Dream Within a Dream Read online

  George and I sit down to write together at the kitchen table. George is quiet. I think he is embarrassed that he used the Swahili word for love. I decide to get it over with.

  “Now that you love me, we should have no trouble writing well together,” I say to him.

  He stares at me, then bursts out laughing.

  “All right, all right. I love you, Louisiana,” he says.

  Now I am embarrassed.

  “You don’t have to say that,” I say.

  “I know. But . . .” He pauses. “It’s true.”

  Neither of us know what to do. Finally George picks up a pen and hands it to me. “Write.”

  ASHLEY

  His voice is music.

  He sings his words

  in a world of color

  and shapes—

  puppets who dance

  joyfully.

  BILLIE

  A bird and more

  come to her

  sit in her hand

  with their fragile feet.

  “The birds and I

  are kind to

  one another.”

  ELIASI

  “Living here gives me great joy.”

  From Lake Tanganyika

  to this island.

  “I love looking over water.”

  ANGELO

  Through all the seasons—

  hot summer winds,

  cold,

  and storms—

  this “island has a language all its own.”

  George and I work together, talking about words and other words and changes and whether to use commas or dashes.

  Then we are done and are silent again.

  Finally I pick up the pen and hand it to George just the way he had handed the pen to me before we began.

  “Done,” he says.

  “Yep.”

  “It’s pretty fine.”

  “The people we interviewed are pretty fine,” I say.

  And then the door to the “painting room” opens and Theo comes out, carrying a large canvas. He has paint smudges on his face, making him look much younger than he is.

  He walks over to us, saying nothing. He turns the canvas around.

  “Jake!” exclaims George.

  It is a painting of Jake with the most surprising blue of Jake’s eyes looking out at us.

  “Jake will love this,” I say to Theo.

  George wipes a smudge of paint from my cheek.

  There is a slap of the screen door and it is Jake. He stares at the painting. He is quiet for a moment.

  “I will remember this painting clearly, even when I can’t see well,” he says to Theo. “That’s the great thing about memory. And it is the great thing about this painting.”

  I start thinking about what to write for Jake’s work of art.

  A car stops outside.

  “Yikes,” says Jake, who does not tolerate Talking Tillie well. “I’ll just wait until Boots sees Theo’s painting. Boots will cry. You just watch. Then I’ll go upstairs and read a book while Talking Tillie carries the rest of the groceries inside while talking too much.”

  “You can’t read, Jake,” says Theo.

  “Oh, right,” says Jake, making us smile.

  But Boots comes in alone, carrying two grocery bags. Tillie’s car drives away.

  “Where are the rest of the groceries?” asks Jake.

  “This is all today,” says Boots. “I had a secret errand.”

  “What?” asks Jake.

  “Secret,” Boots repeats.

  She puts the bread away, then the cheese and meat in the refrigerator.

  “You got a tattoo!” jokes Theo.

  “That’s it, Theo,” says Boots.

  And then Boots sees Theo’s picture of Jake. She stares for a minute. Her eyes widen, then fill with tears.

  “See?” says Jake, putting his arms around Boots.

  “Theo did that picture,” I say to Boots.

  Boots cries more.

  “That blue,” says Boots, crying. “That blue.”

  “Okay, Boots,” says Jake. “I’m going upstairs to read a book now.”

  “You can’t read!” says Boots, wiping her eyes.

  And we all laugh. Even Boots.

  But I know why Boots is crying.

  That blue.

  14

  This Is Great!

  It is almost the end of summer. You can feel fall in the air. I know it, and I am sure Theo knows it too. The paintings are all framed and will be hung in the library soon.

  “Jake’s and Boots’s paintings will go up in two weeks,” I say.

  “But that’s almost the end of summer,” says Theo.

  We finish dinner late, and it is dark outside. After we help with the dishes, Boots goes off to bed. Theo and I start upstairs to our rooms.

  The phone rings, and for some reason it makes me jump. Theo and I are at the top of the stairs, his library light glowing in the corner.

  “Hello,” says Jake. “Well, hello—where are you?”

  Theo and I know. We know it is our parents calling.

  “What exciting news is that? Oh, okay. We’ll look for you then.”

  Jake turns and looks at us at the top of the stairs.

  “No, sorry. They’ve gone to bed. But I’ll tell them you called.”

  Jake hangs up the phone. “I lied,” he says.

  I smile. “You’re forgiven,” I tell him.

  “They’re coming on the weekend—just passing through. They say they have exciting news,” says Jake. “You know what I know.”

  “Good night, Jake.”

  “Good night,” he says.

  Theo looks at me and goes to his bedroom door.

  “Good night, Louisa,” says Theo. “I have to do something.”

  “What kind of something?”

  “I don’t know,” says Theo, looking as sad as I’ve ever seen him.

  He opens his door and goes inside, shutting the door behind him.

  What something?

  I am surprised by my next thought.

  I hope his something works.

  In the morning we find out a bad storm is coming. It is dark and rainy, with strong wind gusts. George, dripping with rain, comes to see if he can help us. He takes off his raincoat and hat by the door.

