It’s a sunny day in July. Penny has been working at the Dallergut Dream Department Store for three months. The streets are full of merchants opening their shops for the day, and the Noctilucas scurry around, collecting the rented sleepwear people have dumped everywhere. Penny is heading to work, sipping on a soy latte she bought at a coffee shop. By the time she arrives at the store, she realizes she’s much earlier than usual.
All employees at the Dallergut Dream Department Store have their shifts carefully assigned so the store can be run twenty-four seven unless dreams sell out. There is no point in coming in early. Penny decides to enjoy the sun outside. She looks up at the five-story wooden building towering over the center of the city. The Dallergut Dream Department Store. The sight of it is indeed a marvel to behold when she’s not at work. But her respite doesn’t last long.
“Hey, Penny, glad you’re early. Hurry up and come help us!”
The entrance bursts open, revealing Vigo Myers, the second-floor manager, shouting at Penny. He holds a half-squished peach in one hand and fans himself with the other.
“Oh... O-okay!” answers Penny, feeling flustered as she enters the store.
The entire store smells of tart fruit. Decorations made of peaches, apricots, big green grapes and other fruits are hanging around the lobby. Penny would easily mistake it for a random orchard if there were no familiar faces.
Besides Vigo Myers, other employees have been temporarily reassigned from each floor to hang fruit, decorate leaves and clean up fallen fruit from the ground. Among them are some unexpected workers.
“Motail, could you please send the Leprechauns back to their own store? Why in the world are they here?” the third-floor manager, Mogberry, shouts.
“I asked them to come. I thought, why should I have to climb up the ladder when we have flying friends next door? Plus they happily obliged. Just look at them—they’re working so hard for us!” Motail points at the ceiling.
Above them, pairs of Leprechauns are struggling to hang green grapes as big as their bodies. At least five of the grapes have dropped around Penny. One even falls on a passing customer.
“Ouch!”
“Oh dear, we’re so sorry! Are you okay? Do you mind going upstairs? As you can see, the lobby is a bit chaotic at the moment.” Weather apologizes on their behalf.
“What are all these?” Penny picks up one of the fallen green grapes.
“You didn’t hear? We’re expecting a VIP today,” Mogberry says, folding a fruit box in half. Her hair looks especially disheveled, with even more baby hair sticking out than usual.
“Who is this VIP we’re all decorating the place for—”
Penny’s question is interrupted by Mogberry’s strict command. “Can you take these out? What would Madam Rockabye think if she saw this? These are long expired!” She moves on from the fruit boxes and starts cleaning up the heaps of dream boxes in the lobby.
Penny rolls up her sleeves to help Mogberry. Her unfinished soy latte on the front desk has gone cold. She makes a mental note that next time she gets to work early, she won’t hang around in front of the store.
“Mogberry, don’t throw them all away! I’ll take them. They’ll sell well on the fifth floor with big discounts!” Motail unabashedly intervenes, munching on the leftover green grapes. The Leprechauns are flying around him in their sleeveless shirts and adorable leather vests, each nibbling on a single grape in their arms.
“Oh, Motail, please. I know you sell dreams at a discount, but this is pushing it too far. The dreams would be undreamable, with chunks of scenes, smell and color all gone. If you have any decency, you can’t sell these. Dallergut would be so furious if he found out. And if Babynap Rockabye discovers we’re selling such low-quality work... I don’t even want to imagine how she’d react. She’d never do business with us again.”
“But the customers won’t remember a thing about their dreams...”
“That’s right, I second that!” the Leprechauns chime in. They seem inclined to add more, but Mogberry’s furious glare cuts them short.
Penny picks up the name from their conversation. “Babynap Rockabye, you said? She’s the one who’s coming today?”
“Yes, for the first time in years. That’s why we’ve been decorating the store. She loves sweet and tart fruit. I heard she’s bringing mounds of dreams at Dallergut’s special request! I can’t wait to see them! Definitely one of the perks of working here. When else would I ever get to meet her in person?”
