The words sounded bass and flat as if from a poorly laid soundtrack. What did they mean? I was childless here. I needed him. I needed him to remind me—
Eileen whimpered in her sleep and rubbed her face in the pillow.
Now!
I ghosted to the bed and stretched out beside my daughter—
—and gasped as my back arced in a painful seizure, and I found myself sitting in a tangle of blue cotton sheets.
Eileen! I panicked at the same moment I saw her, asleep on her stomach with her left arm and foot dangling off the bed.
A dream. Another stupid goddamn dream. I wrapped my arms around my knees and closed my eyes, concentrating on breathing in and out, willing my pulse to slow.
They were getting worse. Sometimes three or four a night, all of them endless variations on forgetting I had a daughter, or having lost my daughter, or on never having had a child at all. In the weeks since the hurricane I’d barely had a night’s respite from these frantic, awful dreams; and what made them so traumatic was the feeling—no, the certainty—that if I was careless, I would be trapped in them. And now, as if my screwed up psyche needed a new barb for self-flagellation, I’d added the horror that my child might become trapped with me as well.
A violent shiver spidered across my body and I dug my nails into my wrists. Pain was real. Helpful. I turned my head toward the window, and sunlight reddened my eyelids. I centered my chin on my knees and felt my left temple warm. What time was it? What day was it? It was May now, wasn’t it?
The lingering confusion was almost as bad as being in the dream, but after weeks of practice, my brain settled into its routine. It offered helpful memories of Eileen helping Adam find homes for the weaned puppies, of Maureen arranging and rearranging displays for the new store, of Miss Hester’s shop with its hand-printed note fading in the window, of a weekend spent painting the porch railings alongside Eileen and Adam . . . shuffling through detail after mediocre detail until I was convinced that weeks had passed and that it was now—
“Happy Mother’s Day.”
My eyes popped open, and I looked down to see my daughter grinning at me from her pillow.
“Thanks, sweetheart.” I smiled as I smoothed a tousled curl from her face. Definitely awake. No way was I creative enough to dream up such an angel.
As if agreeing, Pebbles pounced onto the bed between us and settled down with a purr. She’d become quite the docile house cat since . . . since that night. She seemed to like sleeping with us, and although I was sure she prowled the house when restless, she never woke me to let her out. Not that I would’ve minded a mundane disruption to my hellish REM cycles.
“You want some pancakes, hon?”
“It’s Mother’s Day! I’ll fix ‘em!”
She sprang out of bed and into action, washing up and getting dressed while I tottered into my bedroom. I never slept in here anymore. I plunked down near the foot of the bed and fingered the stitching on my snowy comforter, studying my pale blue walls and counting the three windows with their white roman shades. No balcony. No doorway to the porch even. My room.
Sal’s wispy golden strands were peeking from the top book on my crowded nightstand, but of course, as I stretched for that book I knocked another to the floor. Serious contemplation was required before I finally rocked to my feet, stumbled one step closer, and plopped back down. Leaning over required yet another great effort, but I scooped the abused book against my leg and dusted it against my pajama bottoms. These books were part of my homework. Sal wasn’t the only one who could do research.
A couple of nights after . . . everything . . . when one of my nightmares had left me too unnerved to fall back asleep, Pebbles and I had wandered into the living room. I’d been too agitated to sit down and had moved around the room, touching the leaves of my houseplants, running my hand along the grooves in the kitchen cabinets, rubbing my bare toes along the seams of the wood floor—trying to connect with tactile memories that would reassure me I was really awake and really in my own house.
Pebbles had settled near my bookshelves, arched into a watchful hump of black fur as her head swiveled to follow my movements. Eventually, she’d called out a little mew and lifted her head for me to pet her; but, light-headed from lack of sleep, I’d ended up half-sprawled on the floor. Unfazed, she’d studied me like a therapist waiting for her patient to open up—and so I had. After all, was talking to a cat any stranger than the fact that aliens might be listening?
I’d whispered my worries and fears, telling her about my stupid nightmares and my missing angels, and about how guilty I felt that I hadn’t helped Cara and Adam—and how absolutely, blazingly infuriating it was to have an alien pop in and out of your life leaving you with nothing but questions. I have to admit, the last bit was a spiteful jab that I’d rather hoped Sal heard. Not that mouthing-off to aliens did any more good than talking to a cat, but, hearing myself complain mostly of feeling out of control was kind of helpful. Absurd, but helpful. I needed something to do. Trying to pretend that everything was normal was ridiculous, and even if I couldn’t change anything, I at least needed to come to terms with it all. Somehow.
That’s when it had hit me. What I needed had been right in front of me. My books. My eclectic collection of what-ifs. Some partially read, others devoured, some factual, others fantasy—all had been selected for my mini-library because I’d thought they might offer insight to my own general weirdness. But of course, they offered so much more than that.
My eyes
