Benjamin shook his head. “I just had this weird dream,” he reiterated. “And then I woke up on the old railway line.”
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said.
The policewoman nodded, and gave a light half-smile. As she did so, the policeman took a call from his radio. It was not the first time he’d utilised the device; earlier on, he had used it to assure the station that the boy had been found, and that he appeared safe and well. This time, he gave a brief recap of the boy’s account, listened awhile, and when the call was over he informed Benjamin’s mother that a doctor would be here in about five minutes. “It’s nothing to worry about,” he said, as Pete returned with a trayful of steaming mugs. “Routine procedure, when ca - when things like this happen. Needs to be checked for exposure, you see. Minor injuries, stuff like that.”
“Okay,” croaked Benjamin’s mother. Her voice was hoarse and raw, but her smile had the healthiness of joy about it, and her eyes glistened in little diamante dots. She kissed her son’s head and patted him upon the chest, close to his left shoulder. “I’m so glad you’re back,” she said. “So glad.”
***
The doctor was an old-fashioned looking old man who had a mane of white hair that curled upwards at the back of his neck. His examination of Benjamin was brief: he shone a small torch into the boy’s mouth and told him to say ‘ahh’, pressed lightly under his eyes, asked him a few simple sums, placed a thermometer under his tongue, and when he was finished his diagnosis proved equally as concise. “He’s fine,” he said, taking a sip of the water that he’d requested in lieu of tea. “A slight temperature, but in all other respects absolutely fine.”
Benjamin’s mother, though clearly relieved by the news, was not entirely satisfied with it. “But what about the sleepwalking?” she asked, biting at her lower lip. “He’s never done anything like that before. And why would he be out there all day? It just doesn’t seem -” she turned to her son and frowned a little “- it just doesn’t seem like him.”
“It’s unusual, yes,” said the doctor, stroking one side of his silvery head, then the other. “But somnambulism - sleepwalking - is still something of a mystery, even to the medical profession. Most people never sleepwalk; others do so regularly. A few sleepwalk just once, or a couple of times, in their lives. Given what I know of his history, I’d suspect that your son is unlikely to make a habit of it. As for the oversleeping -” he paused a moment, as if to collect his thoughts “ - well, I have a theory about that: his dream, from what you told me about it, was probably very lucid, very strange. Like a fever dream, in fact. And, as I said, he has a slight temperature. So to my mind, it seems as if this episode - this sleepwalking - was brought on by the onset of an illness. That he fell asleep for the rest of the day is only to be expected, if he spent most of the night outside. Remember that when sleepwalking, the patient is never really fully asleep; the resultant tiredness, as well as the fatigue associated with his fever, would be enough, I think, to send him to sleep soon afterwards.”
“Even outside?” said Benjamin’s mother.
“It’s possible,” replied the doctor. “People don't have to be in bed or indoors for it to happen.” He gestured briefly to the two police officers. “We’ve dealt with people who have nodded off at bus stops, in supermarkets, at the wheel of a car. It’s surprising what turns up. And not all of them were drunk, either; nor did any suffer from narcolepsy - sleeping-sickness. Some admitted to feeling tired beforehand, others did not; some confessed to being unwell, while the rest said that they had felt fine. Considering that we have never had to deal with these people again, I would presume that each incident was isolated, and - as with your son - limited in its cause for concern. The important thing is that he does not appear to show any signs of hypothermia, nor any of the effects of exposure. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that for what he’s been through, he actually seems to be in surprisingly good health.”
Benjamin’s mother smiled. “So there’s nothing to worry about.”
