The morning after Neptune died, I awoke crying. I hadn’t cried in years, yet here I was lying on a soaking wet pillow over a dream. My dreams were changing. The sense of companionship and adventure was gone, a huge black cloud was hovering above me. But I had to see them through to the end and, though I still craved the nights and the stories, their sadness lingered throughout the days. Of course, I couldn’t blame all my misery on my dreams. My parents’ problems were also getting worse.
I felt trapped. I would lie in bed at night and listen to them shouting at each other through the wall. I worried that the fights would get so bad that they would split up and then what would I do? Sometimes I wanted to scream at them to shut up. Why were they doing this?
Around the time I dreamt that Neptune was shot, Mom and Dad’s fights began to get worse. In the past, they had always tried to hold off until I was out of the room. It didn’t make much difference, but at least it gave me the opportunity to slip out of the house unnoticed if things got too bad. Then I would go and hang out at the mall or the video arcade for a few hours until things had calmed down. But that day Mom didn’t hold back. She tore into Dad for all his mistakes right in front of me. I think he knew deep down that she was right, but he couldn’t admit it out loud. Pretty soon they were screaming at each other about something that happened years ago and had nothing to do with the stupid chicken place.
Watching them go at each other was just too much. Something snapped inside me. The pressure that was building up from the fights and the dreams was overwhelming. I yelled at them to shut up and stormed out of the house.
I only went down to the arcade for a couple of hours, but I guess it made them feel bad. When I got back they were both really apologetic. Things settled down and we even began talking about where we would go for a holiday this summer. Dad suggested we go down to California, but Mom gave him one of those looks which means, “We can’t afford that.”
“We could go camping,” she said. “Out to the coast, or maybe even down to Oregon. The beaches are nice there and we had a great time when we went three years ago.”
Dad nodded.
“Yeah, that would be good. Just the three of us in the tent trailer. I could get away for a couple of weeks.”
Mom shot Dad another of her looks. This one meant, “You had better.”
That was when I screwed up. I didn’t realize how important it was to them. Sure I had enjoyed the holiday three years ago, but I had only been eleven then. Now, my idea of fun wasn’t a tent trailer in Oregon with my folks, and I had already arranged something else. I should have told them long before this, but the dreams had me so preoccupied that it had just slipped my mind. Wayne’s parents had a cabin by a lake south of Saskatoon and I was going there for the last half of the summer. There was lots to do there: water-skiing, swimming, wind surfing, and lots of other people my age. In fact, Sarah’s parents had a cabin on the other side of the same lake. So I told them I couldn’t go to Oregon. It was lousy timing, and they looked really hurt. They didn’t say anything, but late that night I could hear them arguing again through the wall. Finally, I went to sleep, and the dreams took over.