Reverie - Part I
A speculative fiction novella in three parts
WARNING: Reverie includes themes of trauma, physical injury (limb and eye loss), postpartum psychosis, and a traumatic birth scene involving infant loss. If you’re in a tender place, please take care while reading.
Part I
June’s skin prickled in the midday sun. She breathed in the salty humidity; the day smelled of seaweed. White sugar sand whistled, hot against her ankles, as she stepped toward the water. The foaming crash of waves and the promise of cool water called her forward. Seagulls squawked, and sandpipers scuttled in graceful, frantic arcs around the glistening swash. Chill water fizzed around her toes, anchoring her deeper into the sand. Silver-darting fish flashed in the turquoise shallows. She waded in.
“Goldie?”
Her chest tightened. The daydream flickered. She held onto it for a moment longer, eyes closed.
Her eye.
The dream shattered, and darkness swallowed her.
She was as far from the ocean as possible, buried beneath the underclass city of 512, on arid planet Kol. She sat outside her tent, in a tunnel under South Gate. Dim city light filtered through a manhole overhead, carrying with it the faint noise of shoppers. A darting flashlight swept down the tunnel toward her, exposing graffiti-covered walls. She watched the beam bounce through the dark. When the light found her, the muscles in her temples tightened. She lifted a hand to block it.
“It’s you,” he said, as though surprised he’d found her.
Heat rose to her cheeks. There was only one person who called her by any name at all.
Jek had introduced himself a week ago, when she’d been sitting beneath the arch at South Gate, watching the desert while the city rushed at her back. He’d startled her, but quickly made up for it by handing her a hot coffee and a fresh donut. She’d accepted breakfast gratefully, but the real thrill had come from being recognized as a person. He’d looked her in the eye, sat down, and asked who she was. Not that she’d told him anything. And now, he’d found her again.
“Hey, Goldie,” he said, as if they were meeting at a bus stop, not in a nightmare.
“That’s not my name,” she said, without conviction.
“I know. But seeing as you won’t tell me, I had to resort to calling you by your hair color.” He angled the light away from her face, illuminating the tunnel walls instead.
“Brought some stuff.” He pulled a plastic bag from his jacket pocket.
She didn’t hesitate to reach for the bottle of water, fresh socks, and a few other essentials. Accepting help didn’t embarrass her anymore. Pride had eroded in the face of survival.
She tossed the bag into her tent. Her mouth was dry, but she didn’t want to fumble with the water bottle in front of him. Not all her pride had eroded.
Jek stuffed his hands in his pockets. “So, how’re you doing?”
“I’m—” She cleared her dry throat. “Good.”
“Well, I was hoping you were hungry.”
A smile crept up before she could stop it.
“I could eat.”
“Great. There’s this new place I’ve been dying to try.” He held out a hand.
She recoiled, her heart skittering sideways.
“I’m not selling. I don’t do that.”
His hand dropped, along with his smile. “I’m not buying. Well, I am buying pizza, but that’s it.”
Pizza. Her stomach twisted. Nothing in 512 was free.
“Then what do you want?”
His frown deepened. “There’s no pressure. But I’m getting pizza with or without you.”
Pizza.
“I’m asking for conversation, that’s all,” he said, extending his hand again.
“Alright,” she said, her voice thin.
As she took it, she knew she was agreeing to tell the truth, or as close to it as she could. Something about him demanded honesty.
She’d been sitting so long outside her tent, wrapped in a dream and untethered from time, that standing sent her balance tilting. Darkness lived on her right side now. She often misjudged and bumped into things.
Their footsteps echoed through the tunnel. She stiffened as Maven’s tent came into view, glowing orange from the light inside. Star charts and equations covered the walls around his camp. A faint whir told her the machine was running.
She pressed closer to Jek, moving quietly through piles of scavenged junk.
“That guy friendly?” he murmured when they were a few steps away.
“Yeah.”
Maven was friendly—as long as he got paid. And even when he wasn’t, he was necessary.
As the city light brightened the tunnel’s end, the muscles in her head tensed. Jek started to look cleaner. Taller. More intimidating.
She regretted coming. Even if she had citizen clothing, even if she could hide her arm, she couldn’t hide the concave scar where her right eye used to be. The mark of a criminal.