“I’d say not,” said the doctor, as he began to pack his case. “Though I would recommend that you make an appointment for him to see his usual GP, just so he can get a fuller examination. In the meantime, keep him off school for a while and let him rest. It’s probable that he’ll be coming down with a flu-like illness as well, so be ready for that. I don’t expect him to go walkabout again, but be prepared for some disturbed nights. If there is anything that alarms you in the coming days, don't hesitate to call me -” he presented Benjamin’s mother with a small card “- your GP, the hospital, anyone. But try not to fret needlessly over things, either. He’s probably going to be out of sorts for a little while, which is to be expected, but I’m sure you know your son, and I’m sure you’ll know whether something is seriously amiss or not. I’d also recommend that both you and your partner -” he nodded towards Pete “- take some time off work too. The stress associated with this incident is likely to leave you feeling quite ill for a day or two. I can get you a note, if necessary; or you can get one from your GP. Who is your regular doctor, by the way?”
“Oh. Doctor Mahmoud,” said Benjamin’s mother.
“Ah yes. Allinson Road surgery?”
“Yes.”
The doctor took a pen and notebook from inside his jacket and jotted down some details. “Is he the boy’s GP as well?”
“Yes. He’s our family doctor. We all go to him.”
“Good.” The doctor finished jotting, and returned the items to his jacket. “I’ll let him know about it. As for myself -” he picked up his case “- well, I think that’s everything. As I said, The boy - Benjamin - is very probably going to be fine, barring the flu. And even that may not happen. As I said, let him rest and see what develops. I’m sure it’ll be nothing extreme.”
***
When all were gone, and his mother had ceased making jubilant phone calls to friends and family, Benjamin was given a hearty tea of pie and chips, and sent off for an early night. He didn’t protest; he was exhausted, and the lure of clean pyjamas and fresh, fragrant bed-linen was irresistible. In the other room, Maddie gurgled cheerfully as Pete told her a story; it was a nice sound. Beside him, his mother sat on the recliner that she and Pete had hauled up from downstairs. She had made it clear that she was going to sit by him tonight, and Benjamin had neither the will nor reason to refuse her.
In the soft light of the bedside lamp that she had brought in from her room, she stroked his hair. “You can look forward to this tomorrow,” she said. “And the night after. And the night after that as well. I won’t be able to sleep otherwise.”
“S’alright,” said Benjamin, drawing the quilt tighter to himself. It didn’t matter that the bedding held no dream-resonances, no sense of something other than what it was. He was more than happy with the simple warmth it provided, a cocoon of blissful comfort.
“You’re very hot,” his mother said, resting her cool palm upon his forehead. “How do you feel?”
“Not bad. Very tired.” He yawned. “I think I could sleep forever.”
His mother smiled wistfully at him, then yawned too. “You don’t mind me being here, do you?”
“Nope.”
She sank back into the recliner, and gazed up at the ceiling. “I still can’t believe it,” she said. “Not really.” She turned her face back to him. “Is that really what happened?”
“Yeah,” said Benjamin. One of his eyes was sore and watery, and he rubbed at it.
“You know you can always tell me if - if something’s wrong. You know that, don't you.”
“Yeah,” he repeated.
“You can tell me anything.”
“I know.” He yawned again, pulling the covers up and over his lower face. His eyes flickered to a close.
It was quiet for a moment, and then Benjamin’s mother whispered “Love you, Benjy-boy.” After that, she let him sleep.
On the bedside table, next to the lamp, was the broken gourd. Be
njamin had left it there when getting changed. Though he had no reason to hide the thing - “Just something I found,” he could say, if anyone questioned him about it - he had every reason to expect his mother to take notice of it, as she tended to spot anything new in his room without fail. Yet she had said nothing; it seemed, in fact, as if she had not even seen it. He wondered, as he drifted off, if it was invisible to her, and recalled what Lilac had said about adults: that they could not easily see the atulphi. Perhaps it went for their devices, too; their artefacts. Drifting further, her envisioned his mother trying to pick the item up, and failing, her hand always passing through it as if it were made of some sort of ghostly material. He then pictured himself attempting to pick it up, and finding it equally as phantasmal. His last thought, before sleep took hold of him completely, was that the broken part of the gourd was sharp, yet it had not cut him. All a dream, then, came a voice, similar to that of Lilac’s. And he replied, in his mind, that it was, and no less real for it.
