The Riverhouse by G. Norman Lippert

Author:G. Norman Lippert [Lippert, G. Norman]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2010-04-10T06:00:00+00:00

It was confusing. He knew he was dreaming, because the view outside the sunroom windows was different. Featureless black pressed against the glass panes, and Shane could tell that it wasn’t the black of mere darkness; it was the black of emptiness, like the eyes of the ghost of Marlena. It was cold as well, as if the sunroom hadn’t felt actual sunlight in ages.

He moved to stand up, and realized he already was. It was that kind of dream, bizarre and inexplicable, where things happened in jerks and whirls, with no reference to actual time. He moved toward the door that led into the library, first tentatively, and then frantically. The sunroom was breaking away from the house, silently falling into that abyss of cold blackness beyond the windows.

As he passed through the French doors into the library he shuddered, as if he’d pressed through a sort of invisible boundary. The coldness diminished, and Shane glanced back. The sunroom was gone, but not fallen away, as he’d feared. It simply didn’t exist. It was as if it had never been there at all, or hadn’t yet been built. The doorway looked out onto nothing. In the dream, Shane himself could barely remember what the room had even looked like.

The rest of the cottage was there, but it was different. It was as if every day of the cottage’s existence was crammed into a single moment. Nothing moved, and yet everything seemed to be strangely in flux, shimmering, night over day, winter over summer, decades and seasons all pressed together until they blended into a single seamless tone, like a ringing in the ears.

Boundary lands, he thought for no reason. It was like a memory, one he couldn’t quite place, spoken in a woman’s voice. We’re drawn to the boundary lands of life… rivers and valleys, shores and cliffs… but this one is unusual. Here, the boundary line is a lot deeper… deeper… The voice was familiar, but Shane couldn’t place it. All he knew for sure was that it wasn’t Marlena, even though—

He looked up. Marlena was there. She stood in the doorway that led down into the basement, her back to him. Shane tried to speak to her, but no sound came. It was as if there was no air, no medium to conduct the sound waves of his voice.

He pushed forward, toward her slight, straight frame. He meant to touch her, for here, unlike in his waking hours, he thought he truly could. He wanted to comfort her, soothe her, draw her into his arms. The cottage swam past him with infuriating sluggishness. It was that kind of dream as well, the kind where space is plastic, elongating in front of you so that you never quite seem to reach your destination, as if some capricious force was constantly pushing you backwards.

And yet he did reach her, suddenly, as if time had once again slipped its gears, launching him forward so that he nearly barreled into her where she stood on the top of the stairs, her back to him, her posture rigid and tense.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.