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The House of Lost Dreams

Storm Christopher

Storm Christopher is a tech writer and editor in the advertising and marketing industry. He lives in the midwest with his cat, Renfield, and is hard at work completing his first mystery novel. This is his first fiction sale.

 

It was a nondescript little shop off to itself at the farthest end of a dilapidated and otherwise abandoned strip mall on the edge of that strange twilight zone that separates the city from the vacuous wastelands of suburbia. The highway by which it set seemed old and forgotten, too, an aging two-lane concrete ribbon that paralleled the newer bypass a hundred yards away.

Howie Davis didn't know why he circled back five miles out of his way or why the shop had even caught his attention. But his eyes had misted over as he passed it, and he thought he'd heard the merry strains of a calliope as if from far away. A flood of half-forgotten memories rushed over him, evoked merely by the name of the shop—The House of Lost Dreams.

Reaching the lunar landscape that once had been a parking lot, he steered his old Dodge off the road and carefully navigated the crater-sized potholes. He still hit a particularly deep one. The impact jarred his teeth, and the front end of his car made a loud metallic protest. "Thank God for warranties," he grumbled aloud. "On the car, if not my dentistry."

He was grateful when he finally reached the curb. He shut off the engine, leaned back in the seat and let go the breath he'd been holding. When he opened the door and slowly stood up to stretch, his knees creaked, protesting almost as loudly as the car's front end.

His back ached from long hours of driving, and he rubbed it with both hands as he looked up at the shop's name again. The neon letters were stained and covered with grime. There was something both sad and comical in the way the H and the D flickered sporadically, as if on the verge of shorting out.

The storefront window had been blacked out. So had the glass door. Howie frowned, feeling a wave of disappointment, even betrayal. He'd seen similar storefronts before along the highway—roadside porno palaces for truckers and traveling salesmen. He'd even stopped in a few, and the name could fit that kind of business.

Yet, there wasn't a truck or big-rig in the parking lot.

Still, he hesitated. Turning his back to the shop, he studied the gray sky, which promised rain, and felt a moist wind on his face. With the wind came the whisper of the calliope again, and something else—the smell of cotton candy, the pink kind that came on a paper stick, that dissolved on your tongue and left sticky sugar crystals on your fingers. It made Howie remember a carnival and a time when he was a kid. . . .

A car whizzed by on the old highway, its wheels humming on the broken pavement. The sudden sound snapped Howie out of his reverie, and he jerked his head up to watch the car and its driver go by. In a too-brief moment, it was gone. So was the memory and the cotton candy smell.

Inexplicably, his eyes misted up as they had before. He turned yet again to read the shop's name. Maybe it was just a porno palace, or maybe it was some kind of souvenir shop hawking cheap tee shirts and kitschy coffee mugs for travelers. Yet, the H and the D winked at him with a crazy seductive rhythm. At him . . .

Howie. Davis. Howie. Then, Davis.

Howie slipped his suit jacket off and tossed it into the car. Despite the gray sky and the threat of rain, the air was warm and humid. He locked his car. Not knowing what to expect, he stepped up onto the cracked sidewalk and put his hand against the shop's door. A small, but startling shock of static electricity flashed over the tips of his fingers, and he gasped in surprise.

The door swung inward.

Just inside, the stoop-shouldered proprietor sat on a high stool behind a counter. His face looked like a withered morel, pasty and pocky, and his scant hair stuck out on both sides of his head and around the largest ears Howie had ever seen. He looked up from an open magazine on his lap and flashed a gap-toothed smile.

"Been tryin' ta get that fixed," he announced in a high voice. "Dang door's supposed ta open automatically. Always liked automatic doors, myself. They're so welcomin'. But danged hard ta get anythin' fixed around here lately. It works jus' fine from this side, though." He ran his gaze up and down Howie, and then fell silent and gave his attention back to his magazine.

Still on the threshold with the door automatically open behind him, Howie looked around. The shop made him strangely anxious. The long fluorescent lights that hung overhead seemed a little too dim. Even the illumination they gave off had an odd quality. He felt mildly dizzy, but told himself it was just the natural adjustment from the bright sunlight outside. Despite his anxiety, he took another step inside, and the door closed behind.

Rows and rows of shelves filled the store. Upon the shelves were boxes of all sizes—big boxes and small, plain boxes and ornate, paper boxes and wooden boxes and tiny chests, boxes of every conceivable color. Still more boxes rested on pedestals or wooden stands around the edges of the shop. A few of them even seemed to glow.

