The Dream Jumper's Promise

Chapter 3

Tina watched tufts of whitecaps slowly materialize in the channel between Maui and Molokai as the sky lightened. The rain had stopped. Good. When the French roast dripped enough for a first cup of coffee, she poured in a finger of milk and emptied five packets of sugar into her mug.

Red sky in morning, sailor’s warning.

Dive conditions were improving, but... She picked up the remote to switch on the news just as her cell phone rang.

“Hey, Boss Lady. I think Molokini might work. I’m willing to try if you are.” Dave sounded confident about taking out the boat, and Tina knew his motivation. If a dive instructor didn’t dive, he didn’t get paid.

“Hmmm. I hate to cancel two days in a row.”

Dave paused. “We didn’t cancel yesterday. We went to Lanai.”

“Dave? We canceled Molokini yesterday.”

“Dude. What are you smoking?” He sounded serious. “We went to Lanai yesterday—the Cathedrals, then Turtle Reef. Remember when I came back, we talked about you fainting?”

“Yesterday we canceled Molokini.” Tina stared at the phone, and then brought it back to her ear. The pause on the other end made her wonder if Dave was checking a calendar.

“Today is Wednesday.” He sounded sober enough.

“I’ll call you right back.” Glancing at the TV news, she saw that today was indeed Wednesday, March twenty second. She froze. Dave hadn’t lost a day. She had.

She sank to the floor and covered her mouth with her hand. What happened to the day she knew as yesterday? The one where she’d woken from the dream with coral in her hand and gone to see Dr. Chan? She looked to the aquarium, where she’d put the coral from her dream. It wasn’t there.

The phone rang. Without saying hello, Dave asked if he should take out the charter.

In a fog of confusion, she whispered that she’d leave the decision to him and hung up. Trying to remember details of yesterday that would confirm she wasn’t going crazy, she looked down to see her legs perfectly clear, free from coral cuts.

The broken vase sat exactly where it had been two days before, whole and beautiful, with the bouquet of flowers her friend Pepper had brought on Sunday. The Chinese screen was upright. Undamaged.

She crossed to the kitchen to confirm the existence of last night’s beer and teriyaki, but the fridge was empty, with only condiments on the shelves and a fuzzy papaya rotting in the crisper. She held onto the refrigerator handle until she knew she wasn’t going to drop to the floor like the faint in the dive shop two days ago. No—yesterday. Had she not woken with coral in her hand, soaking wet, with scrapes on her body?

Maybe she was dreaming right now and Dave’s call was a part of the dream. A pinch on her forearm was painful. Obi’s look of concern mirrored hers. “Am I losing my mind?” Saying it out loud gave the idea life and a shiver sped up Tina’s spine.

The Xanax bottle was on the bathroom counter in the same position as when she’d gone to bed two nights before. She hadn’t put the prescription away after Doc Chan told her to stop taking it, because Emily Chan had never told her to stop.

Sitting on the edge of her bed, Tina tried to process the fact that she hadn’t woken with coral in her hand, gone to see Dr. Chan, been taken off Xanax. Nor had she watched TV with Noble and then drifted off into a sleep without dreams. She hadn’t even seen Jamey with his wife at the grocery store. As far as she knew, Jamey didn’t even have a wife. She’d dreamed so vividly, it had been impossible to tell dreamscape from reality.