Exit Light (5 page)

“It’s the meds,” she said abruptly. “The pills and shots mess with his brain. When he wakes up, he’s disoriented and confused, that’s all.”

“Disoriented, confused and violent.” Dr. Goodfellow studied the inside of his coffee cup, then tossed back the rest of its contents and put the empty mug back on the table. “Which means he needs to be medicated for his protection and the staff’s.”

“Well, what do I know? I’m not a doctor.”

Dr. Goodfellow sighed. “I want to help your friend. I really do.”

“Really? You’d be one of the first, I think.” She sipped cold coffee to cover the bitterness in her tone. “Most of the doctors who come through here see him as a case in a textbook. He doesn’t fit the profiles or the protocols, so they don’t know what to do with him. They want to pump him full of drugs and free up a bed, that’s all.”

His silence filled the space between them, but she didn’t regret what she’d said. Spider was a person, not just a patient, and she was as equally frustrated with him for his unwillingness to function in the waking world as she was with the medical professionals, family and friends who’d given up on him.

“Miss Connelly,” he said softly. “I’m different.”

Tovah looked up, into his eyes, expecting now to see a hint of smarmy smugness. A doctor’s arrogance. Or maybe even condescending pity. But as she studied Martin Goodfellow’s face, she saw only sincerity.

“I believe you,” she said.

Television didn’t interest her, and she’d finished all her library books. She’d fed Max, completed all she could stand to do on her latest assignment for work, and folded all her laundry. Tovah thought with longing of her bed and darkness, the sweet temptation of slipping into a world where she could put aside the problems of her waking life. Where she could run and dance, or fly if she chose. She wanted to be asleep.

It was only 8:00 p.m.

She would force herself to wait until at least nine and try not to count the minutes. She’d take a long shower and deep condition her hair. Maybe change the sheets. Surely those tasks would make the time go faster.

She stopped herself.

She would not allow herself to be like an alcoholic counting the minutes until she could have another drink, or an anorexic measuring every bite. She would not allow this craving to become an addiction. Not again. Yet even as she tried to convince herself, she knew it was too late. Denying herself the pleasures of sleep was as much, if not more, a sign of her unhealthy dependence on the Ephemeros. She’d told Henry he couldn’t sleep all the time, but she knew too well how tempting it would be to do just that.

She would stay awake until ten, now, to prove she could. She would organize her computer files, or scrub her toilets. She would—

The phone rang, and she jerked at the sudden shrill. Caller ID showed a familiar number, and though normally she’d have let the machine pick up, she was grateful for the distraction now. She answered, bracing herself for the leap of her heart that refused to go away, no matter how many times she remembered she was supposed to hate him. Her throat had closed a bit, but he spoke before she could, giving her time to ease herself into speech.

“Tovah? It’s me. Kevin,” he added, as though once upon a time his voice hadn’t been the first thing she’d heard every morning and the last she’d heard at night. “How are you?”

“Great. Fine. You?”

Casual chatter that said nothing. She closed her eyes, listening to the sound of Max’s snores. They centered her, reminded her of where she was. No matter how she wished it, this was the waking world.

“I’m good, too.” He paused.

She waited. He hadn’t called just to chat. She wasn’t going to waste time with inanities.

“I saw the house next to you for sale in the real estate magazine.”

This wasn’t what she’d been expecting, exactly. “And?”

“If they can get that sort of price for it, maybe you want to think about selling.”

Tovah looked around at the house she’d kept along with her grandmother’s silver and the dog. “Why would I want to do that?”

“You could get a nice ground-floor apartment. Or a rancher.”

“Kevin,” she said evenly, “I can manage stairs, okay? Why did you really call?”

She strained to hear the sound of another voice in the background, the bubble of feminine laughter, perhaps, or a baby crying. How old was the baby now, anyway?

“I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

Tovah put a hand to her forehead to ward off the headache trying to stab her between the eyes. She cradled the phone against her shoulder and covered her eyes with her palm.

“Why wouldn’t I be okay, Kevin?”

She had a list of answers to that, none of them useful.

“I got a letter from the insurance company about the settlement.”

“I’ve had about two dozen.”

He sighed. “Tovah, don’t be like that.”

“I’m not being like anything, Kevin.” She stopped herself from saying more.

Once there had never been silence between them. Even when they weren’t speaking, there had never been a void like this, unfillable. It made her heart hurt, and she hated herself for not hating him more.

