I’m back home and upstairs minutes before Dad gets in. Billy hasn’t noticed my absence and shoots off, leaving his Xbox behind. I don’t think Dad likes him. Susan said she’ll message me later, to check on Seb.
I can’t concentrate on anything. I keep replaying in my head the conversation we had with one of the doctors when he said that Seb might be in this state for days, but that they didn’t know, and they’d have to wait for the results of tests, and that they were consulting with another doctor in California, but there’s an eight-hour time difference …
And now everything is lost. My one chance to get the world’s last Dreaminator snatched from me.
Dad comes in and flops down on the sofa opposite. I don’t even have a chance to say, ‘How is he?’ He starts talking straight away, in a kind of monotone.
‘No developments. At the moment, all they’re saying is that he is “stable”. They’ve ordered up some bit of machinery from another hospital that will give them a better look at his brainwave pattern, but it’s got to come from Manchester. They’re not ruling out infection. In some cases, the body can sort of put itself into a coma in an attempt to fight an illness, but they can’t understand why there’s no fever …’
And so on. I try to take it all in but I can’t. Instead, I just stare at the silent figures on Wolf’s Lair, paused on the screen, mid-battle, waiting for someone to take up the console again.
I have to ask Dad, but I’m a bit nervous.
‘The, erm … Dreaminators? Did they …?’ I want to know if they – that is, the doctors or researchers or whoever – have discovered anything. Perhaps it’s a bit early, but still …
‘No, Malky,’ says Dad. ‘I handed them over to Dr Nisha. I felt like I was mad for even bothering her with them.’
‘So you didn’t bring them back?’
Dad’s tone is soft, or perhaps just exhausted. ‘No, Malky, I didn’t. And, until Seb is back with us safe and well, I don’t want to hear them mentioned again, all right?’
He sits next to me now and he wants me to meet his gaze, but I cannot pull my eyes away from the screen where the game characters are doing that thing that they do when the game is stopped: you know, they stay still for ages, then they’ll move a bit, walk in a circle or something, then return to their resting position, waiting for a player to activate them again.
Dad takes my chin in his hand, gently turning my head to face him. ‘Hello? You with me?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Can I ask you something?’
‘Mm-hm.’
He breathes in deeply through his nose. ‘Why did you do it, Malky? Last night? You told the doctor that things had been going wrong before, you had had warnings, so why did you carry on?’
‘I wasn’t going to. Honest. But then … Seb started it, and I thought once more wouldn’t harm.’
Dad is quiet for a while. Then he says, ‘That was my problem, you know? With the drugs. Every time I thought once more won’t harm.’ He sighs. ‘Don’t repeat my mistakes, son.’
‘But you’re okay now?’
‘Let’s just say I’m okay for now, eh?’ He hugs me, saying into my ear, ‘He’ll be all right, son. He’ll be all right.’
And I hug him back and I go, ‘Uh-huh,’ while over his shoulder I’m still looking at the paused game.
Is that what Seb is doing? I wonder. He’s still dreaming but nothing much is happening?
Is it like he is paused in my dream and waiting for me to reactivate it? There’s no hope of that now. Not without a Dreaminator.
I feel my phone buzzing in my pocket, but I don’t think Dad wants our hug to end yet, so I stay wrapped up with him. At last, he gives a big sniff in my ear and then gets up and heads towards the stairs.
‘I’m shattered. I can’t even think straight,’ he calls back to me, but his voice sounds wobbly and cracked. ‘Your mam’s staying at the hospital. Your Uncle Pete and your Mormor are driving over from Ullapool. We’re all taking turns talking to Seb, you know? Trying to keep him with us. You and me’ll head back to the hospital in a bit, aye?’
I nod.
‘I’m going for a lie-down in your room. Can you wake me in an hour? I’ll be out like a light.’
I take my phone from my pocket. There’s a message from Susan.
I wonder if it’s the same thing that I’ve thought of?
If it is, I definitely don’t like it.
Before I can reply, she sends another message: