seeing how bright and clean it was, and then wandering into the living room, whiskey bottle in hand, and standing in front of the television for awhile and watching some infomercial about a juice maker and thinking it was the funniest thing she’d seen in a long time.

After that she could remember nothing until the bright lights outside the patio door and the slender forms moving around, and thinking, “Oh no, not again.”

When she awoke she was on a hard cold surface, with a thin cloth covering her. She opened her eyes, and shut them again immediately because of the painfully bright light. Her head throbbed painfully and she tried to move her arms to bring her hands to her temples but found something was restraining her. She moaned and fought against the restraints, but it was no good.

“Hey!” she called out. Her mouth felt strange, and her tongue felt cottony and swollen, and it was hard to talk. “Let me go!” she cried anyway.

There was no response at all. She cried out again but still no one came to let her go.

Then she did hear a sound, something like breathing to her right. She turned her head and opened her eyes just a little, still over-sensitive to the brightness of the light around her. Through her squinted eyes, she could just barely make out another person also stretched out on a bed that looked like metal, and also covered with a blanket. The profile of the other person looked familiar to her — the black hair and scruffy beard looked familiar too.

“Alexander?” Jessica whispered. “Alexander, is that you?”

Alexander — for that was indeed who was stretched out on the bed next to her — did not respond in any way. Jessica couldn’t tell if his eyes were closed or not, but she guessed that he was asleep.

“Alexander,” she said again, louder. He still made no response.

“Wake up, Alexander, please.”

Jessica was beginning to feel frightened all over again. The silence of the room where she was, the pain in her head, the brightness of the lights, and Alexander’s still form beside her. And, most of all, the restraints that kept her in place, all made her more terrified than she had been ever before. Jessica closed her eyes and prayed fervently that this was a dream, like all the other times, that she wold wake up in bed or even in the closet or shower for God’s sake. This experience, as it was, was too terrifying.

She felt a touch on her arm, and she opened her eyes again. The light was still blinding and she had to squint still, but she thought she saw someone thin and short standing over her, with no easily discerned features on its face except for two huge, black eyes.

Oh dear God, no, Jessica thought, not the X-Files aliens again.

The creature turned its head away from Jessica and looked away. Jessica looked to see if she could tell what it was looking at.

Another creature similar to the first approached her. They glanced at each other then looked at Jessica again.

“Please let me go,” Jessica pleaded.

The two creatures stared at each other as if speaking, but Jessica noticed that neither one had ears, nor were they moving their tiny mouths at all.

“Let me go, please,” Jessica repeated. “I want to go home.”

She felt a sudden sharp jabbing pain in her arm, like a shot, and she cried out and looked down. One of the creatures held a hypodermic in its hand, and Jessica could see a pale blue liquid dripping from the tip of the needle.

. . .

“Jessica.”

Alexander’s voice.

“Jessica, are you okay?”

“Alexander? Where am I?”

“Jessica, Christ, you’re a mess. Jesus, where have you–?”

. . .

Her eyes opened again and she was floating down a brightly-lit corridor of some sort. She looked up and saw the black-eyed face of the creature hovering above her, staring straight ahead.

“Alexander–” she whispered.

She heard another voice: a very gentle voice, somehow sounding both male and female. The voice was soothing, but it spoke in a language she didn’t understand.

“Cameel lefalsha,” the new voice said.

Jessica found herself being pushed into an upright position by two delicate pairs of hands. She was facing a tall, very fair-skinned man with long blond hair and a very calm look on his face.

“Cameel lefalsha,” the pale man repeated.

Jessica couldn’t understand what the man was saying, and shook her head and shrugged to indicate this.

The man looked to one of the gray-skinned creatures for a moment, with a puzzled expression on his face. Then he turned back to Jessica.

“Welcome,” he said in English.

Jessica started. “You speak English!” she said.

The man did not respond to that. “Welcome, Jessica Wiley,” he said. “I am glad to see you awake. My name is Finvarra. Do you know who I am?”

Jessica shook her head. “Should I?”

Finvarra sighed, and put his hands together, steepling his fingers. “I suppose that is to be expected,” he said. “You have come further than anyone has in centuries. I had hoped you would remember my name.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever met you before,” Jessica said.

“We have,” Finvarra replied, “but you were too deep in the illness to remember, I guess.”

“What illness?”

“Too deep into the dreaming,” Finvarra said, as though that explained anything at all.

“What dreaming?”

Finvarra raised his hand as if to dismiss the question. “I’m afraid our time is short,” he said. “If I had more time to explain I would do so. I am very happy with your arrival.”

