Overheard in a Dream

“In fact, that’s why Torgon stood out so much. While I wasn’t at all surprised that a strange lady had popped up in Adlers lot, what was remarkable was that she wasn’t a horse!” Laura laughed heartily.

“Torgon?”

“Yes, that’s what I called her. Right from the beginning, because I knew that was her name. I thought her arrival was very auspicious. It happened right at the point where I was always pretending to be Butterfly the Trick Pony. One of the horsy things I liked to do was eat raw porridge oats and Ma was convinced eating so much roughage would give me appendicitis. I overheard her tell Pa how much she was looking forward to my outgrowing my horsy stage. So I have this wonderful memory of sitting in the bath that night I’d first seen Torgon. I was sluicing water up and down my arms with a washcloth and thinking about what had happened, and I remember feeling such an incredible sense of pride in myself because I had seen Torgon and not simply another horse. I just knew it meant I was growing up!” She laughed so infectiously it was hard not to join in.

“What about your natural family?” James asked. “Did you have contact with them?”

“Oh yes. My dad was living here in Rapid City at the time. He drove up to see me every third Sunday like clockwork. My brothers Russell and Grant always came with him, so despite the fact I didn’t live with them, we were still all quite close.

“Dad would pick me up at the Meckses and we’d always go out on the highway to this diner called the Wayside and have their Sunday special, which was a roast beef dinner with apple pie for dessert. Then afterwards, if it was at all nice, we’d go for a drive through the Black Hills. If the weather was bad, we went bowling.” Laura grinned. “As a consequence, I’m a devilish good bowler, even today!

“I lived for those Sundays. My dad was very good at knowing how to make a kid feel special. He always arrived really enthusiastic to see me, always full of news he thought I’d like to hear, and without fail he brought a present. A good present, you know? Not just a couple of pencils or socks or something. Mostly it was a new Breyer horse statue for my collection. This meant so much to me. I absolutely coveted these horses. They cost quite a bit of money, so most kids didn’t have many of them, but because my dad gave me one almost every month, I had the biggest collection of anybody else in my class. I didn’t have a lot of status otherwise, but in this one way, I was best.

“Of course, what I wanted most was to actually live with my father and my brothers. Content as I was at the lake house with the Meckses, it was different from what other kids had, and different is awful when you’re little. I hated always having to explain why my last name wasn’t the same as theirs, how I came to live with them, why I didn’t live with my own family. So I dreamed relentlessly of the day when I’d be reunited with my birth family. Dad liked this game too, this idea that I was at the Meckses only temporarily. One of the happiest rituals of those Sunday visits revolved around his telling me how he was always just on the verge of taking me back to him, and then we’d plan how it was all going to be when he did. He was always telling me this was going to happen in about six months. Once he got a new job or bought a house with a yard, then he would come for me. Or his favourite reason: when he got a new mum for me. He loved talking about this. Every visit he would regale me with tantalizing stories about all the current prospects and whether I’d approve or disapprove. Then we’d make lots of exciting plans about what we and this new mum were going to do once we were all together again.

“I was incredibly gullible,” Laura said lightly. “I never doubted him. Not once. Month after month, year after year my dad would tell me these stories about what he was doing to get me back with him and I always believed him. I must have been at least nine before I even fully realized ‘in another six months’ was an actual measure of time and not just a synonym for ‘someday’.”

“Did you feel resentful when you did figure that out?” James asked.

“No, not at the time. He was so reliable in other ways, like the way he always came every third Sunday, always brought me a present, always took me out to do fun things. Even when I did realize that a lot of actual six-month periods had gone by, I still believed he was trying his hardest to reunite us.”

“And throughout this time did you have this imaginary companion? This Torgon character you were telling me about?” James asked.

Laura nodded. “Oh yes. Torgon and I were only just getting started.”

Chapter Seven

“Hi Becks!”

“Daddy! Hi ya! Guess what? When the phone rang, I said it was going to be you! I told Mum. She and Uncle Joey were going to take us ice skating tonight, but I told her I wanted to stay in because I thought you might phone. And you did! I got psychic powers, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, probably so, Becks,” James said and chuckled. He didn’t remind her he phoned most Friday evenings.