South Gate markets were busy enough that an Ex-Cit didn’t draw stares. But when Jek ushered her into the restaurant, a hush settled over the room. The mood shifted, tight and awkward. She curled her aching arm to her chest, feeling the twinge of absence.
A man at the end of the line scowled, stepped out of place, and made a wide arc to avoid her. His silent protest stung. As if sensing she might bolt, Jek guided her quickly to a booth near the front door.
“I’ll order,” he said, plucking gently at her jacket sleeve. Flustered, she let him pull it off, then ducked into the booth, sweating.
Jek strolled to the counter, relaxed and smiling, as if blind to the social discomfort he’d stirred. She watched the woman behind the counter say something to him. He responded by pulling out a wad of bills and waving it. The woman glanced toward the booth. June sank lower in her seat. She wanted to run, to return to the dark. She really should have left then. It would have been the polite thing to do.
But pizza.
“Water?” he asked, sliding a plastic cup clacking with ice across the table as he sat. She took a sip and kept one smooth cube in her mouth, letting it melt slowly. Like so many things she’d once taken for granted, ice water was a luxury.
“Why did you bring me here?”
“It’s new. I wanted to try it.”
“No. Why did you bring an Ex-Cit into a public restaurant?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
She stared at him. No way he was that socially blind.
He leaned forward. “Goldie.”
“That’s not my name,” she whispered to the table.
“I just want to talk.”
Then he leaned back and spoke loud enough for everyone to hear. “And I brought an Ex-Cit into a public place because I don’t give a crust what people think.”
His jaw was set, but his fingers twisted the corner of the napkin on the table.
She turned her attention to a set of photographs on the wall. It wasn’t a big place, more of a mom-and-pop cafe than a restaurant, and it was only half full. The tablecloth was plastic, red and white checkered. The sort of place her parents would have loved.
“So, what’s your story?” he asked.
“My story?”
It wasn’t that simple. It wasn’t straightforward or clear-cut. She wasn’t even sure she knew the real one anymore. And even if she could sort it out, separate reality from Reverie, did she really want to say it aloud?
He leaned back, hands still now. “Where are you from?”
She studied him. Hazel eyes, strong jaw, neat brown hair. Even sitting, he towered over everyone. And yet, there was something disarming about him.
“I’m from Edon,” she said, taking another sip of water.
He folded his hands and waited.
“I grew up in a tiny town on the coast of the Pelagos,” she added. “You wouldn’t have heard of it. It’s right on the beach.”
Just the word beach brought a gust of memory: hot breeze, brine, waves crashing, sand sticking to her back. She reveled in the sensation.
-
June held a shell in her hand, a little broken thing, the creature long gone. When she was little, her mother had told her to give it a kiss and throw it back into the sea so it could live. She was old enough now to know the broken ones didn’t make it.
She waded in on strong, steady legs. Goosebumps raced up her back. In the ocean, she felt alive. In the ocean, she was free from the future and responsibility. In the ocean, she could just be.
When she looked back to shore, a man sat in the sand, fully dressed in what he wore every day to run the town market. Her father was watching her swim. She was supposed to be forty miles away, in the city, practicing for the competition. He’d spent hard-earned money on a private tutor, and she’d ditched. Again.
She set her feet on soft sand, dreading the walk up the beach, dreading his disappointment. She dragged herself up the gentle incline to where he sat, pants rolled to his knees, feet buried in the sand. She sat beside him, still dripping, and waited.
He stared out at the horizon for a long time. She dug her fingers into the sand and squeezed.
“I’m sorry,” she said when she couldn’t take the silence any longer.
He sighed, unwrapped his arms from around his legs, and leaned back on his elbows. “Do you still love it?”
“Yes, of course.” She loved the old upright that had been in her family for generations, loved the keys under her hands ever since her mother taught her to play. Most of all, she loved making her own songs.
“Then what are you running from?”
She brushed sand from her legs. It wasn’t the piano or the lessons she was swimming away from. It was the gleam in her parents’ eyes when they watched her play, the weight of their expectation. She was afraid that, like the tide, their hopes would carry her too far from home and she’d drown.
“I’m never going to be the best,” she said matter-of-factly.