Finvarra’s face began to grow blurry, and Jessica began to feel a little light-headed. “What have you done to me?” she asked.

“We woke you up,” Finvarra said. “But now we have some procedures to perform. Try to remain calm. It will be over soon.”

Jessica began to panic, and she felt her chest grow cold and her heart began to pound rapidly. “What kind of procedures?” she asked. She realized she was being taken away from Finvarra backwards down the corridor. She felt another shot in her arm and she began to feel more clear-headed.

“Where are you taking me?” she demanded.

The creatures did not answer her.

She was back n the first room, next to Alexander. She called to him, but Alexander’s form remained impassive. “Dammit, Alexander, wake up! Help me!” Alexander still did not respond.

Jessica felt her legs being forced apart, and tied in place. One of the grey-skinned creatures approached her, carrying an instrument in its delicate hands. The device looked like a speculum, but it glowed with a faint yellow energy, and there was a long barbed wire emerging from the tip.

“Oh, God, please no,” Jessica begged, but uselessly. The creature came closer, as Alexander slept on.

The pain lasted a long time, and might have continued. Jessica didn’t know: before the pain was over she had passed out again.

. . .

“Shit, Jesus, Jessica, you’re bleeding all over the fucking place. What happened?”

Jessica opened her eyes and saw Alexander’s frightened face bending over her. “Alexander, what–?”

“Where have you been, Jessica? What the fuck happened to you?”

Jessica sat up and looked down at herself, expecting to find her lower body soaked in blood. There was nothing though, only a vague ache in her crotch to indicate what the creatures had done to her. “I’m not bleeding,” she said.

“What?”

“You said I was bleeding,” Jessica told Alexander. “But I’m not.”

“I never said you were bleeding. Jesus, Jessica, are you okay? Where have you been? Do you want me to call an ambulance?”

Jessica looked around. She was back in the house. The cleaning she had done had been undone. The place was an infested mess again.

“Jessica, where have you been for the past few days? Shit, I was worried about you.”

“Days?” Jessica wondered aloud. “What do you mean? What’s today?”

“Tuesday, man. Your boss called yesterday and said to tell you to call him and talk to him if you ever get home. I think you’ve been fired.”

“Fired?” Jessica asked dazedly. She was beginning to feel dizzy again. A bright light shined outside the kitchen window.

“NO!” Jessica cried. She got to her feet and ran for the front door.

“Jessica, where are you going?” Alexander called after her. “Jessica, what’s wrong?”

Jessica did not answer but ran crying out the door and into the night. Rain fell, hot and muggy and miserable.

Not really thinking where she was headed, Jessica turned left onto the street where she lived, then right onto a busier street. She ran the mile or so from her house to the park behind the cemetary, and into the large, untended grassy and muddy field behind even the park.

Jessica found herself in front of a strange looking tree, one that had been bent over during the years and now looked like some sort of ancient, hoary creature crouched over ready to lunge. Startled, Jessica came to a stop.

The rain continued to fall warmly and heavily upon her. Overcome with fear and exhaustion, Jessica fell to her knees in front of the hunched over tree, feeling the mud squelch under her, and then surrendered to the fatigue totally, falling over and lying down on her side in the thick mud, staring up at the tree. She felt drops on her face and couldn’t tell if it were the rain or her tears.

. . .

Jessica had no idea how long she had lain in the mud before she heard footsteps approaching her. She rolled over onto her back to see who was coming. She saw three figures over her, with umbrellas and flashlights. It was dark here and Jessica could not make out the faces of any of the three. She wanted to move away from them, crawl backwards, but she was too tired to do so. All she wanted to do now was to stay lying here in the mud, beneath the tree, and sleep.

“Jessica?” the lead figure said, crouching over her. Jessica saw black stockings and pumps, and recognized Diana’s voice.

“Diana?” Jessica asked hesitantly. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to look for you, Jessica. I was worried about you.”

Jessica looked past Diana to the other black-clad figures. “Who are they?” she asked.

Diana turned briefly to look at her companions, then turned back to Jessica. “Just friends of mine,” she said. “They came with me to help me find you. Jesus, you’re a mess, aren’t you?”

Jessica could see Diana’s face now, and that reassured her. She looked concerned. Some of her blond hair had gotten wet and had fallen into her eyes, but she didn’t seem to care about that at all. She held her umbrella above her with her left hand, while with her right she took Jessica’s own hand.

“Let’s go home,” Diana said softly.

“Okay.”

