Perchance

~six~

Ten minutes later, Finn's as dry as he's going to be and has explored every inch of their oversized shelter.

And Rory still hasn't quite wrapped her mind around... well, any of it.

"But how can this be real? You and me, sharing a dream?"

"Why can't it be? How do we know this sort of thing doesn't happen all the time, and we just think dreams are all fake?"

Rory thinks about it for a long moment, the idea like acid, eating holes in the fabric of her understanding of reality. It makes her feel like an entire nest of spiders is in her hair and skittering across her scalp.

"...That's kind of freaking me out."

Finn shrugs, the movement as easy and natural as everything he does. "Well, let's talk about something else then. How's your hand?"

It hadn't really occurred to Rory that her hand wasn't hurting for the first time in a week. She looks down and flexes her fingers - nothing smooth, unbroken skin. No wound, no angry infection.

"It's good as new," she answers, finally beginning to accept that nothing in this place is real. Except for Finn, that is - everything about him seems solid, grounded.

He flops back on the bed, his muddy, booted feet dangling off the edge, carefully keeping them from staining the white bedding. He laces his fingers behind his head and studies her for a long moment, like she's a particularly complex piece of modern art on a museum wall. "So," he finally says, his voice soft. "What's your deal, Rory?"

"My deal?"

"Yeah, you know - your life story, your dreams, the stuff that makes you you. Your deal."

Rory has never been asked any of that; she certainly doesn't have any easy answers. She's always just thought she'd figure herself out when she got a spare moment.

Of course, that probably won't happen until she's as old as the antiques in Mary's shop.

She sighs and shrugs. "I don't know. What's your deal?"

"I work as a paramedic because I want to help people and have a lot of free time to travel and learn. I speak two languages and am working on a third. I play the banjo and dabble in photography... I don't know; I just love the world."

"I... can't compete with any of that."

He laughs, easy as breathing. "It's not a competition. Besides, I'm sure you're far more interesting than you're trying to seem. We'll start easy - what do you do?"

"I work two jobs. One at Mary's antique shop - obviously - and a little bakery. I'm also in my second year at Holyoke Community College, and I'm hoping to transfer to the University of Massachusetts next fall to major in social work."

Finn whistles, low and long. "How impressively noble of you."

"Well, I was in the foster system my whole life, until I aged out at 18 with nowhere to go. But by then I'd met Laurel and she gave me a job, helped me get into college, and lets me live in a little apartment above her bakery. She was like a fairy who swooped in and saved me from a curse; I want to help people who aren't so lucky."

"If you don't mind me asking, what happened to your parents?"

Rory picks at a loose thread on her chair, plucking it between her short, ragged nails.

"I dunno. They abandoned me when I was a baby. I've always liked to think that they were important people - like royalty or something - and were in danger, somehow, so they had to give me up for my own safety. That they hid me away, and wanted to protect me." She blushes. "It's silly, I know."