Babynap Rockabye is one of the Legendary Big Five, and she’s won more than ten Grand Prix prizes at the year-end awards. She’s the only director who creates conception dreams, and she’s a long beloved public figure. Penny has only ever seen her in magazines and on television. She never imagined she’d meet her in person.
“That’s it, guys. This should be enough, so whoever is done with their shifts can leave. Didn’t think it would be this big a hassle.”
Dallergut, who Penny had thought was in his office, sticks his neck out from piles of empty boxes. He’s wearing a working jacket instead of his go-to T-shirt and cardigan. The baggy outerwear makes him look slight.
“You were here all along?” Penny asks, clearing up the boxes that are blocking his view.
“It was my idea to decorate the lobby for Babynap. I just thought a few fake fruits would do, and now it’s out of control! Hey, guys! You can leave! Now. Off you go!” Dallergut rubs his neck with a grimace.
But no one budges at Dallergut’s command. Everyone is frozen, staring at the lobby door.
Penny follows their gaze and her eyes alight upon a petite old lady, standing at the entrance with her entourage.
Penny immediately realizes why everyone’s frozen. The incredible aura this frail old lady exudes leaves them speechless. Babynap Rockabye. Her mysterious, otherworldly energy seems to make time run back and forth around her. She moves as if in slow motion, and yet before Penny can gather her bearings, Babynap Rockabye is already inside the store.
“Babynap! Good to see you!” Dallergut greets her.
“Oh, my dear old friend. I haven’t seen you since last year’s general assembly. My, my! Love the smell of this fruit. The store feels...blissful,” Rockabye marvels at the spectacle of the fruit dangling around the lobby.
Dallergut and Babynap Rockabye shake hands. Awestruck, the other employees cover their mouths at the sight of her.
Penny is fortunate to be standing near her. Rockabye’s scent is richer and stronger than the decorative fruit around them. Her warm countenance is a mix of wrinkles and plump, rosy cheeks like a baby’s.
Rockabye’s entourage follows her into the store, each of them holding heavy bundles wrapped in high-end silk.
“Here you go, Dallergut, as promised. They are not my best products, but I trust you’ll take good care of them. As you always do.”
“Nonsense, they are our most precious products! Thank you for choosing our store,” Dallergut says, holding up one of the bundles.
Penny is too curious about what’s unfolding around her to stay quiet.
“Mogberry, are they all conception dreams? I thought conception dreams were only made to order. Are we allowed to have them premade?”
Mogberry seems too carried away with the silk bundles to hear her.
“Hello? Mogberry? What I’m trying to get at is that someone must be pregnant first to get a conception dream, correct? How are you supposed to know who will be pregnant in order to have the dreams premade?”
The more questions Penny asks, the more confused she becomes. Come to think of it, the idea of a conception dream itself doesn’t make sense. People usually have conception dreams before they even realize they’re pregnant. How is that possible?
“Those aren’t technically conception dreams,” Mogberry replies, too spellbound by the silk bundles to look up at her. “They’re leftovers from the productions.”
“Leftovers? What’s the use?”
Now, Mogberry turns to her. “Back to your other question: how do we know who will be pregnant?” She narrows her eyes, pausing for dramatic effect.
“Right. It doesn’t make sense if you think about it. Foretelling the future by dreaming that a baby will be born...?” Penny feels confused.
“That’s exactly what this is about. Foretelling the future.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Conception dreams are precognitive dreams. The dreammaker foresees that a baby will be conceived in advance and premakes a dream accordingly.”
“Precognitive dreams?” Penny asks in disbelief.
“I can’t say for sure, but rumor has it that Babynap Rockabye is one of the distant descendants of the First Disciple. You know, the disciple who ruled over the future in the tale of The Time God and the Three Disciples? You’ve surely read the story. Anyway, it’s not necessarily the case that every descendant has prophetic visions, but they can often glimpse snippets of the future or get a sense of big events. And they can especially sense the seeds of new life more strongly than anything else. That’s how Babynap Rockabye can create these conception dreams. Isn’t that amazing?”
“So you’re saying they’re...?” Penny points at Rockabye’s bundles.
“Yes. They may be leftovers, but they are still precognitive dreams indeed!”