Slowly, with Diana’s help, Jessica got to her feet. One of Diana’s companions — both of them were men, Jessica realized — took off his black overcoat and gave it to Jessica to wear over her own T-shirt and jeans. Diana held her closely as they made their way to the parking lot by the cemetery, where a long black Cadillac waited. Diana held open the back door on the passenger’s side for Jessica to get in, then walked around to the other side and climbed in herself. The two men got into the front of the automobile. In the soft yellow dome light Jessica noticed that they both appeared very pale, and very thin — almost gaunt, in fact. Their eyes were dark-rimmed and rheumy, and seemed to have an Oriental cast to them.

“Who are they?” Jessica asked Diana.

“They’re friends of mine from work,” Diana replied. “The one driving is Edward, the other is Gary.”

“But they look — ” Jessica began.

Diana hushed her, and pulled her head into her lap. “It’s okay Jessica, you don’t need to worry about it anymore. Right now, just relax and don’t worry about anything, okay?”

Jessica started to say something, but Diana was stroking her hair and shushing her softly, and Jessica felt herself calming down and starting to drift.

. . .

“We’re home,” Diana’s voice said, startling Jessica. They could not have driven for more than a couple of minutes, since the park and the cemetery were so close to the house. Yet Jessica felt as though she had slept for a long time: she felt refreshed, and relaxed. Still she also felt, because of the rain, wt and sticky.

She and Diana were alone now in the black Cadillac. Gary and Edward had gone, and there was no sign that they had ever been there. She leaned against the door of Diana’s Saturn and heard soft jazz playing on the radio.

“How are you feeling?” Diana asked, leaning on the steering wheel.

“I — ” Jessica started to say, but her voice caught in her throat. She tried again. “Where are thye?”

Diana looked genuinely puzzled. “Where are who?” she asked.

“Your friends, the ones who were with you when you found me in the park.”

“Jessica, I was alone when I found you.” Diana’s look of concern intensified. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

Suddenly Jessica was furious — with Diana’s solicitude, her lying, with the weather, Alexander, but mostly with herself. “Dammit shut up!” she yelled. “Leave me alone!”

“What — ?”

“I don’t want you here anymore!” Jessica continued yelling. “Everybody’s lying to me and nothing’s making sense anymore!”

“Jesus, Jessica, you’re bleeding.”

Jessica felt the gush of blood flowing from her nose then, and lifted her hand to her face. Her hand came away slick and shiny, blood coating it like a glove. “Oh…” she said softly.

Diana turned her key in the ignition, bringing her car back to life. “I’m taking you to the emergency room,” she said. She removed her black silk scarf from around her neck and gave it to Jessica. “Put this against your nose,” she ordered.

“Your scarf — ” Jessica began.

“Just do it, Jessica. You’re more important than the scarf.” She thrust the scarf against Jessica’s nose, held it there while she pressed Jessica’s own hand against it. “Like that,” she said. Then she put the car in gear and started to drive away.

10

Sutter Davis Hospital was easily about five miles away from where they lived. Diana drove there quickly, exceeding the speed limit on every street, miraculously avoiding any red lights or being pulled over for speeding. They pulled up in front of the emergency room entrance, and Diana led Jessica inside.

Jessica, still feeling light-headed and confused, stood and waited silently while Diana supplied all of the necessary information to the registration nurse. Shortly after that, Jessica was taken away from the lobby and put into a small room and made to lie down. A nurse put a piece of folded up gauze against her nose, while another put a blood-pressure cuff around her upper arm.

The flurry of activity was overwhelming and Jessica looked around, dazed, trying to find Diana in the confusion.

Standing by the entrance to this room was a woman that looked familiar to Jessica in some way, but Jessica didn’t recognize her at first: she had red hair and very fair skin, and wore a thick army jacket. She was staring intently at Jessica, as if to stare right through her. None of the nurses noticed her, or the long, rusty knife she carried in her right hand. The sight of the knife frightened Jessica and she began to squirm in the bed, the nurses fighting to hold her down.

Finally Jessica recalled the other woman: it was Kimberly, the woman from Cafe Roma who had talked about the Men In Black and had asked Jessica if she had spoken to any dragons.

Jessica fought against the nurses, trying to get away, frightened that Kimberly might approach and try to hurt her. The nurses became upset at Jessica and finally gave her a shot to sedate her and keep her calm.

She tried to struggle a few more minutes, but eventually the blackness overcame her and then the world swam away.

. . .

She awoke in a hospital bed, strapped down with canvas straps, alone in her room. Her bed was next to the window; the other bed was unoccupied.

Out the window, Jessica could see that the sky was clear. There was very little sign of the previous night’s rain, except for a few patches of moisture on the ground which had not yet evaporated in the heat of the daytime sun.

Being tied down to the hospital bed did not upset Jessica or frighten her. She was used to feeling out of control of what was happening to her at this point, and this came as no surprise.

