Kelly looked up, waiting until Tovah’d nodded before continuing.
“Anyway, I was swimming against the waves, letting them bounce me up and down. And then all at once there was this…” Kelly shuddered, the movement pronounced and sudden. She grimaced, as if something tasted bad.
Tovah waited.
“It’s so silly!” Kelly cried, though her face showed she felt anything but silly.
“Tell me,” Tovah said softly.
They had the locker room to themselves. With nobody else to overhear them, Kelly seemed to draw courage. She swiped at her face with her towel, though the sweat had already dried.
“It was a ball. A red-and-white ball.”
Tovah reached for Kelly’s hand on instinct, though she wasn’t normally touchy-feely. “What happened, then?”
Kelly squeezed Tovah’s fingers and laughed self-consciously. “Nothing.”
“That was it?”
“Just the ball. It floated in the water. Up and down, up and down.” Kelly shuddered again, but more like she was throwing off the residue of her fear than giving in to it again. “Like I told you. Stupid.”
“And…nothing else?”
The red-and-white striped ball. The boy. The woman and the man with the dog’s head. Tovah shivered.
Kelly looked curious. “No. Just that. Except that when I saw it, I felt like I was drowning. I woke up right away. Scared Frank half to death, poor guy. He was just coming in, and I sat straight up in bed screaming bloody murder. I even…well, I hit him, Tovah. Really hard. Gave him a nosebleed and everything. I didn’t mean to, you know? But that dream…it took me a few minutes to get out of it. I thought he was something bad. My Frank, a bad guy! Can you believe it?”
Kelly’s laugh teased one from Tovah, too. Relieved that her friend seemed better, she got up again to gather her shower equipment. She pulled the folded piece of heavy vinyl lined with Velcro around the top and shook it out until it fell straight. At home she’d have taken off her prosthetic, but this would protect it from the water long enough for her to rinse off. It was easier and attracted less attention than actually removing her leg would have.
“Well,” Tovah said firmly, “it was just a dream.”
Kelly nodded, her laugh this time fake. “Oh, I know. But it felt…”
Tovah waited, but Kelly didn’t continue. “What?”
Kelly shook her head and shrugged. “When I woke up, I felt like it was all still happening. Only nothing happened, right? But it was all happening, it was all real. I saw that ball and the world was going to just…fall apart. Lame, I know, right? Poor Frank. He’s lucky I didn’t give him a shiner.”
“Super lame,” Tovah said, mocking fondly, even though she didn’t mean it.
She knew what Kelly had felt, about the world falling apart. This was bad. Very bad. And there was nothing she could do about it right now…or maybe ever.
“So…what happened last week?” Kelly’s bright smile and knowing wink left no question as to what she meant. She seemed to have recovered from sharing the nightmare. “After me and Pete left?”
Tovah hadn’t even been thinking about that. “Oh. Nothing.”
“Do you mean nothing as in you’re not going to tell me because I’m nosy, nothing? Or…really nothing?”
“Really nothing.” Tovah followed Kelly to the large open shower. In moments steam wreathed them.
“But he was so into you!”
“Yeah, apparently not.”
“But…Pete said John thought you were really funny and hot!”
“Apparently only as long as he thought I was putting out.” She scrubbed her face under the water.
“Men,” Kelly huffed. “Sex-crazed weasels. What a jerk!”
“It’s okay.”
“You are way less upset than you should be, that’s all. Might it have something to do with a certain doctor?”
“Martin?”
“Ooh,” Kelly said, rinsing quickly and turning off the water. “First name basis. Niiiiiice.”
Tovah turned off her water, too, and wrapped her towel around her. “Stop it.”
“Stop what?” Kelly made a face of mock innocence. “One day he’s Dr. Feelgood—”
“Goodfellow!” Tovah laughed. “His last name’s Goodfellow.”
“Yes, but now he’s Maaaaartin.” Kelly drew the name out, making it sound lecherous. “And you have a date with him.”
