At her feet lay the “menacing” pit bull with his head resting tenderly upon her ankles, breathing in time with the breathing machine. Owen felt his emotions well up—first, surprise at the unexpected nature of what he discovered behind the walls of the house; second, his heart went out to the dog and the man and the poor woman. He knew now why the fellow didn’t want kids hanging out making a racket on the sidewalk, and why he was always too preoccupied to wave back or say hello.
Owen heard the heavy steps of the home owner in the hallway behind him. He felt a burst of panic in his chest, forgetting his invisibility. Turning quickly, he looked for a place to hide. A pale blue arm aglow like Owen’s appeared from out of the center of the closet door in the corner and motioned for him to follow. Just as his neighbor entered the room, he stepped through the closet door. In the dark, he saw the other sleeper pass through the wall of the house and out into the night. He followed.
At the back of the property two houses down, just in front of a line of tall hedges, the dimly glowing sleeper sat at an old picnic table. Owen drew cautiously closer until he could make out it was the woman he’d met at the cemetery the previous night.
“We meet again,” he whispered.
“You don’t have to whisper,” she said in a normal tone. “Most in the waking world can’t hear you.”
“May I sit down?” he asked.
She motioned with a sweep of her arm for him to do so. Now that he was just the table’s width away and neither of them was moving, he got a better look at her face. It was still difficult to read detail, what with the glow, but he could tell she must be a little older than he was, perhaps seven or eight years, in her mid-forties. She was a big woman, not heavy but solid, with broad shoulders. As he scooted into the seat opposite her, he noted she was an inch or so taller than him. Her face was deadpan, and her hair, which he had believed to be short, actually came to her shoulders and in front was cut into bangs. It now revealed its waking-world color as dark brown or black.
“How did you get here?” she asked, and the earlier deadpan expression turned into a smile.
“I seriously think it was from a knock on the head,” he told her.
“I’ve heard of it before. OBEs are uncommon, in and of themselves, but that scenario among those who travel by night is not. Trauma, physical or mental, can set off an episode.”
“My name is Owen,” he said, and put his hand out across the table.
She put hers out as well and the two open palms passed through each other.
“That didn’t go so well,” he said.
“Sleepers can’t touch.” She drew back her arm and said, “I’m Melody.”
“How did you get here?”
“I can get here anytime I want, through mental training and meditation. I studied with some very knowledgeable people. In most cases, I can also control when I return to my body. I bet you can’t.”
“True,” said Owen. “I could get pulled back to myself like a yo-yo at any second.”
“Because you’re an accidental sleeper.”
“Accidental?”
She nodded. “Your ability to achieve an OBE could disappear at any time and you might never achieve it again.”
“Well, it’s kind of strange. I might not mind.”
“It’s like being a ghost, isn’t it?” she said.
“Is that what you like about it?”
“That, and the quiet nature of the night, seeing into things you’re blocked from while awake. I’ve always been a loner at heart.”
“Me too,” he said. “Why were you in that house?”
“I used to work with the woman and wondered how she was getting on.”
“Apparently not so well,” said Owen. “Are you from this neighborhood?”
“Not too far. Down in town, more near the stores.”
“Why did you follow me in the cemetery the other night?”
“I had a feeling you were new by the way you were trying to run.” She laughed. “I wanted to tell you there are some things you need to know about being a sleeper if you want to stay safe. I was trying to warn you. Someone did it for me, so you need to pass it on when you encounter a novice.”
“I’d appreciate your help.”
“OK, then follow me.” She stood, and leaped in one smooth bound over the hedge behind her.
In her nightgown and robe, she looked like an angel, ascending and falling. For some reason, it made him smile. He slid off the bench and followed her with a bound. He landed in someone else’s backyard. Melody was already moving toward the side of the house. Afraid to run to catch up, he walked quickly, and saw her pass through a gate leading to the front and the street. She waited under a streetlight, and as he caught up, she said, “You know, since you could be called back any time, if that happens, I’ll meet you at the picnic table we just left.”
“Agreed,” said Owen.
“Like I said, being you’re here due to a bump on the head, you may find that one night you’re no longer able to achieve this state. The whole thing works mysteriously. Scientists take MRIs of people experiencing an OBE, and register what the brain does, but they really don’t understand what’s going on. Of course, they don’t heed the spiritual nature of it, and that’s definitely a big part of it—at least from my experience.” She turned and walked, with him beside her.
“How did you acquire the ability to achieve an OBE at will?”
“We’ll get to that, but I want to fill you in about the dangers now, while we have the chance. With your limited experience, you probably think the sum total is running around the night streets of the waking world and playing invisible hide-and-seek.”
“There’s more to it?”
“A lot more,” she said, and stopped. He could tell she was listening intently by her stillness and the position of her head. “This way,” she eventually said. At the corner, they turned again toward the park and cemetery. “There are creatures and entities inhabiting this phase of being, the night world, you need to steer clear of.”
“Entities?”
“Even though it feels like we are walking the streets of the waking world, which we are, in this dimension, or astral plane, or whatever you want to call the reality that accommodates us, there are other players.”
“For instance?”
“Well, have you ever heard of the silver cord?”
“I ran into a discussion of OBEs and such on the internet after I made my first journey the other night. Sort of a silver bungee that tethers you to your body. Right?”
“More or less,” said Melody. “If there were illustrations with the information, there probably were depictions of the cord emanating from the sleeping body’s forehead and connecting at the spiritual form’s forehead. At times, you’ll see it as emanating from the chest or the back. The odd thing is, I don’t have one and neither do you and neither do most I’ve met. And yet all of my teachers—great adepts—swear everyone has one whether it can be seen or not.”
He nodded as they crossed the street to the park entrance.
“OK, there are a number of ways the cord might be severed while the spirit is about in the night. If that happens, the sleeper’s body will die. But the spirit body adrift in the night world atrophies, shrivels, and becomes an evil entity with only one purpose: to sever the cords of other travelers.”