“Thanks for sending me that Ramona Quimby book, Daddy. I didn’t have that one. And it’s really good! I’m almost clear through it already and I only started it last night. I was so happy when I opened up your package and saw that’s what it was.”

“Well, thank you for your nice long newsy letter,” James said. “I got it on Monday. What a nice surprise in my mail box.”

“It was so long, it was practically like a Ramona Quimby book too, wasn’t it?” Becky replied gleefully. “My teacher says I’m probably going to be a writer when I grow up, because I’m so good with details.”

“Yes, you certainly are. I like your details. And I’m glad to hear you’re enjoying gymnastics so much.”

James’s words were interrupted by noises of a muffled struggle on the other end of the line. “Get off!” Becky was muttering. “I’m still talking!”

“Daddy! Daddy!” Mikey’s voice broke through.

“Hi, Mike, how’s it going?”

“Becky won’t let me have the phone and it’s my turn.”

More muffled struggling and the sound of Becky muttering, “Pushy little pig. You give it back to me afterwards.”

“Did you get the postcard I sent, Daddy?” Mikey asked. “It’s got a lighthouse on it.”

“Yes, I did. Thank you very much.”

“I did all the writing on it myself. I even wrote your address.”

“And a Superman job you did too,” James said. “It was very easy to read. The mailman got it right to my door with no trouble at all.”

“Dad?”

“Yes, Mike?”

“When can we come to your door again? I miss you. I want to see you.”

“Yes, I miss you too, Mikey. Big lots. And that’s one of the reasons I’m phoning. To make arrangements with Mum for you two to come out over Thanksgiving.”

“I don’t want to wait that long. I miss you now.”

“Yeah, I know. Me too,” James said. “Every night I say, ‘Goodnight, Mikey. Goodnight, Becky’ to that picture beside my bed.”

“Yeah, every night I say ‘Goodnight, Daddy’, to your picture,” Mikey replied. “But I wish it was really you.”

“So why don’t you put your mum on the phone so we can make some plans.”

“Okay, Daddy. Kiss you,” he smacked into the phone. “Love you forever.”

“Love you forever too, Mikey.”

A moment’s pause as Mikey dropped the phone noisily on the table. Then Sandy’s voice, deep for a woman’s voice but soft and darkly fluid, like molasses over gravel.

“Well, yes, I got your email,” she said. “And I want to know exactly what you’re playing at.”

“It should have been quite plain, Sandy. I’m not paying the kind of mortgage I’m shelling out on that place to have Joey living there and I know he is, because the kids have told me. Let Joey pay the damned mortgage.”

“The mortgage was part of the settlement, James.”

“Not if he’s living there.”

“The mortgage was part of the settlement,” she repeated in short, clipped words that emphasized their meaning. “Because our kids are living in this house. That’s still happening. So why are you even bothering with this shit?”

“Because I’m earning a South Dakota wage and paying for a West Side brownstone. Joey’s a fucking corporate lawyer. In Manhattan, for Christ’s sake. He can afford to pay his own way.”

“Well, if you think you can have the kids any time you want and then turn around and say you aren’t going to pay the mortgage …”

“This has nothing to do with when I get the kids. We agreed those dates in mediation, Sandy.”

“Yeah, well, we agreed the mortgage in mediation too.”

“Sandy.”

She slammed the phone down.

“You got to ignore her, Jim,” Lars said. “It’s like in playing football. If you want to complete a good pass, well, then you just got to think of nothing but that pass. You got to totally ignore the other team because they’re doing nothing but trying to put you off your concentration. Same with Sandy. She doesn’t want you to complete any passes, whether it’s getting the kids out here at Thanksgiving or telling the shifty lawyer guy to move the hell out of your house.”

“I know it,” James said in frustration and sank back into the chair. “It’s just when she starts in with that patronizing tone …”

“It’s interference, Jim. Nothing else. She’s just running interference. You got to take your mind off her and put it on the positive. On what you want to accomplish.”

