Charles De Lint - Dreams Underfoot

Something about him calmed her—until she tried to speak.

“Whoareyou?” she asked. “Whatisthisplacehowdidlgethere?”

As soon as the first question came out, a hundred others came clamoring into her mind, each demanding to be voiced, to be answered. She shut her mouth after the first few burst out in a breathless spurt, realizing that they would just feed the panic that she was only barely keeping in check.

She took a deep breath, then tried again.

“Thank you,” she said. “For saving me.”

“You’re welcome.”

Again that dry, dusty voice. But the air itself was dry, she realized. She could almost feel the moisture leaving her skin.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“You can call me Jack.”

“My name’s Moira—Moira Jones.”

Jack inclined his head in a slight nod. “Are you all right now, Moira Jones?” he asked.

“I think so.”

“Good, well—”

“Wait!” she cried, realizing that he was about to leave her. “What is this place? Why did you bring me here?”

He shook his head. “I didn’t,” he said. “No one comes to the City of Bridges unless it’s their fate to do so. In that sense, you brought yourself.”

“But ... ?”

“I know. It’s all strange and different. You don’t know where to turn, who to trust.”

There was the faintest hint of mockery under the dry tones of his voice.

“Something like that,” Moira said.

He seemed to consider her for the longest time.

“I don’t know you,” he said finally. “I don’t know why you brought yourself here or where you come from. I don’t know how, or even if, you’ll ever find your way home again.”

Bizarre though her situation was, oddly enough, Moira found herself adjusting to it far more quickly than she would have thought possible. It was almost like being in a dream where you just accept things as they come along, except she knew this wasn’t a dream—just as she knew that she was getting the brush off.

“Listen,” she said. “I appreciate your help a moment ago, but don’t worry about me. I’ll get by.”

“What I do know, however,” Jack went on as though she hadn’t spoken, “is that this is a place for those who have no other place to go.

“What’re you saying? That’s it’s some kind of a dead end place?” The way her life was going, it sounded like it had been made for her.

“It’s a forgotten place.”

“Forgotten by who?”

“By the world in which it exists,” Jack said.

“How can a place this weird be forgotten?” she asked.

Moira looked around at the bridges as she spoke. They were everywhere, of every size and shape and persuasion. One that looked like it belonged in a Japanese tea garden stood side by side with part of what had to be an interstate overpass, but somehow the latter didn’t overshadow the former, although both their proportions were precise. She saw rope bridges, wooden bridges and old stone bridges like the Kelly Street Bridge that crossed the Kickaha River in that part of Newford called the Rosses.

She wondered if she’d ever see Newford again.

“The same way people forget their dreams,” Jack replied. He touched her elbow, withdrawing his hand before she could take offense. “Come walk with me if you like. I’ve a previous appointment, but I can show you around a bit on the way.”

Moira hesitated for a long moment, then fell into step beside him. They crossed a metal bridge, the heels of their boots ringing. Of course, she thought, they couldn’t go anywhere without crossing a bridge.

Bridges were the only kind of roads that existed in this place.

“Do you live here?” she asked.

Jack shook his head. “But I’m here a lot. I deal in possibilities and that’s what bridges are in a way—not so much the ones that already exist to take you from one side of something to another, but the kind we build for ourselves.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Say you want to be an artist—a painter, perhaps. The bridge you build between when you don’t know which end of the brush to hold to when you’re doing respected work can include studying under another artist, experimenting on your own, whatever. You build the bridge and it either takes you where you want it to, or it doesn’t.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

His teeth flashed in the moonlight. “Then you build another one and maybe another one until one of them does.”

Moira nodded as though she understood, all the while asking herself, what am I doing here?

“But this,” he added, “is a place of failed dreams. Where bridges that go nowhere find their end.”

Wonderful, Moira thought. A forgotten place. A dead end.

They started across an ornate bridge, its upper chords were all filigreed metal, its roadway cobblestone. Two thirds of the way across, what she took to be a pile of rags shifted and sat up. It was a beggar with a tattered cloak wrapped around him or her—Moira couldn’t tell the sex of the poor creature. It seemed to press closer against the railing as they came abreast of it.

“Cancer victim,” Jack said, as they passed the figure. “Nothing left to live for, so she came here.”

Moira shivered. “Can’t you—can’t we do anything for her?”

“Nothing to be done for her,” Jack replied.

The dusty tones of his voice made it impossible for her to decide if that was true, or if he just didn’t care.

“But—”

“She wouldn’t be here if there was,” he said.

Wood underfoot now—a primitive bridge of rough timbers. The way Jack led her was a twisting path that seemed to take them back the way they’d come as much as forward. As they crossed an arched stone walkway, Moira heard a whimper. She paused and saw a child huddled up against a doorway below.

Jack stopped, waiting for her to catch up.

“There’s a child,” she began.

“You’ll have to understand,” Jack said, “that there’s nothing you can do for anyone here. They’ve long since given up Hope. They belong to Despair now.”

“Surely—”

“It’s an abused child,” Jack said. He glanced at his wrist watch. “I’ve time. Go help it.”

“God, you’re a cold fish.”

Jack tapped his watch. “Time’s slipping away.”

Moira was trapped between just wanting to tell him to shove off and her fear of being stuck in this place by herself. Jack wasn’t much, but at least he seemed to know his way around.

“I’ll be right back,” she said.

She hurried back down the arched path and crossed a rickety wooden bridge to the doorway of the building. The child looked up at her approach, his whimpers muting as he pushed his face against his shoulder.

“There, there,” Moira said. “You’re going to be okay.”

She moved forward, pausing when the child leapt to his feet, back against the wall. He held his hands out before him, warding her away.

“No one’s going to hurt you.”

She took another step, and he started to scream.

“Don’t cry!” she said, continuing to move forward. “I’m here to help you.”

The child bolted before she could reach him. He slipped under her arm and was off and away, leaving a wailing cry in his wake. Moira stared after him.

“You’ll never catch him now,” Jack called down from above. She looked up at him. He was sitting on the edge of the arched walkway, legs dangling, heels tapping against the stonework. “I wasn’t going to hurt him,” she said.

“He doesn’t know that. I told you, the people here have long since given up hope. You can’t help them—nobody can. They can’t even help themselves anymore.”

“What are they doing here?”

Jack shrugged. “They’ve got to go somewhere, don’t they?” Moira made her back to where he was waiting for her, anger clouding her features.