The promise of the dark street had felt real, but it escaped him as he reached for it. Instead of opera and nicotine, another scene floats out of the squeezed-eye darkness. This is real as well: not home, but a familiar place...raw emotion, strangling out rational thought. Familiar feelings swelling with the sound of a scream. But the scream is not Ed's--not this time. His eyes flash open and he realizes that he hasn't been asleep. Heart racing and mind reeling he leaps to his feet, pacing aimlessly around his self-constructed cage.
The voice in the second scene was female and familiar. He shuddered in empathy for her, while trying to remember where he'd heard her cry out before.