Page 74 of The Sleepwalker
No one realises the skeleton man is getting closer to the campsite.
‘Are you there now?’
‘Yeah, it .?.?. it’s full of people, all over the place.’
‘That’s just part of the dream,’ says Erik.
‘What?’
Hugo looks out across the muddle of tents and caravans, at the seagulls, folding chairs, cool bags, women in swimsuits, men in shorts and sunglasses, children kicking footballs, and empty bags of crisps.
‘You know that it’s the middle of the night,’ Erik continues. ‘It’s dark, and it has started snowing. It’s cold. The campsite is closed for the winter.’
A boy is sitting inside a small goal, eating an ice lolly. A dog snaps at the water flowing from a hosepipe, and a bare-chested man takes a picture of himself on his phone.
‘I don’t want to die,’ Hugo whispers. ‘I need to find Mum and hide .?.?.’
‘Just pause for a moment. Look at the campsite and try to see it as it really is,’ Erik tells him. ‘It’s quiet, it’s dark, and it has started to snow.’
White flakes slowly drift down onto an elderly couple sunning themselves in front of a caravan. They have a pale-blue thermos and a pack of biscuits in the basket between them.
‘No,’ he replies, his voice wavering.
‘What do you see?’
‘I don’t know,’ Hugo replies, continuing along the path. ‘There’s a woman in a red bikini .?.?. Her shoulders are sunburned, and she’s got a tattoo of a spider at the base of her spine .?.?. I have to step onto the grass to get past this huge guy who—’
‘Feel free to stop and look at anyone you like,’ says Erik. ‘Look at the man on the path, describe him to me.’
‘He’s standing with his back to me, in a pair of white shorts and a stripy short-sleeved shirt .?.?. He’s balancing a massiveinflatable flamingo on his head, holding it with both hands .?.?.’
‘Really look at him now, take your time. You’ll notice that he’s transparent, that you can see reality through him.’
The sunlight filtering through the flamingo has cast a pinkish shadow onto the man’s forearms. His hair looks like it has recently been cut, and he has a pale tan line at the top of his neck.
Hugo studies the man’s shirt, straining over his back, and realises he can see the empty tent pitches between the dark-blue stripes.
Snow has started falling on the deserted campsite, settling on the litter on the yellowed grass, on the electricity poles, the bare trees, the dark branches and the rows of static caravans in the distance.
‘It’s dark .?.?. and deserted,’ says Hugo.
27
Hugo’s foot knocks the floor lamp, and the parrot-print shade wobbles, causing the light to bounce around the room for a moment.
During hypnosis, a person typically looks as though they are asleep, despite the fact that their brain is more active than it is while they are awake. But Hugo’s body is tense, twitching as he works through his memories.
Joona is thinking about something Erik said as they got out of the car and walked across the parking area towards the lab: that he thought the real test would be their patience and ability to navigate through Hugo’s double-exposed world.
The teenager has been caught up in his nightmare since the hypnosis began, but he finally seems to have taken a cautious step out into reality.
The campsite is dark and deserted, he said.
Hugo really does remember what he saw while he was sleepwalking. This is it; they are approaching the hypocentre of the night.
Joona double-checks that his phone is still recording.
Lars Grind rubs his bald head. He seems uncomfortable, his eyes dark and oddly wide.