He glanced at her, squinting in the sun. His eyes were the same blue-green as hers, the same as the ocean.
A gull landed nearby, searching for crumbs.
“You don’t have to be the best to go far,” he said. “But you won’t go anywhere if you don’t try.”
She snorted. “That sounds like something Mom would say.”
“What can I say? Her wisdom is rubbing off on me.” He smiled. “Only took twenty years of marriage.”
“I want to make up my own songs,” she said. She didn’t mention how much she hated her tutor’s choices.
“You can, and you should,” he said. “But you have to learn to practice the classics too. You’ve got a gift, June. It could be your ticket out of here.”
“I don’t want a ticket out of here,” she snapped.
Disappointment, tinged with anger, flashed in his eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I didn’t mean any disrespect.”
“This isn’t…” He paused, pressing his lips into a grimace and brushing sand from his hands. “There’s more to life than running a market. You could go far.”
She didn’t repeat it, but she felt it deep in her chest: she didn’t want to go anywhere. She never wanted to leave.
“Your teachers flagged your file,” he said. “Low ambition.”
Her face burned.
“Unfocused.”
She held her breath and looked away.
“I know better,” he said. “I’ve seen you play for hours without stopping. You’re a hard worker. But you have to want this. You have to try.”
She nodded, still turned away. He pulled her into a hug, and the tension drained from her body.
“You’ve been invited to the Vasilika School of Fine Arts,” he said.
She looked up, startled. She’d heard of the school, of course. Everyone had. It was across the country, far away and prestigious.
“There was a scout at the last competition.”
She’d played well. She’d won and made her parents proud. She’d sparked that gleam in their eyes.
“It’s a big move for all of us. We’ll sell the market, the house. Start over. Find new jobs. I’m happy to do that, to support your dream. But if you aren’t going to put in the effort, we’ll need to decline.”
His arms felt like a vice now. To accept meant being accepted. To decline meant failure.
“I’ll try,” she said, squeezing him to show just how hard she would try.
-
Ten slices of steaming pizza hit the table. The server retreated quickly. Jek rubbed his hands together, grinning until he noticed her expression.
“What?” he said.
“Are we expecting someone else?”
“I couldn’t decide, so I got one of each. Like a pizza tasting.” He pulled a slice toward himself and took a bite. “Ow, hot. Eat as much as you want. I’ll take the rest back.”
“Back where?” She pinched the edge of a plate closer.
“I live at the Library,” he said, mouth full.
She nodded, tucking that information away. She’d never heard of it.
They ate in silence, mouths too full for conversation. She peeled the toppings off slowly, savoring each bite. She tried to ignore the fact that he was watching her slow, deliberate evisceration of her slice with something like fascination. When she picked up the whole floppy, oily slice and bit the corner, her throat tightened. Cheese. Sauce. Warmth. Tears pricked her eye. She grabbed a paper napkin, pressed it to her mouth, and ducked her head.
Their eyes met. His slice paused halfway to his mouth. His eyebrows drew together slightly.
“This is the nicest thing anyone’s done for me in a long time,” she said, sipping ice water like it was champagne.
He smiled, and dimples emerged, softening his otherwise hardened features. She smiled back, despite herself. He had a goofy charm.
She watched him fold another slice in one hand and bite it in half. The mark on the inside of his forearm caught her eye.
“You’re a citizen,” she said, startled.
He nodded, chewing. Swallowed. “Grew up in 467. Dad was a general. I helped Mom run a daycare when he died. Two sisters.”
She blinked, trying to picture this giant running a daycare. The image made her lips twitch before she caught herself. “How’d you end up here?”
He grinned, pointing the crust at her. “Uh-uh. You’re the one supposed to be telling the story.”
She hesitated. The early memories were easy. The rest… the Reverie blurred everything. Daydreams mixed with memory like food dye in water.
“Okay, fine,” he said, mistaking her silence. He leaned in a little and lowered his voice. “I have a problem. With blood.”
Her eyebrows lifted.
“Vasovagal something,” he muttered. His ears flushed red. “I faint when I see it. Couldn’t get over it. Didn’t work out for me in the Forces.”
“You faint when you see blood?” she repeated, unsure if he was serious.
