Bathing the Lion (20 page)

Some of the dream was true to life, some not. Certain sections were understandable only to the separate individuals. However, the most important part of this shared dream had to do with their past lives as mechanics. All of the people should have recognized those parts instantly.

But it didn’t happen. Despite being right there in front of their faces for all five to see, none of the previously very good mechanics noticed or responded to the dream’s main message.

At about the same time, something took place in the Fornax Dwarf galaxy. A mechanic doing a task there too difficult to explain suddenly disappeared. Here one moment, gone the next. It was unheard of. Mechanics never just disappeared. Mechanics didn’t disappear at all. It was like electrons disappearing from inside an atom. Equally astonishing was that this sudden disappearance wasn’t seen by those around her. The mechanic vanished while performing a job in the middle of a large crowd but no one saw it happen.

Later in Vermont two blond mechanics sipped savory soup while waiting for their partner to return from the toilet. And in a blink they were both gone. Not one person in the restaurant noticed.

Plans were going wrong everywhere.

After paying the bill, Jezik walked outside and stood on the snow-covered sidewalk looking around, hoping to see her peers—but they were not there. Next something remarkable happened: for the first time in her very long life, the mechanic felt fear. It was so alien, peculiar, and yet all-encompassing that when it hit, all she could do was stand still and stiff, feeling the force of it grow larger and larger within her. She began to tremble, knowing soon she would be all fear; there would be no more room inside her for anything else.

It was the most powerful sensation Jezik had ever experienced.

And then she too disappeared.

Chaos had arrived in full force.

D Train’s greatest and most beloved friend in the world was a yellow shar-pei/Labrador retriever mix named Kos, who lived two houses down the street. His owners found him in an animal shelter on the Greek island of Kos while vacationing there. The dogs met the day Kaspar moved to town because Kos was allowed to wander free and he came by to check out the new neighbor. It was big love at first sight and the two became inseparable. This was very convenient because it meant the owners could leave the dogs with each other whenever they went out of town. Except this time all of the owners had to be gone for the week. But Dean Corbin stepped in and volunteered to take care of the dogs at his house. Vanessa loved animals and particularly these two goofy galoots. They were her biggest fans. Whenever the three of them were together, D Train and Kos followed Vanessa around like she was a saint and a movie star combined and they were her fanboy acolytes.

She was addressing them now when Dean entered the kitchen on the day after the dream. Both dogs stared intently at her as if they understood and hung on to every word she said. “I know a
lot
of Debbys. It just dawned on me.”

“Who are you talking to?”

“The dogs; I just realized I know a
lot
of women named Debby; not Deborah—
Debby
. Isn’t that odd? How many Debbys do you know?”

Dean ignored her question. “Vanessa, what are you doing? Why are you here? We’re all in the other room trying to figure out what to do about this dream.”

“I
know
, Dean, but we’ve been trying to
figure it out
for the past three hours and I got hungry. So I’m cooking something for all of us because I assume the others are hungry too.”

He sat down on a chair at the table in the middle of the room. “It’s good you’re in here alone anyway because we obviously have to talk.”

Surprised, she looked at her husband. “We do? Talk about what?”

“About what? About the
dream
, Vanessa. About you having an affair with Kaspar. About the fact we’ve been at each other’s throats an awful lot the last few months and things were said in the dream
we actually did say
. I’m wondering now how many other things in there were true.”

“Oh come on, Dean. Do you really think I’m having an affair with your partner and best friend?”

“
Are
you?”

She turned to him and made an exasperated face. “Do you own a sled? A seven-hundred-dollar sled?”

“No.”

“Well, you did in the dream. So, you don’t have a sled and I don’t have a lover.”

He waggled a finger at her. “No, no—it’s not so simple, Vanessa.”

“Why not?”

“Because you lie about big things. We both know it and this is a big thing. We
have
been fighting like dogs and cats recently. Sometimes I get the feeling … I don’t know … maybe we are in real trouble and neither of us is brave enough to admit it.”

