The Girl Who Could Not Dream (16 page)

“Y
OU CAN
FLY
?” E
THAN ASKED.

“Not me. No wings.” Monster flapped his tentacles. “But there are plenty of dreams about creatures who can fly . . .”

Sophie suddenly realized what he was suggesting, and she retreated so fast that she smacked into a bookshelf. Books wobbled as the shelf rocked. “No. No. And in case that's not clear: No! I promised!”

Monster ducked farther into the shadows. He drew his tentacles around him, making himself as small as possible. “Knew you wouldn't like it. Never mind. It's a terrible idea. We'll come up with another plan.”

Ethan looked from Sophie to the shadows that held Monster and back again. “Wait, what's the idea? Fly how?”

“He wants . . .” She stopped. He wanted her to drink a flying dream, but she couldn't say that without revealing what happened when she dreamed. “Never mind. Maybe I'm wrong about this. Maybe it wasn't Lucy's backpack, and Mr. Nightmare has nothing to do with my parents or the gray creature.”

“Or maybe you're right and we missed something,” Ethan said. “He won't be expecting us to come back. If we can find a way to sneak in without him noticing . . . Maybe go in through the basement?”

“You changed your tune quick,” Monster commented.

“You convinced me. Or, more accurately, the gray giraffe did.”

Sophie stared out the window, wishing that she saw her parents walking up to the door as if nothing had happened. A dreamcatcher twisted as she brushed against it. It sparkled in the sunlight, casting a hundred shards of light on the floor. This late in the day, the sun was low in the sky, and it spilled straight through the window. Outside, all the shadows were rosy and long, blending as they melted together on the asphalt. Car windshields reflected the soon-to-set sun, and she heard a dog bark, wanting to be walked. But no one came outside. A police car drove by again, slowly. The street was empty. Yards and driveways were empty. No one was taking out the trash or taking in the mail or playing basketball or jumping rope or riding bikes or doing anything at all outside. It was even more noticeable than earlier—word must have spread. She thought of the policeman saying there would be an announcement on the local news and wondered if everyone was glued to their TV, waiting for the kids to be found. But the kids wouldn't be found if she was right, because no one knew about Mr. Nightmare or the gray giraffe-man. “Fine. I'll do it.” She turned to Monster. “But we take a dreamcatcher, and we turn the flying whatever back into a dream as soon as Mom and Dad and the others are safe.”

Without waiting for Monster or Ethan to respond, Sophie spun around and marched to the basement stairs. She hoped she wouldn't regret this. For six years, she'd kept her promise. But for six years, her parents had been safe. If Mr. Nightmare really had them . . . If she'd been to his house and they'd been there, or if she'd missed a clue to where they were and she'd left without noticing . . . then she had to do this.

“Anyone want to fill me in?” Ethan asked, following.

“She's going to drink a dream,” Monster said.

“Okay. And?”

“And then she'll dream.”

Sophie hurried to the ledger and flipped through. She needed a flying dream, but not just a dreamer-flies-like-a-superhero kind of dream. All three of them needed to fly.

Not a plane. She wouldn't know how to fly that.

Magic carpet? Maybe. But not a runaway one.

Monster hopped onto the counter to look at the ledger with her. “I think whatever you bring out of the dream has to
want
to come out of the dream.”

“What do you mean?” Sophie asked.

“I've given it a lot of thought over the years—why me? Why not the bed or the blanket or the toys? There was an entire room of things, yet only I came out of the dream. I think it's because I wanted to come. In the moment you said you wished I could be your pet, I chose to be with you.”

Sophie looked at the ledger again. “So you think I have to convince a dream thing to come?”

“It's possible. Or maybe I came out because I'm furry and cute. Or it's the tentacles. Or it's random luck. I only have one data point.”

Ethan held out his hands. “Wait. Back up here. You came out of Sophie's dream?”

Sophie took a deep breath and hoped her parents would understand. “I don't dream, not normally. When I do . . . things come to life. That's where Monster came from. So I'm going to drink a dream with something that can fly us across town.”

Ethan's jaw dropped. He then shut it and nodded. “Yeah, that's not any crazier than anything that's happened so far. Okay, so what kind of flying thing?” He joined them at the ledger.

“Just like that?” Sophie asked. “You're not freaking out?”

He shrugged. “I'll freak out later. The school counselor calls it repression. Says it's an unhealthy coping mechanism. But at least I'm coping, right?” Looking over Sophie's shoulder, he pointed at a line. “What's that?”

Sophie tore her gaze from him and looked at the ledger. “Flying hippopotamus.”

“Not stealthy enough,” Monster said.

Sophie read on, skimming for relevant dreams. “Giant bat?”

“Possible.” Monster scampered over to the shelves. “No. Gone. It was filed under monsters, and it's missing with the others. Pity. That would have been fun.”

She scanned down the list, picking out a few more flying creatures. Dragons—all of those had been sold. Gryphons—also sold. Fairies—too small. Phoenixes—too fiery. Gargoyles—filed under monsters, so they were gone. “Winged ponies?”

Monster wrinkled his nose.

“They're meant to carry people,” Sophie said.

“But they're so sparkly,” Monster complained.

“All the monsters are gone. Besides, this isn't about looking good.”

“I always look good,” Monster said automatically, then sighed. “Fine. I'll find the ponies.” He climbed the shelves, sorted through a few bottles, and then selected one. Carrying it in his tentacle, he climbed down. “Check it first. It would be a shame to drink the dream and then discover the ponies are six inches tall.”

Carefully, as if she were holding the most fragile egg in the world, Sophie carried the bottle across the basement to the somnium.
Please work,
she thought as she poured it in the top.

