A second shriek tore through the room. Another of Jack’s nightmares. She jumped up, fumbling a wineglass. Red sloshed onto her sweatshirt. She had dozed off before even taking a sip. She rarely drank alcohol—the calories were better spent on cake or pie—but the day had called for an exception.
Squinting against the hallway light, she stepped onto something sharp. A LEGO piece, in the middle of her bare arch. The pain snapped her wide-awake, along with another yell from Jack.
“Help meee!”
“I’m coming,” she said through gritted teeth, withholding curses at the toy. She forged onward into Jack’s room. In his bed, he sat backed up against the headboard. His night-light cast an eerie shadow, aging him by years. He clawed at a wall of air. His eyes bulged with terror.
“It’s a dream, Jack. Do you hear me? It’s only a dream.” She touched his shoulder gently, an approach that had helped the last few times.
“No!” he exploded with a force that jolted her backward. “Let me out! Let me out now!”
“Please. Just listen to my voice.”
His gaze, though vivid with fear, placed him in another dimension. A maze in which he didn’t belong. If she could visualize it, too, maybe she could guide him out.
“Jack, where are you? Tell me what you’re seeing.”
He muttered some words she couldn’t decipher—except for one.
“Himmel? Is that what you said?” He’d uttered something similar before. She thought of a Hummel. But a collectible figurine made no sense.
He started kicking against the wadded covers, a barricade to destroy.
“Jack,” she said, yet remained unheard.
Enough already. She would wake him despite theories to the contrary. A shock of light could break his trance.
She clicked the switch of the nightstand lamp. As the bulb came to life, Jack swung away fiercely and scraped Audra’s cheek. In shielding herself, she caused the lamp to topple. The lightbulb popped and plunged them back into darkness. His screams and flailing soared.
“Stop it,” she ordered. “Jack, stop!”
His elbow boomed against the hollow wall. She managed to grab hold of his wrists, to keep him from hurting himself. Within her grip, he twisted and pulled and yelled, fighting to escape. Several minutes of battling slicked her grip with sweat. His left arm broke free and slammed a corner of the night table. The crack alone communicated the damage, even without the wail of pain that projected from Jack’s mouth. He retracted into a ball and his body shivered. His cries faded to a soft whimper. The dream had released its grasp.
For now.
“You’re going to be okay, Jack.” She stroked his back, the motion no steadier than her breaths. “Mommy’s right here.”
He raised his head and his gaze flitted around the room—to the lamp, his pillow, his comforter, all strewn across the floor. What happened? he asked without words.
Because she had no real answer, she simply held him. Her arms trembled, more from anxiety than exertion.
When he agreed to let her, she picked him up with a know-how for handling scared, wounded creatures. She carried him to the car, a blanket over his body, and drove to the closest ER.
They didn’t return until three in the morning.
Once they settled in, Audra’s dreams, like Jack’s, were so vivid they were hard to discern from reality. She was prepping for surgery, scrubbing her hands and donning latex gloves. A little girl appeared in the corner. Hair covering her face, she wept into her knees. Audra asked what was wrong. The girl choked out, “You said my dog, Max, would go to heaven. And you lied.” Audra glanced around the empty room, her technician nowhere to be seen. The clinic ached with quiet. “But how do you know he’s not there?” Audra gently challenged the child, who then stopped her crying and lifted her head. Her skin shone pale, thin as a sheet of tissue, but her voice turned hard as stone. “Because I’m dead,” she said, “and he’s not here.”
Audra wiped her hairline, dampened from the dream. She rolled over on her bed and discovered Jack asleep—she’d laid him there after the hospital. Daylight filtered in around the closed white blinds, gracing Jack’s face with a peaceful glow, spotlighting the half cast on his arm.
Careful not to wake him, she edged out of the room.
At the kitchen sink, she filled a glass with water. She retrieved her vitamins from the cupboard, and noticed an old container of fish food partially hidden on a shelf. Between Devon’s allergies and her full-time job, a dog or cat had never made sense for their family—ironic, considering her profession. They’d once treated their son to a pair of goldfish. When the pets died, Jack grieved for days.