Waking Nightmares by Christopher Golden Page A

ahead of myself,” Norm said, heading for the cabin. He opened a hatch and tugged out his toolbox. “Let’s see what’s in this thing before we get too excited. Could be nothing.”
    “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Tommy asked as his father knelt by the iron chest and retrieved a hammer and a big screwdriver from the toolbox. “I mean, what if the box itself is valuable, y’know? Or, like, they can learn something about what ship it came from because of the locks or whatever?”
    Norm faltered with the flat of the screwdriver already propped against the hasp of the lock. He looked at his son.
    “Sometimes I forget how smart you are, punk,” he said, rubbing the back of his right hand—the hand that gripped the hammer—across the stubble on his chin. “You could be right.”
    A few seconds ticked by. Tommy almost felt guilty for taking his fun away.
    “Screw it, Dad,” he said. “You know you want to see what’s inside.”
    Norm laughed, nodding. “Damn straight.”
    He set the screwdriver against the hasp again, raised the hammer, and struck the back of the screwdriver’s handle. On the third blow, the hasp of the lock broke off. The second lock took only one hit to snap off.
    Norm set aside his tools and reached for the box, raising the lid and looking inside.
    He froze. The way he crouched, Tommy couldn’t see his face.
    “Dad? Come on. Don’t keep me in suspense.”
    But his father didn’t move. The boat rocked and Norm managed to maintain his balance, but otherwise he seemed almost to have turned to stone.
    “Dad?” Tommy ventured again.
    He moved up next to his father, but the second he saw Norm’s face he stopped short. His features were contorted with terrible emotion, as though he might be about to scream in fear or collapse in tears.
    “What is it, Dad?” Tommy asked, dropping to his knees.
    He put a hand on his father’s shoulder and shook him. “Dad!”
    When Tommy shook him again, his father let go of the box’s lid and it slammed down. Norm collapsed onto the deck and began to shake, arms and legs flailing, eyes wide and staring at something Tommy could not see.
    Then he started to scream.
    Fear flowed into Tommy, the terror of loss. “No, Dad, stop,” he said, grabbing hold of his father’s shoulders and pinning him to the deck, trying to trap his arms. He wanted to join in the screaming, helplessness seizing him in its grasp. Ever since his mother’s death he had lived in private terror of losing his father as well.
    “Dad!” he shouted. “Look at me!”
    Tommy slapped his father’s face, then immediately felt ashamed and afraid it had been the wrong thing to do. He lay down on the fishing net beside his father and gathered the man into his arms, wrapped himself around those jittering arms and legs and trapped them, refusing to allow them to move.
    “Stop it! Look at me! Norman Dunne, look at me, God damn it!”
    Tommy screamed his father’s name, letting all of his fear out in one burst. When he stopped, the wind carrying his voice away across the waves, his father had gone still. Norm’s eyes were still wide, but they had focus again, staring at Tommy.
    “Do you see the shadows, Tom?”
    “What? What shadows?”
    Tommy glanced around. The only shadows were in the small cabin. Otherwise they were in full sunlight. But his father’s eyes kept darting back and forth, anxiously peering at things in his peripheral vision that Tommy couldn’t see.
    “The corners are dark,” Norm Dunne said, like a little boy talking about monsters under his bed. “The shadows are cracks, and they keep trying to slip through.”
    That was when Tommy knew that he couldn’t help his father. Either Norm would come to his senses on his own, or he would need someone who could figure out what had happened to him—some kind of aneurysm or something. Had to be, the way he was babbling.
    “Okay, Dad,” Tommy said. “Just sit tight, okay? I’m going to bring us home.”
    He stood,