The red of his ears had spread to his cheeks and neck, and he shrank in his seat. The quiet confidence he usually carried flickered. He wasn’t joking.
She had a hard time imagining him fainting at the sight of blood.
“Your turn,” he said, and stuffed the rest of the crust in his mouth.
“That doesn’t explain how you ended up in 512,” she said softly.
“Your turn.”
He’d offered his confession like a truce.
“It was cold,” she said, watching him grab a third slice. “Vasilika was cold.”
-
June trudged through snow that glittered like a billion diamonds beneath the full moon. Her school uniform shoes, perfect for a night out back home, slipped on the ice and let snow in with every step. The feet of her tights were soaked by the time she reached the front door of the Weller estate.
Her parents had fared worse; her mother was in high heels, and her father had given June his winter jacket. She stomped her feet for warmth, waiting while they shuffled arm in arm up the path he’d shoveled earlier that day.
The house loomed, enormous and glowing. Warm light spilled from massive windows, casting golden rectangles across the frozen garden. Beyond the property walls, snow-capped mountains cradled Vasilika Valley.
Through the windows, she saw them: high-ranking officials, policy advisors, tech tycoons, artists, lobbyists, philanthropists. People who mattered. And here she was, the groundskeeper and housekeeper’s daughter.
“We aren’t late, are we?” her mother asked, smoothing her hair with one hand, the other clutching a parcel of homemade candles. She looked beautiful in the silver light. June, in her school uniform, the nicest outfit she owned, only felt itchy.
“Right on time,” her father said, his voice tight.
“I don’t see why I had to come,” June muttered, tugging at her skirt. “I should be practicing.” If she’d stayed home, she wouldn’t have practiced. She’d have been composing her own music.
In the three months since arriving at Vasilika, her playing had improved, but only because she’d lost everything else. Practicing felt endless. She was still at the bottom of her class. All the joy of piano had been drained from her, leaving her droopy with homesickness.
“Nonsense. Mr. and Mrs. Weller wanted to meet you.” He lifted the heavy knocker in the center of the door. Ten seconds passed. Twenty. Thirty. The cold seeped into her bones. All three of them shivered on the flagstone doorstep, listening to faint music and distant laughter.
“Should we try the side entrance?” her mother whispered.
“We’re invited guests tonight.” He reached to knock again.
The door swung open. Warmth and music spilled out.
A boy in a tailored suit opened the door. He had beautiful eyes and a heartbreakingly bright smile. He looked at June like he'd never seen a girl in a school uniform before.
“Finally,” he said, flashing that grin and offering a hand to June as if her parents weren’t even there. “Someone under a hundred. I’m Frank.”
She blushed all the way down to her frozen toes.
Her mother introduced herself before June could recover, jostling her out of her daze. They piled inside the foyer, dripping snow. Frank took their coats with easy charm and shook her father’s hand.
Then he turned back to her. “What’s your name?”
She said it too softly. He leaned in, cupping an ear. She had to repeat herself, cheeks burning hotter. Her voice was always too quiet. Her parents, barely containing their excitement that she might be making a friend, excused themselves to find Mrs. Weller and deliver the candles.
The inside was like a palace: a grand fireplace, crystal chandeliers, a string quartet. Servers carried polished trays of hors d’oeuvres. Everyone looked rich and effortless.
“I like your house,” June said, instantly regretting it.
Frank smiled anyway. “What do you study?”
“Music. You?”
“Politics,” he said. “I want to be Chairman someday.”
Ambitious. Not shy about it, either.
“What do you play?”
“Piano.”
“Play me something?”
“Oh. No, I couldn’t.”
“Please?” That smile again.
She nodded before she could stop herself. He kept up a steady stream of chatter as he led her into the living room, where everyone turned to look. She felt her face go hot again. She thought about backing out, but she wanted to impress him.
The piano was the most beautiful she’d ever seen. She sat down, heart pounding. She knew exactly what to play: Beethoven’s Hammerklavier, Sonata no. 29. It was fast, strong, and joyful. Everything she wished she felt.
She took a breath and began. She didn’t notice the room grow quiet, didn’t see the guests gather until the last notes faded and applause burst around her. She looked up. Frank was watching her with a stunned, open smile, ike he couldn’t believe what he’d just seen.