***
His sleep, deep though it was, did not go without interruption. He awoke a couple of times in the night, often from dreams which he forgot as soon as he was aware that he was awake. The only dream he could vaguely remember concerned Vespinner, though this time the creature was not many, but one, and it was a giant. It was hovering over the prone form of Strifer, and it said, giggling, something along the lines of ‘beware the endless stripe, it shall not stop you from seeing.’ Yet that was all he could recollect of it. Beside him, his mother slept, breathing deeply and with a slight whistle. He fell back asleep soon after.
He awoke another time (if it was before the nightmare about Vespinner or afterwards, he couldn’t tell) to hear his mother talking to Pete in hushed tones. “He didn’t explain anything,” he heard her say, in a slightly irritable tone. “He only explained it away. It’s not the same thing.” Pete murmured something about the doctor, at which she replied, “you talk to him. You talk to him. He might be more open with you.” Pete answered her by saying that he’d try, then mumbled something else. “Goodnight,” she said, as Pete went away.
Later on, he awakened again, though it was not for long. It was dark, and mostly quiet, save for the sound of his mother’s breathing, and the intermittent snuffling noises that seemed to be coming from the vicinity of Maddie’s room. For one second he jolted wide awake, reminded of the last time he’d heard strange sounds next door. This, however, was not the swishing, airy sound of the silf. It was more like the noise of something scratching furtively on the carpet. He lifted his head from the pillow and checked the glowing digits of his clock; much to his surprise, it was not two forty-eight - the time at which he’d been awoken the previous night - but just gone four o’clock in the morning. Listening hard, he tried to make out what could be causing the sound; but by then the sound had stopped, and a little while later he was again falling asleep, convinced that the noise was merely a remnant of yet another half-forgotten dream.
24
The next morning, he awoke refreshed, sprightly, ready for the day; if he was due for a dose of flu, it certainly didn’t seem like it. His mother had gone, but he could hear her voice in the kitchen downstairs. She sounded bright, with nothing of the fraught edginess of yesterday, her tone a pleasing harmony against the percussion of clinking cutlery and clunking crockery. He could hear Maddie, too, chattering away; and Pete, mumbling in response. He heard laughter. The first expression on his face that morning was a smile.
Before he went to get dressed in the clothes his mother had laid out for him (jeans, tee-shirt, the kind of apparel that told him today was not a school day) he checked the gourd. It was still there, in its place on the bedside table. Tentatively, he reached out to touch it. His smile didn’t falter, and yet neither did it broaden. So it was all real, he said to himself, as the fantasia of fireworks again played in his mind. Over this, he thought of Lilac, her gleaming eyes, her splay of hair; and the towers of Niamago too, teeming and tall. He thought of Strifer, and his end. He thought of Vespinner, and was appalled.
He drew his hand away from the object and stared at his palm. “I’m a dreamshader,” he whispered. “I mustn’t forget it.” Then he remembered what Vespinner had said to him, how some turn of its voice had formed the sound of his surname.
Crosskeys.
Cross-keys.
He mouthed the shape of the word, and pondered as to whether or not he ought to ask his mother what had happened to his father. Something inside him urged that he shouldn’t; that now was too soon, that it should wait until all the distress associated with his disappearance was over. His mother, despite her apparent chirpiness, was still probably too raw from the events of the day before, too broken to face questions about a subject that she had never really been keen to talk about even at the best of times. So no, he decided; not now. Another time, perhaps. But not now.
Besides, there was something else he had to find out today, something which was likely to be just as important. There was a test to perform, and - as if cued to do so - the voice of Maddie sailed up the stairs: “Where’s Ben’min?” he heard her ask. “Is he still away?”
***
His mother served him up a breakfast of toast and bacon, which he ate eagerly, despite her insistence that he didn’t have to eat it if he didn’t feel up to it. He told her (again) that he felt fine. She asked him if he was telling the truth. He said that he was. Somehow, the evidence of his well-being did not seem to appeal to her as much as he thought it should.
