What Dreams May Come (8 page)

“But it says not to go that way,” I told her. Playing the game.

“C’mon,” she urged.

“You want a dying redwood tree to land on our heads?” I asked.

“We’ll run if one starts to fall,” she said. “Oh…” I clucked and shook my head. “Miz Annie, you-is-bad,” I said, doing my Hattie McDaniel from Gone With the Wind.

“Uh-huh.” She nodded in agreement, pulling me toward the right hand path.

“You’re a poor excuse for a forest ranger,” I told her. Moments later, we reached a rock slope which declined to the edge of a cliff some fifteen yards away. “See?” I told her, trying not to smile.

“Okay, we’ll go back now,” she said. She repressed a smile. “At least we know why we weren’t supposed to come here.”

I gazed at her with mock severity. “You’re always taking me where I’m not supposed to go,” I said.

She nodded in pleased agreement. “That’s my job; to bring adventure into your life.”

We started across the top of the slope, heading back toward the other path. The surface of the rock was slick with a layer of dry needles so we walked in single file, me behind. Ann had only gone a few yards when she lost her footing and fell on her left side. I started toward her and slipped myself, tried to get up but couldn’t. I began to laugh.

“Chris.”

Her urgent tone made me look toward her quickly. She was starting to slide down the decline, each movement she made to stop herself making her slide further.

“Don’t move,” I said. My heart was pounding suddenly. “Spread your arms and legs out wide.”

“Chris …” Her voice trembled as she tried to do what I said and slipped even further. “Oh, my God,” she murmured, frightenedly.

“Don’t move at all,” I told her.

She did as I said and her backward slide was almost checked. I struggled clumsily to my feet. I couldn’t reach her with my hand. And if I tried to crawl where she was, both of us would slide toward the edge.

I slipped and fell to one knee, hissing at the pain. Then, carefully, I crawled to the top of the slope, speaking as I went. “Don’t move now, just don’t move,” I said. “It’s going to be all right. Don’t be afraid now.”

Suddenly, it all came back. This had already happened. I felt a rush of intense relief. I’d find a fallen branch, extend it down to her and pull her to safety. I’d hold her in my arms and kiss her and she’d be—

“Chris!”

Her cry made me whirl. Aghast, I watched her sliding toward the edge.

Forgetting everything in panic, I dived down the slope, skidding toward her, looking at her dread-whitened face as she slid backward. “Chris, save me,” she pleaded. “Save me. Please. Chris!”

I cried out in horror as she disappeared across the edge and vanished from sight. Her shriek was terrible. “Ann!” I screamed.

I jolted awake, my heartbeat racing; sat up quickly and looked around.

Katie was standing beside the sofa, wagging her tail and looking at me in a way which I could only interpret as concerned. I put my hand on her head. “Okay, okay,” I murmured. “A dream. I had a dream.”

Somehow, I felt she understood what I was saying.

I put my right palm to my chest and felt the heavy pulsing of my heart. Why had I had that dream? I wondered. And why had it ended so differently from what had really happened? The question harrowed me and I sat up, looking around, then called Albert’s name.

I started with surprise as instantly—and, Robert, I mean instantly—he walked into the room. He smiled at my reaction, then, looking closer, saw I was disturbed and asked what was wrong.

I told him about the dream and asked what it meant.

“It was probably some symbolic ‘leftover,’ ” he said.

“I hope I don’t have any more,” I told him, shuddering.

“They’ll pass,” he reassured me.

Remembering Katie standing by me when I woke, I mentioned it to Albert. “I have the strangest impression that she understands what I say and feel,” I said.

“There’s understanding there,” he replied, bending over to stroke her head. “Isn’t there, Katie?”

She wagged her tail, looking into his eyes.

I forced a smile. “When you said think of you and you’d be here, you weren’t kidding.”

He smiled as he straightened up. “That’s how it is here,” he told me. “When you want to see someone, you have only to think about them and they’re with you. If they wish to be, of course; as I wished to be with you. We always did have a kinship. Even though we were years apart, we were on the same wave length, so to speak.”

I blinked in startlement. “Say that again?” I asked.

He did and I’m sure my mouth fell open. ”Your lips aren’t moving,” I said.

