Keys

This is the ninth story in this summer’s online Flash Fiction series. You can read the entire series, and our Flash Fiction stories from previous years, .

Years after leaving his wife and taking up with Isabel, Daniel would dream that he was back home, with Rachel. They were together again. Isabel had left him, or he had never really left Rachel. Or somehow both. He felt reassured, but also extremely anxious, like a man emerging from a coma, uncertain whether he is alive or dead.

Always, in these dreams, his thoughts would go to a bunch of keys. Somewhere, in a bag or a jacket pocket, there was a tangle of old keys. The keys to a small flat, he thought. A place whose rent he had been paying for years, without actually using it. A place where he could be alone, without Rachel or Isabel. Or where he could invite Isabel, without Rachel. But, for some reason, it was impossible for him to look for those keys on their shabby leather loop. It was impossible to do anything at all.

In some variations, he tried to phone Isabel, to ask why she was no longer in touch, but the screen wouldn’t respond to his fingers. Strange symbols appeared that he could not interpret.

Then he would wake up with Isabel beside him, sleeping soundly. He felt immensely relieved and happy.

But one night Daniel’s dream took another turn. This time he woke from another dream and found not Isabel but Rachel beside him; all had been made up between them and they were together in placid old age. At once he was looking for his phone to call Isabel. How had things ended between them? And where were the missing keys? It was crazy paying rent for a place you never used.

Then he woke properly, beside Isabel, but shaken. This time he told her about his dream.

She pondered. Perhaps, she said, in a part of yourself, you wish you were back with Rachel.

Not at all!

I’m not accusing you, Dan.

He wished he hadn’t said anything and decided to steer clear of the subject. But, some days later, Isabel asked, What’s Rachel like, in these dreams of yours?

Daniel sighed.

Just curious, she added.

Dreams are so vague, he said.

A month later, it came again. Afterward, Daniel lay awake, as if he had been assigned a puzzle to solve. He and Rachel had been in an expensive house where there was a large, airy room that for some reason they never used. Water was streaming down the walls and gathering in a pool on the floor. Rachel was a hazy figure in a white nightdress. It seemed they had just made love.

What was Rachel like in these dreams? Daniel remembered Isabel’s question and cast about for an answer. She had been busy, sorting out a cupboard full of dish towels. And there was something sad about her, but resilient, as if she had survived a serious illness. Sarcastic, too. She found him ridiculous, like a little boy playing truant. Her accusation turned his mind to the keys. They would be in one of those places where you stored things that you weren’t immediately using. A kitchen drawer, a garage shelf. The main fact about Rachel, though, was simply that she was Rachel. His ex-wife. Daniel lifted himself on an elbow to watch Isabel sleeping. Calm and snug.

Daniel and Isabel enjoyed going for long walks in the country. The following weekend, they stopped at a pub and took beers outside to a splintery table.

Isabel mentioned that her ex had been in touch recently. Geoff. He had sent her a link to some political article he thought might interest her. Sounding off about corruption.

Did you reply?

A line or two. To be friendly. But I never dream about being back with him.

It’s not that I want to have these dreams, Daniel said.

You always imagine I’m accusing you! After all, she added, it makes sense—you were with Rachel for twenty years. I only knew Geoff for two.

They finished their beers and set off home. But the conversation was well and truly started now; it would have to be taken somewhere.

The problem is, Daniel said, that we’re talking as if dreams had meaning.

If they were completely random, why would you go on having the same one?

I have plenty of other dreams.

But you don’t fuss over them.

Daniel said maybe the problem, deep down, was that he was afraid that Isabel would leave him; she was so much younger.

Isabel protested that she never would. Then asked, But supposing I did, would you go back to Rachel?

Of course not!

And so?

Alone, Daniel wondered about the phantom flat that always came to mind in these dreams, the place the keys would open. He had a vague impression of a semi-basement bedsit in the eastern suburbs of the city. The kind of place where a wounded animal might go to hide. He had looked at any number of flats after leaving Rachel, and they had all seemed dusty and melancholy.

Sometimes I wonder if it isn’t physiological, he told Isabel. There are these old experiences, half dissolved, you know, clogging up some mental drain. We need to pour some Mr. Muscle down there.

Isabel laughed, but, when her friend Hilary came to dinner, a few days later, she poured prosecco and said, Dan has been dreaming of being back with his ex.

Uh-oh! Hilary said, laughing. Time for the analyst!

Daniel was unsettled by this disclosure, which he hadn’t expected. He had long since signed off with his analyst, he said, and had no desire to go back. I’m a perfectly happy man, he declared.

So why did you mention it?

I wish I hadn’t.

Isabel raised her eyes across the table. No, you did the right thing, Dan. I wouldn’t want you worrying about something and not talking to me about it.

Perhaps you needed a problem, Hilary proposed. You’re too happy.

That sounds about right, Daniel agreed.

But the dream came again. He and Rachel were in a beautiful room, full of light, except there was a pond on the floor between the sofa and the piano. Rachel was knitting at the dining table. He had nothing to do and was staring into the water of the pond, which was choked with bright-green weeds. Tiny insects flitted across the surface. Then very distinctly Rachel said, If you want, you can invite her to dinner. Invite who? he asked. Who do you think? she said, laughing. Your latest squeeze. Daniel was dumbfounded. What do I care what you do? Rachel added. You’d never have the courage to leave me.

Waking in a sweat, Daniel decided to say nothing about this. “Squeeze” was offensive, and these dreams had caused enough trouble already. Later that week, though, Isabel hit a curb and had a flat tire. Pulling the spare from the boot, Daniel found, beneath it, a bunch of keys on a black leather loop. They were the keys to the canoe club, near his old home—a key for the outside gate, a key for his locker, and another for the paddle rack. How I loved canoeing, he thought.

For the first time, Daniel stopped thinking about his dreams and cast his mind directly to the past. It had been seven years now since he and Rachel had split up, and he realized that he couldn’t quite recall how or why it had all come to a head. He hadn’t known Isabel then. Of course, there had been any number of quarrels and betrayals, but none of them seemed to explain why he had walked out when he did. The past is a dream, Daniel thought. There is no way to make sense of it. He did remember, though, that, the summer before the marriage ended, in an attempt to save things, he had invited Rachel to go canoeing with him. And they had gone twice, on the lake, which was easier than the river. Those outings had seemed promising. They’d had a good time. But then she’d refused to go anymore. You’re good at canoeing, she explained. I’m not.

Daniel thought about this for a whole week. Spring was coming, and these were the first mild days.

What about going canoeing, next weekend? he proposed to Isabel. Weather permitting. We could take a picnic.

Great idea, she said. She frowned. You’ll have to teach me how, though.

No problem, he said. It’s not that hard.

After a little reflection, he tossed the old keys in the recycling. But he kept the shabby leather loop, for old times’ sake.