Dreams aren't Cold

It was a day like any other in the early summer. After lunch my father would sit in his large armchair by the window, open book in hand, my mother still busying herself in the kitchen. And I was bored. That was the day I first met Charlotte. My memory of that is so vivid it feels like I could re-visit it, if I closed my eyes long enough. I had fallen asleep on the living room couch one sunny afternoon and woken up in a small garden, between strawberry plants. The sun was still bright in the sky and I needed a moment for my eyes to adjust and look around.

“Do you want a strawberry?” the blonde girl with corkscrew curls asked me. I remember how odd she looked to me. She paused. Only then she seemed to realize that I was staring at her and to her I probably looked rather odd too.

The year was 1969. At least for me. It was 1902 for Charlotte. We were both eight years old.

At first I treated it like a dream. Why wouldn’t I? Except this one didn’t end. Soon I saw her again when I was still sound asleep in my bed. Or so I though. One early morning when the air was still crisp but you know the day will get sunny and warm eventually. Charlotte was sitting on the step in front of the front door, waiting for her parents and siblings.

“Hello.” she waved to me, smiling brightly as she spotted me.

“Hello Charlotte! What are you doing?”

“We are going to church. Are you coming along? Mummy is still feeding the baby right now.”

Last time it was just Charlotte and me picking strawberries, I hadn’t met her family yet. But we were naive, innocent children. I considered everyone was my friend. Charlotte opened the door, revealing a dark room with a simple wooden table in the middle of it. That was the only piece of furniture I could see looking in from outside.

“Mummy! Mummy! Look! My friend Izzy is joining us for church.”

I hadn’t even agreed to that. The last time I went to church was probably Easter half a year ago.

When I stepped up to the door, smiling, ready to introduce myself and totally oblivious to how unusual the whole scene looked, Charlotte’s mother stepped into the frame, balancing a chubby baby on her hip.

“What nonsense are you talking about Charlotte?” Her tone was harsh and she looked right at me. Or better yet, right through me. Charlotte turned to me, her eyes met mine, confused about her mother’s reaction. I woke up in my own small bed again.

I told my parents about Charlotte.

“You have been watching too much of that space stuff on the television,” was father's reply. Mother tried a different approach. It wasn’t much better.

“Aren’t you too old already to start having an imaginary friend?”

“But she’s real. She lives with her parents and two younger siblings and we picked strawberries together and she wears the most hideous dresses.”

It was of no use. They didn’t believe me. Over time I visited Charlotte again and again. How? I don’t know and I couldn’t control it. I tried to but I could only ever jump to her time when I was asleep in my time. Some nights I would go to sleep and clutch my toys as hard to my chest as I could, hoping to be able to show her my race car and even my new, precious Barbie doll! There were multiple times I insisted on sleeping with my backpack on. My mother gave up worrying and questioning all together after a while. Yet, every time I popped up in Charlotte’s yard empty handed with just the clothes I had been wearing to bed. We talked and played with her toys. Once she brought her edition of Peter Pan outside, a book I knew I had on my bookshelf at home too. I just hadn’t looked at it in a very long time. The next day I asked my mother to read to me from the book like she used to before I had learned how to read. By wintertime that year I started sleeping with my thick jacket on every day. Just in case I would time travel. Once Charlotte’s neighbor, Mrs. Sheffield, asked her what she was doing outside so late on such an icy evening. But no one ever saw me. I could see Charlotte’s family shuffle in and out of the house, I peeked through windows, heard her mother hum the same song whenever she was peeling potatoes or carrots and watched as her father and brother walked across the white snow in the yard to get more firewood. But no one ever saw me.

Really, it is fascinating how quickly you can get used to something that seems so extraordinary. Soon, we stopped questioning it and found our rhythm when I showed up unannounced outside Charlotte’s house. Winters turned into summers and months turned into years.

