These Dreams of You

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Zan nearly tumbles down the stairs of the inn in pursuit. He staggers out into the street and takes off in the direction that Parker ran.

Running and stopping to listen for the boy’s footsteps, hearing nothing he runs further, but in no time comes to doubt where he is and the direction he’s chosen. “Parker!” he calls, and a light comes on in a window but he doesn’t care; he continues calling the boy’s name. After ten minutes he realizes he’s not only lost his son but himself in an anonymous part of the city with once industrial intentions, the wasteland’s only interruption being the U-Bahn station east of him.

The father peers at the U-Bahn, wondering if the boy ran there. But Parker doesn’t like the dark closed places. Zan moans, “Parker, please come back,” not loud enough for anyone to hear but God, and in the dark he turns where he stands, constantly spinning as if to create a vortex that might catch the boy in its sway. Over and over as he spins, Zan says the boy’s name, an incantation to conjure him.

At a loss, he begins to stumble back the way he came when someone hits him in the head.