But she was sunnier today, without a doubt. He’d heard her humming tunefully in the kitchen as she prepared the food; heard her talk back to the radio when someone (usually a politician) came on and said something she didn’t agree with. Pete was better too, even though it was clear that he’d heeded the doctor’s advice and taken a day off work. He munched his toast in his usual manner, brushing crumbs away from his beard and frowning as he did so, as if inconvenienced by his facial apparel (not that he’d ever shown even the slightest inclination to shave it off: when Benjamin’s mother remarked, a few months ago, that the beard made his face look like a goat’s bottom, Pete had merely shrugged, replying that it said more about her that she was happy to kiss it!) Maddie was sitting cross-legged on the floor, slurping from a bowl of instant porridge. Everything was as near as normal as could be, save for the dark circles under the eyes of the adults, and the occasional glances they gave each other whenever some passing uncertainty tainted their smiles.
Prior to breakfast, Benjamin’s mother had taken his temperature. “Still high,” she’d said, flicking the thermometer so that she could be sure the reading was correct. “But lower than yesterday.” After breakfast, she took his temperature again, and found it to be the same. “You definitely feel alright,” she said, raising the inflection at the end and making a question out of it. Benjamin replied that yes, he felt okay. His mother tapped her lips with her fingers and glowered at the thermometer for a moment. “I’ll call the doctor anyway,” she said, taking the thermometer into the kitchen and running it under the tap. A little while later and she was on the phone, making an appointment to see Dr. Mahmoud for that very afternoon.
As for the rest of the morning, it progressed uneventfully. Aunt Karen popped round to see if everyone was alright, and there were phone calls from friends and family, as well as a courtesy call from the police. Other than that, there was nothing to engage Benjamin’s attention except either the glib inanities of daytime television, or the world beyond his bedroom window, which he sometimes watched with the gourd in his hands and a faraway look in his eyes. It was difficult to actually do anything - draw, read, mess around with the computer - because he didn’t really want to do anything, except take the gourd to Maddie and test her with it. Until that moment came, the morning was almost Sunday-ish in its lack of lustre, more a day off from life than a day off from school.
Maddie was in the garden, gingerly patting a mud pie into an old hubcap, when the chance to be alone with her finall
y arrived. As he approached, he carried the gourd in plain sight, in the hope that it might catch his sister’s attention without him having to cajole her into noticing it. After all, if his reckoning was correct, then his sister should be able to see it without any effort whatsoever.
“Hiya,” said Maddie, as Benjamin went down on his haunches beside her. He tossed the gourd lightly from hand to hand, as if it were of no more importance than a cricket ball. “Whassat?” she asked, when the object finally caught her eye.
“What, this?” said Benjamin, holding the gourd up and in front of his grin. “Well,” he paused, “what do you think it is?”
Maddie reached over for it.
“Uh-huh,” said Benjamin, pulling the item away from her. “You have to tell me what you see first.”
Maddie gave an exaggerated shrug and folded her arms. “Silly boy, silly games.” She huffed, looked up, and rolled her eyes. “It’s just a ball,” she said. “And it’s broken.” She held out a muddy hand. “Can I have a look now?”
Benjamin hesitated, but was curious to see if the gourd had the same effect on her as it did him. “Be careful,” he said, placing his prize on her mucky palm. “I think it’s glass. Sharp, remember.”
“I know, I know,” said Maddie, cupping the object in both her hands and drawing it carefully towards her chest like some sort of small pet. “Whassit do?” she asked, gazing down on it.
“I dunno,” said Benjamin. “It’s just something I found.”
“It’s speckly,” said Maddie.
Benjamin nodded. “What do you think about it?”
“It’s nice,” she said, in the same haughty sing-song tone as used by his mother when she wasn’t really impressed by something. She gave the gourd back to her brother without a second glance and returned to her mud pie.