She wanted to draw up her knees and press her face to them, the way she used to. Unable to do that, she settled for burying her face into the cushions of the couch. They smelled of dog, though Max wasn’t supposed to lie there.

“So, they’re close to settling, then?”

“I think so, yes. The lawyer says so.”

Friends and family had counseled her to fight for more, but at the time all she’d wanted was to cut him free. Let him go. She’d loved him too much to fight for pennies. The divorce mediation hadn’t taken long. She’d agreed to take on the medical bills and fighting with the insurance company in exchange for whatever payout they might deign to give her. Kevin had taken half their savings, the car and the furniture, moving on with his life and new partner without even looking back.

More silence that he wasn’t content to keep. “So…I guess we should talk about filing those papers.”

Though Tovah’d been the one to tell him to go, she’d never actually filed for divorce. Her reasons had started out complicated and then eased into simplicity. She didn’t have the money right now to file for divorce, and Kevin, despite his new girlfriend and life, had never bothered. Tovah didn’t want to guess at his reasons.

“If that’s what you want.” Instant regret took over at those words. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of thinking she wanted him back.

“Yeah…well…” Kevin cleared his throat. “Here’s the thing. My lawyer also got a letter from yours about the settlement. And my lawyer says the mediation agreement we signed needs to be revisited.”

Her breath burned in her lungs until she let it out. “Revisited?”

The soft huff of his breath tickled her eardrums. “He says the amount we originally agreed on was equitable, but with the new arrangements from the insurance company…and…we could use the extra cash.”

We.

It still stung, even now.

“I’m sure you can.”

“Because…”

The hesitation in his voice set off alarms in her head, and she lifted her face from the pillows. She didn’t want to hear this. Not this, the inevitable, the news she’d been waiting to hear since the first time a woman had answered his phone.

“We’re getting married.”

“It’s about time.” Each word, a nail hammered into her, no matter how lightly she said it. “I’m sure Dalia will appreciate it.”

Three months old, she remembered now. The baby, Kevin’s daughter, was three months old. Tovah had never seen her, though she imagined she’d have Kevin’s eyes.

“Yeah. I guess she will.” Oh, how she remembered that rueful chuckle. “But listen, Tov—”

“You’re telling me you want to revisit the divorce agreement because you think I’m going to get more money?” Each word, a thorn ripped from her flesh.

She took no enjoyment in how miserable he sounded, or from knowing he’d probably been urged into this by his new fiancée and his lawyer. “Yeah.”

“But you’re calling to see if I’m
okay.
” She layered the word with grief masquerading as disdain. “Wow. Well, really, Kevin, if that’s how you show concern, I’d much rather you didn’t worry about me.”

“I still do,” Kevin said in a low voice.

Tovah imagined him cutting his gaze to the side to make sure he wasn’t being overheard. “Don’t.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t do that, either.”

Silence again, a space between them that could never close. Not with all the sorries in the world. She put her finger on the disconnect button.

Then she hung up.

Max woke up and, whining, licked away her tears as she clung to his neck. When her sobs had ceased he squatted on his haunches, head tilted, and watched her. The curve of his mouth and lolling tongue was the same, but there was no question his expression was perplexed sorrow, not a smile. Tovah wiped her face and patted the couch beside her until he jumped up and put his head in her lap.

Sitting that way, she looked down at her legs, stretched out. The right, nicked and scarred from a lifetime of activity, reached all the way to the tufted ottoman. The left ended in a smoothly scarred cap of tissue just above the knee.

“He says he’s sorry,” she said. “Well, guess what. I’m sorry, too.”

The problem was, sorry didn’t buy beans, as her grandma had been fond of saying. Nor would it take them back in time to the night of the accident, when slick roads and a sleepy driver had ended in tragedy. If asked what she could’ve saved that night, her leg or her marriage, Tovah would have chosen her marriage. Unfortunately, she hadn’t been given a choice. She had to live without both.

Sorry couldn’t turn back time. There was only one place she could go where things would be the same as they were, at least as far as her body was concerned.

“I’m going to bed,” she told Max, and went upstairs to seek the land of dreams.

She was cautious this time. Spider’s warning had been merited, and though she’d managed to get away from the shaper who’d tried to do…whatever he’d meant to do, Tovah was not about to let herself get into a situation like that again.

She entered the Ephemeros on edge, wary, shaping nothing at first until she could make certain she knew what she wanted and certain to always know where to find her exit light. No club this time, though she ached to dance and flirt and drink to wash the taste of Kevin’s conversation from her tongue. She stretched her body arm by arm and leg by leg and let her will surround her, seeing what came up.

