The Gem – Part 5 – A Short Story

A fictional short story series: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 6

Very early, the next morning, after a sleepless night, finally Whynn fell asleep and dreamed a dream. The following narrative in italics describes Whynn’s dream.

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Whynn, “awoke” (while in her dream state), to the sound of her cellphone ringing. It played her real ringtone—the opening bars of “Back in Time” by Huey Lewis and The News, her mother’s favorite song from the ’80’s.

Still in her dream, Whynn answered her phone and listened. The caller did not speak, and after a few brief moments, hung up.

Whynn was certain there was someone at the other end of the line. She recognized the background noises. They were the same sounds she remembered from this past summer when she and her team found the gem in King Fahamuiti‘s sorcerer’s tomb.

As her dream continued, suddenly, Whynn heard a strange doorbell rang; it sounded more like distant church bells striking midnight, than a doorbell. In the next moment, she was transported somehow to a dark cave-like place or a tomb. There, she met herself. There was someone else there in the darkness. A tall angel-like figure with deep navy blue wings stood beside her other self. Whynn watched in awe as the angel-like figure opened his right hand to reveal the gem.

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In the next moment, Whynn was jolted awake out of her dream back to her own bed. Her blanket in a heap on the floor, sweat forming on her brow, her heart racing, she sat up in her bed.

Then, her doorbell rang.

Slipping on her robe and into her slippers, she rushed downstairs.

Opening the door, she discovered an always welcomed visitor — Dr. Niles D’jet, the curator in charge of the gem and other early Egyptian artifacts, at the New York Division of the Cairo Museum. His warm smile meant he came seeking her opinion on a pressing matter in his collection.

“Hello Professor Prentice, first, I am not a medical doctor, but I heard of the little emergency at your office. I wanted to see if you were okay.”

“Surely, you could have phoned. Is there something else I can do for you Doctor? Whynn paused. “I am very sorry for my sharpness my friend. I have not had much sleep.”

“No apologies necessary, my friend. You are not sleeping well— are you plagued perhaps with episodic dreams, as if…”

Dr. D’jet paused looking at Whynn who seemed even more pale, than when she first greeted him at the door, a few moments earlier.

“As if what?” Whynn asked holding her breath, already knowing what he would say.

“As if you were an observer, watching yourself in another location or time. As if you knew events before they occur.”

“What exactly do you mean?”

“Ah, Professor Prentice you of all people, with your family background should know that there is a great deal of truth in the royal Fahamuiti family legend as it relates to the gem. I would stake my PhD reputation on my belief that the gem has the power within it to affect time.”

Buoyed by the emotional toll of inadequate sleep, by recent events, and by her affection for her mother’s story about the Fahamuiti family—Wynn wept.

For a moment, her soul grieved, bereft of comfort at her mother’s unexplained disappearance twenty years ago. One day, Whynn’s mother Gemma, vanished from her office (the same office which Whynn now occupied at the University), without a trace. The authorities concluded, that no foul play was suspected.

As it so happens, Whynn and her team discovered the gem inside King Fahamuiti’s sorcerer’s tomb, this past summer on July 7, 2019—exactly twenty years to the day since her mother Gemma’s mysterious disappearance.

****To be continued next week****