“Unbelievable!”
In short, Penny is not only at a historical moment where the descendants of the First and Third Disciples are conversing, she’s also witnessing piles of precognitive dreams within her arm’s reach. It is like she’s been dropped into a fairy tale.
Are they really precognitive dreams? Will I be able to see my own future? Penny starts imagining her future husband, her mouth agape.
“Are you leaving already? That’s too soon,” Dallergut says to Rockabye, cutting Penny’s daydreaming short.
“I have many couples waiting for my dreams. I must get going. I’ll see you at the next meeting in a few months. It was nice seeing you, Dallergut, and thank you all for this. You guys must have put in a lot of work for this old lady.” Babynap Rockabye smiles as she looks at the hanging fruits, then at the entire staff, who nod their heads in gratitude.
“Please take these fruits with you, then,” Dallergut says, and Rockabye’s entourage gather the decorations and neatly pack them up.
“We should’ve just handed them the fruit in boxes in the first place. Would have saved us the hassle, and the dirty floor,” mutters Vigo Myers, wiping the peach juice from his hand with his handkerchief.
After Babynap Rockabye and her entourage are gone, the lobby quickly returns to normal, thanks to the help of the second-floor employees, who have outdone themselves by pitching in. Dallergut finally manages to send back the rest of the staff, although they can hardly keep their eyes off the pile of dream boxes Rockabye has left. Dallergut starts sorting out the bundles with Weather and Penny.
“I still can’t believe my eyes. Are they really...?”
“You want the dream, too, huh?”
“Oh, Weather, of course! So does everybody else on the planet!” Penny raises her voice excitedly.
They take the dream boxes from the silk bundles and arrange them on the displays and counters. Penny carefully writes out a notice: Select Precognitive Dreams in Stock.
In a matter of hours, Penny finds herself stuck between a line of customers drooling over the precognitive dreams and Dallergut, who seldom sells them. Usually, Dallergut would go straight to his office, but this time he hangs around the dream products, hampering sales.
“One precognitive dream—actually, two, please,” one customer asks.
“May I ask why you want to see your future?” Dallergut asks.
“Do I have to share that?”
“We need to make sure these go to those in need. As you know, there are only a handful of them.”
“I want to know the lottery numbers for this week.”
“We’re sorry, but we don’t sell them for that use.”
“What? You asked me. Are you screening customers?” The patron fumes.
Penny becomes anxious and quickly tries to draw the customer’s attention to another dream. “How about this one? It’s about an apocalypse where the earth is destroyed, and you’re the last human standing. What an experience, don’t you think?”
“I’m good,” the customer curtly replies, still furious as he leaves the store.
Another customer wants to see his future wife, and another wants to know when she’ll finally pass the civil service exam. Dallergut turns them both down.
“Looks like we’re not going to sell any today,” Penny mumbles.
“Let’s give it some time.” Weather shrugs it off.
“Why is Babynap Rockabye doing business with Dallergut? He doesn’t seem to be trying to boost her sales,” Penny says, trying not to sound like she’s talking behind his back.
“Rockabye doesn’t think her dreams are worth all the fuss. She didn’t choose us as her only store because she’s being picky. She’s just selling to her old friend Dallergut, thinking her dreams are too embarrassing for the public in the first place.”
“No way. They’re precognitive dreams, for God’s sake. She’s too humble.”
“If you could pick and choose the future you want to see, maybe. But not even she can make that possible. She can only show a snippet of the future, at most. A very short slice, like a split second.”
“Still, it’s amazing to foresee the future.”
“Is it really? What if you don’t get the information you’re hoping for? What if you only see a random scene of a child dropping a baseball, or a mundane slice-of-life moment where you’re just staring at your black tea boiling? Would you still think it’s amazing?”
“Well... Not something that mundane.”
“Those dreams are all mundane. But they can become special to someone if we sell them to the right person.” Weather smiles mischievously, putting on the same expression Dallergut often wears. Penny is beginning to understand how they’ve kept their work partnership going for over thirty years.
Meanwhile, Dallergut keeps guard over the precognitive dream display, still shooing customers away. He seems in no rush.