He laughed at my expression.

“How come I didn’t notice that before?”

“I wasn’t doing it before,” he told me. Lips unmoving.

I stared at him, dumbfounded. “How can I hear your voice when you’re not talking?” I asked.

“The same way I hear yours.”

“My lips aren’t moving either?”

“We’re conversing with our minds,” he answered.

“That’s incredible,” I said. I thought I said.

“Actually, to speak aloud is rather difficult here,” he told me. “But most newcomers don’t realize, for quite a while, that they aren’t using their voices.”

“Incredible,” I repeated.

“Yet how efficient,” he said. “Language is more a barrier to understanding than an aid. Also, we’re able, through thought, to communicate in any language without the need of an interpreter. Moreover, we’re not confined to words and sentences. Communication can be enhanced by flashes of pure thought.

“Now,” he continued, “I’ve been wearing this outfit so you wouldn’t be taken back by my appearance. If you don’t object, I’ll return to my natural garb.”

I had no idea what he meant.

“All right?” he asked.

“Sure,” I said, “I don’t know what—“

It had to have happened while I blinked. Albert wasn’t wearing the white shirt and trousers any longer. Instead, he wore a robe the color of which matched the radiation around him. It was full-length, hanging in graceful folds, a gold sash at its waist. I noted that his feet were bare.

“There,” he said. “I feel more comfortable.”

I stared at him—a little impolitely, I’m afraid. “Do I have to wear one too?” I asked.

“Not at all,” he said. I don’t know what my expression was but it obviously amused him. “The choice is yours. Whatever you prefer.”

I looked down at myself. It was a little odd, I had to admit, to see the same clothes I’d been wearing the night of the accident. Still, I couldn’t see myself in a robe. It seemed a bit too “spiritual”- for me.

“And now,” Albert said, “perhaps you’d like to take a more extensive look at where you are.”

Your problems lie herein

AN ODD THING happened as we left the house. It seemed odd to me at any rate. Albert was unsurprised by it. Even Katie didn’t react as I would have expected.

A pearl-gray bird swooped down and landed on Albert’s left shoulder, causing me to start.

Albert’s words startled me even more. “It’s one your wife took care of,” he informed me. “I’ve been holding it for her.”

“One my wife took care of?” I asked, glancing at Katie. In life, she’d have launched into a frenzy of barking at the sight. Here, she was completely placid.

Albert explained to me that Ann had come to have a permanent rapport with the injured birds she had nursed back to health. All the birds she’d saved—and there’d been dozens—were here in Summerland, waiting for her. Albert even knew that at one time local children had called Ann The Bird Lady of Hidden Hills.

I could only shake my head. “Incredible,” I said.

He smiled. “Oh, you’ll see things far more incredible,” he told me. He stroked the bird with one finger. “And how are you?” he asked.

I had to laugh as the bird fluffed its wings and chirped. “You’re not going to tell me it answered,” I said.

“In his own way,” Albert told me. “Just as with Katie. Say hello to him.”

I felt a little awkward about it but did as he said. The bird hopped instantly onto my right shoulder and it did seem, Robert, as though our minds exchanged something. I don’t know how to tell you what that something was except to say that it was charming.

Now the bird flew off and Katie startled me again by barking once, as though saying goodbye to it. Incredible, I thought as we started walking away from the house.

“I noticed you have no mirrors,” I said.

“They serve no purpose,” he told me.

“Because they’re mostly for vanity?” I questioned.

“More than that,” he answered. “Those who’ve marred their appearance in any way by their actions in life aren’t forced to witness that marring. If they were, they’d become self-conscious and be unable to concentrate on improving themselves.”

I wondered what my own appearance was; knowing that Albert wouldn’t tell me if it was unpleasant in any way.

I tried not to think about that as we started up a grassy slope, Katie running on ahead. How trim she looks, I thought with pleasure. Ann would be so happy to see her. They’d spent much time together. Literally, Ann couldn’t leave the house without her. We used to laugh at Katie’s unfailing awareness of Ann’s intention to go out. It seemed, at times, positively psychic.

I put that from my mind too, breathing deeply of the cool, fresh air. The temperature seemed ideal to me.

