We Won't Feel a Thing (18 page)

Riley folded the printout as the bus delivered them to their city stop. The warning was more sinister than he would have liked, but he felt a little better. Advertisements for those STOP SMOKING, STUPID! subliminal persuasion CDs used to pop up on late-night television, when he and Rachel watched British sitcoms and shows about ghost hunters, and the glowing personal testimonies always seemed very sincere and trustworthy.

“Ready?”

He looked up. Rachel stood in the aisle, staring at the floor, dangerously lovely with her hair mussed and the pen mark smeared across her cheek like blood. He gulped and got to his feet.

“Let’s do this,” he said.

***

Oneira Sleep Solutions was located on the seventh floor of the Forthwith Corporate Plaza, down the hall from Double Rock Investments and Tandem Security Services. They had found Oneira online after David had prescribed absolute quiet; with Riley’s parents loudly rediscovering each other at regular intervals, the Woodlawn house would not do. The Oneira photos had looked promising: immaculate hardwood floors; white walls hung with pleasant, unchallenging abstract art; and—best of all—two rows of high-tech, soundproofed sleep pods with built-in privacy shields.

Rachel and Riley double-checked the suite number and hurried down the hall to 702. The double doors were white frosted glass with ONEIRA etched across them—ONE on the left door and IRA on the right—like a message on a steamed-up mirror. A faint tune of mysterious origin drifted into their ears.

Rachel tried the doors. Locked.

“Uh-oh,” said Riley.

Rachel stood on tiptoe. She peered through the N on the left door.

“Anyone in there?” Riley peered through the R on the right door. “—Oh!”

Between the rows of sleep pods, two young men with ONEIRA nametags slow-danced in each other’s arms. They were exactly the same height. The man in the blue gingham shirt and gray tie had dark skin and long rust-colored dreadlocks; the one in the tight red hoodie had pale skin, more freckles than strictly necessary, and a mohawk the color of sweet tea. They gazed into each other’s eyes as they waltzed the polished floor.

“Aww,” said Riley.

Rachel rapped on the door.

They heard scuffling and muttering on the other side. The mohawked boy unlatched the door and pulled it open. The song amplified. Rachel and Riley recognized it from the college station, an off-kilter waltz called “Desperately Unrehearsed.”

“I’m so so sorry!” said the boy.

“We have a 10:00,” Rachel said, reading his nametag.
“…Flann.”

“I know, I
know
!” Flann clutched his head in a hammy show of remorse that made them think of Tilly Merriam. “I forgot to write you down.”

“Nicely bungled, F,” said the dreadlocked boy. He snapped a check-in sheet to a clipboard. “How could you just forget?”

“They called in the middle of that fight. About
Retrograde Motion
?” Flann turned to his customers and jerked a thumb at his partner. “Clancy thinks the new Chronic Dukes album is their best one since
American Stereo.”

“Objectively, it is.”

“Objectively, it’s repetitive, self-indulgent, and yawning with wasted potential.”

Clancy grinned. “So it’s you, but in album form.”

“Don’t mind us. Please,
please
.” Flann gave Clancy a wicked eyebrow and mounted the swivel-stool behind the front desk, his arm jostling a big bowl that held two goldfish. The bowl was labeled WOOFER & TWEETER with gold stick-on letters. “Let’s get you set up,” said Flann.

Clancy handed Riley the check-in sheet and accepted their payment from Rachel. Flann called up a file on the computer and started rattling away at the keyboard.

“‘Kay. You guys booked a two-hour interval?”

“Correct,” said Rachel.

“Would you like to upgrade to three for just fifteen dollars and ninety-nine cents more?”

“No thank you.”

“Sure thing; had to ask. Any major health issues?”

“No,” said Rachel.

“Sleep disorders? Insomnia? Night terrors?”

“No.”

“Either of you claustrophobic?”

“No,” said Rachel.

“I am,” said Riley. “But I’m okay if she’s around.”

“Awwwwwww!” Flann pressed a hand to his heart. “You
guys
.”

“Please don’t
awww
the customers.” Clancy tilted a bottle of fish food over Woofer and Tweeter’s bowl and gave it two precise taps. “Paul is his favorite Beatle, if you haven’t guessed.”

Flann made a great show of ignoring him. “Now, what sleep sounds would you like in your pods? We have Whale Songs, Rainforest, Rolling Surf—”

“We brought our own sound system.” Rachel unzipped the duffel bag. “Is that okay?”