She paused, staring as Tovah made her way back to the locker and began drying herself. “Oh, wait…you had a date with him? Didn’t you! Spill it!”
“No!” Tovah protested. “It wasn’t a date. We just had lunch together, that’s all. I was visiting Henry and he was there, and…”
“He asked you to lunch?”
“Yes.” Tovah grabbed her clothes.
“He paid?”
He had, actually, but Tovah felt funny admitting it. “He’s a gentleman.”
“Date,” said Kelly in triumph. She whistled under her breath and shook her hips in an impromptu bump and grind. “And you’re seeing him again when?”
“Friday afternoon. He’s looking at the house then. And it’s just coffee,” Tovah said, before Kelly could interject. “He likes coffee.”
Kelly stared a bit, then concentrated on pulling on her clothes. “He was a cheater, wasn’t he?”
“Who? Martin?” Tovah paused in buttoning her shirt. It took her a second to get it. “Oh. Kevin. Yes, he was.”
“Bastard.” One of Kelly’s best qualities was her unquestioning loyalty.
“There was a lot going on.” Tovah had made a habit of excusing Kevin, though she hated it.
Kelly’s look told her there could be no excuse in her mind. “Does that matter?”
“No. I guess it doesn’t.”
Kelly looked at Tovah’s left leg. “He left you because of that?”
“Does anyone ever leave because of just one thing?”
Kelly paused, then shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess not.”
“Anyway, technically I asked him to move out.” Tovah sighed. “It was a bad time for me. I was in the hospital for so long with my injuries and he couldn’t deal with it. And then…things just went sour. I went a little crazy.”
“Who wouldn’t?” Kelly said firmly.
“I mean I really did.” Tovah took a slow, deep breath. “I’m talking meds crazy. I was in the Sisters of Mercy Hospital for about six months.”
Kelly, bless her, didn’t seem fazed. “Did it help you?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’s what matters. And you’re free of your cheating ex-bastard.”
“If only.” She outlined the sordid tale of settlements and payments.
“God,” said Kelly. “No wonder you don’t want to date.”
Tovah laughed loudly, grateful for a friend who understood and didn’t push her all the time. “Every time I think I might want to, I realize just how much of a pain in the ass it is.”
Kelly nodded, then reached to squeeze Tovah’s shoulder. “Have you been with anyone since Kevin?”
It felt like a lie to answer no, but that’s what she said.
“Because you’re nervous.”
Tovah didn’t have to pretend otherwise. “Of course. It’s bad enough getting naked for the first time with someone and worrying about belly blubber and thunder thighs…but…”
“Anyone who cares about you won’t care. You know that.”
“Yeah,” Tovah said with a shrug. “That’s the problem, isn’t it? Finding that person?”
Kelly gave Tovah’s shoulder another squeeze. “You will.”
Tovah smiled, wishing she could tell her friend the truth, that she had found someone like that.
He just wasn’t real.
Chapter Fifteen
Gray skies, a heavy blanket and the soporific drone of a classic drama on the television all argued against wakefulness. Tovah, who’d been rubbing her stump with oil and doing all the adjustments to her pr
osthetic to make sure it stayed in working order, put aside the small bundle of tools and the bottle of lotion with a sigh. Her head fell back onto the couch.
“Just a little nap, Max.”
The dog didn’t bother lifting his head from his own sleep to comment on hers. Tovah sighed again, content in the warmth of the blanket and softness of the cushions. The phantom pains that had plagued her off and on all week trickled away. She closed her eyes.
She wandered for a while, hesitant to settle into one place that might be changed out from under her. The Ephemeros had betrayed her, badly, and it was hard to trust its promises again. She passed scenes half-finished, their occupants caught up in their own dramas that had nothing to do with her. Their wills tugged at her, some of them more urgently than others. Some needed guides. She ignored them all. She wasn’t much in the mood for interaction.
She did make a net of her will and cast it out, hoping to catch Spider, but once again he eluded her. If he didn’t want to be found, he wouldn’t.