Usually we would update each other on major life events and what was happening to us. She never quite believed me and would just laugh at the stories I told her of the 1970s. For her, the Beatles were as fantastical as the moon landing. I on the other hand was shocked when I heard her talk about her work the summer after she turned 13! My biggest problem at that time was Timothy Reeds, the cute boy in the class above me and Charlotte was already earning her own money helping out the tailor two streets over.

“I need to tell you something but you have to promise not to tell anyone!”

I chuckled at that. It was late summer of 1978 or 1911 - depending on whom you asked.

“Okay, I promise.” I placed a hand on my chest to emphasize my solemn oath.

“I met someone.”

“You what!?” Charlotte was a quiet, nice girl, never talked much about boys at all, patiently waited for me to tell her about yet another crush of mine or why this or that boy was decidedly not cute anymore.

“I met someone.” She simply repeated like I hadn’t heard her correctly. But I could see her trying to hide a certain kind of smile.

“Tell me everything!”

“His name is Leonard and he’s from London. But his uncle lives here and Leonard was helping him out this summer after his aunt passed away. We met at church. He works at the London docks and meets so many people from all over the world. He says he works a lot with some men from Italy and even picked up some words in Italian. Can you imagine? Italy!”

Yes, I could in fact imagine. For Charlotte Italy seemed like a far away foreign country. To me it was the country we had spent our last family holiday in a couple of years ago.

From that moment on I heard a new story of what Leonard did or who he had met or what he had written in his letters to Charlotte. And I loved every detail of it, shared all her excitement and happiness. Sometimes it felt like watching a cheesy movie where you are waiting for the passion to happen. Charlotte’s parents had no idea that their daughter was in a secret relationship with a young man from London. When Charlotte told me about their first kiss she was so embarrassed she could hardly speak the words out loud. The way she trusted me with this made me all emotional. We grew up together somehow and yet the world had changed so dramatically in more or less half a century.

It was Christmas time and Charlotte had smuggled some tea outside for us to drink while we sought shelter from the cold under one of the evergreens.

“I’m leaving, Izzy. Leonard and I made a plan. We are leaving together.” Charlotte’s voice was even more of a whisper than it usually was. A short silence spread between us as I was trying to comprehend her confession.

“Leaving? You are going to London?” It was the only logical conclusion. Again, the silence stretched a little longer.

“No. We are going to America.”

“America?” Finally, she looked up at me. She looked like she was breaking up with me. It felt a little like that too.

“Yes. Leonard has been saving money. We want to leave after the new year.”

I was stunned, my mind went blank and I could neither say I was excited for her nor try and convince her to stay. Years ago, I had tried to look for Charlotte in our town’s records, see if I can find any mention of her. To my surprise, I found four different women by the name of Charlotte Margaret Ellison born in 1894. One died before her second birthday, one was the daughter of a prominent criminal of that time and for the other two I could find no further records at all. But none of them was the same Charlotte I knew. Maybe this explains why. Maybe all records were lost or destroyed as she emigrated to America.

Every following meeting felt like it could be the last one. With still no way for me to control these time jumps we tried to cherish each visit. We talked like we used to, grateful for the days and nights that weren’t as bitter and cold as the previous ones as the winter slowly faded. The difference was in the silences, when we just sat next to each other without talking. The air felt heavier. There was so much I wanted to ask her, so much I wanted to tell her in case this really was the last time we saw each other. But instead, we just kept quiet. Neither of us knew how this time traveling worked and who was to say that I wouldn’t just follow her to America and pop up in her new strawberry garden?

“Happy Easter!” Charlotte beamed with a bright smile when I appeared on her front door that Sunday. We embraced and she handed me a small piece of cake she had put on a saucer. For the first time since Christmas, she felt like herself again, smiling, babbling, asking me questions and widening her eyes when I told her there was a device coming to the stores where you can put your cassettes in and carry them around and listen to music while you walk. The birth of the Walkman.

“Nothing is impossible in this crazy world.” She said more to herself than to me. That was more than suspicious to me.

