Dreamside - By Graham Joyce Page 0,4

the real psychopaths."

"What's worse is that the dreams make more sense than what happens when I'm awake. When I was talking to you this morning I was convinced that it was just part of another repeater and that I'd put the phone down and wake up."

"But you should have known that I'd pulled you out with the telephone. It was one of our old techniques for burrowing out. Or burrowing in."

“I know that, but I didn't ever trust it. I don't entirely trust that business with the book either."

"Can you remember anything the professor said about the repeater?"

"Only that he described it as a side effect, and said to try to enjoy it."

"Yes, he was helpful like that."

"When did it start happening with you?"

"Like you, around Christmas. Infrequently at first, then with regularity. I thought it was me; but it wasn't just repeated dreams of waking up. It was some of the other stuff."

"You went back to that place?" Lee was shocked.

"Not exactly. But I felt an overwhelming pull. Almost irresistible. I've been fighting it. That's why I decided I had to get in touch, find out what was happening to you."

"I know. I felt it too, pulling me back there, I mean. It was strong. I fought it. That's when the repeaters started to really take hold."

"Exactly. The more we fight off going back, the more the repeaters go to work on us."

"But what would happen if we did give in? What would happen if we really did go back there? I couldn't face it."

"At first I wondered whether you'd been there," said Ella, "whether you were up to something, trying to make contact with me."

"No."

"It was just a thought. I realize now."

"Ella, there have been many times when I've wanted you. But never like that. It didn't seem to hold so much fear for me when I was younger. Now even the thought of it can make me break into a cold sweat."

Ella ran a hand through her hair, silver moon and stars glinting at her ears. "So where does that leave us?" she asked. "If it's not you and it's not me . . . Oh God, look at us, Lee, just look at us. What a pair of casualties. I'm trying to be brave, Lee, really I am, but I'm scared. So scared."

Then Lee did what he should have done when he first saw Ella standing outside his house; he put his arms around her and kissed her, and let her cry for both of them. And when Ella cried that evening it was not only for the terror of the dreams that hung in chains around them. It was also for the unburdened, uncaring children they had been thirteen years ago, and for the thirteen years of distance and loss that had recast lovers as strangers.

"Which one of them is doing it, do you think?"

"We can't be sure that it's either of them."

An open fire burned brightly in the hearth. Ella sat close to it, her legs drawn up under her. Lee sat behind her in an armchair. "You're wrong. One of them is doing it. One of them is calling it all back. Is it him, do you think? Or is it her? We have to find out. Then we can stop them."

"I was afraid you might say that."

"No time for faint hearts," said Ella.

"You really are making a lot of assumptions. You can't know that the others are responsible for this."

"So what are your ideas?"

"Me?"

"Exactly. How long do you think it's going to be before these dreams, these repeaters turn into something else? Something more dangerous."

Lee felt like a man in a paperweight snowstorm. Everything in his life had been settled and silenced. Then Ella had arrived, had shaken the glass, and was now watching him in his blizzard.

"When push comes to shove," said Ella, "there's only one question. Is it him? Or is it her?"

“Him, her; what's the difference? It's happening."

"I think it's her. I think we'll find that she's responsible."

"Look, Ella, I'm really not convinced that we should get in touch with the others. It might not do any good. Sleeping dogs and all that. It might just make things worse. A whole lot worse. There must be something else we can do without running to them."

"We've been through this once already. It's not a question of running to them. It's a matter of not running away from them."

Lee wouldn't have minded running away from all of them, Ella included. He