At last The Friend said, “I am going now” Then, as if it did not want
them to interpret its recent display of compassion as a sign of
weakness, it added: if you attempt to leave, you will die”
“When will you be back?” Holly asked.
“Do not sleep. ”
“We’re going to have to sleep sooner or later,” Holly said as the amber
light turned red and the room seemed to be washed in blood.
“Do not sleep. ”
“It’s two in the morning,” she said.
“Dreams are doorways.” Holly flared up: “We can’t stay awake forever,
damn it!”
The light in the limestone was snuffed out.
The Friend was gone.
Somewhere people laughed. Somewhere music played and dancers danced,
and somewhere lovers strained toward ecstasy.
But in the high room of the mill, designed for storage and now stacked
to the ceiling with an anticipation of violence, the mood was decidedly
grim.
Holly loathed being so helpless. Throughout her life she had been a
woman of action, even if the actions she took were usually destructive
rather than constructive. When a job turned out to be less satisfying
than she had hoped, she never hesitated to resign, move on.
When a relationship soured or just proved uninteresting, she was always
quick to terminate it.
If she had often retreated from problems-from the responsibilities of
being a conscientious journalist when she had seen that journalism was
as corrupt as anything else, from the prospect of love, from putting
down roots and committing to one place-well, at least retreat was a form
of action. Now she was denied even that.
The Friend had that one good effect on her. It was not going to let her
retreat from this problem.
For a while she and Jim discussed the latest visitation and went over
the remaining questions on her list, to which they made changes and
additions. The most recent portion of her ongoing interview with The
Friend had resulted in some interesting and potentially useful
information. It was only potentially useful, however, because they both
still felt that nothing The Friend said could be relied upon to be true.
By 3 :15 in the morning, they were too weary to stand and too to
continue sitting. They pulled their sleeping bags together and
stretched out side by side, on their backs, staring at the domed
ceiling.
To help guard against sleep, they left the gas lantern at its brightest
setting. As they waited for The Friend to return, they kept talking,
not about anything of importance, small talk of every kind, anything to
keep their minds occupied. It was difficult to doze off in the middle
of a conversation; and if one did slip away, the other would know it by
the lack of a response. They also held hands, her right in his left-the
logic being that even during a brief pause in the conversation, if one
of them started to take a nap, the other would be warned by the sudden
relaxation of the sleeper’s grip.
Holly did not expect to have difficulty staying awake. In her
university days she had pulled all-nighters before exams or when papers
were due, and had stayed awake for thirty-six hours without much of a
struggle.
During her early years as a reporter, when she’d still believed that
journalism mattered to her, she had labored away all night on a story,
poring over research or listening yet again to interview tapes or
sweating over the wording of a paragraph. She had missed nights of
sleep in recent years, as well, if only because she was occasionally
plagued by insomnia. She was a night owl by nature anyway. Piece of
cake.
But though she had not yet been awake twenty-four hours since bolting
out of bed in Laguna Niguel yesterday morning, she felt the sandman
sliding up against her, whispering his subliminal message of sleep,
sleep, sleep. The past few days had been a blur of activity and
personal change, both of which could be expected to take a toll of her
resources. And some nights she had gotten too little rest, only in part
because of the dreams Dreams are doorways. Sleep was dangerous, she had