“He can see us,” one of them squeaks.

I never believed they existed, but this one is staring right at me. It looks like one of those walking sticks you find in the woods – well, maybe not this time of year since they prefer summer. Still, Christmas Eve or not, there’s an army of walking stick insects performing some kind of science experiment on my older brother.

“What are you doing?” I whisper-scream.

Drew stirs under his covers. Like ants caught red-handed, all their motion ceases in a split second. Drew and I would’ve done the same if Mom had caught us in the pantry after midnight.

“Told you he can see us,” squeaks the one staring at me.

Six of them are propped on my brother’s pillow, holding a glass beaker near his face. The pear-shaped vial looks like something from chem lab. I have to wipe my eyes to be sure, but there’s some kind of bright, transparent goop floating in it like a dead jellyfish. I see another three stick bugs holding a syringe to Drew’s ear while a fourth pulls on a microscopic handle. I have to look past their surgical instruments to notice a platoon of them spread atop his blanket and bed covers, holding clipboards and notebooks. Another two dozen are on the wooden floor, passing messages along in an elaborate game of telephone, their line trailing off into our closet.

“What are you…?” I start to repeat.

“Shhh!” one of them protests, waving twig arms thinner than dental floss. Do I see miniature bifocals and a small puff of white beard on its face? “We dare not hurt the lad.”

I know it’s my hearing, not my sight, that’s failing me now, but I rub my eyes aggressively with closed fists anyway. As my vision comes into focus again, I see only a handful of the walking twigs with their chemistry equipment. The others must’ve scattered back into the closet.

“Dreamsnatchers are shifty critters,” Grandpa used to say. He’d share the same long-winded myth every Christmas. It’s been a couple years since he passed, but I can still see him sitting in his favorite recliner chair, the one grooved uniquely for his robust form.

“Their work is precise,” he’d say. “In and out quicker than a flash and just like that, your childhood dreams are gone. Dreamsnatchers! Thieves in the night.”

“It can’t be…” I sigh without thinking.

Drew stirs again, threatening to turn completely around.

“Cease and desist, boy,” the bearded twig begs me.

“He’s critical, Doctor,” says the twig next to him.

“Doctor?” I repeat to myself.

“We can’t have you wake the lad,” he says.

If Gandalf were a stick, I think to myself.

“Did we extract the requisite volume?” Dr. Gandalf asks.

“My estimates show eighty percent,” one replies.

“I concur, Doctor,” says another.

“Are we able to proceed without completing the procedure?” Dr. Gandalf asks again, rubbing his chin with his twig arm. The beard looks like the snow-smeared bark on the redwoods outside.

“I wouldn’t wager it,” one says from under the syringe.

“We’ve had success from ninety percent extraction, but no less,” adds another from under the jelly-filled beaker.

“It’s a risk,” contributes a third. “Not one we should take. We owe it to our people to collect as much as we can.”

Their high-pitched debate continues, but it’s Grandpa’s raspy bass that I hear, like an echo from behind a curtain I can’t see. The nostalgia puts his ghost in the corner of my bedroom. I can see his kind blue eyes hiding behind thick-rimmed glasses. I can see his Einstein hair and the white stubble on his chin and cheeks. I can smell the cigar smoke infused in his sweater.

“It happens to everyone,” Grandpa would tell us. “One day, we are bright-eyed and bushy-tailed children chasing far-fetched dreams, confident that anything is possible. The next, we’re wondering how to escape our grown-up routine. We become weighed down by the burden of adulthood. It’s not the dreams that have changed, it’s us. And why’s that, bumpkins? Because the Dreamsnatchers take them!”

Drew and I never believed Grandpa could be telling the truth! Wasn’t it just a fairy tale that grandparents told their children’s children on holidays? Some way parents could explain away their growing up? I look to Drew’s bed and see the small squad of walking twigs preparing to reinsert the syringe into his ear!

“Stop!” I cry out, careful not to be too loud.

“For heaven’s sake,” one of the Dreamsnatchers say.

