I'm standing in a posh hotel lobby. Chandeliers gleam from above, scattering shimmering light across the floor, and just to my left lies a restaurant with white tablecloths and twinkling candles. Silverware clinks and a band plays traditional Bangla music. My hand gropes the air until I find a wall where I'm able to steady myself. A rush of bile fills my mouth and a piercing jab stabs against my temple.
I whimper.
Slowly I take even breaths. This transition is far more difficult than any other I've encountered, and if it was any other situation, I'd have faded right away. Without our chairs back at MaxLife's lab, this transition into the Dreamscape is hell.
"Dad," I whisper, reminding myself why I'm doing this. "Find him."
These thoughts pull the room into focus and I'm able to take one, two, three steps. I scan the crowds of indistinct faces in search of Mr. Bosu, our dreamer. I find him sitting at a table beside a massive buffet table piled high with mounds of food. He's talking to someone.
I weave through the restaurant full of faceless people until I come to a table where Tony sits. He's eating a giant plate of rice with vegetables with a stack of naan bread piled up on the side of the plate. A chagrined smile crosses his face.
"You can't be serious," I tell him, hands on my hips.
"It relaxes me." He shrugs. "Habit, you know? Besides, this naan. To die for."
Javier strolls past us, a frown on his face. "Focus, you two!"
Nodding, Tony sets down his fork and joins me as we ease into the chairs at a table beside Mr. Bosu. I pick up a fork, side glancing over at our dreamer who is with a woman at the table. The two aren't talking. The woman is passing spoons across the table, piling them high in front of Mr. Bosu.
"Spoons?" I ask questioningly to Tony who only shrugs and piles rice onto his naan.
I tip my chair back to get a better look at the woman, trying to look as nonchalant as possible. My guess is she's a foreigner to Bangladesh, maybe Chinese. Her black hair is tied back at the nape of her neck. She has large, luminous eyes and a full mouth lined with red lipstick. She's wearing a strapless, black sequined gown with a choker of diamonds ringing her neck. Basically, she is drop-dead gorgeous, and from the glazed look in Mr. Bosu's eyes, he agrees. There's something familiar about her that niggles at the corner of my mind, but I can't place it.
"Are we going to sit here all day while this lady passes him spoons?" Tony asks. "Because this is going nowhere fast."
"You're right," I say. "We need to shake things up."
I rise to my feet when I spy Sun and myself sitting at the table on the other side of him. I freeze, shocked because I've never actually seen myself in a dream. At one of Dad's conferences, I remember him saying hypothetically it could happen if the dreamer knew the Dream Walker, but that has never been the case since we didn't know our clients.
Except for Jake, that is.
I ease back into my seat. "Tony, look! Sun and I are sitting at that table. We must be a part of the dream."
"Ooo." Tony scrunches his face and shakes his head. "Not cool. You've got to keep it on the low. If he sees you, it could freak him out and wake him up. Which we definitely don't want to happen."
I consider my options. In the past, I've always been the one who was able to think outside of the box and break through the boundaries that were in our path to help us stay in the dream. But now that I'm actually in the dream, it changes everything.
Javier hunkers down at my side. "You have to fade. If he sees you, it could ruin our opportunity."
His tone is insistent, unwavering. Back at MaxLife, I would have to listen to him. It's part of our protocol since I'm technically still an intern. Javier's been our team leader ever since I started working for the company. In our handbook, it's listed that to disobey the team leader, we are subjected to a reprimand. I've never questioned his authority before, but then my dad's never been kidnapped, forcing me to break nearly every rule in our code of ethics.
"I can't leave," I say. "You know I'm the best here at thinking outside of the box. I'll just stay in the background and watch. As long as he doesn't see me, we should be fine."
"It's your hair." Javier rubs his temples and throws his free hand up in frustration. "Sometimes it works in your favor to get the dreamer's attention, but in this case, it's not."
Unconsciously my fingers twirl around a strand of my hair. Deep down, I know he's right, but I can't. I just can't leave. If we don't get information from this guy, it means our trail has gone cold and I can't think beyond that because the ramifications are too huge.
So I shake my head ever so slightly, pressing my lips together. I imagine myself with different colored hair.
"White?" Javier asks. "No offense, but I don't think you could pass for a grandma."
"It's the best I can do," I mutter. It's not a great disguise, but it will work if I stay focused on it. "Now get off my case."
"Fine." He shoots me a scathing look. "But if this goes down, it's all your fault."
Ouch. But yeah, I deserve that.
Javier moves to a table near Mr. Bosu who is now sitting completely surrounded by golden spoons. Meanwhile, Sun and my dream self are inching closer to Mr. Bosu's table. My dream self holds a large bowl full of dark liquid and I have a twisted grin on my face. Seriously, I resemble the witch from Snow White holding out a shiny apple. Except I'm wearing jeans and my nose doesn't have warts bubbling over it.
"Girl," Tony says. "Look at that evil gleam in your eyes. What is that?"
"I don't think he likes me." I grab the edge of the table as my dream self looms over Mr. Bosu and his piles of spoons.
"What are you doing with that bowl?" Tony asks.
"I've no idea."
Dark liquid pours out from the bowl, pooling over his head, shoulders, and body, and then it cascades over the spoons. But the liquid doesn't stop there. It rushes through the whole restaurant, washing over the pristine whiteness into a dark inkiness. The liquid rises higher and higher, forcing Tony and me to stand.
My dream self still holds the bowl, and the black liquid continues to pour out like a waterfall. Everyone in the restaurant begins screaming and the beautiful woman at Mr. Bosu's table vanishes. Mr. Bosu waves his arms around, screaming.
"We have to calm him down," I say. "He's entering the REM cycle, which means he's about to wake up!"
Suddenly calm music washes across the room. Mr. Bosu's screaming ceases and his eyes blink rapidly. The people in the restaurant stop yelling and splashing.
It's Bach's cello Suite No. 1 in G Minor—one of Mom's favorites. Instantly, I'm reminded of her, and a flash of guilt streaks through me, churning in my stomach until I feel like I'm going to throw up. Yes, my dad is important, but I also have a mom who is sitting at home worried I might never return. I swallow the lump in my throat. Would she ever recover if she lost both Dad and me?
No, she wouldn't.
The room shifts until everything vanishes except a spotlight beaming down on Sun, sitting in a chair, eyes closed as if drinking in the music, and Mr. Bosu. The music plays on while the rest of us hover at the edge of the Void. A door opens and a wedge of light slices through the darkness. Mr. Bosu turns his attention to the door and begins walking, and then running, toward it.
"He's transitioning!" Tony says.
Javier and Tony burst into a sprint to follow him.
But I don't move. All I can think about is Mom all alone, that distant look in her eyes the night I left. Maybe I should never have left.
My legs remain rigid as I watch them rush through the door. Bach continues to play, Sun's bow flying over the strings, her eyes closed as if she's engulfed in the melody.
The door slams shut, and darkness swoops around me.