Howie could discern no apparent order or organization to any of the boxes. "I was just driving by and thought I'd stretch my legs," he lied to the proprietor. "Any chance you might have a coke machine?"

The proprietor closed his magazine and placed it on the counter. "Now, Mister, ya didn't stop for no coca-cola." He stared at Howie for a long minute, his mushroom face and mushroom eyes inscrutable. Then he lifted his hand and wagged one thin, bony finger. "You got a smell all over ya, like snow-cones an' popcorn an' cotton candy. An' ya got music clingin' to ya that I know, too, like merry-go-rounds."

The finger continued to wag like a steady metronome. "But ya got somethin' else that kinda stinks up, an' that's a lot of sadness. The sadness of regret." He wrinkled his nose and reached for his magazine again.

Howie reddened and clenched his fists at his sides. Turning angrily on his heel, he prepared to exit. True to the proprietor's word, the automatic door opened automatically from the inside, as if showing him the way out.

Then, Howie calmed. A smile turned up the corners of his lips as he turned back again. The door closed indifferently. "Man, I've been a salesman for twenty-five years, but that's just about the cleverest pitch I've ever heard." He waved a hand at the shelves of boxes. "What the hell kind of place is this?"

The proprietor looked up again and leaned on the counter. "Well, I suppose ya could call it sort of an antique shop. For some, it's a second-hand store. For still others, I guess ya could say it's a Lost-and-Found."

Howie scratched his head and approached the nearest pedestal. A pentagonal, pearl-colored wax box caught his attention, and he bent closer. The swirls and knot designs pressed into the lid held a mesmeric quality that confused his senses. Straightening, he backed away and rubbed his eyes.

"I've never seen so many boxes," he said after a moment, aware that the proprietor was watching his every move. "Are they just decorative, or is there anything in them?"

"Dreams," the proprietor said simply. "Lost dreams. Just like the name of the shop says."

"Yeah, right," Howie muttered. He was beginning to wonder why he'd stopped. After all, it was just another roadside gyp-joint full of kitsch and crap.

"Isn't that why you stopped, Mr. Davis?" The mushroom eyes behind the counter suddenly shone with a deep, diamond light as the proprietor rose from his stool, and his strange, backwoods accent vanished. "You've lost something. A dream you once had. You wonder if you can possibly find it again."

"Now that would make me something of a fool, wouldn't it?" Howie shot back. He reddened again, feeling his blood pressure rise. "You can't go chasing lost dreams, not at my age. I've got a good career and a good life! And even if you could, what kind of a dream would you find in a box?" He grabbed the pearl-colored box and angrily ripped the lid off.

 

The heady smell of the rose garden filled his nostrils, and camera flashes filled the air. He faced a sea of microphones and tape recorders and stared past them at all the adoring, upturned faces. Never had he felt so good, so proud, so confident! The day he'd hoped and prayed for—the day he'd dreamed about—had finally come! Vindication!

With the White House for his backdrop, and all of Congress on their knees before him, he raised his hands. "Today," he proclaimed, "I can finally declare—and this time it's for real—Mission Accomplished! Yes, I mean it! Victory in . . . !"

 

Howie lurched sideways and caught himself by grabbing for one of the shelves. The proprietor caught him, instead, with one hand and put him back on his feet. Howie shook his head, surprised and a little bit embarrassed as the proprietor put the lid back on the pentagonal box.

"What the hell?" Howie exclaimed. "For a moment, I thought I was . . . I was the president of . . . !"

The proprietor replaced the box in its position on the pedestal. "Everybody has lost dreams," he muttered. "But trust me, this one's unique, not to mention dangerous and demented. Even if it was for sale, you couldn't afford it."

With vestiges of the experience still swimming in his head, Howie stuttered. "But, but . . . ! I don't understand! That wasn't my dream!"

Crooking a finger, the proprietor beckoned for him to follow. Down a long row of shelves they walked and into another, darker room entirely. Howie sensed there was still another room beyond that. The shop was large and deep. Impossibly large and deep. Everywhere he looked, he saw shelves and stacks of boxes.

"Yours are here," the proprietor said. "Somewhere. You'll just have to search. Take your time."

Howie raised an eyebrow. "But don't a lot of these dreams belong to other people?"

The proprietor pointed to a curtained area. "There's a fitting room over there. Feel free to try anything on. But if you open a box, just be sure to replace the lid when you're finished."