Flann peeked in the bag. Then he slid off the stool just so he could stagger backwards.

“What what
what
,” he said, jabbing a finger at the console, “is
that
?”

Rachel glanced at Riley. She wanted to kiss him as soon as she did. She looked away fast.

“We…can’t say,” said Riley.

Rachel nodded. “It’s a specialized piece of proprietary—”

“Clance. C’mere. They’ve got like, some distant cousin of the old PanAudio 4000—I mean, I’ve never even
seen
this model.”

“Seriously?”

Before Rachel or Riley could say a word, Flann and Clancy had lifted the console from the duffel bag and enthroned it on the swivel-stool.

“I LOVE this. It’s so Kubrick,” Flann said.

“Never seen one of these in white.”

“This looks like the version with the built-in 8-track, but where are the speakers?”

“Oh, interesting. There’s an MP3 player—look.”

“Oh-em-gee, this is vintage, Clance. It’s a first-gen Xego. I can’t believe it still works!”

“How many gigs is it?”

“Um.” Rachel stuck her hands on her hips.

“Hang on, hang on!” Flann held up a hand. “Look at this glow-in-the-dark clickwheel.”

Clancy shook his head. “Flann, we shouldn’t—”

“Can we peek at your songs, pretty please?” Flann fiddled with the MP3 player. “We love seeing what—”

“It’s private!” Rachel grabbed it back.

“That’s okay. We don’t even have to look. We can see your musical Venn diagram with like, perfect clarity…” Flann stepped back and framed them with his hands. “Clance, you take her.”

Clancy sighed. “Ahh, I don’t know. She’s not hardcore enough for horrorfunk, but she likes to think she is. Mostly anti-folk with the punk kicked up a notch: Armada Tramps, Mannequin Project, Zuzu Omari. Some early Pretenders thrown in; maybe some cock-rock poseurs like Thirsty Herd.”

Flann nodded. “And he’s all about coffee-shop cuddlecore, sunshine pop, and—I don’t know, neo-surf? He’s got the first two Modern Shirts albums for sure; Elk Artist’s
Abstract Shore
EP; a few Demifilth songs for when he wants to feel like a badass. Maybe a weird soft spot for Fleetwood Mac. And then in the middle there’s this island of overlap where they both like—”

“Moody, literate Britpop,” Flann and Clancy said.

“Wonderfool,” said Flann.

“Slumberjack,” said Clancy.

Rachel closed her eyes. She pictured her hair turning into golden snakes, like Queen Vesuvia at her most insane and glorious. “We are
not
a Venn diagram,” she said. “And Thirsty Herd are not ‘cock-rock poseurs.’”

“I kind of agree,” said Flann. “
Return of the Harsh
is pretty boss.”

“Please.” Clancy rolled his eyes. “They’ve been useless since
Apologies.
After Grinhall left it was all downhill. ‘Oh, no! We don’t need him! It’s not like we’re missing our soul now—’”

“Excuse us!” Riley shoved himself between Clancy and Flann and rescued the console. Then, without a word, he steered Rachel down the aisle of sleep pods.

“Well done.” She studied the side of his face. “I mean, usually you let me—”

“I know.” He white-knuckled the strap on the duffel bag. “I think it’s time for ‘usually’ to stop.”

“Right.” She bit her lip. Now was not the time to find his assertiveness attractive.

Rachel and Riley chose two pods beneath a painting of clouds. They put the console on the endtable between the pods and placed Bob and Athena on top for luck. When the two sets of headphones were plugged into a splitter and the MP3 player was cued up, Riley stood very straight and extended his hand.

“See you in two hours?”

Rachel shook his hand lightly. “Be careful in your dream.”

“Yep.”

“Watch out for mothmen and three-legged dogs.”

“Okay.”

“Ri—”

“The longer you shake my hand,” he noted gently, “the more likely it is that I’ll kiss you again.”

She dropped his hand.

“Sorry,” she said.

They climbed in the pods and tugged down the white privacy shades, sealing themselves inside.

The soft deep-red cushions in the pods smelled of chocolate and the perfumes of strangers. The hiss and swish of the Auditory Intervention track melted them into half-sleep in seconds; actively avoiding each other had burned up all their energy. Their bodies went boneless. Through the translucent shades, they saw the shadows of Flann and Clancy waltzing in the aisle. They closed their eyes on the perfect couple, perfectly in tune.

They opened their eyes in dreamland.

***

“Hey,” said Riley.

