Page 124 of Yumi and the Nightmare Painter
“Well, write down the address where he saw it,” the Dreamwatch member said, then turned back to her game.
Painter took a deep breath, then stepped forward. “There’s a hundred of them coming, sir,” he said. “The nightmare told me. An invasion of nightmares. Like what happened in Futinoro. From the west. Please, youmustdefend the city!”
The woman glanced at her two colleagues. The one playing table tennis with her rolled his eyes. The other kept staring at the viewer.
“An army of nightmares,” ping-pong woman said, strolling over to him.
“Please believe me,” he said. “Please.”
She nodded to his jacket. “You’re a painter?”
“Yes. I was the one who found the stable nightmare in the first place.”
“You look like a real go-getter,” she said. “Interested in the Dreamwatch, eh?”
“All my life,” he said. “I tried so hard to get in. I’m…not good enough. That’s why we need you. To defend the city. They’re coming—maybe soon!”
“We’ll take care of it,” she said (highly). “Nice work out there. Thank you for the warning. Keep this up, and you might turn into Dreamwatch material yourself.” She gave him a firm pat on the shoulder, then nodded to her bearded companion, who took Painter by the arm and tried to guide him out the door.
Painter lingered though. The Dreamwatch member turned back to her ping-pong game. Maybe…maybe that was how she meditated.
Now, you’ve probably caught on more quickly than Painter did here. You might be thinking at this point of the old adage that says having heroes is not worth it. There are variations on it all around the cosmere. Cynical takes that encourage you never to look up to someone, lest by turning your eyes toward the sky you leave your gut open for a nice stabbing.
I disagree. Hope is a grand thing, and having heroes is essential to human aspiration. That is part of why I tell these stories. That said, youdoneed to learn to separate the story—and what it has done to you—from the individual who prompted it. Art—and all stories are art, even the ones about real people—is about what itdoes to you.
The true hero is the one in your mind, the representation of an ideal that makes you a better person. The individual who inspired it, well, they’re like the book on the table or the art on the wall. A vessel. A syringe full of transformational aspiration.
Don’t force people to live up to your dreams of who they mightbe. And if you’re ever in the situation in which Painter found himself, where your ideals are crumbling, don’t do what he did. Don’t make it slow. Walk away and patch the wound instead of giving the knife time to twist inside.
“Come on,” Hikiri the companion said, pulling him again by the arm. “Let me get your statement.”
“Did she mean what she said?” Painter asked. “About me being Dreamwatch material? Could I still join them?”
Hikiri rubbed his temples. (An action he did so often it’s a wonder he didn’t have calluses there. Such was the life dealing with the Dreamwatch.)
“Do you like being a painter?” Hikiri said softly.
“I guess,” Painter said.
“It’s a good job,” Hikiri said. “Stable. Respected. Not too dangerous. You should enjoy it.”
Painter could read the tone of the man’s voice and understood.You have no chance here, kid.Of course he didn’t; he’d known that. He took a deep breath to plead anyway, but something else came out.
“I have friends,” he said. “Great painters, loyal. When I was in school, we all thought I’d get into the Dreamwatch. They were going to be my companions, but I let them down. I wasn’t good enough. It’s always felt unfair to me that they got punished because I couldn’t paint well enough. Do you think…there is a way they could be companions still? Are your Dreamwatch soldiers here recruiting?”
Hikiri shook his head, seeming bemused. “You thought you’d get into the Dreamwatch, did you? Were a skilled painter, I assume? Best of your class?”
“So I thought,” Painter said. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Hikiri pointed at the woman at the game table. “Do you know who she is?”
Painter shook his head.
“Tesuaka Tatomi,” he whispered. “Daughter of the senator?” He pointed at the next. “Son of the main investor of the new wing of the college.” The third one, by the viewer. “Old money. He’s fourth-generation Dreamwatch.”
Fourth-generation? That must be a very skilled family. Or…
Yes, in this regard, Painter was nearly as permeable as a bank vault. But three key cards and one pressure lock later, his eyes widened.