“She so knows how to twist the knife,” James muttered. “She knows she can hurt me through the kids.”

“Jim, don’t let her get to you.”

“She makes me feel pathetic. That’s what I hate. She acts like in coming out here, I’ve run away when in fact, I’ve done just the opposite. I’ve faced up to myself, to where I went wrong. I made some bad choices and took some wrong turnings but when I realized that, I took action to create a better life. It just wasn’t the one she thought she was signing up for.”

Very slowly, Conor began to talk more. It was difficult to tell if it was meaningful speech or simply echolalia because it was made up largely of phrases James himself had used first, but it became increasingly clear that Conor wanted to interact.

One morning when he arrived, Conor said, “In here, you decide,” at the doorway of the playroom, almost as if it were a greeting.

“Good morning, Conor. Won’t you come in?” James replied.

“Ehhh-ehhh-ehhh-ehhh.”

For a long moment Conor remained in the doorway. He pressed the cat against his face, over his eyes, then lowered it and pointed it around the room.

“In here, you decide,” he said again. “In here, you go around the room.” He began his usual counter-clockwise perambulation. Once, twice, three times he went around the room.

“Where’s the boy’s auroch?” he said suddenly. “In here, you decide.”

“Yes,” James said. “In this room you can decide for yourself if you want to play with the toy animals.”

“Where’s the boy’s auroch? You decide.”

“Would you like me to help you find the basket?” James asked.

“Find the basket with the animals,” Conor replied, although James couldn’t discern if it was a genuine response or simply an incomplete echo.

Rising from his chair, James crossed over to the shelves. “Here are the animals,” he said, and lifted the red wire basket out. “Shall I take it to the table for you?”

“In here, you decide.”

“That’s right. You decide if you want me to take it to the table.”

“Take it to the table.”

Conor followed. Lifting the cat up, he scanned the basket, then reached in and lifted an animal out. “Here is a dog,” he said and set it on the table. This seemed to please him. There was almost the hint of a smile on his lips. “Here is a duck.” He set that up too.

James watched him as he progressed through the basket of animals. While the boy’s actions were slow and obsessive, they were not quite the same as the rote repetitions of an autistic child. They were nuanced in a way that made James quite certain they had meaning, although he couldn’t even speculate at this point what it might be.

“Here is the boy’s auroch,” Conor said with emphasis. “The auroch will stand with the others.” He surveyed them. “There are many animals. How many? How many is many?” Then he started to count them. This was new. James hadn’t heard him count before. “Forty-six. Forty-six is many. Forty-six in all,” Conor said.

“You like seeing many animals,” James said. “I hear a pleased voice counting.”

“There is no cat.”

“No, there’s no cat among them.”

“Many animals. Forty-six animals. But no cat,” Conor said.

“No. All of those animals, but none of them is a cat,” James reflected back to indicate he was listening carefully.

“Now they will die,” Conor said matter-of-factly. “The dog will die.” He pushed the dog on its side. “The duck will die. The elephant will die.” One by one he went through the plastic animals, pushing them over on to their sides. There was no distress in his voice. The animals all died with the same equanimity as they had lined up.

“Died. Many animals have died,” Conor said. “No more in-and-out. No more steam.” He pulled his toy cat out from under his arm where it had been stashed. He scanned it over the fallen animals, pushing the cat’s nose up against each individually. “The cat knows.”

The cat knows? James thought. The cat knows what? Or perhaps he had been misunderstanding all this time. Perhaps it was “the cat nose”. Perhaps Conor believed the cat was capable of scenting something.

“Where’s the rug?” Conor said suddenly and looked at James.

James looked up blankly.

Conor turned his head and glanced around the room. Abruptly his face lit up and he crossed over behind James to get the box of tissues.

Coming back to the table, Conor pulled tissues out of the box and laid them one by one over the plastic animals. This took up most of the space on the table. And most of the tissues too.

