The next several days are late October gloomy, cold and rainy.
There’s nothing from Alana, and it begins to occur to me that she might never respond. And even if she does, who knows if she’ll tell the truth? Who knows if she’s the only girl out there? Jason didn’t exactly look new to the whole flirting-while-having-a-girlfriend deal. Until he wakes up, I might never be able to answer the question of whether Jason really has been cheating on me. Plus, all my original questions still remain: whether Jason loves me, why he broke up with me, what I’m supposed to do until he wakes up.
I haven’t been to see Jason since Friday morning, and I don’t know if I can go back.
In the quiet of my room and with no one here to notice, I let myself cry over everything that has happened the past few days. Things weren’t supposed to be like this. They weren’t supposed to be this uncertain or this painful.
Crying has made a brand-new headache start to blossom, a kind of faraway ringing in my head. I reach for my nightstand and take one of the pills the doctor prescribed, but it doesn’t make the ache disappear. It just makes me feel different, like there’s electricity in my head. The door to my room is gone, a distinct rectangular hole in the world, but it doesn’t last. It’s like a dream is threatening to start, but something is stopping it from happening.
Maybe it’s the medication.
Finally, the dream gods win out, and it happens the way I’m used to: My walls collapse, and the world restarts.
Twenty-Four
In tonight’s dream, we’re indoors. The space is familiar—a dimly lit house with tall ceilings and widely spaced walls, shiny marble floors, all of it with its own great big pulse. Everything is out of balance for a second or two, and I’m unsteady, nervous, until I locate Marcus just a few feet away from me. I grab for his hand, and he lets me, as a synth-pop song plays loud enough to fill an arena. Kids our age are grinding and drinking, talking and making out to its soundtrack.
Marcus leads me through the party now, our fingers intertwined. When I was a kid, my dad read me a book about being “snug as a bug in a rug,” and that’s how my hand feels now. Snug, warm, enclosed by Marcus’s much bigger hand. It’s a weird thought to have about Marcus, but not as weird as the agreement we made that we’d hug tonight.
Marcus is mouthing along to the music as he checks something on his phone.
“Where are we?” I shout to be heard over the music. I could swear I’ve been here before. Something about the cabinets—the color of the wood, the host of those same purple-blue poppies on the dining table, and even the giant painting of a safari on the far side of the room.
Marcus leans in closer. “What?” he yells.
“Wherearewe?” I say, each word accompanied by its own feeble gesture.
Marcus is too busy bopping his head to be of any help. He shrugs.
“Let’s try and figure it out!” I shout.
“Maybe?” he yells back, clearly not on the same wavelength. This is officially the most distracted I’ve ever seen Marcus. Probably because this party with its chaotic energy, girls in skintight clothes, and sweaty packed bodies is exactly the scene I picture him thriving in. Grateful for our entangled hands, I take the lead now, dragging him toward the entrance of the room.
And then it hits me.
“Penny!” I shout.
Marcus just looks at me.
“Penelope Miller’s house! That’s where we are!” I’m ecstatic to have figured it out. And right on cue, as if to verify my theory, Penny comes stumbling out of the kitchen in a leather miniskirt, crop top, and tall boots. She’s laughing with a guy I don’t know.
This is the party Penny threw in the summer last year. The party I met Marcus at. But the dreams had been becoming more recent, and this is going way back to the start. Plus, there’s something odd about the house. The light of the room or the proportions or something is off. It doesn’t look right.
We keep walking around, pointing out kids from the soccer team and yearbook and student council and dance. The people don’t look quite right either, as if we’re peering through glasses with the wrong prescription. My head is beginning to pound in direct opposition to the music, a thunderclap of discomfort, as I tug Marcus toward a long hallway.
Boom-BOOM. Boom-BOOM. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
I push into the first room on the right, seeking relief. I never get headaches in the dreams.
“Oh my God!”
Two people are standing in a corner, making out. Likeaggressivelymaking out. The girl I recognize as Jazz King. The guy’s back is to me, but I don’t think anything of it. I’m about to go out and shut the door when something stops me. A low throaty laugh I recognize.
Boom-BOOM. Boom-BOOM. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM.
I’m trying to place the voice when an identical one cuts into my thoughts, only slightly less sleepy and breathy. “I really think we should—” Marcus whispers, trying to lead us out of the room. I snap to attention.
“It’s you! This isyourdream!” I say, smacking his chest hard. The shaggy-haired guy making out with Jazz is Marcus.
