Dreamology(12)

“Your parents sound busy,” I say.

“They run their own packaging company, so they’re always running off to China at the last minute. They aren’t around a lot.”

“Do you get lonely?” I ask.

“Sure, but a guy finds ways to entertain himself.” He gives one of his charming Oliver smiles. “Like doing poorly in school and getting into trouble all the time.”

“I get it,” I say. “My mom took off when I was little, and my dad isn’t much of a talker, so I developed a pretty active imagination.”

I expect him to feel awkward after my admission, or ask where my mom went. But instead he just says, “Like what?”

“I dunno, I was a curious kid,” I say.

“Give me an example,” he presses.

“I can’t tell you!” I cry. “It’s embarrassing.”

“Alice Rowe, so secretive,” Oliver teases. “You could be a Russian spy, for all I know. Have you already stolen my identity?”

“Okay fine!” I say when we stop at a crosswalk. A man walking a pair of poodles stares at Oliver’s Segway. Oliver just nods hello. “For example, I used to follow our dog Jerry around like we were in one of those National Geographic documentaries, recording his every move on my dad’s old tape recorder. He’s a bulldog, and they aren’t exactly energetic, so you can imagine how interesting it was.”

“Please tell me you still have the tapes,” Oliver says.

“If I do, you will never hear them,” I reply.

“I think I know what’s bugging you,” my dad says over paella that night. He learned to make it when we were in Portugal two summers ago for one of his conferences. Besides scrambled eggs, it is basically all he can make.

“Oh yeah?” I say absentmindedly, staring into a prawn’s eyeballs. He can’t just make it with the store-bought shrimp. It has to be authentic.

“The boy,” he says then, and I almost drop my fork. “The one from New York. Come on, you can’t fool your dad.”

“You’re right.” I nod, though of course he has it all wrong. Because there is no boy from New York. “It’s the boy from New York.”

My dad sits there quiet a moment. “Did you know the brain processes emotional rejection the same way it processes physical pain?”

I raise my eyebrows. “I did not.”

“Well, it’s true.” He always lights up when he discusses the brain. “When you’re in love, your brain has an influx of dopamine. The same effect people get from doing drugs. You’re basically an addict. But when love, the person of your affection, is taken away from you, we process it in the same part of the brain that tells us if we’ve burnt ourselves, or broken a bone, or scratched our skin. So what I’m telling you, Bug, is not to worry. Heartache is not just a word we use. It has a scientific basis. So you don’t have to feel bad for missing him. It’s totally normal. But all broken bones or burns or hearts . . . well, they all heal up eventually.”

I reach over and give my dad a pat on the forearm, just short enough so neither of us gets uncomfortable. Sometimes I wish he was the kind of dad that would just ask where the guy lived, drive to his house, and grab him by the collar. But I know this kind of dad is better.





6


Mrs. Perry Requested Peacocks




THERE IS NO number 1.

I’m circling the interior of Dunham Court at MIT, peering at all the names and numbers like an old lady, while students shuffle by me. Dunham is made up of a central lawn bordered on four sides with university buildings, not unlike Bennett’s main quad, except it’s a fully closed square. CDD is listed at 1 Dunham Court, yet there is no number 1. The building at the most northwestern corner of the quad is number 2, and they increase in number as they circle around, with the highest, number 15, meeting right up with number 2 again.

I sit down on a bench and am just about to give up when I notice something peculiar. In the center of the quad is a small cupola-like building that looks as if it was removed from a rooftop and placed on the ground. It’s solid white and has a dome on top, surrounded by pillars. A woman in a copper-colored sweater has just ducked out from behind one of the pillars and is skittering in the direction of Massachusetts Avenue, books clutched to her chest.

I approach the rotunda, and begin to walk the exterior. Sure enough, next to a set of heavy wooden double doors is a sleek metal sign, almost undetectable. It reads, CENTER FOR DREAM DISCOVERY. GUSTAVE L. PETERMANN, PHD.

I press a small button just below the placard and am jolted backward when a loud intercom voice comes out of nowhere.

“Yes?”

I hesitate, not sure how to begin.

“Do you have an appointment?” The voice is female and impatient.

I think for a second. “Um . . . Sure?”

“Name, please.”

I roll my eyes, knowing this isn’t going anywhere good. “Alice Rowe.”

There is a long pause.

“You don’t have an appointment.”

“Is this an automated machine?” I ask. And what I think is another pause turns out to just be no response at all.

“I used to be a patient,” I finally say, smacking my hand on the button again. “I need to speak to Dr. Petermann.”