She turned back to the stove and continued preparing the food. “I’m making saltimbocca. Do you know what the word means in Italian? ‘Jumps into the mouth.’ This recipe is so good that when it’s ready, it jumps into your mouth all by itself.”

Frustrated, Dean shook his head. “Relevance please?”

Every time one of the Corbins spoke, the dogs’ eyes moved back and forth between them, as if they were watching a tennis match.

“Husband, there are very few things in my life so good they jump into my mouth by themselves. I swear to God you are one of them. Yes, we
have
been fighting a lot lately and sometimes it’s been mean and ugly. But so what, Dean? Couples who’ve been together as long as we have fight, and yes, it does bring out the worst in both of us sometimes.
Mea culpa and you’re a culpa.
Does it mean I want to divorce you? No. Do I secretly dream about walking out or throwing coffee at you? No.

“I lie about things sometimes, I do, but do you really believe I’d risk our relationship for a few good bonks?”

“Yes, Vanessa, I do. You can be very selfish when it comes to things you want and you don’t give a damn for other people’s feelings if you want it badly enough. You and I have fought way more in the last few months than we ever did in the past. Times have been rough between us and you know it. Sometimes I feel we really
don’t
like each other.” Dean’s voice was calm and even; there was no hurt or accusation in it. He was simply stating facts.

“Dean, Vanessa—come in here! You’ve got to see this.”

Jane was calling, but they’d never heard her voice sound so loud and shrill. The Corbins often joked Jane Claudius was Queen Poise, stealth itself, the cool ninja. Everything she did—the way she spoke, her languid yet precise gestures, how she moved—most everything about her was the embodiment of cool. But right this minute she sounded like her hair was on fire.

The couple hurried out of the kitchen followed closely by the dogs. In his rush, Dean let the kitchen door swing back hard. It hit D Train smack on the head. Unaffected, the big gray pit bull just kept moving, followed by his pal Kos.

The living room was the largest room in the Corbins’ house. When they first moved in, Dean measured it by striding across. On reaching the other side he announced triumphantly, “This room is
big
; it took twenty regular steps to cross it!”

Hovering now in the middle of the big room was a blue-gray cloud about three feet wide by four feet high. It was not low like ground fog or bumping against the ceiling like a regular cloud in the sky. It hung halfway between floor and ceiling at eye level.

“What the hell…?”

“Where did
that
come from?”

Jane and Bill Edmonds stood on opposite sides of the living room. Both had their arms crossed over their chests in exactly the same manner and looked like mirror images of each other.

Vanessa said, “It’s an Aurora Cobb.”

“Who is? What do you mean?”

“The cloud—it’s called an Aurora Cobb.”

“Who’s that?”

“It’s not a
who
—it’s a
what
. An Aurora Cobb is a
thing
and I know for sure it’s bad.”

Dean looked at his wife as if she were insane.

Seeing his expression she said in an irritated voice, “You asked what it is and I’m telling you:
that
cloud is an Aurora Cobb and it’s a dangerous thing. Maybe it’s not bad but I know for sure it’s dangerous.
Finito.
” Without looking at anyone, Vanessa crossed her arms too.

While listening to the Corbins argue, Bill Edmonds realized he’d heard the weird name before—
Aurora Cobb
. The three-syllable prettiness of “Aurora” combined with the contrasting ugliness of “Cobb” for a last name was one you’d remember. Had he seen it written somewhere? Seen it or heard it? He couldn’t remember, but when Vanessa said the name, it
was
familiar to him.

Tail wagging, Kos walked past Dean and Vanessa over to the cloud in the center of the room. All four people stiffened and felt the same impulse to lunge forward and stop the yellow dog from going any farther because of what Vanessa had said. At the same time, they were curious to see what would happen if the animal made contact with the blue thing.

For a moment Edmonds thought as soon as the dog touched the cloud, out of it would boom a stentorian voice saying something like, “I am the great and powerful Oz!”