“I know what you’re doing,” I say with timid accusation

Today hadn’t exactly been a textbook Christmas Eve. Drew went off to the Boy’s Academy last August, the first time we were in separate schools. Every student in the Academy chooses an emphasis, but Drew didn’t know what to focus on. Dad pressured him to choose something reliable like he had back in the day: science. But I grew up next to Drew. He never liked numbers or formulas or laws. Drew plays the fiddle better than the tavern musicians. He writes stories better than Grandpa used to tell. Drew’s an artist. He came home today, much later than everyone wanted him to – after all, the Academy’s winter recess started two weeks ago. Well, Dad found out that Drew chose creative writing. Their Christmas gifts ended up in the trash bin. Let’s just say today would be the worst day to have his dreams stolen.

“Please don’t,” I say with a shaky voice.

Dr. Gandalf peeks at his neighbor’s clipboard.

“Andrew Joseph Edmonds,” he reads aloud. “Age fifteen?”

“Yeah, but I’m fourteen,” I call back. “Take mine instead. Drew needs his still.”

“Gregory Stewart Edmonds?” Dr. Gandalf asks.

“That’s me,” I say, nodding.

“You aren’t due for extraction yet. Not for another twelve months, at minimum.”

“So what?” I can feel my heartbeat quicken. These Dreamsnatchers may be small, but the sight of them terrifies me. And even more than how they look, it’s what they do that sends a chill down my back. “Drew needs them, please don’t steal them.”

“We’re not thieves!” cries the one who caught me staring.

I can tell now that it’s a female, and a lot younger than Dr. Gandalf. A few of them dart to my bedside with remarkable speed.

“Take it back!” she yells at me, pointing a twig arm so close to my nose, I can almost feel its prick.

“Nurse Gwen,” Dr. Gandalf says, trying to calm her down. He turns to me, poking his bifocals further up his twig nose. “Take care not to accuse too hastily, Gregory. Despite what you’ve heard, we don’t take dreams from children.”

“But Grandpa told me…” I start.

The wise Dreamsnatcher raises his arms to silence me.

“I know very well what he told you, but it wasn’t the whole truth. We don’t take dreams away, we rescue them.”

It takes a second for the big reveal to sink in. Even so, I still can’t grasp what Dr. Gandalf is trying to say.

“Human beings are the greatest wasters of dreams in the known universe,” Dr. Gandalf shares. “Most adult humans choose a path of security, wasting the limitless potential they had as children. Every child inherently understands the inspiration of what surrounds them, the magic of what it means to be alive and to live while you’re alive. Somewhere along the way, life chips away at that raw childlike awe. Then, there comes a pivotal moment of no return. The dreams don’t come back after that.”

“What are you talking about?” I ask. “Drew’s chasing his dreams. He just declared an emphasis at the Academy. He’s going to be a writer!”

“Is that so?” Nurse Gwen shoots back.

“I’m afraid that’s not altogether accurate,” Dr. Gandalf says. “The note folded in his journal will confirm that he elected medical science. Andrew will be a doctor, and a good one, too.”

“How can that be?” I wonder.

As if talking to walking sticks isn’t already hard enough to accept, I have a harder time believing that my brother and best friend chose to follow Dad’s footsteps. I tip-toe gingerly across the room to find the journal buried in his book bag. When I remove the folded paper from inside the front cover, what I read confirms Dr. Gandalf’s statement. Drew probably lied about his emphasis today because he was lashing out. Maybe, he resented Dad for forcing him into something that wasn’t his dream.

“But he wants to be a writer…” I mutter.

“So did your father.”

I turn around, wide-eyed. Only Dr. Gandalf and Nurse Gwen remain on my pillow, the other Dreamsnatchers and their surgical tools gone from sight.

“My father wanted to be a writer?” I ask, thinking I may have heard wrong.

“He would’ve been one, too,” Dr. Gandalf explained. “But when his mother passed – your grandmother – he forewent his heart’s desire to learn more about the sickness that took her life. A noble choice indeed. After that, I ordered the extraction of his dreams myself. Our people use this dream energy for wonderful things. It is our lifeblood. We only extract them if and when the adult foregoes them of their own choice. Andrew, like your father, made his choice.”

