It was a dream. Sam knew it was. Sometimes his dreams were in color, but this one was in a stark black and white, with gray tones defining its nuance and obscuring its simplicity. The image was pulp noir, suggesting choices made in haste, and consequences written in dark, dark blood...ink. It was a dream. And she was there.
He hadn't seen her in more than forty years. She was fifteen then, and he had been eighteen. It wasn't what you might be thinking. She was a runaway. Sam gave her a place to stay. Her boyfriend Billy stayed there, too. Billy was nineteen, and maybe that was what you're thinking. Sam shrugged. Billy was his best friend. Sam figured they knew what they were doing.
Time had passed, even in the dream. She was older, perhaps idealized, but no longer fifteen. She looked up, and saw Sam. She scowled, then smirked. She winked at Sam, and faded away.
Sam remembered.
Sam and Billy had been fellow outcasts in high school. They'd remained friends after graduation. As far as Sam could recall, the runaway girl was the only girlfriend Billy ever had. Billy claimed there had been others, many others, one-night stands, love 'em and leave 'em. Maybe there were others, as Billy said. Billy asked Sam not to judge, not to think about her being only fifteen. Billy was in love. Sam shrugged again.
Sam's parents were away for the summer. The girl and her mother were at odds, and the subject of Billy escalated the conflict. The girl wanted out. At Billy's urging? Sam could only guess. Billy knew just where they could seek sanctuary.
Left alone with the girl when Billy went out to buy beer, Sam chatted with her, joked with her, made her giggle. She looked into his eyes.
That was not what happened.
Their faces drew closer together.
That wasn't what happened.
They kissed.
THAT'S NOT WHAT HAPPENED!
She slapped him. Then kissed him again.
NO!!!
Billy returned. If he suspected anything, he gave no sign. Because nothing happened! Sam cried out desperately in his dream, distraught by how the story twisted into an unrecognizable shape. That's not what happened.
Something happened.
A year later, Billy and the girl had already parted company, acrimoniously. Sam never knew any more than that. One summer night, Billy stopped by Sam's house to listen to records, and to borrow a book. Something Happened by Joseph Heller. Sam's new girlfriend was also there, hanging out, getting ready for an evening on the town. Billy said goodbye.
The last goodbye. By morning, Billy was dead. Billy's sister called Sam to break the news of what Billy had done with his gun. It would be a closed casket service.
That. Sam felt the lump in his throat, even in dream. That happened.
Sam awoke. His wife, the new girlfriend of four decades ago, remained asleep. The clock by their bed--always set ahead, a silly habit formed long ago--claimed it was three in the morning, which meant it was only about 2:15 am. Sam got up as quietly as he could, and crept downstairs.
It had been forty years. There was no reason to cry now, no reason to mourn after all this time. In the wee hours, with the lights out, the room seemed black and white and gray all over, as if the dream continued still. He hadn't betrayed his friend. The guilt Sam felt was unrelated to that fiction. He hadn't betrayed Billy; he hadn't saved him either. Even with the dream's fabrications, he still couldn't make sense of that awful memory. But it was done. It was fact. It was history. It was too late to weep about it.
The tears forming in Sam's eyes? Those must have been part of the dream, too.
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