“Hey yourself,” said Rachel.

“Didn’t expect you to be here.”

Rachel and Riley sat facing each other in near-dark. They wore matching white shirts printed with sound waves. They could barely make out their surroundings; the only thing they could see was a stretch of gold bars beside them.

“Am I in your dream or are you in mine?” said Rachel.

Riley shrugged. “Maybe we’re in each other’s.”

“Whoaaa.” Rachel glanced from side to side. “You just blew my mind.”

“Should we call for some light?”

“Worth a shot.
Light!”

Rachel clapped her hands. It sounded like a thunder-boom, the one that had broken their shed embrace. A chain of fluorescent lights popped on. They saw where they were. The gold bars were part of a railing at the top of a double staircase, which afforded them a spectacular view of the largest, most elaborate thrift shop they had ever seen.

Rachel let out a happy gasp. Riley rushed to the railing. The walls were light purple, like the walls of Jonah’s Junque, but this place stretched on and on as far as the eye could see. It was exactly the kind of store they loved: all random racks and mismatched shelves, the chaos whispering promises of cheap hidden treasures around every corner. A huge metal sign creaked from the ceiling beams: THE ECHO LOCATION.

“Let’s go!” Rachel was already halfway down the stairs.

They poked around in the first aisle, which was labeled ANIMALS with an ear-shaped sign. Every shelf was crowded with wooden and ceramic boxes and figurines. Each one had a gold windup key on its base, and each was marked with a round sticker in red, blue, or purple.

“Weird,” said Rachel.

Riley picked up a figurine of a black three-legged dog, stickered in purple. He wound it, his fingers trembling a little. When he released the key, he heard the bark again, the same bark that chased them through the forest and up a tree on his thirteenth birthday.

“Percy,”
they said.

Rachel picked up another purple-stickered figure—a parrot in a brass cage. She turned the key and heard Sophie, the macaw in the lobby of Aunt Jerrie’s inn.
Mayday!
the bird said, like she had the day after Rachel and Riley held hands on the 7B balcony.
Mayday! Mayday! Anchors aweigh!

“Wow,” said Riley.

Rachel put Sophie down gingerly, as if the figurine might come to life and snap her finger off. They ventured farther down the aisle and saw more things they recognized: a porcelain hamster with a blue sticker on its screechy wheel; a red-stickered figure of Poe, the talking stuffed raven Arthur Seton gave Rachel for her seventh birthday.

Riley touched his hamster. It was nice to see him again. “Blue for mine,” he said. “Red for yours.”

“Purple for ours.” Rachel hugged Poe.

They heard a click-clack from a distant aisle. Heavy slow footsteps. They froze.

“We’re not alone,” said Rachel.

“Let’s investigate,” said Riley.

“Why are you brave?”

“Sorry.”

“I like it.”

“Don’t like it too much,” he said.

“Right. I won’t.”

They tiptoed out of the ANIMALS section and hurried down the thrift store’s main aisle, passing dozens of signs. They caught glimpses: AMUSEMENT PARKS. BIRTHDAYS. CARS. COMMERCIAL JINGLES. Shelf upon shelf of music boxes shaped like their sound-memories. Carousels, the jingle bells on Jonah’s door, Mr. Woodlawn’s old van that horked and coughed when it started.

They ran until they caught up with the footsteps.

Calm and measured, the steps came from an aisle marked FALL SOUNDS. When Rachel and Riley rounded the corner, they spotted David Kerning halfway down the aisle. He wore his crisp white lab coat and carried a large basket.

“Hey!” Riley waved. “David—!”

“Shh,”
said Rachel.

“Why?”

“You’ll break his concentration.”

David didn’t seem to notice them. He reached in the basket and pulled out a white music box shaped like the console and stamped with a WAVES logo. Carefully, he wound the silver key on the box and slid it on the shelf between two figurines, a glittery crackling fire and a brown ceramic boot crunching a pile of leaves. Whistling a song they didn’t know, he took another identical music box from the basket and walked on, scanning the shelves for its proper home.

“Wow, look at him go,” whispered Riley.

“He looks very official,” said Rachel.

“I guess he knows what he’s doing,” said Riley. “How does he know where to put them?”

“I’m sure there’s an algorithm.”

“What do you think the messages say?”

Rachel sized up Riley. “They’re probably telling me wicked queens should never kiss worrywart artists.”

“And that your grammar obsession is the sign of a deranged mind.”

“And that it’s not worth loving someone you’re just going to leave.”