Na-rim was an aspiring screenwriter. She’d been working part-time at a movie theater for a long time. It was the best part-time job she could ever wish for because she could watch movies for free and brood over the dialogue or eavesdrop on people sharing raw feedback.
“Thank you. Enjoy your day!” Na-rim was bidding farewell to moviegoers at the exit. Two people, likely a couple, were the last to leave.
“What’d you think? I thought it was decent,” said one of them.
“Wasn’t it too predictable?” said the other. “So many clichés, it’s like I’ve seen this before with a different cast. The theme felt too conventional, as well.”
Na-rim nodded in solid agreement. She imagined how the story would have played out if she had been the writer. As she cleaned up leftover popcorn beneath armrests, all she thought about were ideas for her own stories.
Na-rim wanted her first script to be a romantic comedy. She loved the bubbly rom-com posters and cute, familiar titles.
In fact, romantic inspirations were all around her. She’d heard Employee A from the cafeteria and Employee B from the ticket counter were secretly seeing each other. She’d also heard an interesting story about C, who made the best grilled butter squid, and D, who worked in the parking lot. But they needed to be more exceptional to feature in a movie. Na-rim struggled to develop an ordinary idea into something special.
“Hey, what are you doing tonight?” a fellow part-timer asked, as she helped Na-rim clean up nacho crumbs.
“I’m having dinner with a friend from high school. You?”
“Actually, I booked a session at a fortune-teller’s shop nearby. Heard they’re great. I’m just a bit nervous about going alone, so I was wondering if you wanted to tag along. I remember you said you’re an aspiring screenwriter. Don’t you want to know if you will become a successful writer? Maybe you could join me in the next session. How does that sound?”
“I’m good, thanks,” Na-rim said, and seeing the coworker pout, she smiled and added, trying to appease her, “I mean, what fun is it if you know your future in advance?”
When Na-rim met her friend for dinner, the friend’s eyes were twinkling. Because Ah-young, her best friend for more than a decade, had just started dating someone.
“So, you’re saying the guy kept appearing in your dreams?”
“For several nights in a row! It made me think I must really be into him.”
“And that made you ask him out first? You, Ah-young Jeong, the infamous hard to get?”
“I thought the odds were better than doing nothing at all. Pride doesn’t pay the bills.”
“That’s badass. So, you’re officially going out with him?”
“Yeah, since last week. I still can’t believe it.”
“You know, this might just make for good rom-com material if I can polish it up a little.”
“It’s a fun story for girls’ night out for sure, but a screenplay? It’s too bland to be movie material.”
“Maybe it’s because it’s been ages since I’ve been in a relationship. Everyone’s dating life feels like a movie to me.” Na-rim stirred the now-stale curry on her plate, heaving a sigh.
They each headed back home after dinner.
Na-rim lay in her steel-frame bed.
Is there any good material for a story?
“Welcome!” calls Dallergut.
“Welcome to our store,” Penny says in a worn-out voice that contrasts with Dallergut’s lively one. Three hundred customers came in for precognitive dreams today, and Dallergut sent them all back empty-handed. Penny is exhausted.
“What kind of dream are you looking for?” she asks.
“I’m looking for something fun. If it gives me a story inspiration, even better.”
The customer skims through the Limited Releases corner. Piles of precognitive dreams are in plain sight, but she doesn’t seem to care. Instead, she methodically picks through unsold dreams clumsily thrown into piles. Penny realizes Dallergut is keeping a close eye on this customer.
Sure enough, he approaches her and strikes up a conversation. “So, you said you’re working on a screenwriting contest?”
“Excuse me, do we know each other?” the customer asks back.
“I remember everyone who’s been here.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I actually don’t remember if I’ve ever been here before.”
“Of course you might not remember, but it doesn’t matter. In fact, you’ve bought pretty much all the dreams we have in stock over the last two years.”
The customer’s eyebrows flinch as she tries to remember. “I guess so, now that you say that. But I assume none has been story-worthy. I still haven’t written a good one,” she says, looking disappointed.