“Is that why it’s called Summerland?” I asked, experimenting to see if Albert knew what I was asking.

He did, replying, “Partially. But, also, because it can reflect each person’s concept of perfect happiness.”

“If Ann were here with me, it would be perfect,” I said, unable to keep her from my thoughts.

“She will be, Chris.”

“Is there water here?” I asked, abruptly. “Boats? That’s Ann’s idea of heaven.”

“There are both,” he said.

I looked up at the sky. “Does it ever get dark?”

“Not totally,” he said. “We do have twilight though.”

“Was it my imagination or did the light in your study dim as I was going to sleep?”

“It dimmed,” he said. “Corresponding to your need for rest.”

“Isn’t it an inconvenience not to have days and nights? How do you schedule yourself?”

“By activities,” he answered. “Isn’t that, essentially, the way people in life do it? A time to work, a time to eat, a time to relax, a time to sleep? We do the same—except, of course, that we don’t have to eat or sleep.”

“I hope my need for sleep disappears soon,” I said. “I don’t relish the idea of more dreams like the one I had.”

“The need will go,” he said.

I looked around and had to make a sound of incredulity. “I suppose I’ll get used to all this,” I said. “It’s awfully hard to believe though.”

“I can’t describe how long it took me to accept it,” Albert told me. “Mostly, I couldn’t understand how it was possible for me to be admitted to a place I’d always been positive didn’t exist.”

“You didn’t believe in it either,” I said. It made me feel better to hear that.

“Very few people do,” he replied. “They may give lip service to the notion. They may even want to believe it. But they rarely do.”

I stopped and leaned over to remove my shoes and socks. Picking them up, I carried them as we started off again. The grass felt warm and soft beneath my feet.

“You don’t have to carry them,” Albert said.

“I wouldn’t want to litter a place as beautiful as this.”

He laughed. “You won’t,” he said. “They’ll vanish presently.”

“Into the matrix?”

“Right.”

I stopped to put down the shoes and socks, then strolled on with Albert; Katie was beside us now, moving easily. Albert noticed my backward glance and smiled. “It takes a while,” he said.

Moments later, we reached the summit of the slope and, stopping, looked across the countryside. The closest sight I can compare it to is England—or, perhaps, New England— in the early summer; rich green meadows, thick woods, colorful patches of flowers and sparkling brooks—all domed by a deep blue sky with snowy clouds. No place on earth could compare to this, however.

Standing there, I drew in deep breaths of the air. I felt completely sound, Robert. Not only were the pains from the accident gone but there was no longer a trace of aching in my neck and lower back; you know the problems I had with my spine. “I feel so good,” I said.

“You’ve accepted where you are then,” Albert told me.

I didn’t understand that and asked what he meant.

“Many people arrive with the physical convictions they possessed at death,” he said. “They believe they’re sick and continue to be so until they realize they’re in a place where sickness can’t exist on its own. Only then are they whole. The mind is all; remember that.”

“Speaking of which,” I told him, “I seem to be able to think better too.”

“Because you’re not encumbered by a physical brain any longer.”

In looking around, I’d caught sight of an orchard of what looked like plum trees. I decided that they couldn’t be but they aroused a question in my mind. “You said it isn’t necessary, here, to eat,” I said. “Does that mean you’re never thirsty either?”

“We get our nourishment directly from the atmosphere,” he answered. ”The light, the air, the colors, the plants.”

“We have no stomachs then,” I said. “No digestive organs.”

“No need for them,” he responded. “On earth our bodies eliminated everything from what we ate but the energy of sunlight originally imparted to the food. Here, we ingest that energy directly.”

“What about reproductive organs?”

“You still have them because you expect to have them. In time, when you understand their lack of purpose, they’ll disappear.”

“That’s weird,” I said.

He shook his head, a sad smile on his lips. “Consider those whose lives depended on those organs,” he said. “Who, even after death, retain the need and use of them because they can’t conceive of existence without them. They’re never satisfied, of course, never fulfilled; it’s only an illusion. But they can’t break free of it and it impedes their progress endlessly. That’s weird, Chris.”

“I can understand that,” I conceded. “Still, part of my relationship with Ann was physical.”