In Your Dreams: Excerpt

Page 1 of 8 - first draft

Following the waxing and waning of a song in a car is tiring. I took an hour to reach the outskirts of Denver as a result of several false starts and u-turns. Satellite navigation it wasn't. In fact, as far as I could tell, unarmed as I was without a mapbook in a city that I didn't know, it seemed that Adam was directing us pretty much as the crow flies - which meant disregarding any 'No entry' and 'One-way street' signs. Thank God, it was the middle of the night - which kept down the honking of horns, and the shouts of irate drivers, though we had enough of those. I began to wonder whether we might become the first dream victims of road rage. Jon told me that 'road rage' didn't exist as a concept in 1980s America, but I didn't find that in the least reassuring. People in cars probably did shoot people in other cars, back then. There just wasn't a name for it.

All I remember of that night was a great deal of reversing up one-way streets while making lots of profuse British apologies, and cursing the fact that I was in a convertible with little to separate me from other irate motorists. The taxi drivers and lorry drivers used particularly colourful language that made me believe, like nothing else did, that I wasn't just dreaming up this whole adventure. I could never have dreamt up such language, I assure you.

Eventually we emerged onto a highway that headed towards dark looming shapes that Jon told me were the Rocky Mountains. By then, I could have cared less if they were the Pyrennes. I was drained from the experience and hoping that the Adam-FM signal would stay strong and true so that I could drive in a straight line for a while.

Throughout the whole driving experience in Denver, Jon had calmly clutched his seat and said little, other than comment on a fading signal, or offer reassurance as I manoeuvred my way out of another dead-end street accompanied by the catcalls and whistles of drunken teenagers standing on a street corner. Now that we were out of the city maze, and I could put my foot down and make the TR6 fly along the dark, nearly empty highway, I began to relax a little again. I stole glances over at Jon, who seemed mesmerised by the mountains ahead. I wondered what he was thinking about. His second encounter with his high school friends perhaps? They hadn't boarded our flight, and I'd seen no sign of them in Denver Airport. Perhaps they too had been left behind in the New England 70s, and had no place in the 80s of the Southwest. Except for Julia, of course. She had a place in his real life, in the next millennium, in Oxford, England.

It took me a minute, but I mustered the courage. "I got hold of Julia," I said, above the roar of the engine and the rush of the wind. "She's been to hospital to see you."

At first, I didn't think he'd heard me because he carried on staring at the mountain range. Then he turned his head and nodded.

"Was she angry?" he asked.