Dreams Underfoot: A Newford Collection by Charles De Lint, John Jude Palencar Page A

Goon, who had taken the Professor’s place behind the tottering stacks of papers and books on the desk.
    “Skookin,” Goon said, when the Professor had finished serving them their tea and left the room.
    “They’ve never existed, of course.”
    Jilly nodded in agreement.
    “Though in some ways,” Goon went on, “they’ve always ex-isted. In here—” He tapped his temple with a gnarly, very skookin-like finger. “In our imaginations.”
    “But—” Jilly began, wanting to tell him how she’d seen skookin, right out there on her very own street tonight, but Goon wasn’t finished.
    “And that’s what makes them real,” he said.
    His head suddenly looked very much like a pumpkin. He leaned forward, eyes glittering as though a candle was burning there inside his head, flickering in the wind.
    “And if they’re real,” he said.
    His voice wound down alarmingly, as though it came from the spiraling groove of a spoken-word album that someone had slowed by dragging their finger along on the vinyl.
    “Then. You’re. In. A. Lot. Of—”

    Jilly awoke with a start to find herself backed up against the frame of the head of her bed, her hands worrying and tangling her quilt into knots.
    Just a dream. Cast off thoughts, tossed up by her subconscious. Nothing to worry about. Except ...
    She could finish the dream-Goon’s statement.
    If they were real ...
    Never mind being in trouble. If they were real, then she was doomed.
    She didn’t get any more sleep that night, and first thing the next morning, she went looking for help.
    “Skookin,” Meran said, trying hard not to laugh.
    “Oh, I know what it sounds like,” Jilly said, “but what can you do? Christy’s books are Bramley’s pet blind spot and if you listen to him long enough, he’ll have you believing anything.”
    “But skookin,” Meran repeated and this time she did giggle. Jilly couldn’t help but laugh with her.
    Everything felt very different in the morning light—especially when she had someone to talk it over with whose head wasn’t filled with Christy’s stories.
    They were sitting in Kathryn’s Cafe—an hour or so after Jilly had found Meran Kelledy down by the Lake, sitting on the Pier and watching the early morning joggers run across the sand: yuppies from downtown, health-conscious gentry from the Beaches.
    It was a short walk up Battersfield Road to where Kathryn’s was nestled in the heart of Lower Crowsea. Like the area itself, with its narrow streets and old stone buildings, the cafe had an old world feel about it—from the dark wood paneling and hand-carved chair backs to the small round tables, with checkered tablecloths, fat glass condi-ment containers and straw-wrapped wine bottles used as candle-holders. The music piped in over the house sound system was mostly along the lines of Telemann and Vivaldi, Kitaro and old Bob James albums. The waitresses wore cream-colored pinafores over flower-print dresses.
    But if the atmosphere was old world, the clientele were definitely contemporary. Situated so close to Butler U., Kathryn’s had been a favorite haunt of the university’s students since it first opened its doors in the mid-sixties as a coffee house. Though much had changed from those early days, there was still music played on its small stage on Friday and Saturday nights, as well as poetry recita-tions on Wednesdays and Sunday morning storytelling sessions.
    Jilly and Meran sat by a window, coffee and homemade banana muffins set out on the table in front of them.
    “Whatever were you doing down there anyway?” Meran asked. “It’s not exactly the safest place to be wandering about.”
    Jilly nodded. The skells in Old City weren’t all thin and wasted. Some were big and mean-looking, capable of anything—not really the sort of people Jilly should be around, because if something went wrong ... well, she was the kind of woman for whom the word petite had been coined. She was small and slender—her tiny size only