Her fantasy of returning to Bhogavati and resuming her normal life evaporated, just like the wisps of the man’s dream. Tanvi ran and ran, desperate to put Sameer’s street behind her.

Every house and restaurant and store felt like a mosquito biting her, injecting her with colors and signs and architectural flourishes that raised little itchy bumps of almost memory. Bumps she could feel but couldn’t reach to scratch.

Tanvi was halfway to Penn’s Landing, resigned to her fate, when another detail floated up. A memory.

She’d ended up at Sameer’s door, but that wasn’t the right one. The door in her memory was red.

The red door. It was real, and Tanvi knew where to find it.

The taxi idled, waiting for Tanvi to get out, and she muttered her thanks before handing over the promised diamond. First she hadn’t been able to find a taxi, and when she finally did, it took her three tries before one would accept a dreamstone instead of cash to drive her out to Mount Airy. And here she’d thought mortals really liked these cold rocks, as if they meant anything without a dream inside them.

Her breath skittered. She didn’t have to do this. She could give the driver another vial to turn around. Except everything had gone wrong since that night that girl had called her the wrong name, and she still hadn’t found out why.

The driver grimaced at the diamond. “How do I know it’s real?” he challenged yet again.

That decided her. “Only one way to find out,” she shot back, then hopped out of the car.

The engine’s rumble subsided, leaving her to confront the big gray stone house with the circular stained-glass windows on the second floor.

And the red door from her dreams.

Tanvi was going to throw up. Dread soured her guts, and the thing in her chest galloped fast enough to take on a racehorse. Every part of her screamed for her to run, to go home. Dream runners didn’t have families. They didn’t care about the past.

Every part—except the one that unclenched at the sight of the red door. The thing in Tanvi’s chest, her heart that should have gone dormant for all time.

A bird had made a nest in the magnolia tree in the landscaped front yard. The tree promised more unknotting of memories she didn’t want, now or ever.

Just like the azaleas, both pink and red, lining the side of the house. But not like that pinwheel garden stake or those solar lights on the railing—those were new.

Tears pricked at her eyes for the second time this morning, and she rubbed at them with her knuckles.

You don’t have to do this. This isn’t your world.

So what if her mind kept playing that name? She could keep ignoring it until it went away.