Just Dreaming

  11:30 p.m.: Someone kicks over the umbrella stand in the cloakroom, and now the whole hall smells like Maisie’s lemonade. Jasper decides to end the party. It was terrific all the same, Jasper. We’re so glad to have you back!

  And we’ll see each other again. Just carry on in the same way. But do go carefully with the local drinking water.

  With love from your totally exhausted friend

  Secrecy

  Tittletattleblog.com

  * * *

  13

  THE WEDDING PLANNER was called Pascal de Gobineau, and he was an extremely well-groomed, very good-looking man with dark hair. The floppy bit combed to the side fell over his forehead so often as he talked that, after a while, I felt sure his elegant gesture as he pushed it away from his face was simply part of his general styling, like his French accent and his charming smile.

  That smile was in complete contrast to the sourly puckered lips with which the Boker had greeted me when I turned up in the dining room, at ten on the dot. Which hadn’t been so easy, because until five to ten Florence had been mercilessly hogging the bathroom, so when she finally emerged, perfumed, with her hair done, and her makeup on, I had exactly five minutes to shower, get dressed, comb my hair, and run downstairs. I hadn’t managed to apply any makeup, or I could have been in The Guinness Book of Records.

  All the others were already sitting at the table, so I had to make do with the last available chair—right opposite the Boker, and next to Florence, who in spite of her perfect styling and the gigantic mug of coffee in front of her, looked tired and wore an expression that would have suited someone having a colonoscopy.

  I could think of better ways to spend my Sunday morning than at the dreary discussion of the wedding as decreed by the Boker. “Then no one can claim later that they never had a chance to put forward their own ideas,” she had said, insisting on the presence of all members of the family, including Charles, who looked even balder than usual to me today, compared to the wedding planner with his floppy hair. He didn’t look wide awake either.

  Mom and Ernest had tried to sell us the whole thing as a relaxed family breakfast when we would just happen to discuss the wedding casually, but Ernest’s choice of vocabulary had already shown that there would be nothing relaxed or casual about it. When he was on edge, he always lapsed into a curiously stiff kind of legal language full of difficult phrases—and he was on edge nearly all the time when the Boker was around. “Our intention is solely to configure a few ideas,” he had said. “And maybe on the same occasion we shall succeed in consolidating aversions that one or another of us may harbor for important occasions in general, or weddings in particular.”

  If that didn’t mean that he was scared out of his wits, then I didn’t know how else to interpret it.

  “The only aversion that we harbor is to pink organza dresses,” Mia assured him. (When she was five, she had been forced to carry the bride’s train at a wedding, and ever since then she had suffered from a pink organza phobia. So had the bride.)

  We hadn’t told Ernest that we also harbored an aversion to bridegrooms’ mothers who assumed, without asking, that they could order us around and commandeer our time. The last thing we wanted was to spoil his and Mom’s fun in looking forward to their wedding, although we were a bit scared by the Boker, the size of the celebration as she envisaged it, and the expense of it all. And we were sure it also scared Mom, but today she didn’t once mention her preference for small, informal garden parties. On the contrary, she immediately agreed with Pascal that there was no better place for a wedding party than a classic English country house hotel. That made Pascal very happy, because just by chance one of the finest such country house hotels, usually booked for years in advance, happened to be available on the planned wedding date of the last weekend in June. Which was as much of a miracle as the fact that Pascal himself had been available at such short notice, as the Boker never tired of emphasizing. Because Pascal, too, was booked for years in advance, and many famous couples had him to thank for unforgettable festivities. The couple who had changed their minds at short notice, thus leaving the booking open for Ernest and Mom, were also famous, but unfortunately Pascal wouldn’t tell us who they were.