“Actually, there’s one dream you haven’t tried that might interest you...”
“What is it?”
“It’s...” Dallergut pauses for a beat to create a dramatic buildup. “A precognitive dream.”
“No, thanks—I’m good.” The customer rejects his offer right away.
“Don’t you want to dream about your future?” Penny asks, curious.
“It’s no fun to know things in advance. Same with cinema, same with life. I hate spoilers.”
“You don’t want to know if you’ll be a successful screenwriter?”
“Not at all. I would actually be unhappy to know it in advance. Even if my future seems bright, it’s not guaranteed that the dream will come true, and it’ll only make me idle. And if it doesn’t come true, I would be devastated.”
“People are usually curious to know their final destination. You’re not?” Weather chimes in. Penny notices that both Weather and Dallergut look rather intrigued.
“My final destination? I don’t think humans are some self-driving car, racing toward a finish line. We need to own our lives, start the engine ourselves and sometimes put on the brakes. My life isn’t all about becoming a famous writer. I enjoy writing scripts, that’s all. Wherever I end up in life, whether beach or desert, I’ll embrace it.”
Dallergut is looking at her intently.
“I’m sorry—I was rambling.” The customer scratches the tip of her nose, seeming a bit embarrassed.
“No, not at all. I’m actually impressed. So, you think if you live in the present, the future will follow accordingly.”
“Exactly! That’s what I meant,” she says confidently.
Dallergut smiles. “In that case, I can’t recommend this precognitive dream highly enough. Rest assured, you won’t see future events you don’t want to see. You’ll see an instant of the future, a glimpse, which you’ll quickly forget anyway.”
“What’s the point if I won’t remember it?”
“Well, you may remember it someday. You have nothing to lose. As usual, you can pay afterward.”
“This looks expensive... How can you be sure that I’ll pay?”
“You’ve always paid your dues. You’re a sensitive and emotional customer, and we owe you a great deal. Penny, could you pass her that precognitive dream?”
After a while, the customer leaves the store, tilting her head to examine the dream that Penny handed to her.
“You used reverse psychology, didn’t you?” Penny says to Dallergut, who’s dusting the display.
“You don’t like my sales method?”
“You’re selling the dream to those who don’t want it, instead of those who’d kill to buy it.”
“Rockabye’s precognitive dreams can be disappointing to someone who wants to see their future. But they can come as a pleasant surprise to those who have no expectations at all.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will eventually, when you’ve worked here long enough—like me.”
“I was wondering when you would say that.” Penny pouts.
Na-rim had had a short precognitive dream, but she didn’t remember a thing the next day. After brooding over script ideas for a week, she finally decided to use Ah-young’s story as her inspiration; it was stuck in her head for some reason.
“Are you sure this will be enough material?” Ah-young asked.
“Of course! The man in your dreams. How romantic!”
“I still feel it’s too boring, even though I’m sure you’d polish the dialogues and characters and stuff.”
Na-rim and Ah-young were at the curry house again, discussing Na-rim’s new screenplay idea over dinner. They were each lost in thought, trying to come up with additional ideas to make the story unique.
Na-rim smudged the leftover carrots on her plate with a fork, while Ah-young fidgeted with her table mat. Just then, Ah-young’s phone rang. The name “Jong-seok” came up on the phone screen. Na-rim was present, calmly taking in every detail around her.
And right at that moment, a backstory sprung into her mind, and a strange but clear sense of déjà vu enraptured her.
The soggy leftover carrots, the shape of the table mat’s folds from Ah-young’s fidgeting, the name appearing on the phone screen... Na-rim knew immediately that the name belonged to Ah-young’s boyfriend, despite never having heard his name.
“Boyfriend?” Na-rim asked quietly. Ah-young nodded and took the call.
Na-rim felt the puzzle pieces of the story scattered inside her head suddenly fall into place.
“Déjà vu!” she shouted excitedly as Ah-young hung up the phone.
“Huh?”
“I think I just had a déjà vu! The exact moment when your boyfriend was calling you—I think I already saw it in a dream!”
“Really? That’s interesting!”