She couldn’t remember what he said next or recall all the names, faces, and introductions. But what she did remember was how he made her feel. Like they were already best friends. Like she belonged. Like she was somebody.
She remembered what it felt like to hold his hand.
-
June gasped as bone-crushing agony gripped her hand. The hand that no longer existed. It felt like the skin was melting, like every cell was exploding.
“What?” Jek said, looking around. “What happened?”
She gripped the edge of the table with her other hand, bending so far forward that her forehead nearly touched her plate. A soft, humiliating groan escaped her.
“What’s wrong?”
She shook her head, unable to speak until the wave passed. When she finally sat up, she made sure to compose her face.
“I’m fine,” she said. “But I need to go.”
She knew how this worked. The pain would come and go for hours.
“Is it your arm?” he asked, his voice gentler now. His face had gone pale, brow furrowed, eyes wide.
She searched his expression. All she found was concern. Not curiosity, not pity, not disgust.
“Yes,” she said quietly.
“We’ve got a new doctor at the Library,” he said. “Citizen-trained. Knows what he’s doing. You should let him take a look.”
“I don’t need a doctor. Can’t afford it anyway.”
“It’s free,” Jek said. “Everything at the Library’s free.”
Sure. Free if you were underclass. Not Ex-Cit. No one wanted someone like her taking resources, their medicine, their space.
“I have to go,” she said. She gathered what was left of her pizza with slow, practiced movements, willing her body to stay composed. Her dignity was a thread, stretched tight but still holding. She put on her coat, then slid the plate across the table.
“I was hoping you’d visit,” Jek said.
“I can’t.” She stood.
He stayed seated for a beat, as if unsure whether to push. Then he rose too.
“Why not?”
“Thank you,” she said. “For this.”
He opened the door for her, but she could feel him behind her as she slipped into the crowd. He caught up.
“You don’t have to stay out there.”
She turned away sharply. He followed.
“Just… please come back with me. I can help you find a job. A safe place to stay.”
“I have a job and a place to stay.”
She changed direction. He moved with her.
“It’s not safe.”
He was right. This was not safe, whatever this was. It stank of trust and courage, of risk and disappointment.
“I don’t need you to save me, Jek,” she snapped, mirroring his bluntness.
“Not trying to—”
“Yes, you are.” She stopped, standing tall, even if everything inside her wanted to collapse. She looked him dead in the eye. “I’m doing just fine on my own.”
-
Frank was everything to June. That winter, and the spring and summer after, they were inseparable, mostly at his house. While she longed for the sound of the ocean, he had a lake big enough to swim in.
She barely passed school that year. Frank had graduated with honors last month and was a week away from starting his coveted internship at Planning and Resource Management headquarters.
He kissed her in the heat of a summer day, and she melted into him, into the plush outdoor seating on the deck behind the Weller estate. A red umbrella shaded their faces. Sun baked their bare legs.
A message popped into her vision through her citizen device. Her father. Probably another notification of absence. She waved his message away, but the guilt stayed, sharp and sour. She traced Frank’s jaw with a finger, feeling the prickle of his new beard.
He caught her hand. “What are you thinking about?”
She pressed her cheek to his collarbone, listening for the steady beat of his heart. “Planning and Resource Management,” she said, coy.
He chuckled, and his heart sped up.
“What about it?”
“Resources,” she said. “Specifically…”
He leaned away, one perfect eyebrow raised.
“Time,” she said. He looked confused. She inhaled before the plunge. “I’m wondering how much of it we have left.”
“There’s a gala tonight.” He flashed that devastating smile. “We’ve got until morning. My parents are gone.”
“I’m talking about the future,” she said.
The smile vanished. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed, long and dramatic. “Right. Planning. The future.”
She knew what he needed to say. He had to focus on his career. He wanted someone who could keep up with his aspirations or hang off his arm as a trophy. June was neither ambitious nor did she have the family to be a social-status spouse.
She stood, the weight in her stomach expanding.
Barefoot, she stepped down the sun-warmed stairs, unlatched the gate, and walked through tall grass to the lake’s edge. The water was glassy, holding its breath.
She slipped out of her sundress and dove in. The lake swallowed her. The shock of cold seized her lungs, and goosebumps broke across her skin. She surfaced, gasping, and looked back.