The waking world came close but didn’t touch her. She knew where she was, heard the blah-blah of the television and saw light pressing her eyelids. She wasn’t down deep, but it was enough.
She sensed him before she saw him. A trickle of familiar will, a thread of desire she recognized. She stopped wandering and opened herself to the ebb and flow of the Ephemeros around her. Waiting.
It was impossible to know how long it took him to arrive, but when the gray veils parted, shifting and firming into a set scene, Tovah had been asleep long enough for the movie to end and another begin. They were in a park, now, with a nice wood-and-iron bench and a fountain. A stream, too. Ben’s familiar touch. He liked the sound of running water.
He was fishing again. He stopped when he saw her, like he was surprised. It stung, a little, the way he so clearly wanted to avoid her. She saw it in the hesitation of his step and his wary gaze.
“Hi, Ben.”
He nodded and looked toward the fountain. “That’s very nice.”
Until he said so, she hadn’t noticed, but as soon as she did she understood that she’d shaped it. Not him. “Thanks.”
He shoved his hands deep into his pockets. “How’ve you been?”
“Fine. You?” Tovah sat on the bench. Its curved metal was cold and hard and bit into the backs of her thighs, a discomfort she allowed for a moment before shaping it away.
“Fine.”
Ben cleared his throat. “So…what’ve you been up to?”
Tovah’s mouth twisted on her answer. “According to you and Spider, nothing important.”
It was a mean thing to say, and she got no satisfaction from the slightly guilty look he shot her. His answer, though, surprised her. “Yeah. I can be a little bossy.”
She huffed a little, not willing to concede even though it wasn’t gracious of her. “A little?”
A small smile tugged the corner of his mouth. “I’m not as bad as Spider. C’mon. He’s frustrated me, too.”
She’d seen the way Ben worked hard to strengthen his shaping skills. Spider wasn’t always the one pushing him. “You work hard.”
Ben looked around. “Not hard enough. There are still people I can’t help.”
She studied him. “That’s always going to be true, Ben.”
Even though he nodded, she didn’t miss the way his fists clenched as he shoved them deep into his pockets. “Yeah. Maybe.”
“There’s no rule that says you have to save everyone you try to guide, you know. Spider says we dream what we’re meant to dream.”
Ben looked at her. She noticed, for the first time, faint lines at the corners of his eyes. “What about us, then?”
Tovah shook her head. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
Ben gestured. “This. Us. Shapers. If we’re supposed to dream what we’re meant to, where does that leave us? If we can shape anything we want and unshape what we don’t, what does that mean?”
Once said aloud, the words made such utter sense Tovah couldn’t believe she’d never thought of it herself. “But…we are dreaming this, Ben. This is all a dream.”
He shook his head with a small scowl. “Sleepers dream both good and bad things. Sometimes they need someone to help them through. Find a conclusion. Solve a problem. Sometimes they just need to be rescued. Spider says we don’t have to know why, just that they do.”
He looked up at her. “What was the last dream you had before you knew you could shape?”
“I don’t remember.” Tovah shrugged, watching as he paced. “Do you?”
Ben shook his head. “No.”
“So maybe this is what we’re meant to be doing. For whatever reason.” Tovah offered the suggestion quietly. He seemed so vehement. “Maybe Spider’s right, Ben. There’s a reason for everything that happens here. We just can’t know it.”
“Why not? God doesn’t want us to?” He laughed derisively and sneered the word God. He waved a hand around them. “Sorry. I don’t buy it.”
“Are we back to that? I’m not going to try to convince you it’s any sort of god, Ben.”
He peered at her. “Good.”
“In fact,” she said, getting up from the bench, “I’m not going to argue with you.”
“Tovah—”
She held up a hand to stop him. “No. I don’t come here to fight with you. And I’m not going to. You don’t like me. I get it, okay? I don’t need it spelled out for me.”
He tried again, saying her name, but Tovah dismissed him again. “Bye, Ben.”