  “My father and I took our boat out of the water and helped Angelo secure his. My mother is bringing in all of her potted plants and cutting some flowers to bring in.”

  “We should do that,” says Boots.

  “Rafiki won’t go outside,” says George.

  “Dogs know,” says Jake. “Want to go outside, Tess?”

  Tess looks up, yawns, and closes her eyes again.

  “What about the sheep?” asks Theo. “What if there is lightning and high winds?”

  “Good question,” says Jake. “I never fixed the barn roof. It’s too dangerous for them.”

  “Maybe you can take the car out of the garage and put the sheep in there,” says Boots.

  We all looked at Jake.

  Jake turns to look at Boots, his mouth open as if he is about to say something.

  Boots bursts out laughing.

  “Come on, old fellow, you know we’re going to bring them into the kitchen! Remember, we once had seventeen hens and a rooster in here during a hurricane.”

  “I remember,” says Jake. “The rooster pecked at the shells of my poached eggs. George, maybe you could help me bring in the fencing. We can put the sheep in the corner with hay and water.”

  “What about our parents coming here?” asks Theo.

  “They’re not coming until after the storm passes, if the ferry is running,” says Jake.

  “It’s not running for a few days,” says George.

  “Okay. I have time to think,” says Theo.

  “Think about what?” asks Boots.

  “The ‘something’ that sometimes happens,” says Theo.

  “Oh, that something,” says Boots.

 
The wind grows stronger. Boots and I cut lots of flowers and bring them in. We carry in pots of flowers.

  There is thunder and some lightning.

  George and Jake bring in fencing to the corner of the big kitchen. They carry in hay, and Theo spreads it around the floor. And then the wind grows stronger and some of the trees bend down. We go out to lead the sheep, Bitty and Flossie and Flip, into the kitchen.

  They are peaceful, even staring calmly at Tess through the fence.

  “This is great!” says Theo.

  And the lights go out. We find candles and oil lamps.

  George goes to the phone to see if it works. He dials.

  “Hi. I’m going to stay overnight to help out at Jake and Boots’s house.”

  “Yes, her too,” he says, looking at me.

  Right after George’s call the phone stops working.

  “I have my cell phone,” says George, “if we need it. My father said there may be some hurricane-force winds for the next day or two.”

  Boots has made spaghetti sauce already, and she cooks the spaghetti on the gas stove, which works without electricity. She has a roast in the oven for the next two days.

  We eat by lantern light, the sheep starting to smell like wet sheep in a warm house.

  “I should check the garage,” says Jake suddenly.

  “I did,” says George.

  “This is great!” repeats Theo.

  “It is,” says Boots.

  “It is,” says Jake.

  “It is,” says George.

  They look at me.

  “This is great,” I say, grinning at them all.

  Bitty looks at me and bleats loudly.

  This is great.

  15

  The Storm

  In the night the winds grow worse. We can hear small branches falling on the roof. The sheep lie down happily. George sleeps on an extra mattress on the floor in Theo’s room. I can hear them talking when I get up for a drink of water.

  George comes out of Theo’s bedroom and sees me on the top stair.

  “George?” I whisper, tapping his shoulder.

  “Yes?” he says, tapping my shoulder back.

  “You told Eliasi about kissing me, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, and you kissing me back,” he adds.

  “And what did he say?”

  “He nodded the way he nods when I tell him I’ll mow the lawn.”

  “Maybe he didn’t hear you.”

  “He heard me.”

  “I told Boots you kissed me,” I say.

  “And what did Boots say?”

  “She said ‘of course he did.’ ”

  “That’s the same thing as my father nodding at me,” says George.

  “I suppose so,” I say.

  “I know so,” says George, sounding a lot like Boots.

  We can hear Jake downstairs talking soothingly to the sheep, though the sheep seem peaceful.

  I touch George’s shoulder. “Good night,” I say.

  George touches my shoulder back. “Good night, Louisiana.”

  All night long the wind blows hard. I sleep and wake, sleep and wake. When it is morning the storm is still fierce and I hear the bleating of the sheep downstairs. George is sitting at the kitchen table watching Jake cook breakfast.

  The sheep have been given bowls of breakfast too.

  “The sheep love apples,” says George, watching me come down the stairs.

  “Is Theo still sleeping?” I ask.

  “He is. I woke up in the middle of the night several times and Theo was sitting up in bed, thinking.”

  “Yes. Theo is thinking about how to figure out the rest of his life.”

  “Aren’t we all,” says Jake, bringing three plates of poached eggs on toast to the table.

  He looks at us. “Aren’t we all?”

  George and I look sideways at each other, George raising a questioning eyebrow at me.

  I shake my head. No, Boots had not told Jake we kissed. Boots keeps secrets. My mind goes back to the first time I met George, in the garage, by the beautiful black car. Jake had known my thoughts about George then. Maybe he knew our secret now. Sometimes I think the worse Jake’s eyes become, the more things he knows. Like paying attention to things only Jake sees in his head. Once he told me what Helen Keller said about blindness—“the only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.”