Frank wasn’t watching her from the deck like she’d expected. He’d followed. He was standing at the shore, his expression serious.
She turned and swam for the far bank, her hands cutting through the green water like blades. A dullness settled into her fingertips and toes.
“June!” he called. “I want to be Chairman someday.”
She stopped, treading water.
He dove and darted forward like a big fish, surfacing inches from her face.
“And I want you,” he said, water running from his hair. “But if I have to choose between the two, it’s you. It’s you forever.”
-
June had to stop and ride out another wave of pain before squeezing between the bars of the gate, the unofficial front door to the tunnels. She caught her breath at the edge of the comforting dark.
With pizza folded in a paper plate in one hand and her other arm brushing damp concrete for balance, she took small, careful steps, avoiding trash and uneven spillways. The dark was a relief for her pounding head. One eye gone meant the other worked twice as hard.
This was better than being around people who didn’t want her. It was a quiet kind of freedom. No need to strive for things that felt impossible.
Maven sat on a bucket outside his tent, flipping a knife in his one hand.
There was a community of Ex-Cits in the tunnels under South Gate. They didn’t steal from or bother their neighbors. In a way, they looked out for each other.
Maven lived nearest the gate to keep watch. He kept unwanted people out, violent people, those who might take advantage.
They’d never talked about their past lives, but the equations scrawled across the tunnel walls told her he’d been a mathematician in his citizen life. He was the kind of man who held a grudge.
She stayed on his good side. It was a small price to pay for protection. More importantly, he owned the Reverie.
The light in his tent cast an orange glow across his camp. He sat with his back to the tent, hair standing up in black flame shapes.
“Hungry?” she asked, holding out the slice of meat pizza. He eyed the plate, tossed the knife, caught it by the hilt.
“Is that all?” he said, voice flat.
She shivered. Another wave of pain was coming. “I have a bag with water, socks, and wipes. I’ll bring it later.”
He pocketed the knife, stood, and reached for the pizza.
“Who’s Pretty Boy?”
“Just some guy,” she said lightly.
He brought the pizza to his nose and sniffed. “It’s my job to keep these tunnels safe. You understand that, right?”
She held her breath and nodded.
“Next time he steps into my home,” Maven said, “on my stuff, he can expect to get his throat slit.”
Anxiety hatched under her skin like a thousand tiny spiders.
“Don’t forget who protects you down here.” He set the pizza down. “This’ll get you half an hour.”
“That’s fine.”
He unzipped the tent and held it open for her. She climbed inside, sat cross-legged on his sleeping bag, and let him attach the nodes to her temples. She wished he’d dim the light, but didn’t ask. He leaned across her and flipped the switch. The machine whirred to life. She closed her eye.
-
June Aurelia Mills became June Mills Weller in a small, sun-drenched ceremony on the Weller property. Her parents cried. His parents frowned. She wore an elegant, lace-trimmed dress. They vowed to choose each other forever. They moved into a cottage by the lake, where mornings smelled like dew and coffee, and Frank kissed her forehead before leaving for work at Planning and Resource Management. Finally happy, she rose to the top of her class. She graduated with honors. Her compositions were praised, and her first album sold for an outrageous sum. They used the money to buy her old family house by the beach. One summer night, under a sky full of stars, she found out she was pregnant.
She raised her daughter on sunshine and saltwater.
-
“Time’s up,” Maven said.
She held on to the fading warmth of the Reverie until the sound of Maven fumbling with the zipper brought her fully back. She wiped her face on her arm and peeled the nodes from her temples one by one.
“Thanks for the pizza, sweetheart,” Maven said, offering a hand to help her out. She didn’t take it.
She made her way back to her camp. She couldn’t feel the wall as she stumbled through the dark. She lay down on her pallet and pulled every piece of clothing she owned over her body.
Shaky relief crept in. The Reverie hadn't blurred the line, not like she’d feared. She could still see it, see the line between what had really happened and what she wished had. In reality, she’d gotten pregnant before the wedding. The dress had been different—simple, vintage, a hand-me-down that hadn’t quite felt like hers. She’d never graduated, never finished composing. She’d never gone back to her beach.
She hadn’t raised her daughter at all.
