stare in the middle of the fucking night. We have four meetings tomorrow. I need to be sharp, I can’t deal with this.”
“I think you need to make peace with your father,” Julian said.
“What?”
“I know. It’s not easy. He hasn’t been . . . you’re the child, and he’s the parent; you’re not supposed to make the first move. But he isn’t going to. He’s only the way he is because he lost his own father too young, and he doesn’t know how to be a dad to anyone past the age of twelve.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I told you my dad didn’t have a dad.”
“The one-armed man who raised him.”
“You’re nuts. And how did you know he was one-armed? Did I tell you that?”
“I don’t know,” Julian said. “Did you?” The one-armed man walked through nearly every vivid street of Julian’s dreams. Someone in his dreams was always without arms, or fingers, or eyes. Especially Julian. In his dreams, he was always one-eyed and mutilated. He took a breath. “Ash, do you remember how you once told me you wished you could live your life over, so you could live it without regret?”
“I never said that. Live your life over? Now that sounds like a nightmare.”
“You said it. You said you wanted a rewrite.”
“Jules, I promise you, it’s not even close to something I think, much less would say.”
“Your dad lives with a lot of regrets. Let him know who you are. You’ll be glad you did.”
“Yeah, ’kay. I’m going to get right on that. Can I go to bed now?”
“Trust me, Ashton, there comes a time in every man’s life when he says or does something that surprises the shit out of him. The regret thing may not sound like you, but in a few years, you won’t recognize yourself. You’ll stop being the person you are and become a person who says shit like that.”
“So have I said it to you or not?”
“One hundred percent you said it to me. What has your story been so far? You’ve been wandering like most of us, living in all the long minutes of your life. And you’ll continue to have your bright days before you end up alive in the horror.”
“What are you talking about, what horror?”
“Despite your hard knocks, you don’t hate the world or God or the moon, and that’s good. In one of my dreams,” Julian said, “I drifted down a very long river, and at the end of it you were saved. I don’t think I’ve ever felt happier in my life.”
“In the dream or in real life?”
“Yes,” said Julian.
“So now they’re happy dreams?”
“Now,” Julian said, “you’ll go on, like you’ve been going on. You’ll make new friends to go drinking with and for years you’ll sit with them, ceaselessly talking about nothing.”
“Jules, I swear . . .”
“Look, I know you’re a mule, but shut up and listen. I can’t answer all your questions, and trust me, you don’t want me to, but I’m begging you, stop doing the thing you always do. You think you can wade ankle deep in your life, and that everything will somehow work out fine because it has so far.” Julian shuddered. “But, Ashton, some things are not going to work out.”
“What things?”
Julian wouldn’t say. Couldn’t say.
“Is it possible to be slightly less, oh I don’t know—crazy?” Ashton said.
“You want me to be less crazy?”
“Yes—fuck—please.”
“Give Riley back her life.” Like Julian was giving Mirabelle back her life.
“Riley?”
“She needs to be free of you,” Julian said. “I don’t know how else to say it.” Ask him to do something, he heard a wise man’s voice in his head say. If he obeys, he can be healed. If he doesn’t, he cannot.
“Riley and I are great, we made up, we’re all good,” Ashton said. “You do understand that I can’t operate in the real world because you saw something idiotic in your phantom world, you do understand that, right?”
“You will hang them both like puppets on a string,” Julian said, “and the string will break. And everybody will break with it. There will be nothing left.” At last, Julian stared into Ashton’s face. “Nothing.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Ashton exclaimed. “You need to have your head examined. I think all your old injuries have resurfaced. Who’s them both in that scenario?”
“Maybe she hasn’t come yet. And maybe she has.”
Ashton said nothing.
Julian nodded. “You’re playing it cool. I’m used to it. You act as if nothing is