  “All I say is that it is better for many people if they notice that they are not right for each other before the wedding” was the only comment he would make before turning to his “famous, or infamous, de Gobineau wedding checklist.” I don’t know whether that checklist really was famous, or even infamous, but if so, it was probably for its enormous length. In spite of his charming smile and his accent, Pascal’s voice droned monotonously on, and he had obviously decided to tell us about absolutely everything that was in the folder on the table in front of him, from the two thousand ways of folding linen serviettes worldwide, to the effect of floral decorations featuring globe-headed alliums in square glass vases, to the best height for pedestal tables. With the best will in the world, it wasn’t possible to show any genuine interest in the difference of quality between brands of lined envelopes, so I did what I do in boring classes: I allowed an interested expression to come over my face, and let my thoughts wander. That way you couldn’t exactly catch up on the sleep you’d missed, but you reached a state of deep relaxation, which was better than nothing. And it didn’t annoy anyone.

  Now and then a few words got through to me, like embossed printing, floribunda roses, seating plan, and almond mousse filling, but I could easily fit those into my vague thoughts while dozing.

  For instance, there must have been almond mousse filling instead of brains in my head last night, after Henry had left me alone in Mrs. Honeycutt’s dream, and instead of waking up myself, I had decided to venture out into the corridor again. Because however frightened I’d been of the darkness that swallowed everything before, there was something now that frightened me even more: our spring vacation.

  Usually Mia and I always went to stay with our father on school vacations, but this time we were staying at home for once, because Papa was away on business so often and until he finally moved from Zürich to Stuttgart he was living in hotels. (Although he was going to come to London for a few days in May, allegedly to see us, but no doubt also to get a look at the man Mom was going to marry.)

  The corridor had been peaceful; there was nothing to hear but my own footsteps—so whoever had let the darkness loose might perhaps be awake by now. Or else there was no such person, and it was only my own fears and gloomy thoughts that had come to life. My thoughts were no longer gloomy, just very complicated, but they were leading me deliberately into a certain corridor. I let my eyes wander over the doors, and there it was, just as I’d expected: Matt’s red door.

  It must be early morning, I had worked out. My sleep would probably be interrupted any moment now, because I had a very reliable alarm clock known as Little Sister. Mia never slept in for long on weekends, and ever since I could remember, she had come scrambling into bed with me on Sunday mornings. Staring at Matt’s door, I persuaded myself that the time for me to wake would come very soon.

  Of course I had known only too clearly that my idea wasn’t a good one—but then again, I couldn’t think up anything better. Spring vacation began in less than three weeks’ time, and Matt … well, Matt would have to be my flight simulator.

  I had glanced briefly down the corridor. Still no one in sight, no sense of anyone about. I was alone and could still turn back. But I didn’t. I had taken a deep breath, turned the door handle to the right, and opened Matt’s door.…

  “Love isn’t what we expect to get, but what we are prepared to give,” said Pascal all of a sudden. Hopefully, I raised my head. Had I missed anything important? Had he by any chance finished?

  No, it didn’t look like it. The file was still more than half full of papers.

  I cast a searching look around the table. The Boker, Mom, and Lottie seemed to be the only ones following Pascal’s remarks with genuine interest. Everyone else appeared to be paying as little at
tention as I was. Florence was secretly fiddling with her iPhone under the table, Ernest was holding Mom’s hand and had a vague smile on his face, but his eyes were looking into space. Mia was building castles of scones on her plate, and Grayson was making up for the sheer boredom of it all by eating. He had already consumed vast quantities of scrambled egg on toast and about half of Lottie’s blueberry tart. When I smiled at him, he didn’t smile back but just glanced up at the ceiling.

  Charles had half closed his eyes, and his chin was sinking lower and lower, but whenever his head was nearly touching his plate, he looked at Lottie and sat up straight again.

  And Lottie looked particularly pretty today in her close-fitting ivy-green cardigan. It really suited her brown hair, which she had tied together loosely at the back of her neck. Maybe I was only imagining things, but it seemed to me that Pascal smiled at her especially often.

