Dream Job Read online

  My heart began to race as I walked over to the window. Flashes from my dreams about Hamm edged their way into my mind. I could hear my speeding pulse in my head, pounding like the surf below us.

  When I stood next to him, Hamm put his arm around me and pulled me close.

  “We’re almost there, Adrianna. After tonight, we’ll be ready. We can close the deal and be done with all this.”

  He clasped me to his side and held my wrist gently in his large, soft palm. His touch was electrifying. I could smell the sandalwood odor of his skin, the lemon from his shampoo. I drifted, high on Hamm. It was like a dream. Maybe it was a dream. Maybe I was still upstairs in the pool, dreaming all of this.

  “Shall we go?” Hamm asked.

  He gently pulled away and headed for the door.

  What was I supposed to say?

  No, don’t go, don’t let go of me, hold on to me. Let’s just stand here next to each other so I can feel your body press against mine. Let’s touch one another and never separate again, not now, not ever.

  I followed Hamm to the stairs. With those long legs of his, he moved fast. I clutched my bag with my supplies and hurried to keep up.

  Chapter Four

  After I struggled into my damp swimsuit, I felt awkward leaving the privacy of the curtained changing room. The suit was baggy, hanging off my waist in wet folds. I lifted my floor-length yellow terry cloth robe off the drying rack and slipped into it. It too was still damp. Why everything I had worn on the test-drive had remained damp for three days was one of those Florida facts all residents must learn to live with. Nothing ever dries in the humidity of a South Florida summer. I was shivering, from both nerves and the wetness against my flesh.

  When I came out, Hamm was in the pool. He was hanging off the side of the tub, his clothes folded neatly on one of the chaise lounges. My heart skipped.

  “Hurry up, let’s go,” he called, impatient, boss-like. My heart stopped its silly racing.

  I walked slowly toward the pool. I planned on grilling him before I got in that weird tub again. I wanted to find out why I had so little memory of the hours that had passed during my last test-drive, and I was determined to find out some facts before I put myself back in the same situation.

  So I sat down on one of the lounge chairs and waited for him to look up at me. His eyes were clear and deep.

  “Hamm,” I said. “What in the hell is this all about?”

  He snorted. Then he laughed so hard he went under. When he bobbed up again, water spurted out of his nose. I grabbed him by the shoulder. His skin was warm. My own was covered with goose bumps.

  “Adrianna, just put on your goggles and earbuds and get in here. We need to do this together, and then you’ll understand. Come on, I’m hard as a rock.”

  He was still laughing.

  “You’re what? I don’t even like to use the term ‘sexual harassment,’ but—”

  Hamm grabbed my arm and pulled.

  “Stop thinking, Adrianna. Get your gear on and get in here and let’s start dreaming.”

  He pointed to something lying on top of his pile of clothes.

  “Grab that mp3 player over there. We’ll use the submersibles this time. We need to go under.”

  I had no idea what he was talking about, but I picked up the equipment he had indicated, an mp3 player with a plastic seal around it in the shape of a bubble. I plugged in the earbuds and stepped over to the tub.

  I looked down at Hamm. He stared up at me through the plastic layer of his goggles. The lenses were so thick I couldn’t see his eyes.

  And then I noticed something else: My boss was naked. And big. And hard as a rock.

  He held out his hand, and I took it in my own. His flesh was warm and wet and I wanted to kiss it.

  “Come in, Adrianna. Now.”

  When he held onto my hand, the way a lover does, I knew. There was a connection between us. There was something strange and eerie and remarkable between us. It had to do with my dreams about Hamm, my stalking dreams with Davis, and with whatever was going on here at DreamCorp International. It was why Hamm had hired me. And why I was so in love with him, this man, my boss, an impostor, a beautiful enigma, someone I barely knew but felt so much for. I had no idea how everything connected, but I knew what I had to do.

  I had to get in the water with Hamm. I had to dream with him.

  I dropped the robe to the marble floor and stripped off my damp suit. My flesh was pale and cool. Thunder tore at the sky and jagged lightning flashed overhead. My white skin lit up as I climbed into the tub beside him.