  Bitty and Flossie begin bleating again as the wind blows and the rain pounds against the windows.

  The storm goes on, hail pellets beginning to hit the windows now.

  “Jake?” says George.

  “What?”

  “Teach me?”

  “Teach you what?”

  “How to make your poached eggs.”

  Jake smiles. “My pleasure. Louisa is right. You are turning into me. It’s an art of butter and timing.”

  “And it is my pleasure being you,” says George.

  I shake my head. “Soon I’ll be outnumbered,” I say.

  “No,” says Boots at the kitchen door. “You’ve got me.”

  “I do!”

  Theo comes down the stairs. “Who have I got?” he asks.

  “Us,” says George. “And Jake’s great poached eggs. And what do you have as well?” adds George. “You have a library of books with words you will carry with you all of your life.”

  Everyone looks at George. He is amused at our looks.

  “That was very intelligent, wasn’t it?” he says.

  “Yep,” says Jake, handing George the box of eggs. “You are me.”

  “Then who am I?” says Theo, his voice rising.

  All of the sheep—Bitty and Flossie and Flip—look at Theo and begin to bleat loudly. “Baa, Baa. BAA.”

  We all laugh.

  The kitchen is filled with the noise of people and sheep.

  George cooks four poached eggs on toast and gives the sheep more apple slices. He tosses crisp toast to Tess. Then Theo and Jake shovel out the old hay into buckets, put on their rain gear and boots to get fresh hay and check the barn and trees.

  Boots watches them out the window.

  “This is a long storm,” she says. “It’s still rough out there. I haven’t opened the freezer so we’ll have food for days.”

  I sit down at the table. “I kind of like it,” I say.

  “I do too,” says Boots. “We all get to take care of each other inside, even the girls.”

  I smile that she calls the sheep “girls.”

  “My parents called,” I say.

  “I heard that. I heard they are ‘passing through,’ ” says Boots. “It’s not yet the end of summer.”

  “I’m going to tell you a secret,” I say.

  “Okay.”

  “Theo doesn’t want to go home. He told George. He told me. He loves it here.”

  “I know that,” says Boots.

  “I forgot . . .,” I begin.

  “That I know everything,” finishes Boots. She shrugs. “Something will happen,” she says.

  “That’s what Theo is waiting for.”

  “It will happen,” says Boots. “I know that because . . .” She waves her hand.

  “You know everything.”

  That night, when everyone has gone to bed, the sheep sleeping peacefully in their new hay, Jake and I go up the stairs together.

  “Jake?” I whisper.

  I seemed to be whispering in the dark these nights.

  Jake turns to me. As always, Theo’s lamp by his library shelves is on.

  “Did Boots tell you anything about George and me?”

  Jake smiles. “No. I know lots of things about you and George, but not from Boots. And all the things I know are good.”

  I nod.

  Jake puts his arm around me.

  “My pal,” he says.

  And we go to bed, waiting for the storm to end.

  16

  Silence

  We had two days of storm, no electricity. Even George’s
cell phone didn’t work anymore. We ate everything in the refrigerator and freezer as time went by.

  Eliasi drives to our house to make sure we are fine.

  “This should be the last bad day of the storm,” he says, hugging Boots.

  Tess is happy to see a new person. He pats her and she leans on him.

  “I’m ready to get back outside with my car,” says Jake.

  “Louisa and I have liked it—with the people and sheep inside,” says Boots. “Would you like to take a sheep home?”

  Eliasi laughs. “No, thank you, Boots. But you’re right. It changes the nature of life on the island. We realize we are small when the weather comes.”

  “Want me to come home?” asks George.

  Eliasi shakes his head. “No. Willa and I are having a lovely romantic time together.”

  “Dancing probably,” says George.

  “You betcha,” says Eliasi. “You can be more help here, I think. There will be limbs to haul and some damages to barns and sheds.”

  “What about the ferry?” asks Theo.

  “It will be ready to go day after tomorrow,” says Eliasi. “Maybe,” he adds.

  I know Theo is thinking of our parents visiting for a day.

  “The paintings are all hanging in the library, Micha told me,” Eliasi says. “They knew the storm was coming and finished all the work early,” said Eliasi.

  Eliasi kisses George good-bye. He pauses, then leans down to kiss me good-bye too. Then he is out the door in the rain and wind.

  “I have something to do if you don’t need me,” says Theo.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Something,” says Theo, already going upstairs.

  “Your fault, that ‘something,’ ” I say to Boots.

  “What are you talking about?” asks George.

  “I’ll explain it to you later,” I say. “It kind of involves my meeting you in Jake’s garage that first morning.”

  “I was right about that, wasn’t I?” says Boots. “That ‘something’ was really ‘something.’ ”

  “Oh, that kind of something,” says George.

  Boots and I look at each other.

  “Hey, how about I make poached eggs on toast for dinner,” says George happily. “Then we can dance!”

  “We’ll have no music,” I say.

  George peers at me. “You know it isn’t about the music, Louisiana,” he says softly.