Twisted Dreams

Chapter 12

    My bare feet made little noise as I padded warily behind Dr. Barnabas' assistant to the office of the elusive Dr. Leonardo Wright. The arrival revealed a small room occupied by a couple of bookshelves, a small desk, and two complementary chairs facing one another, but with no potential occupants in sight.
    "Wait here," the assistant said brusquely. "He will be with you in one moment," he finished with a quick shut of the door to hinder any questions I might have asked.
    I sunk into one of the two chairs and cast my stare about the room to find some source of meaning in the clear mess that had been left behind. I could see books filling a trunk, partially unpacked and filling the spaces of the shelves available. The desk was covered in a soft-buttery light from the sun's morning rays stretching through the office window, the light exposing papers strewn about the desk in no known order. I craned my neck to try make sense of some of the papers available to no avail, and resorted to walking around the desk to study the information from a sensical perspective.
    My change in perspective revealed a tip of a fountain pen peaking from some of the sheets spread about. With a small sense of elation, I grabbed the pen and sighed at the sense of familiarity amidst the foreignness of my environment. The addition of the pen to my arsenal boosted my confidence enough to take another spin about the room to study the books that remained trapped in the confines of the trunk.
    I bent over and read the title of the first spine I could make out, "Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen". I frowned, trying to make sense of this imaginary Dr. Leonardo Wright, whom I was beginning to imagine favored a doppelgänger of Dr. Barnabas, as reading this novel.
    It was in this precarious position, bent over the trunk of books frowning that Dr. Leonardo Wright himself happened to find me in when he finally arrived at his office.
    At the sound of his door I jolted upright, reddening in embarrassment, and hid the fountain pen in the folds of my brown dress. I spun around expecting to find my visions of Dr. Barnabas' doppelgänger in the flesh, only to be pleasantly surprised. I discovered a tall man, with warm skin that radiated the sun instead of reflecting the flourescents. The white lab coat that hung lose on Dr. Barnabas's tall frame was drawn tight over broad muscular shoulders. His brown eyes widened at the sight of myself, and I could see the questions forming at the tip of his tongue before he restrained himself.
    "Hello. My name is Dr. Leonardo Wright. You must be Vee."