We went silently to bed after she had limped around and checked the house, even under the bed again. I heard that odd breathy whisper of a prayer and lay awake, trying to add up something shiny and the odd eyes and the whispering sob. Finally I shrugged in the dark and wondered what I'd pick for funny when I grew up. All grownups had some kind of funny. The next night Mrs. Klevity couldn't get down on her knees to look under the bed. She'd hurt herself when she plumped down on the floor after yanking me away from the bed. 'You'll have to look for me tonight,' she said slowly, nursing her knees. 'Look good. Oh, Anna, look good!' I looked as good as I could, not knowing what I was looking for. 'It should be under the bed,' she said, her palms tight on her knees as she rocked back and forth. 'But you can't be sure. It might miss completely.' 'What might?' I asked, hunkering down by the bed. She turned her face blindly toward me. 'The way out,' she said. 'The way back again—' 'Back again?' I pressed my check to the floor again. 'Well, I don't see anything. Only dark and suitcases.' 'Nothing bright? Nothing? Nothing—' She tried to lay her face on her knees, but she was too unbendy to manage it, so she put her hands over her face instead. Grownups aren't supposed to cry. She didn't quite, but her hands looked wet when she reached for the clock to wind it. I lay in the dark, one strand of her hair tickling my hand where it lay on the pillow. Maybe she was crazy. I felt a thrill of terror fan out on my spine. I carefully moved my hand from under the lock of hair. How can you find a way out under a bed? I'd be glad when Mr. Klevity got home, eggs or no eggs, dime or no dime. Somewhere in the darkness of the night, I was suddenly swimming to wakefulness, not knowing what was waking me but feeling that Mrs. Klevity was awake too. 'Anna.' Her voice was small and light and silver. 'Anna—' 'Hummm?' I murmured, my voice still drowsy. 'Anna, have you ever been away from home?' I turned toward her, trying in the dark to make sure it was Mrs. Klevity. She sounded so different. 'Yes,' I said. 'Once I visited Aunt Katie at Rocky Butte for a week.' 'Anna.' I don't know whether she was even hearing my answers; her voice was almost a chant, 'Anna, have you ever been in prison?' 'No! Of course not!' I recoiled indignantly. 'You have to be awful bad to be in prison.' 'Oh, no. Oh, no!' she sighed. 'Not jail, Anna. Prison, prison. The weight of the flesh—bound about—' 'Oh,' I said, smoothing my hands across my eyes. She was talking to a something deep in me that never got talked to, that hardly even had words. 'Like when the wind blows the clouds across the moon and the grass whispers along the road and all the trees pull like balloons at their trunks and one star comes out and says 'Come' and the ground says 'Stay' and part of you tries to go and it hurts—' I could feel the slender roundness of my ribs under my pressing hands. 'And it hurts—' 'Oh, Anna, Anna!' The soft, light voice broke. 'You feel that way and you belong Here. You won't ever —' The voice stopped and Mrs. Klevity rolled over. Her next words came thickly, as though a gray film were over them as over her eyes. 'Are you awake, Anna? Go to sleep, child. Morning isn't yet.' I heard the heavy sigh of her breathing as she slept. And finally I slept too, trying to visualize what Mrs. Klevity would look like if she looked like the silvery voice-in-the-dark. I sat savoring my egg the next morning, letting my thoughts slip in and out of my mind to the rhythm of my jaws. What a funny dream to have, to talk with a silver-voiced someone. To talk about the way blowing clouds and windy moonlight felt. But it wasn't a dream! I paused with my fork raised. At least not my dream. But how can you tell? If you're part of someone else's dream, can it still be real for you? 'Is something wrong with the egg?' Mrs. Klevity peered at me. 'No—no—' I said, hastily snatching the bite on my fork. 'Mrs. Klevity—' 'Yes.' Her voice was thick and heavy-footed. 'Why did you ask me about being in prison?' 'Prison?' Mrs. Klevity blinked blindly. 'Did I ask you about prison?' 'Someone did—I thought—' I faltered, shyness shutting down on me again. 'Dreams.' Mrs. Klevity stacked her knife and fork on her plate. 'Dreams.' I wasn't quite sure I was to be at Klevity's the next evening. Mr. Klevity was supposed to get back sometime during the evening. But Mrs. Klevity welcomed me. 'Don't know when he'll get home, ' she said. 'Maybe not until morning. If he comes early, you can go home to sleep and I'll give you your dime anyway.' 'Oh, no,' I said, Mom's teachings solidly behind me. 'I couldn't take it if I didn't stay.' 'A gift,' said Mrs. Klevity. We sat opposite one another until the silence stretched too thin for me to bear. 'In olden times,' I said, snatching at the magic that drew stories from Mom, 'when you were a little girl —' 'When I was a girl—' Mrs. Klevity rubbed her knees with reflective hands. 'The other Where. The other When.' 'In olden times,' I persisted, 'things were different then.' 'Yes.' I settled down comfortably, recognizing the reminiscent tone of voice. 'You do crazy things when you are young.' Mrs. Klevity leaned heavily on the table. 'Things you have no business doing. You volunteer when you're young.' I jerked as she lunged across the table and grabbed both my arms. 'But I am young! Three years isn't an eternity. I am young!' I twisted one arm free and pried at her steely fingers that clamped my other one. 'Oh.' She let go. 'I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you.' She pushed back the tousled brush of her hair. 'Look,' she said, her voice was almost silver again. 'Under all this—this grossness, I'm still me. I thought I could adjust to anything, but I had no idea that they'd put me in such—' She tugged at her sagging dress. 'Not the clothes!' she cried. 'Clothes you can take off. But this—' Her fingers dug into her heavy shoulder and I could see the bulge of flesh between them. 'If I knew anything about the setup maybe I could locate it. Maybe I could call. Maybe—' Her shoulders sagged and her eyelids dropped down over her dull eyes. 'It doesn't make any sense to you,' she said, her voice heavy and thick again. 'To you I'd be old even There. At the time it seemed like a perfect way to have an odd holiday and help out with research, too. But we got caught.' She began to count her fingers, mumbling to herself. 'Three years There, but Here that's—eight threes are —' She traced on the table with a blunt forefinger, her eyes close to the old, wornout cloth. 'Mrs. Klevity,' My voice scared me in the silence, but I was feeling the same sort of upsurge that catches you sometimes when you're playing-like and it gets so real. 'Mrs. Klevity, if you've lost something, maybe I could look for it for you.' 'You didn't find it last night,' she said. 'Find what?' She lumbered to her feet. 'Let's look again. Everywhere. They'd surely be able to locate the house.' 'What are we looking for?' I asked, searching the portable oven. 'You'll know it when we see it,' she said. And we searched the whole house. Oh, such nice things! Blankets, not tattered and worn, and even an extra one they didn't need. And towels with wash rags that matched—and weren't rags. And uncracked dishes that matched! And glasses that weren't jars. And books. And money. Crisp new-looking bills in the little box in the bottom drawer—pushed back under some extra pillow cases. And clothes—lots and lots of clothes. All too big for any of us, of course, but my practiced eye had already visualized this, that and the other cut down to dress us all like rich people. I sighed as we sat wearily looking at one another. Imagine having so much and still looking for something
