I am there to catch her without knowing I have moved. And as soon as my hands are on her, Sky rushes past me, bumping my shoulder. I make myself fall backward instead of forward, landing hard on my rump, keeping my arms around Chloe. Take Chloe, that’s what Sky had said, when I rush him.
As I watch, she throws herself at Peter, her arms open wide, as if she means to embrace him. He is surprised into opening his arms. On his face is an expression I’ve never seen. How often, I wonder, had he dreamed of this as a child: his mother returned to him to take him in her arms? Maybe it’s not too late, I want to tell Sky. For either of them. For any of us.
But the force of her embrace tips Peter over the ledge. I lay Chloe on the floor and lunge at Sky’s leg, but it slips out of my grasp. They are falling, out the open window, propelled by Sky’s headlong rush. I glimpse her face against Peter’s cheek, her arms cradling him as if she meant to lay him down softly in his bed—
And then they are gone. I gather up Chloe in my arms and stand, holding her tightly as I inch closer to the window, hating to go so near the drop, needing to see—
In the light of the fire I can see Peter splayed out on the pavement, Sky curled by his side, her arms still holding him. A fireman comes rushing around the house, sees the bodies, then looks up at the tower and sees me. He shouts something at me, but I can’t make out what. Come down? Stay put?
I turn around—
And see smoke rising from the stairwell. While I’ve been up here the fire has jumped from the main house to the tower. I hear voices below me—shouts, roars—no, the roar is the fire. Holding Chloe to me, I take a few steps toward the stairwell, peer over, and see flames leaping up, seeking the open air of the window behind me. The firemen can’t make it up here on the stairs.
The floor is hot beneath my feet. The air is thickening with smoke. Chloe begins to cry. I step backward to the window and look down. There are several firemen now. One points a bullhorn at me and shouts: Go to the other side! We’re getting a ladder.
I move to the other side, to the window facing the driveway, and try to wrench it open. It’s painted shut and I can’t get it open while holding Chloe and I’m not willing to put her down. She could crawl to the open stairwell. I could lose her in the smoke, which is thicker on this side of the tower with all the windows closed.
I look down at the truck backing up to the tower. If I wait, they’ll break through the glass, but how long do I have to wait? Chloe is coughing, gagging on the smoke. I can feel it filling up my lungs. If I lose consciousness, I’ll drop her.
I cross back to the other side of the tower, to the open window. The emptiness that yawned so threateningly before now beckons. Is this how it felt for the woman who jumped from a window with her baby strapped to her chest? Like the only choice left to her?
But she was deluded. Crazy.
And yet . . . her baby lived.
She had a baby carrier, though. I look around the room, hoping for a Snugli to materialize, but there’s nothing but smoke here now. But that’s okay. I can make a Snugli. I take off my pajama top and button Chloe into it, knotting off the bottom and tying the sleeves around my chest. Then I take off my pants and wrap them around us, securing Chloe tight to my body. Then I look down.
Three stories. Sky and Peter are lying motionless on the flagstone. The fall killed both of them, but then, they both landed on the pavement. If I go straight backward, Chloe won’t hit the pavement because she’s tied to me.
You’ll die. It’s Laurel, her voice flat, unjudging.
But she may live, I answer back.
There’s no reply. I don’t need one. I know what to do. I’ve always known.
I look across to the other window. If the firemen break through now . . .
I count to ten but no rescuing fireman breaks through the glass. I can barely see the window. Is it the smoke or am I blacking out? Chloe has gone still against me, her breath rattling against my bare skin.
I sit on the windowsill. I check the knots on my makeshift Snugli. I wrap my arms around Chloe and tuck my chin down and draw my knees up, making myself into a human egg crate.
Then I fall back.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
When I wake up I think I am back in the Green Room. Not that the room is green. It’s white and blindingly bright—near-death-experience bright.
Dead is my next hypothesis, but then the pain kicks in and I decide death can’t hurt this much. Every cell in my body is crying out like a million screaming babies who haven’t been held or fed or changed in days.
Chloe. What happened to Chloe?
“Chloe,” I manage to croak out and someone, a man, says, “She’s all right. She wasn’t hurt . . .” Something catches in the man’s throat. “You took all the damage.”
I feel my face turn wet and my body convulses, which turns up the volume on all those other babies. What about us? What about us? they cry. I can’t possibly help them all, so I slip away, out of that blinding light, into the dark.
THE NEXT TIME I wake the light is a little more bearable and I can turn my head a little. Not paralyzed then, a voice says in my head, at least, not from the waist up.
“Shut up,” I murmur.
The man sitting by my bed startles awake. “Was