A frown of doubt creased Howie's lips. Boxes and boxes everywhere, and the strange proprietor was offering him the chance to peek as he would? "It seems kind of prurient," Howie said.

"Suit yourself," the proprietor answered with a shrug, donning his accent again as he turned away to leave Howie. "If ya find your own dream, it's yours ta keep." Then, he turned back toward Howie and wagged that bony finger once more. "Just be careful," he warned. "Don't get too caught up in someone else's dream."

"Hey, wait," Howie called as the proprietor walked away. "How did you know my name? You called me Mister Davis"

The proprietor didn't answer, but just kept on walking until he disappeared in the gloom among the seeming miles of shelves, and only his footsteps echoed in the weird air. Finally, even those faded.

Alone, Howie pursed his lips and wondered what to do, where to start. He ran his finger over what looked like a satin hatbox. Beside that was a shoebox. A small, porcelain ring box glimmered on the shelf beside the shoebox. Howie reached for that with utmost care. It seemed wrong somehow. An intrusive thing to do. Yet, he lifted the delicately hinged lid just a crack.

 

"Oh, Robert!" Howie exclaimed as he stared at the incredible diamond Robert had just placed on his finger. "You've made me the happiest woman in the world!"

 

Howie slammed the lid down on the porcelain box and drew a sharp breath. Instinctively, he pressed a hand to his chest, then to his crotch, to reassure himself of his masculinity. "This could seriously warp somebody's mind!" he muttered as he returned the box to its place. Yet, his fingers lingered on the box as he pushed it back on the shelf. He could feel sadness along its edges, an emptiness, and he wondered what had become of the woman to whom the dream belonged.

He took down another box. This one was an old cigar box with a faded picture of a pretty señorita and the word Havana stamped on the worn lid. Howie lifted it close to his nose. The box still exuded the crisp, distinctive aroma of fine tobacco.

Yet he hesitated. Howie looked nervously over his shoulder to see if anyone was watching. Hadn't the proprietor said something about a fitting room? He glanced around, turning almost in a circle before he spied the curtained area. He chewed his lip, and his eyes narrowed.

Then Howie Davis loaded up his arms with boxes and scuttled behind the draperies. The fitting room contained an overstuffed armchair and a table. Arranging the boxes in haphazard fashion, Howie sat down and balanced the cigar box on his knees.

He grinned with anticipation, licking his lips, and slowly lifted the lid.

 

The scents of ocean breezes and perfume filled his nostrils. The surf boomed on the sandy shore, and behind him, the strains of a Cole Porter song, adapted to a heady mambo beat, wafted out from the beachside Cuban nightclub. The tropical night glittered with stars.

But he held the brightest star in his arms. He pressed his mouth to hers, and her lips tasted like cotton candy.

"Stephen!" she breathed in his ear. "Please don't go! I'm so afraid!" She gripped the lapels of his flight jacket and pressed her head against his chest.

Stephen/Howie thought he'd never seen a woman more beautiful, more desirable. He wanted her with a passion that matched hers, and he meant to have her right here on the beach.

"The squadron leaves at dawn," he answered, drawing her down. "You'll join me in England in a few weeks, and we'll be married. This damned war won't come between us, Maria, I swear it!"

"You American pilots!" she whispered as she yielded to him. "Tell me again the three most important words in the world!"

Stephen/Howie grinned. It was their private joke. "Pitch, yaw and roll."

 

Howie closed the cigar box lid and sagged back into the armchair. Tears ran down his cheeks. He could still taste Maria's mouth, still feel her heat, and still feel her hands upon him. So much joy!

Yet, so much pain.

Stephen's dream had gone down in flame and bullets, and though Stephen had survived, Maria hadn't wanted a man with no legs.

Howie leaned forward and cradled his head in his hands and wept. It was Stephen's dream, but he had shared it, and he couldn't shake it off.

His heart hammered. His tears turned to beads of sweat. Howie leaned back again and thrust his hand into his pocket for a bottle of tablets. He swallowed one and set the bottle aside to stare at the pile of boxes still on the table. "No more," he murmured.

Yet, as he set the cigar box among the others, his hand brushed a small chest. It teetered on the edge and started to fall. Howie made a lunge to catch it.

The lid flipped open.

 

Howie flopped back in the chair and cried. His right hand made a fist around the bottle of tablets. His heart was racing. Or maybe it was breaking. His head reeled with dreams that were never his. Except, now they were. They were in his memories, as much a part of him now as his hands or his name.