When he was finished, Conor surveyed his work. “Where is the dog?” he asked. Then he lifted one tissue. “The dog is here. Where is the duck? The duck is here.” Repetitively he went through all the animals, asking where an animal was and then lifting the tissue to say that here it was. There was a repetitive, sing-song quality to his questions and answers. This reminded James of a baby’s game of peek-a-boo. However, there was also a stuck-record quality to it, as though once started he couldn’t stop himself.

“You are concerned that the dog won’t be there, that the dog might not be under the tissue, if you can’t see him,” James ventured to interpret. “You want to look again and again to make sure.”

For a brief moment, Conor looked up, looked directly at James, his eyes a cloudy, indistinct blue. He had registered James’s comment and by his reaction James guessed his interpretation must have been correct.

“You are worried about what you will find under the tissue, so you must look,” James reiterated.

“The dog is dead,” Conor replied.

“You think the dog is dead and so that’s why you’ve put a tissue over it.”

“A rug.”

“So you’ve put a rug over it.”

“The cat knows.”

“The cat knows the dog is dead?” James asked.

“Ehhh-ehhh-ehhh-ehhh.”

“You are making your worried sound,” James said.

“The dog is dead,” Conor said very softly. “The duck is dead. The auroch is dead.” He looked down at the toy cat in his hands. “Someday the cat will die too.” And as he stood, a single tear fell, wending a wet path down over his cheek.

Chapter Eight

“So what exactly happened to you that night you first saw Torgon?” James asked, once Laura was settled for her next session. “When you experienced this intense imaginative episode?”

Laura sat in silence for a few minutes. “Well, as I followed Torgon towards the lilac hedge, I was in her world. One moment I was on the path through Adler’s vacant lot and the next moment I was on this high promontory of chalky white stone. The soil itself was white. Not crumbly like in the Badlands, but actual rock that was pushed up in great, distinct ribs to form the cliff, as if a giant had slammed together a handful of blackboard chalk. Below us was this massive broadleaved forest that stretched off in all directions. Sort of what I’d expect the Amazon Basin to look like, if you viewed it from high up. I remember the trees undulating restlessly in the breeze, almost like waves in an ocean. That’s how it got its name. From that point on, I always called it the Forest because of that view from the cliff.”

Laura paused pensively. “When I say ‘I went there’ or ‘I went with her’, that’s not quite right. It’s hard to describe what really happened, because I was aware ‘I’ myself wasn’t there. This was one thing that was different about the Forest from my other fantasies. In all of those, I was always at the centre of the action, imagining myself as the star, doing things with the characters I created. The Forest was completely different. It was more like seeing a movie.

“At first I couldn’t figure out what Torgon’s role was. It was immediately obvious that she was a leader of some kind. You could tell that straightaway from the way people treated her. I assumed at first that she was a queen, but came to realize that she was, in fact, a kind of holy person. Not a priestess exactly, but of that type. The word in the Forest people’s language for her role was benna.”

“So they had their own language?” James asked.

“Yes. Although the only time I was aware of it was with words like benna that didn’t have an equivalent in English. I’d ‘hear’ those words.”

James listened with fascination. He had always found children’s imaginary companions intriguing, partly because he’d had no similar companions himself so it was hard to conceptualize the experience. Becky, however, had gone through a phase at three when an invisible tiger named Ticky had accompanied her everywhere, so that had given him a valuable second-hand experience. He knew that imaginary companions, outlandish though they could seem, were a normal, healthy part of childhood and usually indicated a child of above-average intelligence. It was unusual that Laura’s imaginary world had come into being so late, as the more usual age for this sort of thing was between three and six, but it wasn’t unheard of, especially in highly creative children

James looked at Laura. As she talked about the Forest, she relaxed. The anxiety of the previous session had entirely gone and she sat back in an open, comfortable position. Her eye contact was excellent, her smile ready.