“But, but, but…” I struggle to find words.

“This is the natural course of life, Gregory,” Dr. Gandalf explains. “Human beings grow up. They pass their wisdom and knowledge to their children, who eventually grow up themselves. There is beauty in that.”

“But Drew doesn’t want to be a doctor,” I say. “He just wants to make Dad proud. Isn’t there anything you can do?”

Dr. Gandalf stops to consider my request.

“Are you thinking…?” Gwen asks in her high-pitched squeal.

“Hush, Gwendolyn. Perhaps, an experiment is in order.”

The wise twig pricks my nose so quickly that I barely see his arms move. I don’t even feel the needlepoint pierce my skin before everything goes dark.

* * * * *

It’s a bit harder to open my eyes than it usually is on Christmas morning. With gifts ripe for the picking, I’m usually sitting by the large pine before the sun rises. But after that strange dream pulled me another level into sleep, it takes extra effort to get out of bed. Drew’s bed is empty, but what do I see poking out from under the frame? It’s an envelope. I have to squint to see the writing on it:

We couldn’t undo our work on Drew, but you had plenty of dreams to spare. Don’t fret, we only took what little they needed. Merry Christmas. – Dr. Q.

I walk through the hallway, wondering how small that pencil must have been, when I hear a sound that had become foreign in these walls. Is Dad laughing? When the Christmas tree comes into view, I see Dad sitting on the couch with Drew on the ground in front of him.

“Not bad,” Dad says, waving a small pamplet in his hand. I'd recognize Drew's composition notebook anywhere.

“Really?” Drew says. “I didn’t know if you’d like it. Sorry I overreacted last night.”

I half expect Dad to begin one of his preachy sermons, but there’s almost a reciprocal apology in his face. Then, he says something I never thought I’d hear in a million years.

“Did I ever tell you I wanted to be a writer once?”

A journal entry by Zane Callahan, dated 2/13/19:

Gracie’s gone.

For once, she gets a lucky break.

Gracie’s suffered from the beginning. She’s been repeatedly flung through the wringer for fun. Life or Fate – or whatever Being sits in the driver’s seat – has had it in for her from the start.

Mom was already at a “risky” age when she had me, let alone Abel. But they wanted a girl. The docs told them it wasn’t wise, that her pregnancy with my brother had already been irresponsible. They tried for another year, and no dice. Everyone gave up…us boys would have to do.

Nine years later, along comes this miraculous accident. It was supposed to be impossible. Mom was supposed to be too old. This little girl was never supposed to be here. But she was conceived and brought to term and lived. Well, that must’ve pissed Somebody off because all her life, Gracie was made to pay for the undeserved gift of having been brought into the world.

At first, the payback was small. A hearing impairment here. A reading disability there. Prickly thorns in her side that made every little thing that much more inconvenient, that much more irritating. But we learned sign language. Dad sold his car and paid for some extra tutoring. We got by.

Gracie was 12 when she broke her back.

She’d been left stranded at the tutor’s, so her instructor agreed to give her a lift home. The drunk driver that plowed into them killed Gracie’s instructor on impact and paralyzed her from the waist down. Welcome to a new normal. Dad usually picked her up, but that afternoon, the buses were backed up real bad. Of course, he would’ve had his car if he hadn’t sold it to pay for the tutor. Mom could’ve picked her up, but she used to see a shrink back then. Of course, she wouldn’t have needed counseling if the precious daughter she had prayed for hadn’t been born with certain…complications. Us boys could’ve helped, but I’d moved to LA long before that and Abel was at university.

Gracie was 20 when she lost the love of her life.

With all the odds stacked against her, Gracie managed to graduate with honors, alongside this kid named James. They both studied education in college and fell in love somewhere along the way. They planned to get married afterward, too. James knew all the difficulties in front of them, but there was no changing his mind. Abel called James a saint. So, James jumped on a train to pick up the ring, but the Express pulled up short of Braddock. The engineer was texting, at least that’s what the news said. Otherwise, how do you blow through two red signals to find yourself face to face with a freight train?