He floated in a world of blackness. The walls of the room, even the curtain, had long since disappeared. It was just him and his armchair and boxes dotting the timeless dark like stars. He'd opened them all, one by one, like an addict unable to resist. They teased him with hope and laughter and joy, but in the end, every time, hope shattered, laughter turned to grief, joy to regret.

Lost dreams.

Howie tightened his grip on the bottle of tablets. A bad heart and high blood pressure. A dangerous combination, especially for a salesman on the road alone.

All alone. No family, no friends. No dreams.

One tablet kept him alive. The bottle contained thirty. And maybe none of it mattered anyway, he thought, as he unscrewed the bottle cap. Maybe he was already dead, and this was some kind of hell.

From out of the bottle came the faint sound of a calliope playing a jolly little march that conjured images of merry-go-rounds with painted horses and bouncing rabbits and long-necked ostriches going up and down and around and around.

Howie was beyond surprise, but still he opened his eyes. First, he looked at the bottle. It looked like an ordinary medicine bottle, but there was something different about it. Something unusual about the prescription.

He opened the lid for a closer look.

 

It was night, but no longer dark. The sky swirled with bright neon carnival lights. They made Howie dizzy with their colors. The ferris wheel loomed on his right, and the tilt-a-whirl spun crazily on his left. Right in front of him, the octopus tossed riders up and down with senses-stealing abandon. He turned in a circle, observing the roller-coaster and the mile-high parachute ride, the flying Dutchman, all the booths and games of chance with their kewpie dolls and stuffed toys, and he drank in the wonder of it all, the magic, wide-eyed as only a nine year old child could be.

In his right hand, he held a cotton candy, the pink kind on a stick, the kind that made sticky sugar crystals on your fingers and lips. In his left hand, he held a cherry snow cone.

Power cables stretched across the ground like black snakes, but he was careful not to trip and drop his treats. With no one to guide him, he wandered alone among the laughing crowds of thrill-seekers from one wild, incredible ride to the next, past the haunted house and the tunnel of love, past the tent with Hitler's body and the amazing transforming ape-woman from the deepest heart of Africa.

Howie was lost. But at nine years old, he didn't care. He had no money for the rides, but he had his cotton candy and his snow cone, and he was having the most astonishing night of his life!

When a clown appeared suddenly at his side, Howie didn't jump. The crazy wig and the huge red nose were just two more wonders. He smiled, and offered his left hand to the clown. But then, he realized he couldn't shake hands without dropping the snow cone, so Howie just smiled.

"Hi, Mister Clown!"

The clown bent low and placed his immense, white, rubbery hands on the knees of his red-and-yellow checkered pants. It was hard to hear over all the loud music and the screams and the laughter, but the clown spoke his name.

"I'll bet you're Howie Davis," he said through red-painted lips that stretched all the way up to his ears. "Your parents are worried. Half the carnival is looking for you!"

"I'm right here!" Howie shouted back. Then he took a bite of cotton candy and turned his attention to the merry-go-round. He particularly loved the big black stallion with the white mane and golden saddle.

As if by magic, the clown produced a token and held it up between his gloved fingers. "Would you like to ride that?" he asked.

Howie's eyes grew even wider. "Wow! Would I!"

The clown's eyes twinkled. "Finish your treats," he said, "then take this to the man at the gate. Tell him your name and that Chuckles said to put you at the head of the line and to give you the best ride he ever gave anybody."

Howie couldn't believe his luck. A free ride! He tore into his cotton candy. The sticky strands stuck to his face, even to his hair. In his eagerness to finish the pink mass of fluff, he dropped his snow cone. But it was only flavored ice and didn't matter as much.

With the last bite gone, he cast aside the paper stick, dashed to the roustabout at the gate and thrust out the token. The roustabout grinned as he repeated word for word everything Chuckles had said, and sure enough, he got the best horse—the big black stallion with the white mane and golden saddle.

That ride seemed to go on forever. Clinging to the pole upon which the painted stallion was mounted, Howie flung back his head and laughed as the world churned into one buttery mass of candy color. His heart beat faster and faster. The music of the calliope poured from loud speakers as he and his horse went up and down.

When the ride finally ended, Howie leaned breathlessly on the pole and waited for the world to settle down again. When all the other riders had dismounted, the roustabout came to get him, pried his small hands from around the pole, and helped him down.