The nurse stepped in, looked down on her and gave her a friendly smile as she checked Jessica’s pulse and looked over her chart.

“Why am I here?” Jessica asked. “Am I going to be all right?”

“You’re going to be just fine,” the nurse said. “Doctor Anderson will be in to see you in a little while.”

“Can you take the straps off of me?” Jessica asked. “I promise I won’t try to leave or anything.”

The nurse shook her head, still smiling. “I’m sorry, no, not until Doctor Anderson has spoken to you.”

Jessica sighed, resigned. At least there was no danger here, no little gray-skinned aliens or monsters coming at her here.

“I’ll be in to check on you in a little while,” the nurse said, leaving.

Jessica was left alone again as the door swung softly shut behind the nurse. She turned her gaze back to the window and looked at the clear blue sky. In the distance she saw a helicopter hovering.

“The government keeps the helicopters at the University Airport,” said a voice from the other bed.

Jessica turned her head, startled. Kimberly was sitting on the other bed, still wearing her thick olive-green army jacket, her hair still stringy and wet. She was holding the same knife in her left hand that she had been holding the night before, the long knife with the rusty blade.

“What are you doing here?” Jessica demanded. “How did you get in here?”

“I’m here to help you escape,” Kimberly replied. “Look out the window.”

Jessica did. The view outside the window had not changed, except that the helicopter was closer. Jessica could see that it was black and had no markings on it at all. The sight of it gave her a panicky feeling inside.

“The government’s been keeping the black helicopters at University Airport on campus,” Kimberly explains. “They have a secret underground hangar there. They raised our registration fees to pay for it.”

“Why?” Jessica asked.

“Some people know too much. The government has to keep them silent. You know too much and they’re coming to get you. Why do you think you’re here?”

“You’re crazy,” Jessica told Kimberly.

“I know,” Kimberly replied. “I talk to dragons, right? I have to help you out of your bed now.”

“Um…” Jessica began. “What do you mean?”

She watched as Kimberly got off the other bed, the knife in hand. “What are you doing?” she asked.

Kimberly didn’t answer, just continued to walk over to Jessica. Then she stood over Jessica’s bed, holding the knife up.

Jessica closed her eyes tightly and pulled against the restraints, anticipating that Kimberly was going to attack her with the knife. Instead she heard a ripping sound — and then the pressure from the restraint on her left wrist disappeared. Jessica had been pulling against the restraint so hard that her arm flew upward.

“Relax,” Kimberly said, moving around the bed to cut the restraint on the other side. She cut Jessica’s other wrist restraint, then the ones that bound her ankles.

Jessica glanced out the window. “they’re gone,” she said, meaning the helicopter.

“They’ve landed on the roof. They’re going to come here any minute for you.”

Jessica sat up, rubbing her wrists where they were sore from the restraints. “Thank you,” she said.

Kimberly came close to Jessica and stared directly into her eyes. “Are you awake yet?” she asked.

Jessica blinked. “What?”

Kimberly sighed. “No, you’re still dreaming. But you’re not the Seer.”

“The what?”

“Run!” Kimberly said instead of answering. She pushed Jessica off her bed. Jessica landed on the floor, her gown falling loosely around her.

“Run!” Kimberly shouted again, waving her knife in the air. She took a couple of steps towards Jessica.

Jessica scuttled backwards a few feet, keeping an eye on Kimberly and the knife. Then she turned, got to her feet — and when she looked around again, Kimberly was gone. The bed she had been in was neatly made. There was no sign that Kimberly had ever been there.

“Jessica!” a voice shouted from down the hospital corridor.

Jessica turned. Diana was just emerging from the elevator, dressed, as usual, entirely in black. Her face was very pale and she looked as though she had lost a great deal of weight in the past few hours. Her eyes had dark circles beneath them and seemed hollow and sunken in. Behind her stood Edward and Gary, the two men in black that had been with Diana in the park.

Diana’s hair looked windblown.

As if she had just gotten out of a helicopter.

“Jessica, what are you doing?” Diana called.

The sight of the three black-clad figures seemed to intimidate the hospital staff. Diana seemed to be taking no notice that everyone was staring at her.

Jessica stood up and ran for the far end of the corridor, her bare feet slapping against the linoleum, hospital gown billowing behind her. She reached the end of the corridor, no one trying at all to stop her.

“Jessica, come back!” Diana’s voice came from the far end of the corridor and Jessica heard the sound of hard-soled shoes against the floor.

She looked around and saw a door marked “Stairs”. She pushed it open and saw a stairwell leading down. She ran down, nearly tripping twice.

