The Crying Bridge

The Crying Bridge--Chapter 9

 The digital alarm clock on the bedside table began its insidious beeping. Del sat straight up, eyes wide and heart pounding. Wow, she thought. I was really sleeping! She reached over and stopped the alarm. The dream came back to her then. It had been so real...and so surreal at the same time. Del lifted the sheet to confirm she was still nude and not wearing some horrid old-fashioned nightgown. She laughed a little shakily then got out of bed.

She never would have believed her own imagination could be so fertile. She had taken a little bit of information about a long-ago tragedy and invented a dream so vivid she was still feeling disturbed by it.

She quickly dressed for her morning run. She started putting on a pair of athletic socks and noticed that the bottoms of her feet were covered with dirt. She got up off the end of the bed and pulled back the top sheet. There was dirt here, too. Del stepped away from the bed, as if it were a mass of angry bees that might sting her to death. "Okay," she said out loud in voice not like her own. "What the fuck is going on?" She was genuinely scared. Was she walking in her sleep now? She had never sleepwalked before, not even as a kid. Was it possible that her dream hadn't been a dream at all, that maybe there had been someone outside her home last night, someone she had chased after? She reminded herself of the wind-up clock and the horrible nightgown. Those things weren't real, so the rest of it couldn't have been either. She threw her hands in the air. "So I walk in my sleep now," she said. She was still a little frightened, but her voice sounded more normal. She took a deep breath and finished dressing. After her run, she would replace the dirty sheets, but for now, she needed to get out of this room and clear her head.

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While she ran, Del decided quite firmly that an episode of sleepwalking was not so weird, given the circumstances. She had been very tired, she had consumed alcohol earlier in the evening and eaten a heavy dessert much later in the evening than she normally would have. Combine those facts with the legend of the poor woman with PPD and a murdered child, it was no wonder she'd had a dream so real to her she'd gotten out of bed to check things out. For some crazy reason, she had an urge to call Evan. She believed he could reinforce her own decision about the whole thing.

After changing the bed, having breakfast and showering, Del gave in to her urge and dialed Evan's number. It was still early for a Saturday, and she was hoping she wasn't waking him. He answered halfway through the second ring, sounding very awake and alert.

"Evan, hi," Del said. Just the sound of his voice made her feel better. "It's Del."

"Good morning, beautiful," Evan replied. "How did you sleep?" Before Del could answer, he continued. "You know, I'd much rather be saying those words to you in person after having spent a wonderful night with you lying next to me."

"Evan, right now, I am wishing that was exactly what was going on. I would give anything if I had woken up with you, in your house, instead of here."

"Del, what's wrong? What happened?" He was suddenly very serious, hearing the stress in her voice. "Do you need me to come out there?"

"No, no...it's all silly, really..." she told him about her dream and the realization that she had been walking around out in the dark in her sleep, and in the nude, no less. No matter what she told herself, she was still upset by it all. And just as she had thought, Evan made it better.

"Are you okay?" he asked. When she told him she was, he echoed her own thoughts as to why the whole thing had happened.

"Thank you, Evan." Del said, finally beginning to relax a little. "I knew you'd make me feel better. I was feeling like I was losing it there for awhile."