  “I’ve been working for years with the same gardener on the little baskets of blooms for the flower children to scatter. She provides organically grown and freshly picked flower heads on the wedding morning, in perfectly matched shades of color.” There was something hypnotic about his voice. Maybe that was why no one interrupted him, for instance to ask what all this was going to cost. Organically grown flower heads—I ask you! Good old rice did the same job. And who was going to scatter the flowers, anyway? But I didn’t intend to ask a single question. That would just drag it all out unnecessarily.

  I felt as if I’d been sitting at that table for days, but it was only eleven in the morning.

  Was Persephone awake yet? And had Secrecy already exposed what she’d done at the party in her blog? I bet she had. I was going to call Persephone as soon as I was through with this wedding stuff, hoping she could manage without me that long. By now she’d certainly be wishing she could turn the clock back and cancel last night.

  And speaking of canceling things: my mind wandered back to Matt’s red dream door. Maybe I’d have withdrawn in time, if it hadn’t been so easy to get in. Most people unconsciously protect their doors with an obstacle of some kind, but with a few, you can simply walk in during their dreams. Matt was one of those.

  When I crossed the doorstep, I found myself in the foyer of an obviously enormous modern building with a huge amount of glass and gigantic steel constructions. To right and left, people were streaming past me toward broad escalators, and they all looked very busy. I was greatly relieved to be in a comparatively normal dream; you never knew what people would be dreaming, and especially in the small hours of the morning, the dreams often turned rather crazy, at least mine did. It took me a few seconds to locate Matt himself. That was because, like most of the other people here, he was wearing a dark-blue suit, so he didn’t stand out from the crowd. He was standing in front of the electronic security gates leading to the elevators, talking to a woman sitting behind the reception desk. They were flirting, as I could see at once from the way Matt was leaning against the desk and smiling. The woman tossed her hair back provocatively, and when I came closer, I saw that the jacket of her business suit was unbuttoned rather a long way down, and she was leaning well forward on purpose for Matt to look inside her neckline. Which he was doing very thoroughly.

  Okay, so it was that sort of dream. At least that meant the general atmosphere was right for what I had in mind. Much better than if Matt had been having a nightmare in which he was pursued through an empty multistory parking lot by a serial killer or chased through the jungle by cannibals. Or than if he’d been dreaming he was still a little boy, going for a walk in the park with his granny. No, this was perfect.

  Now I only had to get rid of the woman at the reception desk. And of my own inhibitions too.

  That bit was better than I’d hoped. I simply imagined that I was a secret agent who had been told to seduce Matt. It was like an improvised theatrical show but much better, because in the morning none of the other actors would know anything about it.

  Secret Agent Silver generated herself an outfit as much like what the woman behind the desk was wearing as possible, a figure-fitting, dark-blue skirt suit and blue pumps, with heels so high that in real life, I could never have taken more than a couple of steps in them without stumbling. I let my hair flow over my shoulders, like hers, and I even gave myself lipstick the same color, somewhere between pink and dark red. Persephone would certainly have known its name at once. Then I put on my glasses (because so far Matt had only ever seen me in glasses, and might not recognize me without them), and I stalked toward the reception desk like a model on the catwalk, holding a stack of folders out in front of me with both arms. I dropped the folders right beside Matt and let out a little cry of alarm when one of them landed on his foot.

  “Oh, excuse me, I’m so sorry!” I said breathlessly, and as Matt bent down to help me pick the folders up (how nice that he had such good manners even in a dream), I quickly made the woman at the desk twenty years older and gave her yellowish teeth and a wart under her left eye, but the wart looked so disgusting that I removed it again.

  “Thank you so much,” I murmured, beaming at Matt through my glasses. “That’s really so kind of you.”

  “You’re welcome,” said Matt. Then he did a double take. “Liv? Is that you?”

  “Yes.” I blinked at him as if surprised. “Oh God. Hi, Matt. I didn’t recognize you in that suit. What are you doing here?”

  Matt straightened up and put the folders on the desk. After a glance of annoyance on seeing that the object of his flirtatious attentions had aged so suddenly, he turned back to me and said, “I work here. My office is on the thirty-second floor.”

