If Only in My Dreams (13 page)

“I know it has. But you’re going to get through this. You’re a tough cookie.”

“Well, today, I think the cookie is crumbling.”

After hanging up, she steps out onto the street into a steady drizzle falling from a gray sky.

She’ll have to walk all the way home to Eleventh Street. That’s over thirty blocks… in shoes that feel like torture devices.

She’ll just have to take it slowly. At least the fresh air will give her a chance to clear her head.

Forty-Second Street is teeming with midday traffic and pedestrians. She makes her way to the opposite side and rounds the corner onto Park Avenue, heading downtown toward her apartment.

Wishing she had an umbrella, she notes that it’s an unseasonably warm day for December.

How strange that it was just snowing…

In my dream
.

That’s all it was. She hit her head on the train before blocking her scene, then blanked out everything that happened after that—like finding her way out of the vintage train car and onto a southbound train—all the while dreaming that she had gone back in time.

It just seemed so real.…

All of it.

Especially Jed Landry.

Why was he a part of it?

Then again, why wouldn’t he be?

She supposes it only makes sense that she would dream about him.… She was, after all, preparing herself to fall in love with him.

Just… not with the
real
Jed.

With Michael playing Jed.

If she was going to fantasize about Jed Landry in her dreams, wouldn’t she see him as Michael? Why would she see him as… himself?

It isn’t as though she’s even given much thought to that black-and-white photograph she glimpsed weeks ago in the
Glenhaven Park library, in the local history room. She’s given it no thought at all, really.

Yet she must have filed Jed Landry’s image away in her subconscious.

Right, and it was jarred loose when I smacked my head
, she thinks wryly.

And now that he’s in her brain, floating around—well, she can’t seem to shake him. She can still see him as clearly as she did when he was standing right in front of her.…

In the dream
.

Just as long as she keeps reminding herself that none of it is real—that Jed Landry isn’t alive at this very moment in some alternative universe—she’ll be fine.

Because if he were…

Well, she might just have a bittersweet afterthought about leaving him behind.

At last, Clara limps the final few steps along West Eleventh Street toward her building. She averts her eyes as she passes a trench coat–clad man from a neighboring building. She can feel him watching her from under his black umbrella as he clings to his dog’s leash, waiting for it to do its business along the curb.

She can just imagine what she looks like at this point: still wearing the vintage costume, soaked to the bone, her hair bedraggled and makeup undoubtedly smeared all over her face. If she had collected a dollar for every curious stare she attracted in the course of her journey down from Grand Central Station, she could have bought a car in no time and driven herself the rest of the way.

Grimacing, she forces her swollen feet up the steps to the door and buzzes the building super’s apartment on the ground floor.

If he isn’t here, she’s going to have to get to a phone and call Jason. He still has his set of keys… if he didn’t toss them into the East River.

Please be home, Mr. Kobayashi. Please let one thing go right for me today. Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease
…

“Yes?”

“Mr. Kobayashi, it’s Clara McCallum. I’m locked out. Would you mind…?”

The door buzzes promptly, unlocking with a click.

She opens it and steps in out of the rain at long last. Relieved to be home, she closes the door behind her and leans against it with a sigh.

What a nightmare
.

Beyond the inner vestibule door, she can see Isamu Kobayashi, an elderly man with surprisingly jet-black hair. He ascends from his apartment and shuffles toward the door, wearing a robe and slippers, as usual. She undoubtedly caught him in the midst of what seems to be his favorite pastime: watching one of the old cop shows to which he’s addicted.

He was doing that the very first time she met him, when she first came to see the apartment. She could hear the distinct
Dragnet
theme blasting from his television.

She remembers the details of that sweltering July day very well, with good reason, because something strange happened. Something she hasn’t been able to explain to this day.

The moment Mr. Kobayashi first saw her standing there in the hallway with Kim, the Realtor, his jaw dropped.

At the time, that didn’t strike her as unusual; he was probably a fan of her soap. Or so she assumed.