“Okay, tell me. What is going on? Why are you so cheerful?”

“Oh, Izzy! You will not believe it. Tomorrow I will be going to London. I am finally leaving. It’s happening!”

“So soon! What…? How…?” Her cheerful mood made me all the more sad now.

“Yes. It will all happen awfully quickly. From London, Leonard and I will go to Southampton and board the ship to New York! New York, Izzy!”

“Wow.” It was all I could say. For what felt like forever, I was frozen in place. As Charlotte went on to tell me about her upcoming journey, I was barely listening. Until…

“Wait! What? What did you just say?”

“What do you mean? That Leonard got the two tickets because he knows one of the people working for the ship’s company? They were almost sold out.”

“No, after that.”

“It’s a brand new ship? Largest and fastest and most expensive ship in the world?”

“Yes. That.” She looked at me like I had gone crazy. “What’s today’s date, Charlotte?”

My heart plummeted before she could even answer.

“April 7th, 1912.”

“No, Charlotte! You can’t go!” I was shouting at her. Never before had I raised my voice like that but the panic overcame me like a wave, drowning every bit of rational thinking.

“Why?” Charlotte seemed offended and hurt, like I didn’t want her to go because I didn’t want to lose her. But she didn’t understand.

“That’s the Titanic, Charlotte. It will sink! In the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Most of the people will die! Charlotte, believe me, you cannot go!” I was panting, almost started crying.

“No, it will not. It’s unsinkable.” The way she peeled my hands from her shoulders and straightened her posture told me that she did not want to have this discussion. The prospect of a new life with the man she loved was more important than my warnings.

“Charlotte, believe me. It is sinkable. And it will sink. It will hit an iceberg before it ever reaches New York. Thousands of people will die, freeze and drown in the Atlantic. You cannot go. Please, Charlotte.”

“Izzy. I am going. This is the most ridiculous story you’ve come up with so far. Can you not be happy for me?”

This was going all wrong. I started trying to convince her with all the facts I did know about the Titanic, which wasn’t a lot. When I resorted to begging and pleading with her, I was sobbing. Apparently, I was crying so hard that my mother shook me awake and ripped me from Charlotte’s front steps. Between tears, I tried telling my mother about Charlotte’s plan to board the Titanic. Even if my mother was able to understand what I was trying to tell her, she didn’t understand why I was so worked up.

“It was just a bad dream. Try to go back to sleep, Isabelle.” And I tried. I really tried. I hoped and prayed to fall back asleep and return to Charlotte’s house. When the sun started to rise and the muted morning light filled my room, I gave up.

The next time I landed outside in Charlotte’s time was only a few days later. By this time, the Titanic will have left the port in Southampton, full of excited and hopeful dreamers. I couldn’t stand it. Restlessly, I walked up and down the short street. The houses on either side sat quiet; here and there, a window was still lit up and some shadowy figures moved inside. It felt like the beginning of a horror movie and all I wanted to do was leave. I wondered if I would just keep coming back here with no one there anymore who could see me. Then weeks passed and nothing happened. I tried to go back to research, reading everything I could about the Titanic and its maiden voyage and the passengers that were onboard. Again, I came up without evidence that Charlotte or Leonard ever even existed, if they had tickets for the Titanic or if they survived or perished with the ship. Nothing. Outside, the world kept turning. The trees grew back soft green leaves and people spent more and more time outside again. All I could think about was how precious our time is and how limited the time we get to spend with our family and friends is. By May, I wanted to move on, forget. I must have fallen asleep in my room shortly after dinner because it was still light out when I woke up behind the house where Charlotte’s parents lived, now only with their two sons.

Reluctantly, I sat up.

“Hey, stranger.” And there she was. In the flesh. Alive. Breathing. Smiling at me. The tears started falling before I could even get up and run toward her.

“How?” That was all I could ask.

“I couldn’t do it. I heard your voice over and over in my head when I looked up at this enormous ship. And I couldn’t do it.”