Instead, Kos got right up close and stopped. Tail still wagging, he looked straight at the cloud but slowly tipped his head to one side in puzzlement. Then he turned it to the other side, the classic canine sign of “I’m confused.” After more head turning back and forth, Kos raised his head as far back as it would go and let fly the longest, saddest howl any of them had ever heard from a dog. It was so distressing D Train and the humans knew the wail had to have come from the deepest reaches of pain in the animal. The mournful bay was uncanny. It went on and on although Kos did not move. Jane thought of the old phrase “to keen,” as in a prolonged cry of abject grief. The dog was keening for something—there was no doubt about it.

The only one to move was D Train. He went to Kos and nervously licked his face over and over. It did no good; the yellow dog kept howling. Growing more frantic, D Train moved all around his friend, kissing him, bumping him with his head, trying to stop the other from crying. When he was as close to the cloud as Kos, he looked at it and did exactly the same thing: put his head back and began howling too.

“Jesus Christ. What’s going on?”

Above this din, someone’s phone began to ring. Dean reached into a pocket and took his out. Looking at the screen to check who was calling, his eyes widened when he saw it was his partner.

“Kaspar?”

“Dean, is a cloud there now? Wherever you are, do you see a cloud nearby, a big one? It’s probably at ground level. Someplace it wouldn’t normally be.”

“Yes! One’s right in the middle of our living room. How did you know?”

“Everyone there has to reach into it. Go up and reach right in. Nothing will happen—nothing bad. That’s all you need to do. Grab hold of whatever your hand touches first inside the cloud and bring it out. Don’t be afraid but make sure everyone does this. I’ll explain more after you’re finished.”

Dean told the others.

“How
does
he know there’s a cloud here?”

“I don’t know but he said there’s no time to waste. Just reach in and bring out whatever you touch first.”

Edmonds and Jane said nothing but moved toward it.

Vanessa stayed where she was and shook her head. “I’m not getting near the thing; it’s bad. I don’t know anything else, but I know it’s
dangerous
and I’m not doing it.”

Dean told Kaspar. After listening to the other’s response he held the phone out to his wife. “He says he wants to talk to you.”

She took it hesitantly, as if even her husband’s telephone might bite. She lifted it cautiously to her ear.

“Vanessa, the cloud’s about three feet high, right?”

She nodded but kept quiet.

“Listen, it’s
not
what you think it is. Vanessa, do you hear me? You think it’s an Aurora Cobb, but it isn’t. I swear to you. I’d be scared too if it was one of those, but it’s not. You have to trust me.”

“How do you know all this, Kaspar? How do you know its name? How did you know there’s a cloud in here?”

“Because I’m looking at exactly the same kind of cloud here in my hotel room now and I recognize it.”

“You have one there too?” She looked at the others to make sure they’d heard what she’d said.

“Yes. It’s the same as yours. I’m sure of it.”

“There’s a cloud exactly like this in his hotel room,” Vanessa announced before turning her attention back to Kaspar. “But why are they here? What are they?”

Kaspar spoke slowly and precisely. “They hold information and tools. They’ve brought tools we need now. But you have to get them
yourself
; each one of you has to reach inside the cloud to get what’s specifically meant for you. There can be no exceptions because we’re going to need anything it gives us—
anything
, do you understand? They’re like separate pieces of a puzzle that fit together. If we don’t have all the pieces, we won’t be able to work out what to do. Please tell everyone they must do it and then I’ll explain what comes next. Trust me on this, Vanessa.”

She told the others what he’d said. The four exchanged glances, uncertainty in their eyes, all of them wondering who was going to move first. The dogs had stopped baying but both were panting now as if it were a hundred degrees in the room. D Train leaned over and once again started frantically licking the side of Kos’s face.

“All right, what the hell—I’ll do it. I’ll go first.” Bill Edmonds walked to the cloud and without hesitating stuck his whole arm in.