“Torgon didn’t live in the village where the others lived she said,” because she was considered divine by her people, an embodiment of their god, Dwr. So she lived in a walled compound in the forest, a sort of monastery. There was another high-status holy person living there as well. His name was Valdor, but he was always called the Seer because he had divine visions. This was actually his role, sort of like an oracle. He wore long, heavy white robes with gold embroidery on the edges and he was very old when I first saw him – in his mid-seventies, perhaps. There were some women also living in the compound. Like nuns. And children. Lots and lots of children of all ages. They came from the village, from wealthy families mostly, to get an education at the compound. They were called acolytes, even though they didn’t do anything very religious.

“That first night I went …” Laura gave a small quirky smile. “I was actually a bit disappointed to find out all this. Up until then my life had been all about comic books and TV shows. I was passionate about Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, and I can remember thinking, why couldn’t it have been Dale Evans who popped up in Adler’s lot? But it took no time at all for me to fall in love with Torgon. She was this amazing person. Very charismatic. And intelligent. Really savvy, you know? In a streetwise sort of way. But she was also very emotional. Her moods could change with breathtaking suddenness and she was never the least bit inclined to rein them in. Yet she could still be so appealing, so charming, even in the midst of the most unreasonable behaviour. I loved that about her, that complicated wildness.”

“Who knew about Torgon? Did you tell anyone? Your father, for instance?”

“Kind of,” she replied and became thoughtful for a moment.

“I’m hearing something more in your voice,” James said. “Did your father not approve?”

“It’s not so much that he disapproved. Just that he didn’t get it, so there wasn’t much point in telling him. I spoke to him about it, but he didn’t ‘hear’ me, if you know what I mean.”

“Can you clarify that a bit?”

She considered James’s request, then nodded. “Like, for example, I remember once when I was eight. I was on my annual visit to his house here in Rapid City. I came every August to stay a week with him and my brothers. It was the highlight of my life in those days. Not Christmas, not my birthday, but that last week in August when my dad took his vacation and I got to come and stay with him.

“I slept on this rollaway bed that he put in the corner of his bedroom. For a long time, it had become my practice to go to the Forest during that period between getting in bed and falling asleep. I liked to do it then as it was a nice relaxing time and I didn’t get interrupted. At the Meckses no one ever even noticed because I was up in the attic, so I’d never paid much attention to whether I was talking out loud or not. But, of course, in Dad’s small apartment, he heard me and came in to see what I was doing. I remember him silhouetted in the doorway, asking, ‘Are you talking to one of us?’ I said no, that I was just playing.

“He came on into the room then and sat down on the edge of the bed and said, ‘You seem to be having an awfully good time in here by yourself. What are you playing?’

“Torgon had been coming to me for about a year by then and I was really into all the details of her life. For example, she was the elder of two daughters and had this sister four years younger who was named Mogri, and I knew all about the kinds of things they had done together growing up. I knew tons of other stuff too. The Forest society had an incredibly rigid hierarchy of castes and which caste you were born into counted for everything there. It determined who you were, what work you could do, which other members of society you could associate with. The highest caste was a religious ruling class that consisted of the Seer, the benna and their offspring. They were almost like a royal family, because they had absolute rule. The next highest caste was the elders, who made laws and arbitrated on civil matters. Then it was the warrior caste, and then the merchant caste and the traders, and so on and so forth. The very lowest caste was composed of the workers, the people who did manual labour. They weren’t even allowed to live in the same part of the village as those of the higher castes. They were actually walled off and kept out of the main village, except to do their work. Torgon and her family belonged to this lowest class. Her mother was a weaver, and her father built and repaired carts. Because she was low-born, it had come as a huge shock to everyone – including Torgon herself – when she was identified at nineteen as the next benna. So suddenly here she was, thrown from the lowest class to the highest. She was twenty-three at the point she had appeared to me in Adler’s vacant lot, and even then, she was still finding it hard to adjust in her work.”

“Goodness, that is all complex,” James said, thinking these were most extraordinary thoughts for an eight-year-old to be having. Trying to envisage Becky saying things like this to him, he could easily imagine how disconcerted he would feel as a once-a-month father to find out Becky spent most of her time playing pretend games about holy people and caste systems, and worrying over an imaginary twenty-three-year-old’s vocational problems.