“Wait here a minute,” he said, and she assumed he was going to get the keys to the vacant apartment or something.

That wasn’t it.

He handed her a package wrapped in brown paper and marked with her handwritten name, all but faded. It was wrapped with string and sealed with a yellowed, brittle strip of tape.

“This is for you,” he said.

“Oh, how sweet. Thank you. What is it?”

“I don’t know.” At her questioning look, he elaborated, “A man dropped it off and said to give it to you whenever you came.”

Puzzled, Clara smiled politely, tucked the package into her bag, and exchanged a knowing glance with Kim, assuming the old man must be slightly senile or something.

She fell in love with the apartment at first sight, and agreed to rent it on the spot.

It wasn’t until she got home later that night that she remembered the package.

She opened it somewhat gingerly, uncertain of what she was going to find.

Certainly not the fuzzy red mittens with the white snowflake pattern her grandmother knit for her mother when she was a little girl. Along with a matching red hat, they were part of a set Jeanette had given to Clara years ago, but she rarely wore them. Mittens just weren’t in style; she preferred sleek leather gloves.

She always assumed the hat and mittens were tucked away in a dresser drawer, but when she opened it to check,
only the hat was there. Puzzled, she put the mittens in with it, and the set was whole again.

Obviously, she unwittingly lost the mittens somehow, at some point.

But how on earth had they come into Mr. Kobayashi’s possession?

Even he seemed clueless. When she asked him, he just repeated that a man had given him the package and told him to hold it for her.

“When was this?” she asked.

His answer told her that he really was senile. “Oh, years ago. When I was a little boy.”

Not wanting to embarrass him, Clara dropped the subject. To this day, she’s stumped about how her mittens landed in her super’s hands, but at least she hadn’t lost them forever. She wore them all last winter, and plans to this year as well.

But at this moment, she isn’t dwelling on the mittens as she comes face-to-face with Mr. Kobayashi.

“Oh! What happened to you?” he asks in his Asian-accented English. “You look like a drowned rat.”

“I know… I’m sorry to bother you, but I don’t have my keys.”

“You got mugged? Did they steal your purse?”

Clara hesitates, then nods. It’s easier than attempting to explain what really happened. She simply doesn’t have the energy to provide even an abridged version.

Unfortunately, in addition to watching old cop shows, Mr. Kobayashi’s other favorite pastime is conversation. He’s the chattiest man Clara has ever known—and oddly, he has rarely come across as senile since that first day she met him. Maybe that was just a momentary memory lapse.

For the most part, she usually doesn’t mind chatting with him. But today, right now, she just wants to get into her apartment and out of these clothes.

“You poor thing! They attacked you! You’re all bruised!” Mr. Kobayashi has spotted her forehead. “Let me call the fuzz for you.”

The fuzz?

Okay, he’s definitely seen a few too many outdated cop shows. She wants to smile, but manages not to. He’s so earnest, so concerned.

“I’ll call the doctor, too,” he offers.

“No, I don’t need a doctor or—or the
fuzz,
Mr. Kobayashi, but thank you. I’m sure I’ll be okay.”

“But you’re hurt! You need ice on that.”

That’s it. His kindness, combined with the reminder of Jed Landry gently applying an ice pack to her head, suddenly has Clara feeling like she’s going to cry.

She opens her mouth to explain that she’s really fine, but she can’t seem to push the words past the lump of emotion in her throat.

“Did you get a good look at the perp so you can ID him in a lineup?” Mr. Kobayashi asks then, sounding like Starsky, Hutch, and Baretta all rolled into one.

Okay, now she feels like she’s going to laugh
and
cry all at once.

She manages to tell him, straight-faced, that the perp got away.

“That’s a shame. But maybe he dumped your purse somewhere. Usually these swine just want the bread and toss the rest.”

“The bread?” she echoes in bewilderment, before realizing that he’s talking about the money.

The bread
.

Bread
…

Bakery
…

Doughboy
…

Her momentary amusement with Mr. Kobayashi’s outdated cop jargon segues right back to Jed Landry with disarming ease.