  Hamm tucked me under his arm, and kissed the top of my head. A charge passed through me from my scalp to the soles of my feet, buoying me up in the warm water.

  Above us, heavy rain splashed against the glass roof. Blackened thunderclouds roamed the sky, followed by flashes of lightning. I flinched and Hamm tightened his hold on me.

  “Stop worrying,” he said. “Just let yourself go like you did last time.”

  I started to respond but he moved too quickly, shifting positions and pressing his body into mine. His lips were hot against my cool neck. My body felt light, weak, submerged in something greater than my flesh. His long fingers stroked their way down my belly, and I shivered. He opened me easily and slipped his erection inside just as the watery pulsations began. My cells tingled and I let out a groan.

  “Dreaming reduces everything to simple desire,” Hamm said, pulling me tight against his muscular chest. We slid down, our enjoined bodies sinking deeper into the water.

  I was going under but I didn’t care. We sank together, cleaving, clinging, until we were fully submerged. The intense pulsation filled my body and mind until that was all there was. That, and Hamm.

  He moved inside me, and I rocked with him, waves of pleasure washing over every cell in my body. I knew he was telling me not to struggle, not to go up to the surface. I knew exactly what he wanted me to do but not how I knew what that was. For some reason, I trusted this man. Completely.

  We floated, sank, and drifted together, our bodies a single throbbing life-form. I was one with him and we were one being, together, a primitive sea creature, a dream inside the water’s sleeping mind. We were entering another world, a world beyond the watery dream.

  ***

  When I opened my eyes I was seated in a giant room the size of a hundred football stadiums, a cavernous space with a glass dome on top. It was warm and sunlit and smelled of lilacs in New England in the spring. In this room sat thousands of Dreamers, each in a comfortable chair with a large computer screen in front of him or her. The technology was futuristic, unbelievable. I couldn’t really describe it to you. You’d have to see it for yourself.

  Like everyone else, I sat before a computer screen. I looked at the images that played there. They were dreamlike, and more real than real. Hyperreal. As I stared at the screen in front of me, I watched a version of my former self walk down the empty streets of Woolcox. I was headed for Marty’s, underdressed in my skimpy shorts and scuffed spike heels. I watched, mesmerized, as I flirted with Davis, sticking out my tongue and leaning on the counter seductively. Poor Davis. He looked scared to death.

  In the high-backed chair next to me, Hamm sat watching his own screen. I tried to take a look, but the computers had been specially designed to ensure total privacy. Hamm poked me in the shoulder.

  “Stay in your own dream, Adrianna. We have work to do.”

  “What am I supposed to do here, Hamm?”

  “Rewrite the dream, and get rid of that idiot. Write him out of your script. And for God’s sake: do not have sex with that geek. He’s ruining all our plans.”

  I wanted to believe that Hamm was just jealous. But his tone was all business. I was stunned, clueless.

  “Fine by me, but what does that have to do with—”

  Hamm tore his eyes from his screen and spoke quietly.

  “We went through all this the last time. Have you been blacking?”

 
Blacking? Did he mean blacking out? It sure seemed like it, so I nodded and Hamm launched into an explanation, patiently describing the impossible.

  “We’re Dreamers, you and I. But right now we’re on a mission. So we’re working as Fallers. Davis is neither Dreamer nor Faller. Remember? I told you to write yourself a note about all this when you got back to your office on Friday night after the test-drive. Did you forget to do that?”

  I shrugged, completely at a loss. Maybe he had, but then I’d forgotten. Dreamers and Fallers? What the hell?

  Hamm sighed. “I thought so.”

  He seemed resigned to dealing with my ignorance.

  “That’s why I put that photo on your desk. With the message. One of the many, many messages I’ve sent to you, my little cryptic notes, all to try to remind you who you are. Do you know what I’m talking about now, Adrianna?”