Gracie was 26 when she was diagnosed with cancer.

Leukemia is an old man’s disease, so there’s no rationalization for the question that haunts us still. Why her? Chemotherapy didn’t work. Radiation didn’t work. Her only chance was a transplant. I cursed her odds…why would this tragedy be any different than the others? But I was wrong! They found a match in the marrow registry! A miracle! Salvation! Except that one month before the transplant procedure, the would-be donor pulled out. With the chance to save a life at his/her fingertips, the donor retracted. Gracie died three months after that.

I’m sick about it. Not only that Gracie’s gone – and that’s reason enough to be sick – but that when Abel called to tell me, I felt…relieved. There’ll be a funeral tomorrow and a million sullen faces sharing their condolences. All I’ll be thinking? At least her torture’s been ended. At least her luck has finally improved. At least she’s finally been granted mercy.

I love you, sis, and I’m sorry that life was so cruel.

You didn’t deserve a bit of it.

* * * * *

A journal entry by Abel Callahan, dated 2/15/19:

Dearest Gracie,

Remember when I held your hand the last night you fell asleep? Remember when I asked how you dealt with tragedy after tragedy? Remember when you told me there was a reason for all this – you, the one in the hospital bed, comforting your suffering family in the midst of your own mess?

Sis, I think you were right.

Suffering Grace.

Have you heard that phrase before? I hadn’t until the funeral yesterday. One of your nurses said you suffered gracefully. I didn’t know that was possible. She said she asked you if you hated your donor. “There’s someone out there who needs her marrow more than I do.”

Did you really say that? HOW could you say that? Mom, Dad, and I were fuming when the donor turned her back. You were on the brink of a life-saving procedure! That person effectively killed you! You would’ve been forgiven for hating them. But no, what do you do? Defend this perfect stranger with the benefit of a doubt. The nurse said she was inspired by your answer, inspired to forgive her own sister…I guess they a falling out 20 years ago.

That story gave me pause.

I wonder if I owe it to you to square things with Zane. You found a way to share a huge piece of your heart with this stranger who could’ve saved you. Why can’t I find an ounce of courage to do the same…with our brother no less?

Oh, but you’re chock full of surprises, aren’t you?

James’ mom was at your service, too. “Suffered in a way true to her namesake,” she said. She told me what you did for the widow’s ministry at Kindred Church. I don’t get it. Your almost-fiancé is taken from you in a freak accident…I mean, days before he was going to propose. You would’ve been forgiven for exploding in anger, for shutting the world out, for turning your back on love. But no, you turn around and use your pain to pour into others. Did you know that James’ mom established a scholarship in your name at that church? Of course, you knew. Mom and Dad had no idea. When did you learn to be so sneaky?!

This got me thinking about your accident, too. It took me all day today, but I found out what happened to the drunk driver. Nick Thompson is sober now – 15 years too late if you ask me. But it turns out that he sustained some brain damage in the crash. Even with the massive speech impediment, he uses his handicap to show high school students the dangers of substance abuse. He’s a motivational speaker at high school rallies. I could’ve killed him when I found out what he did you to you. But you wouldn’t have. You would have pointed to the trail of breadcrumbs leading to the fruits produced by your suffering.

I had to look up the meaning of your name after the funeral. Grace: an undeserved gift. This world is selfish and crass and fast-paced and cold. How did you find the energy to shine a light on all that despite being given lemons over and over? You’re a superhero, kid, the baby constantly teaching folks supposedly wiser than you.

Grace, indeed.

Now, you’re gone.

I could write those words a million times, and it’ll never be easy to accept their permanence. But, there’s this idea that makes it a little less bleak. One idea like a ray of sunshine on a dreary afternoon. How many lives were touched because you lived? How many lives improved because you suffered gracefully? I don’t know about heaven and hell, but I hope to discuss the answers next time I see you.

I love you, sis. Until we meet again.