Veil

Chapter 18

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Veil dreams.

Dreams within the dream.

He sits bolt upright in his broken bed, sweat-pasty sheets sticking to his bare flesh like a shroud. He instinctively grabs for his rifle, but it isn't there. After a few moments the realization comes that he is not fighting in Vietnam or Laos, but living in a summer-smothered, roach-infested studio apartment not much bigger than a closet on New York's Lower East Side. He has been in the city now for three months, working as a temporary laborer to earn money, walking the streets to fight pain. He knows he is drinking far too much. He would like to brawl, but does not for fear that he will accidentally kill somebody. He has crippled three would-be muggers, possibly killed a fourth, and he knows that he is losing his mind.

For almost a month he has been experiencing a recurring dream—night after night, all night. The dream is not quite a nightmare, but it leaves him anxious and fearful in a way that combat never did.

In the dream he finds himself on a steel-gray path that stretches off to a horizon that is a brilliant blue and which he feels with his heart as well as sees with his eyes. Although the surface on which he stands is flat and level, he constantly fears that he will lose his balance if he takes a step in any direction. The surface has no "feel," but seems a natural extension of his own flesh.

The path is bounded on each side by walls of thick, swirling gray mist that seems to be alive; the walls hiss, although he is not sure if the sound is real or only in his mind. Figures of subtle, almost translucent color move through the mist and occasionally seem to stop and peer out at him. Some of the figures have teeth. However, he can only glimpse these moving things out of the corner of his eye, for he does not dare to look at either wall directly. He hates this fear and has never known anything like it; still, he cannot summon the courage to overcome it. Although he is deeply ashamed of his cowardice, there is no way he can bring himself to turn body or head and look at, or into, the walls.

He has come to believe that to do so, even in a dream, is to die. He will be sucked through the gray barrier, and there will be no way out.

Veil peels the sopping sheets from his skin, sits up on the edge of the bed, and buries his face in his hands. Sweat of both summer and fear slides through his fingers and drips on the floor. He is determined to find the courage to step or turn on this dream-path, even if it means his death.

But Veil does not want to die, nor does he want to go mad. Having survived in the jungles of Southeast Asia, he does not want to be killed by his own mind—nor transformed into a coward. If he cannot rid himself of the dream, Veil thinks, then he must find the courage to conquer it.

He rises, turns on the light, and goes to the indelibly stained washstand in a corner. He studies himself in the cracked mirror and is disgusted by what he sees. His eyes are chronically bloodshot from too much alcohol and not enough sleep, and there are dark rings under them. He feels his gut pressing against the dirty porcelain of the washbasin; the flesh of his face is sallow and puffy. He is getting soft.

He dresses in yesterday's clothes that smell of sweat and goes out to walk the streets. There is no breeze, and the night air sitting on the sidewalks is as stifling as the air in his apartment. He finds himself walking toward the West Village, purposely choosing the darkest streets and slowing as he approaches and passes alleys. He would like to be attacked so that he can fight to relieve his tension. However, stories of a strange, savage man with long yellow hair and incredible fighting skills have spread throughout the neighborhood, and Veil is not bothered.

He reaches the lights and mellow ambience of the West Village and wanders aimlessly through its streets crowded with jazz bars, coffeehouses, crafts shops, art galleries, and clinging couples. He passes an art supply shop and continues walking for almost four blocks while the seed of an idea takes root in his mind and grows to block out the sights, sounds, and smells around him.

His problem is finding the courage to turn and look directly at one of the gray walls in his dream, even if it means his death. Perhaps if he approaches the problem from a different perspective, in a different dimension; perhaps if he tries to draw or paint his dream on paper . . .

Veil returns to the shop and purchases art supplies— charcoal, drawing pencils, watercolors, brushes, oil crayons, paper—and starts home. He finds his pace quickening as his excitement builds. He has a feeling of anticipation, of being on the verge of an important discovery. For the first time since returning to the United States he is free of stress and anxiety and is actually looking forward to something. Awake, he finds that he is not afraid to deal directly with things he can only bear to glimpse peripherally in dreams.

When he arrives back at his apartment, he sits down on the splintered floor and immediately begins to work. He has no skills, no idea of the proper way to use the materials he has purchased. Frustration builds as he struggles to capture on paper the essence of what he has witnessed in sleep; he experiences anger at his clumsiness, but also feels a kind of ecstasy that takes him out of himself, beyond his distress. He works through the night and by dawn has used up all his paper.

He sleeps during the day, missing work. For the first time in many weeks he does not dream. He is awakened by a late-afternoon thunderstorm that cools the air and flushes the streets of both city and mind. A cool breeze wafts through Veil's tiny apartment as he rises and dresses. He thinks about going out to buy something to eat, but discovers that he is not hungry.

Slowly, he leafs through the drawings and paintings he has made the night before. He finds them dismayingly crude, not even an approximation of the path, walls, and horizon he has witnessed.

And so he begins again.

He does not have money to buy more paper, and so he uses the backs of the sheets he has already drawn and painted on. Completely absorbed in his task, it is not until many hours later, when he has exhausted his supplies, that Veil realizes he is actually relaxed, even happy. He is still dismayed by the inadequacy of his representations, but he is equally awed by the psychic comfort he has acquired merely through the process of struggling with his visions. This is a different kind of combat, he thinks, combat in which winning the war is not as important as waging it; it is a bloodless battle that keeps the enemies in the self at bay, and now he dares to hope that he has found a way to fight for his sanity, and perhaps even his life.

If Madison wants him dead, then Madison is going to have to kill him.

Veil showers, shaves, and dresses. He has decided that he will look for work in the village. He may even ask the owner of the art supply shop for a job, or see if, in exchange for materials and lessons on how to use them, there might not be some service he can perform.