“Tovah, wait!”
She didn’t wait. She left him behind. It should’ve been easier; she’d put worse behind her, after all. Even so, she looked over her shoulder at him just before she shaped herself away.
When she looked ahead again, she stood in the middle of a church. The scent of incense tickled her nostrils. Shafts of light pierced the stained glass, illuminating the lifted hands of the saints. She wasn’t alone. Penitents bent their heads in several long benches as the priest in full vestments murmured ancient words from the altar.
She was in a field of flowers, surrounded by mountains.
She was in a classroom, about to take a test for which she hadn’t studied.
A playground.
A treehouse, looking down at the world below.
And then she was in a quiet room, on a plush couch, wearing a long silk robe and smelling roses.
Tovah sighed, reclining a little. Soft fabric caressed her skin. Tension eased.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
She smiled. “Hi.”
Her lover approached on swift, silent steps and knelt before her. He put his head into her lap, and her hands came up to caress his short dark curls. His breath pushed against her thighs through the silk.
“How do you always know where I am?” she asked after a moment.
He tilted his face to look at her. “I can feel you wanting me.”
“That’s very convenient,” she teased. She traced the rim of each brow and the slope of his nose. “And clever. Surely you have better things to do here than find me.”
His smile warmed her. “Better than making love to you? Never.”
Tovah laughed, tipping back her head. He climbed her body and captured her mouth, stealing the laughter and giving it back to her at once. They laughed together, until he bent to nip her throat and she gasped. He licked her skin, his hands sliding up over silk to cup her breasts.
“It feels good to know you want me,” he murmured.
Pleasure built slowly, and she didn’t try to rush it. There was plenty of time. Her lover eased his lips and tongue over her skin, finding all the places that best pleased her. Tovah shivered, her body tensing and releasing. Bright sparkles of delicious tension surrounded her, hovering like butterflies. Or stars. She was covered in stars.
Stars covered him, too, until his nakedness gleamed with silver and gold. Even his hair turned to gold and she ran her fingers through it as his face pressed against her. He nuz
zled her skin. His hands pulled her closer. He looked up at her.
He had blue eyes, now, and she smiled at him. “Why don’t you ever stay the same?”
“Would you like that better?” He kissed her mouth. “If I was always the same?”
She kissed him, too. “I don’t know.”
The couch had become a bed, just as soft but with much more room. She lay back, pulling him with her. He stretched out over her, his body hard where hers was soft. He kissed her jaw and throat. His teeth pressed her lightly as he took a mouthful of her and sucked gently.
“Tovah, I thought you understood. Nothing holds you back here. You can be whatever, whoever you want. Always. All the time.”
She rolled onto her side to look at him. When she reached to touch his cheek, her lover caught her hand and kissed her palm. He closed her fingers over the spot, which burned a little.
“I know that,” she said. “I do.”
“Then why not let yourself do it?” He seemed genuinely curious. He took the hand he held and put it to his chest. “Feel that. My heart beats because I tell it to.”
The pulse-thump under her fingers stopped. Alarmed, she tried to pull back her hand, but his kept hers prisoner. His skin was still warm. He kissed her. The familiar beat began again. Thump. Thump. Thump.
“See?”
Her own heart had sped its rhythm, her body’s innate reaction and not something she did on purpose. “You have more control than I do.”
“You can have what I have.”
She shook her head. Her hair fell over her shoulders and across her breast. He brushed it away. His fingers cupped her. His touch still sent ripples of sensation through her, and she moved closer.
“What do you really look like?” she asked.
“Why does it matter?” He smiled, disarming her.
Why did it matter, really? Except that she’d had lovers in the Ephemeros before, but never more than once. This man…this lover…
“I don’t know,” she admitted, feeling foolish. “I shouldn’t try to control you.”
“Tell me what you want, and I’ll be it,” he said. “You might find you like the variety.”
Blond hair, green eyes. Brown eyes. Black eyes.