  I didn’t know what to say. This was one freaky dream. I glanced down at my body in the soft, formfitting chair. I was dressed in a sleeveless sheath made from a gossamer material. It sparkled when I moved. I loved it. Hamm was wearing a white cotton T-shirt and shorts. He looked like he was fresh off the tennis court.

  “Okay, one more time then. Listen up, Adrianna. Perception is reality, no matter what dimension you’re in. Right? So that’s how we work, right there, in the gap between memory and reality. The mission right now is to deal with Davis. He worked for Charlton Hamm at DCI a number of years ago, before we got here. He was a programmer and one of the early testers on the dream-invasion software, but he got fired. I Fell to DCI to replace Hamm and prevent further development on this software. It’s way too dangerous for use during this particular era. Maybe later, like in a thousand years.”

  He rolled his eyes, but I was beyond irony. I was undone. And hoping I would wake up soon.

  Hamm continued, “You Fell to Woolcox to meet Davis and find out what he’d been doing with the software he stole from DCI. Apparently, he’s been able to do some major work on it. Now he’s able to use the DCI software to dreamstalk you. The antics of this clown are proof enough that we need to destroy the product. Use of dreamstalking to influence others could lead to worldwide chaos. Imagine what various political factions could do with this software.”

  The dream was starting to make sense to me, in a dreamlike way. I nodded and sat forward, suddenly aware of the facts of this dream of my life. There were, in fact, two Adriannas, the one in this dream and the one floating in a pool on the rooftop at DCI.

  In this dream I was a Dreamer, and my job was to monitor human activity. I’d entered the human dimension as a Faller, that is, a Dreamer who lives part of a human life in order to accomplish a mission. I was a Dreamer and a Faller with a mission, but I had forgotten this in the bright and lovely, sensual and distracting human world. Hamm was a Dreamer too, a Faller who could help me accomplish our mission in the human world.

  “I had my suspicions about Davis’s capabilities,” Hamm continued, “which you’ve been able to confirm. He’d taken from DCI an early version of their dream-invasion software. In Woolcox, he worked on the programming, developing it in ways nobody expected. Especially after you left town. Now he’s rigged it so he can download himself into other people’s dreams. Yours in particular.”

  I sat there, blinking, the information clicking in my brain. Pieces fell into place. I reached for Hamm’s hand. His clear blue eyes were pools I could fall into again and again.

  “Once you Fell into your role, Adrianna, you blacked your mission. This happens to first-time Fallers. I was still here, Dreaming, so I began to feed you information. I sent you notes, but that didn’t awaken your memory. So I fed you when you were asleep. In your dreams, I reminded you about us. And our mission. Making love to you was supposed to remind you about who we were, and what we need to do.”

  He shrugged.

  “Shit happens, Adrianna. We forget who we are, why we are here. Or there. Love helps us remember.”

  His face clouded. I squeezed his hand.

  “Unfortunately, you screwed up. You were supposed to find the software, not sleep with the guy. Once you’d connected with him, he became obsessed with you. So now he’s using his own very potent version of the DCI software to invade your dreams.”

  Hamm shook his head.

  “He won’t stop there, of course. The guy’s gone nuts. He has plans to take you to DC with him. He wants to dreamstalk the President next.”

  Hamm leaned in and whispered, “Mistakes like this happen all the time. Dreamers are not infallible. Hey, I blew my cover with Bob by forgetting to edit the old photos of Charlton Hamm. I screwed up too. So let’s get to work and make this right, Adrianna.”

  His breath was soft on my ear. I wasn’t sure what he was talking about. The whole dream was insane! But I knew that I loved him. Faller, Dreamer, whatever and wherever. I loved this guy. But did he love me?

  “Where’s the real Charlton Hamm?” I asked my dream lover.

  “Asleep. In his own body. He’ll recall everything I did in his place when he returns to himself once our work is done. I’ll disappear, and he’ll step back into his life. He’ll be proud of the decisions I made and, in the mysterious way of the unconscious mind, he’ll believe he made all his own choices.”

  I sat there staring at him, stunned. Hamm was my lover, but not the real Hamm. So the question remained: was he married or not?