Chuckles waited by the exit gate with his parents. His mom held out her arms to embrace him, her face tear-stained with worry. But Howie flung his arms, instead, around the clown. "Thank you," he said, barely audible over the carnival din. "I want to be a clown just like you when I grow up."

 

Howie gave a quiet sigh before he gently screwed the cap back on the bottle. He closed his fist around it again, but not out of anger this time or out of pain. That bottle had just become the most precious thing in the world to him. What was a bottle, really, but another kind of box?

The fitting room curtains parted, and the proprietor looked down at him for a long moment before taking the bottle from Howie's hand. He studied it, read the label, then inclined his head as he returned it. "Dreams are the best medicine, wouldn't you agree, Mister Davis? You thought you'd lost yours, and you've been carrying it all along."

Howie looked up with a puzzled expression. There was still so much he didn't understand. He made an encompassing gesture with his hand. "But you said it was back here somewhere."

The proprietor looked mildly indignant, but also amused. He pointed to the bottle with his bony finger. "Well, it is back here! Isn't this where you found it?"

Howie couldn't argue with that. He leaned back in the armchair, uncertain whether to laugh or to cry again. "I wanted so much to be a clown," he blurted. "I even went to clown college. But when my parents got sick, I needed a real job, something with money and security so I could take care of them, so I became a pharmacy systems salesman." He glanced at the medicine bottle. "I hated it. I still hate it. I travel from city to city, but I think now that I've just been running from that fact."

Howie leaned forward and set the bottle on the table among all the other boxes. "I'd completely forgotten that carnival. How could I have forgotten Chuckles?" He threw his head back suddenly and laughed as he hadn't laughed in years. "Oh, God! I flunked out of clown college! I couldn't juggle worth a damn!"

The proprietor pushed open the curtains with a swish and began to collect the many boxes scattered about. Howie rose to help him, and together, they returned the boxes to their shelves. When the last box was back in place, the proprietor fixed him with his mushroom eyes.

"You have a rare opportunity, Mister Davis," he said. "An opportunity these others never had. Their dreams are still lost dreams. Many of them can never be retrieved." He turned away and started toward the front of the shop. "You, on the other hand, have found your dream. It's in your front pocket right where it's always been. The question now is, what will you do with it?"

Reassuring himself that the bottle was indeed in his pocket, Howie fell into step behind the proprietor. "I don't know," he said doubtfully. "I'm a bit old to be a clown now. I've got a lot of seniority and job security, too, and a sizable 401K plan."

The proprietor said nothing. They had reached the front of the store, and he took his place behind the counter where his magazine still lay open.

Howie chewed his lip. He looked at the proprietor for some hint or guidance, but the strange man just climbed back on his stool. Howie took a step toward the door, which opened automatically. But then, he stepped back, and the door closed.

"Maybe I could be a clown part-time," he blurted. "Do hospitals and things like that for sick little kids! They'd like that, wouldn't they? Or maybe birthday parties!"

The proprietor turned a page of his magazine. "It's your dream," he answered. "Follow it the way you will."

Howie beamed, suddenly excited at the prospect of finally living his dream, if only in a small way. "Thank you," he said in a quietly earnest voice.

The proprietor didn't look up. "Don't mention it," he answered.

Howie grinned and gave the proprietor a look. "I was thanking Chuckles. I have a feeling he heard me, too. But thank you, also."

He stepped again toward the door, and again the door opened. This time, it didn't seem to be showing him the way out. Rather, it showed him a beginning. Still, he turned toward the proprietor once more, almost reluctant to leave.

"You know, I still can't juggle worth a damn."

The proprietor looked up. "Are you sure?" He made a gesture, and from the pages of the magazine, three red rubber balls sailed across the room straight at Howie.

Without thinking, Howie caught them. His hands became a blur, and the rubber balls went around and around in the air. Howie laughed. He felt younger than he'd felt in years.

He felt like a nine-year-old boy, and the world smelled of pink cotton candy, and the music of merry-go-rounds filled his ears.

 

Selina Rosen's stories have appeared in several magazines and anthologies including Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy Magazine, the two new Thieves' World anthologies, and HelixOnLine. Some of her fourteen published novels include Queen of Denial, Chains of Freedom, Strange Robby, Fire & Ice, Bad Lands (with Laura J. Underwood), and Sword Masters. She owns Yard Dog Press and created their Bubbas of the Apocalypse universe.

 

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