The Vault of Dreamers Read Online Free PDF Page B

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     because of my connections.”
    “Actually, I was just wondering how rich you are. How classy is that?”
    “Real classy,” he said, laughing.
    “Do you take the same pills the rest of us do?” I asked.
    “Yes, of course. Why?”
    “I don’t know.” I was thinking about Janice’s seizure again, and the track mark in
     my own arm. “Is it purely the sleep that’s supposed to make us more creative, or is
     there something in the pill that does?”
    “It’s just the sleep,” Burnham said. “If the pill could make people more creative,
     we’d be selling it by the millions.”
    “You don’t sell a lot just as sleeping pills?” I asked.
    “Well,” he said, “we do.”
    I laughed. I had a ton of questions, now that I thought about it. “Why does the school
     make us sleep for twelve hours?” I asked. “It can’t be just for the convenience of
     the repeat cycle.” One of the distinctive features of The Forge Show was that it showed the exact same footage twice, once as it happened live during
     the day, straight through for twelve hours, and again at night, while the students
     were asleep. Viewers could watch the same or different student feeds the second time
     through, focusing on their favorite moments of interaction.
    “The twelve hours came out of a study the Forge School commissioned back when they
     were trying to find the optimal amount of sleep for creativity,” Burnham said.
    “When was that?” I asked.
    “Back before we were born. I’m thinking eighteen or twenty years ago?” he said. “The
     rationale is that we’re on a kind of hyper-life during the day while we’re here. We’d
     burn out without enough sleep. You get tired by six, don’t you?”
    “Yes,” I said. “Definitely.”
    “There you go.”
    I wondered if Burnham had any idea why a student would have seizures, but it seemed
     unwise to ask him in front of the cameras. I glanced out the window. Across a narrow
     courtyard, inside the glass walls of a ballet studio, a class was practicing at the
     barre. The dancers arched their arms over their heads, all in synch, like models for
     a Degas painting, but without the tutus. I wished I had my video camera with me to
     capture the movement.
    “Can I try something with your footage?” Burnham asked.
    “Sure.”
    He reached for my touch screen and swiveled it closer to himself. He pulled up a still
     frame of Dubbs. Then he pulled up a color wheel and started sweeping in bits of purple
     and blue around the shadows of the boxcar and its wheels. He worked so quickly and
     fluidly, it was almost like he was painting directly on the photo. A few minutes later,
     after a final click, he stopped and slid his hand away. He hadn’t touched Dubbs herself,
     but by deepening the colors and darkness that framed her face, he’d made her even
     more luminous than before.
    I stared, absorbing the effect, wondering how he’d done it. I touched a finger to
     Dubbs’s cheek, wishing I could have her with me in person. We walked on the train
     tracks together sometimes. She liked to hold my hand and randomly tug downward for
     an inside joke.
    “You like it?” he asked.
    “It’s very cool. Can you teach me how to do that?” I asked.
    Mr. DeCoster approached behind us. “Rosie, I’ve had a call from Dr. Ash,” he said,
     indicating his earphone. “She wants you to stop by the infirmary after lunch.”
    I clenched the edge of my chair. They had caught up with me. I swiveled to look at
     Mr. DeCoster. “What for?”
    “She didn’t say.”
    A student called him from the other side of the room, and I glanced over to see Janice
     with her hand raised. Mr. DeCoster reminded us to save our work before he headed off.
    “Are you sick?” Burnham asked.
    “No. I have no idea what that’s about,” I lied. I glanced at Janice again and wondered
     if she would be called to the infirmary, too.
    “You look, how shall we say, a bit constipated,” Burnham said.
    I let out a