Na-rim felt a stream of brilliant ideas rushing through her. As if a finished script had been in her head all along. A string of thoughts began to flow.
“What if I write about someone who can foresee others falling in love in her dreams, and she becomes a dating consultant? Just like how I saw Jong-seok’s name in advance in my dream. A consultant with a miserable dating life herself, who can foresee others’ love lives from precognitive dreams.”
Ding Dong. “Payment received from Customer No. 1011. A small amount of Flutter has been paid for ‘Precognitive Dream.’”
“Weather, look! Remember those precog dreams we sold last week? People have started paying!”
“Really? That’s great news. Oh, it’s about time Rockabye comes back to collect her dues. I should start converting the payments into cash.”
There had been more customers who had come in with no interest in precognitive dreams but then left with a box or two of them at Dallergut’s advice.
Ding Dong. “A small amount of Wonder has been paid for ‘Precognitive Dream.’”
Ding Dong. “A small amount of Curiosity has been paid for ‘Precognitive Dream.’”
“The payments are so diverse. Look, there’s Wonder and Curiosity, too!” Penny says.
“Let me see,” says Dallergut, intrigued. He has been cleaning the Eyelid Scales behind her. “That’s amazing! I told you, it’s the customer’s call to decide whether a dream is useful.” He scrolls through the screen, clicking the mouse to check each notification message.
“Dallergut, I think I just saw an update notification pop up... You didn’t just turn that off, did you? I told you we must keep the system up-to-date and always check for any viruses,” Weather asks, suspicious.
“There are just too many of them...”
“What?”
“Nothing, Weather...” Dallergut trails off.
“What’s ‘déjà vu,’ by the way?” Penny finds a new word from the product reviews that have come in with the payments. “All the customers are saying they had an amazing ‘déjà vu’ experience.”
“Déjà vu! It means, ‘something you’ve already seen.’ It refers to an uncanny sensation that you’ve experienced something before, even when you know you never have. Isn’t it wonderful? Our customers have given our leftover precognitive dreams such an adorable name. How creative is that?” Dallergut exclaims.
“But you know what? Most of them initially marvel at their déjà vu, but soon shrug it off as a neurological illusion,” Weather adds.
“Really? That’s disappointing. All that effort we put in to sell the precog dreams, only to get that reaction...” Penny feels discouraged, scratching the back of her head.
“That’s the point!” Dallergut chuckles. “No one was confused, even after seeing their future!”
“Of course they weren’t, because they didn’t technically see anything,” Penny answers, not understanding what Dallergut’s trying to get at.
“That’s exactly what we need.” Dallergut smiles as he gets up. “I’m thirsty. I’m getting myself something cool to drink. Oh, shall I add a few drops of the fresh Curiosity that just came in today?” With that, Dallergut disappears into the storage room with a glass in his hand.
“This is why Babynap Rockabye brings her leftover productions to our store only. Other stores don’t take them, because they have no idea how to sell them,” Weather whispers.
Penny recalls the way Dallergut waited for the right customers instead of handing out the dreams to everybody. For a split second, she wonders if Dallergut can foresee the future himself.
“I want to pick Dallergut’s brain,” Penny mutters.
Dallergut returns from the storage room. “I’ve put in a couple of drops of fresh Curiosity. Here, give it a try,” he says, handing over crystal-blue lemonade that looks like it just came from the deep ocean.
Penny takes the glass and gulps away. A roller coaster of tangy sweetness fills her mouth. Curiosity feels much more pleasant than she’d expected. She feels a sudden surge of motivation.
“Dallergut, I want to do some research on Babynap Rockabye’s dreams. I have so many questions,” she says, inspired. “And who knows—if I dig deep enough, I might be able to create precog dreams myself and predict things far ahead. Just like in the old tales!”
“Well, it’s your choice if you want to study them... But it shouldn’t come as a surprise that many people have wasted their lives on that same line of research, if you know what I mean,” Dallergut says ambiguously. “There is no such future as grand as you might imagine. There’s only the excitement of the present and dreams for tonight.”
With that, he disappears into the crowd of customers, the lemonade in his hand.