One by one, the details appeared. Grass. Trees. One small patch, the borders blurry with the hint of mountains in the distance. But for now, just this one small place where she could sit in the sunlight.

She’d encountered bad things in the Ephemeros before, even since she’d learned it was a real place, not just fantasy. Nightmares still existed. Spider claimed they did for a reason. Bad dreams were usually limited to the sleeper having them, or the guide who decided to help them through. She’d encountered bold shapers who didn’t understand or didn’t care about the etiquette of forcing their will upon others, but they were rare. The Ephemeros never unshaped around her the way it had during her last visit with Spider. Parts shifted and moved, sometimes startlingly, but nothing had ever shaken the fabric of the dream realm before.

Spider had been scared, reason enough for her to be wary, too. Yet now, tipping her face to sunlight she’d created to have perfect brightness and heat, Tovah found it hard to concentrate on anything bad. Surely this place would always be this good and perfect and sweet, so filled with glory?

“Tovah.”

Startled, she opened her eyes. “Ben!”

He gestured around him. “Nice place.”

“Yes.” A running brook appeared not too far from where she sat. His touch, not hers. She patted the grass beside her. “Have a seat?”

Ben sat, his long legs stretching out beside hers. He had a rod in one hand and cast at once, line whirring before settling into the water with a small
plink.
“How are you?”

“Fine. You?”

He also tipped his face to sunlight. “Fine.”

“What are you trying to catch?”

Ben reeled in the line, cast it again. “I should be able to catch whatever I want, right? Isn’t that the way it works?”

She’d never heard Ben sound so bitter. “Spider would say you’ll catch what you need to catch. Maybe not what you want.”

Ben tossed the rod to the grass. “I know what Spider would say.”

Tovah reached to pluck a flower, watching him. “Have you seen Spider recently?”

“Yes.” Ben squinted at her. “He told me what happened.”

“What do you think it was?” She turned toward him and pulled her knees to her chest to rest her chin on them both.

“I’m an expert?” Ben shook his head. “I don’t know.”

She studied him. She wondered if she’d ever be able to put aside the memory of how his mouth had felt, and his arms, and how safe he’d made her feel for those brief moments before he’d realized he was dreaming and let her go. Probably not, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to.

“Spider’s never been afraid of anything before. Not that I’ve seen. But that was different.” Tovah shrugged and picked a blade of grass. She put it between her thumbs and blew, making it bleat. She looked up at Ben. “Were you here when it happened?”

He hesitated, then nodded. “Yes.”

“Was it the same for you?”

“Black sand? Black sky?” He reached for his own blade of grass and whistled with it. His worked better.

“Yes. Lightning. And the ground shook.”

Ben looked away from her. “It was the same for everyone I’ve talked to, no matter what they were doing.”

Of course he spoke with others. There were plenty of times she entered the Ephemeros and didn’t see Ben or Spider. There was no reason for her to believe they weren’t here when she wasn’t. The sudden flare of jealousy surprised her.

“Was it something from a shaper, do you think? Or something bigger?”

Ben shot her a frown. “How should I know?”

Though Spider had explained the Ephemeros to Tovah and she’d seen firsthand how it worked, she didn’t exactly understand it. She didn’t think Spider fully did, either, nor had she expected Ben to hold the key to its secrets. Even so, she frowned at his reaction.

“Sorry. I thought you might have a theory or something, that’s all. Spider’s told me a lot. I figured he’d told you the same things he’s told me.”

“What things?” Ben had shredded his grass whistle, but didn’t pick another.

“That the Ephemeros is shaped by the collective unconscious. That we all enter it, but not everyone can manipulate it. Not even sleepers who know they’re dreaming are always shapers. That some people think it’s Heaven, or Hell—”

“Yeah, he told me that, too.” Ben got up and strode away from the patch of grass he’d shared with her. Pacing, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his worn tan cords. He turned to look at her. “Do you believe him?”

“I don’t believe he was lying to me, if that’s what you mean.”

Ben shook his head. “I didn’t say he was lying. He believes it. I asked if you do.”

She took a moment to ponder that. “I saw Jim Morrison in the club, once.”

Ben laughed. “That’s not proof. Besides, Morrison’s not really dead. Just like Elvis and Marilyn Monroe. What was Mr. Mojo Rising doing?”

“Nothing. I mean, we didn’t speak. He was at the bar, just watching everyone around him.”

“Was he old and fat?”

Tovah smiled. “No. He was young and lean and gorgeous.”