  Aha. So in the dream corridors he obviously wasn’t an unsuccessful law student who had moved back in with his parents.

  “Mr. Davenport will soon be a partner in Strong and Jameson,” the woman behind the desk explained. “The youngest partner in the history of this legal practice.”

  Ho-ho-ho. In his dreams—literally.

  “Oh wow!” I tried to inject genuine admiration into my voice. “The view from up there must be staggering—I’m working as an intern in the admin department,” I added, hoping to heaven that there was indeed such a department in this outfit, “and I’ve never been higher up than the twelfth floor.”

  “Really?” Matt gave me a slightly pitying smile. “You can go right to the top in the elevator anytime. That’s what the tourists do.”

  Damn it. “Well, er, yes. I will as soon as I get time.” I gave Matt a trusting smile. “This is only my third day here. I’m afraid my boss, Mr.… er, Smith, is terribly strict.”

  “Oh dear,” said Matt. The sympathy dodge seemed to be working, so I decided to lay it on even thicker.

  “I think he’s upset because I don’t like it when he calls me ‘sweet little thing.’” I pushed the hair back from my face. “Although I’m taller than he is. I mean, the man is about two hundred years older than me, and he has bad breath too.”

  “That’s disgusting.” Matt indignantly shook his head. “In fact, it obviously comes under the heading of sexual harassment. Even aside from the fact that you’re still underage. A child!”

  Damn it again. Child wasn’t what I wanted. I must correct him about that. “I’m eighteen,” I said untruthfully. If Matt had promoted himself from law student to partner in a legal practice, I could easily add a year to my age; his dream logic wouldn’t have any difficulty in coping with that. “But I don’t want to be groped by a slimy character like that.… It’s not how I imagine my first time.” I held my breath for a moment, afraid I might have been going too fast. On the other hand, we were in a dream, and every second counted. Seeing that Matt didn’t look particularly shocked but interested instead, I quickly went on. “Yes, I know. I realize it’s not right myself—but it’s not easy to find someone who…” Here I fell silent. Not on purpose, but because at this point Secret Agent Silver’s talent for improvisation simply let her down. Like in real life.

  “Oh, I can’t imagine that.” Matt look
ed me up and down. “I mean, you’re a very pretty girl.”

  Very pretty. In boy language, didn’t that mean exactly the opposite of stunningly beautiful? I obviously wasn’t his type. All the same, I gave him a warm smile. “Thank you. But the men I meet don’t like … er … girls without any experience. Well, apart from Mr. Smith. But on principle he isn’t choosy.”

  Matt said nothing.

  Oh God. It wasn’t working. Maybe I ought to change the scenario a bit. Stage an earthquake. Or an attack by aliens. That always brought people closer to each other in movies.

  Or maybe I should simply give up.

  I looked around surreptitiously for Matt’s dream door. It was standing in the foyer, looking lost and totally out of place, but no one else seemed to notice it.

  “I … I must go,” I murmured. Secret Agent Silver had failed. “To give Mr. Smith my notice. I can’t stand it here another day. Good to see you.”

  The foyer blurred before my eyes, and then the sun was dazzling me instead. A city lay spread out far below me, and at first I thought I was flying. Then I realized that I was looking down at London from the window of a very tall skyscraper. Ravines of buildings, rooftops, towers, the dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral, the glittering ribbon of the Thames with its bridges. Someone put a hand on my shoulder from behind.

  “Impressive, isn’t it?” said Matt’s voice, close to my ear, and the back of his hand was caressing my throat.

  “Yes.” I swallowed. It really was impressive to see how quickly Matt had changed his dream backdrop and how nimbly his subconscious mind had simply skipped any unnecessary preliminaries. I was half-relieved to find that I was obviously his type after all. But only half. When he put both hands around my waist, turned me to face him, and held me close, I felt distinctly queasy.