Jed, and his comment about his father having been a doughboy.

The thing is, if that was all a dream… then how could it contain information she’s never heard of?

For a moment, she’s stricken anew by the possibility that she might really have traveled back to 1941 this morning.

Then she comes to her senses.

Who says any of those details in the dream were authentic? You probably just made up the stuff you never heard of before
.

Like doughboy.

“Mr. Kobayashi,” she says, dragging her errant thoughts back to the matter at hand, “if you could just let me into my apartment, I would really appreciate it. I know I’ll be fine. I just need to rest.”

“First, you need to get ice,” he says, pulling out his key ring and leading the way to the stairs. “Then call the fuzz. Then rest. Okay?”

“Okay.”
Except for the part about the fuzz and the ice
.

Shaking his head as he climbs the steps above her, the diminutive man says, “Such a shame this happen to nice dame like you.”

This time, she does smile. He can’t see her.

“I’ve lived in this city all my years—seventy years, you know that? Seventy years right in this house.”

She does know that. He likes to tell anyone who will listen about what the neighborhood was like in the old days. The neighborhood, his life, the house…

She knows that his parents were household help for the Sloans, the last people to live here when it was a one-family home. After Mr. Sloan passed away years ago, his heirs sold it for a small fortune and it was turned into apartments like most of the other townhouses on the block. Apparently, Mr. Kobayashi came with the building.

“All these years, the city has gone downhill. Now, nobody is safe around here. You can’t be too careful.”

“No, I guess you can’t.”

“You poor thing. You’re a nice person. Why did this have to happen to you?”

“It’s just been a really bad day,” she admits, her smile vanishing.

“You should watch TV when you rest,” he suggests. “
Dragnet
is good. It’s coming on soon. That will take your mind off troubles, cheer you up.”

Dragnet. Right, very cheerful
.

They’ve reached her door. He unlocks it and she steps over the threshold. “Thank you so much, Mr. Kobayashi.”

“You so welcome. Oh! I almost forgot!” He slaps himself on his hair, still jet-black despite his advanced age.

“What?”

“Somebody was here looking for you today.”

“Looking for me? Who was it?”

“She didn’t say her name. Just rang the bell and asked if you live here. I told her no, in case she was a nutcase, but
she pointed to your last name on the buzzer panel,” he says apologetically.

“That’s okay,” Clara says with a sigh. “What did she look like?”

“Old lady. White hair. Glasses.” He shrugs.

It was probably another die-hard
One Life to Live
fan. They pop up from time to time, seeking autographs and complaining about Arabella Saffron’s untimely demise.

“I’ll check on you later,” Mr. Kobayashi says, turning to leave.

“Oh, that’s not necessary. I really am fine.”

“I’ll check on you,” he says, and departs with a wave, shuffling back down the stairs in his robe and slippers.

Safe and warm in her apartment, Clara unwedges her feet from the hideous shoes and kicks them into the corner. In the bathroom, she slips off the wet clothes and throws them into the claw-foot tub. Oddly, the stench of stale cigarette smoke again reaches her nostrils. She picks up the jacket she was wearing and sniffs it.

It definitely smells like smoke.

Which proves…

Absolutely nothing.

Sitting on the closed toilet seat, she unpeels the seamed silk stockings, which are hopelessly snagged, and deposits them into the trash.

Looking down again at her breast, she gingerly touches the gauze bandage. The site beneath it is still sore. But in a few days…

The lump will be cut out, leaving her permanently disfigured.

Oh, my God
.

Without warning, a wail escapes her throat. Even as she tells herself that she should just be damned grateful for the surgery and her prognosis for survival—and grateful that she isn’t losing her entire breast—she can’t help but mourn the imminent loss.

She buries her face and sobs, long and hard and loud. If the flood of bitter tears alone could wash away the heartache, she would be healed.

Instead, she merely feels ravaged in their wake, more depleted than ever before.

She rises to her feet shakily, takes her robe from the hook on the back of the door, and puts it on, needing to hide the bandage and all it signifies.