The door slammed shut behind her. Jessica heard the thuds of Diana and her companions coming up against the door and trying the door once or twice before opening it successfully. By then, Jessica had reached the ground floor — Sutter Davis Hospital was only a 2-story building — and had started across the lobby to the front door.

Behind her Diana and the two men in black emerged from the stairwell. Jessica looked back and saw — briefly — a glimpse of something that could have been a gun.

“Jessica I just want to talk to you!” Diana called.

Jessica stood in the parking lot, looking around, and saw a ramp leading down into the hospital’s underground parking area. She ran down into the brightly-lit cavern, hoping to find a place to hide before her pursuers could come after her.

The light coming from the parking garage was intensely bright. Jessica looked around and saw hundreds of cars, parked apparently at random. She tried the door of the one closest to her, but found it locked.

“Jessica!” a male voice called from the far end of the garage. Jessica turned and saw Alexander standing against the far wall of the garage, next to his beat up Volkswagen.

“Oh, thank God,” Jessica said softly. She began running.

Then Alexander’s chest exploded.

Jessica stopped. Alexander looked down at his chest, dumbfounded. Then he looked up at Jessica, looking confused. Then he collapsed.

“Alexander!” Jessica screamed. She turned around and saw Diana standing at the entrance to the garage, the two men in black flanking her. One of them had a gun in one hand.

“Jessica,” Diana said, “you’re very sick. We have to talk, and you’re in a great deal of danger.”

“You killed Alexander,” Jessica said.

“Listen to me,” Diana said. “That wasn’t Alexander. Alexander is safe at home, drunk in front of his monster movies.”

Jessica turned back to look at Alexander’s body. But Diana had been right: it wasn’t Alexander at all who lay on the ground, but a short, black-eyed creature. One of the creatures that had abducted her.

Diana came up and put her hands on Jessica’s shoulders. “Jessica, listen to me,” she said. “You’ve had a psychotic break. You’re hallucinating. We need to get you back upstairs and to your room now.”

“I was tied up,” Jessica said.

“You were never restrained,” Diana said. “These men with me are doctors, Jessica. Jessica, you’re my friend and I want to help you.”

Jessica, confused, looked over to the men in black. They looked as impassive and as alien as ever to her. Still, the idea that she was hallucinating had a calming effect: it explained a lot, and even made her feel better. “Okay,” she said, approaching Diana. “Take me back to my bed.”

“That’s a good girl,” Diana said, putting her arm around Jessica’s shoulders. The two of them walked toward a door marked, “Elevator.”

They stopped, though, when there was a sound like a thud which made Jessica’s ears throb. Jessica turned.

One of the two men in black was on the ground in the middle of a spreading pool of green liquid. The other had vanished completely.

“Shit,” Diana swore. She reached under her black jacket and pulled out a gun.

One of the grey-skinned creatures stood before them, looking absurdly vulnerable and short, and carrying a large weapon of some sort.

“Drop it!” the creature commanded.

“Go to hell,” Diana replied, and fired the gun.

A bolt of blue lightning erupted from the end of the alien’s weapon and caught Diana in her chest. Her shot wend wild, ricocheting off one of the concrete pillars. Then she fell, clutching her chest with one hand, and pulling on Jessica’s hand with the other. “Don’t listen to them,” she whispered to Jessica. “They want you to be insane.”

Then Diana died.

The grey alien approached Jessica. Jessica trembled in place, too confused and scared to move or do anything.

There was a touch on her arm, and Finvarra’s voice came from beside her.

“Come, Jessica,” said Finvarra. “It’s time to awaken.”

11

But Jessica did not awaken, not fully. In the chamber where she slept and dreamed next to Alexander, Jessica moaned, opened her eyes once, almost cried…

…and fell back asleep.

12

Jessica moved out of Davis and went back to Danville to live with her family. After two years, she went back to school, at San Francisco State University, and finally finished her degree in psychology. She remained close friends with Diana, and the two of them eventually opened a family practice together.

Which left Alexander. Whose nightmares finally consumed him and he awoke screaming in the chamber, reaching out desperately for someone’s hand, and, finding none, died.

13

And, in a place very far away, beyond what Jessica or Alexander wold ever know, the man called Finvarra sat near Jessica’s sleeping form, holding the daughter she never knew she had had. The baby had been born healthy, but within days it had succumbed to the dreaming.

Fivarra laid the baby on the now empty bed next to Jessica and gazed down at it, wondering if mother and daughter were sharing the same dream, or if, in their different dreams, they lived different lives.

And, in his own way, mourning that he would never know.

Special thanks to my good friends Aaron Parr and Stephen B. Whitehead