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Chapter Nine
The pancakes her father made were delicious. She could eat forever if she wanted to; she realized this wasn’t real life, and she could stuff her face for hours and not get full. Charlotte put down her fork and wiped her mouth with the white linen napkin.
“Are you finished already?” her father asked.
“I don’t want to get fat. Oh, sorry. I don’t want to get even fatter.” She pushed her plate away.
Her father eyed her critically. “You’re a healthy and beautiful young woman. Don’t try to change a thing. You’re perfect as you are.”
“You sound like Grandmaman.”
“Because she’s right.”
Charlotte thought about her grandmother, who always scolded her to eat right. “Do you ever meet her?”
“Naturally. It would be rude if I didn’t.”
/> “Do you still…” Charlotte hesitated, “see mom in her dreams?”
“I do. She lives in Dreamscape most of the time.”
“Am I here because you want our family to be together?”
“I cannot deny that is the wish I desire most in this world, but it isn’t your time yet—yours nor your mother’s.”
“I have so many questions for you.”
The Dream Lord watched her dotingly. “Ask away.”
“I never got around to asking Mom how you two met.”
“Well.” Her father played with a teaspoon, twirling it between his long, tapered fingers. There was child-like excitement in his face as he told his tale. “When your mother was young, she had an accident that landed her in hospital for a long time. Afterward, she wasn’t able to dream at all. Can you imagine how bad a person would feel if she didn’t have the ability to dream? It’s quite different from people who can’t remember their dreams.”
She nodded. “It feels like you don’t sleep at all. When you wake up, it feels like you just dozed off even though you slept all night long.”
“That is correct. Your mother wanted to dream so badly that she started to pray to me. Her faith in me was so great that a special bond between us was forged. Naturally, we fell in love and you were born.”
“Huh.” Charlotte thought for a second. “How come I never saw you all these years?”
“I visited you often when you were little, but you said you hated me so I never came into your dreams again.”
“Is that so?”
“It pains me to have my own flesh and blood resent me, but I know that one day we’ll be able to clear up our misunderstanding.”
“I see. Dad, am I already dead?”
The man called Dream Lord didn’t answer her question immediately. “No,” he finally said. “At least, not yet.”
“Oh.” She stared out the kitchen window. It was sunny outside. She could see the branch of a peach tree swaying, green leaves shyly covered the ripe, blushed fruits. From where she was sitting, she could smell the freshly cut June grass mixed with the acrid smell of lawnmower fuel, and the scent of laundry that her mother had hung outdoors. A waft of caramelized burgers on the hot grill from the neighbor’s yard. The smell of summer. The season she loved most at the childhood place she cherished in her memory, safely tucked away in the recesses of her mind. Her father had chosen this particular clip for a special reason. “I’m not ready to leave. Besides, I’ve made a promise to someone that I would stay by his side.”
Her father smiled. “I know of him.”
“Can you help me get back to Daniel?”
He tilted his head gracefully. “It would be my pleasure, but you have to help him first.”
“What do you mean?”