The clouds swirled in the base of the somnium.

“What are we looking for?” Ethan asked.

“You'll see the dream here.” She pointed to the fattest part of the tube.

The blue sparkle touched the smoke, and Sophie leaned closer to the glass. Ethan squeezed next to her, and Monster put his front paws on the table and rose onto his hind legs to see. He tucked his tentacles underneath the somnium.

Images began to appear: the post office, the supermarket, the gas station, and then a house she didn't recognize. It was white with blue shutters. The windows were dark, as if smudged with soot, or as if nothing were outside. Dreams were often like that, with incomplete houses and hints of objects that implied full rooms. The dream was silent, of course—the somnium was always silent, another way watching a dream wasn't the same as experiencing one.

Sophie tried not to feel excited. She was doing this because she had to, because her parents were in danger (possibly), not because she was seizing the first excuse she'd had in years to drink a dream. She
had
said no.

The dreamer opened the door of the white house, stepped inside, and onto a cloud. Clouds were all around: a town shaped out of them. Houses were shaped out of clouds. Trees were puffy swirls of cloud. Rainbows arched between them. And then the winged ponies appeared: a herd of them, flying between the clouds.

One of the ponies halted in front of the dreamer. She climbed on and they flew, swooping and soaring, joining the herd as more rainbows shot into the sky around them.

Below, there was an ocean. All the ponies plunged into it, and then they were gone, and the dreamer was in a classroom clutching a pencil . . . The dream shattered as the teacher turned around with a mouth that filled his entire face. He stretched his mouth in a silent roar, which widened and widened until it swallowed the classroom like a whale in the water.

The dream went dark.

“Weird,” Ethan said.

“Actually that was reasonably coherent,” Sophie said. “You should see some of them. Completely useless for resale. This one will be hard to sell because it's a mix of nice parts and not nice. Buyers prefer the dreams with more consistency.” Or so her parents said. It felt strange trying to sound like an expert. “Guess I try to wake up before the part with the teacher.”

“You don't need to be afraid. I'll be right here with you the whole time,” Monster promised.

The dream dripped back into the bottle, and she picked it up, then turned to Ethan. “I need you to promise that you'll never tell anyone about this.” She clutched the bottle to her chest. If she was wrong about what was going on, her parents were going to be furious. But if she was right . . . Either way, she couldn't sit here, hide, and hope everything was okay. It was already very much not okay. “Please.”

He shrugged. “Still not clear what's going on.”

“That wasn't a promise.” Monster drew himself up taller on the counter. His tentacles writhed around him, making him look like an octopus with the ocean currents around him. “You will promise.”

Ethan took a step backward toward the stairs. “Sophie, I think your ‘housecat' is threatening me.”

Not for the first time, Sophie wondered what Monster had been like in the original dream, before she'd interfered. The dreamer must have woken up terrified. “He won't hurt you.”

“That is not an entirely correct assumption.” Monster bared his three rows of teeth. “Promise, and I won't. Don't promise, and you won't like the consequences.”

Sophie smacked Monster lightly. “Stop that.”

“This isn't the time for your delicate human sensibilities, Sophie. He needs to promise. Your safety depends on it.” Before she could stop him, Monster launched himself off the counter and across the floor toward Ethan. Sophie hurried after him, but Monster was quicker. He wrapped his tentacles around Ethan's wrists, black bands like handcuffs. “My Sophie is very special to me. You
will
promise.”

Trying to shake him off, Ethan shrank away. “Okay, okay, I promise.”

Monster released him so fast that Ethan staggered backward and bumped into a shelf. Bottles rocked and clinked into one another. Kneeling, Sophie scratched Monster on the head. “Uh, he's normally very sweet.” She'd been right never to bring friends home. She shot Monster a warning look and mouthed,
Behave.

Sweetly, Monster wrapped his tentacles around her neck. “Don't worry, Sophie. I'll be right here with you.” Tentacles around her shoulders, he led her to a beanbag chair in the corner. She sank into it.

Ethan hung back. “Now what happens?”

“Now, Sophie sleeps.”

“But what—”

“Shh.” Monster snuggled next to Sophie. She put her arm around him and stared at the bottle. The promise she'd made to her parents echoed in her head. She thought again of the backpack she'd seen on the kitchen table. She wished she was sure whether it was Lucy's. It could all still be a coincidence, including the gray giraffe.

There was one way to be sure, if she dared.

Taking off the stopper, Sophie drank the dream.

S
HE WAS ON THE STREET OUTSIDE THE POST OFFICE BUILDING.

Above the post office, the sky was smeared blue. On either side, the buildings were blurry, as if she were seeing them through cloudy glasses. All the windows were gray. She didn't know why she was here. Did she have to mail a letter? She opened the door to the post office . . .

Inside was a classroom. Back to the door, the teacher was writing on the chalkboard, and Sophie remembered in a rush: watching the dream in the somnium, sitting on the floor with Monster, drinking the bottle. But in the somnium, the teacher appeared at the end of the dream. She was messing up the order. She was supposed to find the winged ponies first.

Shutting the door, Sophie jogged away from the post office. The houses were indistinct smudges on either side of her. She craned her neck, looking for the white house with blue shutters. The street was silent. No cars, no buses, no bikes.

Behind her, she heard footsteps.

Glancing over her shoulder, she saw the teacher. His face was only a mouth. No eyes. No nose. He spoke: “You cannot escape me.”

His mouth began to open, wider and wider, and the post office was sucked into his mouth. A few buildings followed, like a painting ripped from a wall. This wasn't what was supposed to happen! She must have changed the dream.