  “Focus,” he ordered.

  That one would have to wait. I sat back in my seat and looked at my computer. I could see myself on the screen, hanging around the liquor store with wine on my breath. I made me sick.

  Hamm said, “Adrianna, listen to me. Don’t judge. Just get to work. Because right now, we have some serious editing to do. While we’re in the pool on this test run, we’re between space and time. Any moment—past, present, future—can become our frame of reference. We can change references at will. We can delete Davis from the story. Do you understand?”

  Hamm paused. I nodded, so he continued.

  “I’m working on reducing his role in Charlton Hamm’s history, and you need to get him out of yours. Or we’re both going to end up as permanent Fallers. So get to work. Start editing.”

  He turned back to his screen and started pecking away at his keyboard.

  I was speechless. Was he out of his mind, or was this the weirdest dream ever? I watched him work, his broad shoulders hunched over the computer, his chiseled face intense. When Hamm glanced over at me, I looked into the calm azure sea of his eyes and I saw myself reflected there.

  I was in there after all.

  He leaned over and kissed me softly. His lips were sweet and full.

  “Adrianna, our time in the pool is limited, so stop thinking about us and snap to it. Cut off Davis before he becomes interested in you. If you don’t sleep with him, he won’t get obsessed with you. And he won’t want to stalk your dreams. He’ll never even think of doing so. And once we get rid of his desire for you, you can delete his work on the DCI software. Then we’ll scramble the software itself at DCI. DCI will decide not to develop or test it. In fact, DCI will choose to focus on neurobiochemical replacement drugs for the elderly. And they’ll make millions. Charlton Hamm will be a billionaire before he’s fifty and he won’t care enough to ever pursue a dream-invasion product.”

  Hamm patted my cheek and turned back to his screen. “Money is everything in their dimension. Money and sexual conquest. Most of them know so little about love. Fortunately, it’s not our mission to teach them.”

  He tossed his head and his blond hair shone under the sunlit dome above us. I reached up and ran my fingers through his silky hair. It felt so real. The whole dream felt real. Better than real. Hyperreal.

  Hamm kept typing. “Once we complete the editing, we should be done with our mission. Then Charlton Hamm will be back in charge at DCI where he belongs, and you and I can get back to what we do best. Dreamers, together again.”

  I shook myself and pinched my arm twice. When I refused
to wake up or float to the surface of the DCI rooftop pool, I turned back to the screen in front of me.

  There were keys for cutting and editing, and a kind of super advanced image-editing software with a wide array of graphics. I found the keyboard easy to use.

  “A life consists of what we remember and what we imagine,” Hamm was saying. “To edit a life, Dreamers enter the world of memory where nothing is real but thinking makes it seem so. By altering memory, we can change the past and with it the ability to imagine the future.” That made sense. So, in order to edit my life in Woolcox, I deleted or rewrote many scenes from my time in that podunk town. I enjoyed rewriting a bad time in my life.

  First, I got rid of the cheap clothes, the beer and wine, the liquor store called Marty’s. Davis was revised as a reclusive video store clerk, and I only saw him in passing. He seemed like a secretive person and a depressive. Woolcox was a dry town, and my job kept me at home most of the time, sitting at my computer, writing my articles. Occasionally I took a long bike ride in the hot sun. I avoided the video store.

  Adrianna was a bore, a person you passed on the street and maybe said hello to without really noticing. Her newspaper job lasted a year, then she left town, soon to be forgotten.

  Before leaving Woolcox, however, Adrianna broke into Davis’s apartment while he was at work. She rummaged through his computers for the primitive version of the test software he had stolen. He was still in the early stages of programming and, without the hot Adrianna as his muse, would not feel compelled to work on it much after she left town. Just in case, Adrianna corrupted his files.

  Then Adrianna packed up her few belongings, jumped into her car, and drove away. She did not look in the rearview mirror. Not until Woolcox lay many miles behind her.

  ***

  A normal person would have felt something as she drove away from Woolcox. But I was not a normal person. Not then, and certainly not now.