if he did call out? Where is Judy, where is the deputy? It’s as if Sleeping Beauty’s fairy godmother drifted into the ward and cast a spell, putting everyone to sleep. Outside the door to the examination room, it’s dark, lights dimmed as usual for the night shift. The habitual noises-the far-off laugh track of a television program, the metallic ticking from inside the soda vending machine-have disappeared. There is no whir from a floor buffer wending its way laboriously down the empty halls. It’s just Luke and his patient and the muffled sound of the wind beating against the side of the hospital, trying to get in.
“What was that? How did you do that?” Luke asks, unable to keep the horror from his voice. He slides back onto the stool to keep from dropping to the floor. “
The last question seems to hit her like a punch to the sternum. She hangs her head, flossy blond curls covering her face. “That-that’s the one thing I can’t tell you. I don’t know what I am anymore. I have no idea.”
This is impossible. Things like this don’t happen. There is no explanation-what, is she a mutant? Made of synthetic self-healing materials? Is she some kind of monster?
And yet she looks normal, the doctor thinks, as his heart rate picks up again and blood pounds in his ears. The linoleum tiles start to sway underfoot.
“We came back-he and I-because we missed the place. We knew everything here would be different-everyone would be gone-but we missed what we once had,” the young woman says wistfully, staring past the doctor, speaking to no one in particular.
The feeling he had when he first saw her this evening-the tingle, the buzz-arcs between them, thin and electric. He wants to
She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes momentarily, like she is about to dive underwater. And then she begins.
TWO
I’ll start at the beginning, because that is the part that makes sense to me and which I’ve inscribed in my memory, afraid that otherwise it will be lost in the course of my journey, in the endless unraveling of time.
My first clear, vivid memory of Jonathan St. Andrew is of a bright Sunday morning in church. He was sitting at the end of his family’s box at the front of the congregation hall. He was fourteen years old at the time and already as tall as any man in the village. Nearly as tall as his father, Charles, the man who had founded our little settlement. Charles St. Andrew was once a dashing militia captain, I was told, but at the time was middle-aged, with a patrician’s soft belly.
Jonathan wasn’t paying attention to the service, but then again, probably few of us in attendance were. A Sunday service could be counted on to run for four hours-up to eight if the minister fancied himself an elocutionist-so who could honestly say they remained fixed on the preacher’s every word? Jonathan’s mother, Ruth, perhaps, who sat next to him on the plain, upright bench. She came from a line of Boston theologians and would give Pastor Gilbert a good dressing-down if she felt his service wasn’t rigorous enough. Souls were at stake, and no doubt she felt the souls in this isolated wilderness town, far from civilizing influences, were at particular risk. Gilbert was no fanatic, however, and four hours was generally his limit, so we all knew we would be released soon to the glory of a beautiful afternoon.
Watching Jonathan was a favorite pastime of the girls in the village, but on that particular Sunday it was Jonathan who was the one watching-he made no secret of staring at Tenebraes Poirier. His gaze hadn’t wavered from her for a good ten minutes, his sly brown eyes fixated on Tenebraes’s lovely face and her swanlike neck, but mostly on her bosom, pressing against the tight calico of her bodice with every breath. Apparently it didn’t matter to him that Tenebraes was several years his senior and had been betrothed to Matthew Comstock since she was six.
Was it love? I wondered as I watched him from high up in the loft, where my father and I sat with the other poor families. That Sunday it was just me and my father, the balance of my family at the Catholic church on the other side of town, practicing the faith of my mother, who came from an Acadian colony to the northeast. Resting my cheek against my forearm, I watched Jonathan intently, as only a lovesick young girl will do. At one point, Jonathan looked as though he was ill, swallowing with difficulty and finally turning away from Tenebraes, who seemed oblivious to the effect she was having on the town’s favorite son.
If Jonathan was in love with Tenebraes, then I might as well throw myself from the balcony of the congregation hall in full sight of everyone in town. Because I knew with absolute clarity at age twelve that I loved Jonathan with all my heart and that if I could not spend my life with him, I might as well be dead. I sat next to my father through the end of the service, my heart hammering in my throat, tears welling behind my eyes even though I told myself I was a ninny to get carried away over something that was probably meaningless.
When the service ended, my father, Kieran, took my hand and led me down the stairs to join our neighbors on the common green. This was the reward for sitting through the service: the opportunity to talk to your neighbors, to have some relief after six days of hard, tedious work. For some, it was the only contact they’d had outside their family in a week, the only chance to hear the latest news and any bits of gossip. I stood behind my father as he spoke to a couple of our neighbors, peeking from behind him to find Jonathan, hoping he would not be with Tenebraes. He was standing behind his parents, alone, staring stonily into the backs of their heads. He clearly wished to leave, but he might as well have wished for snow in July: socializing after services typically lasted for at least an hour, more if the weather was as pleasant as it was that day, and the stalwarts would practically have to be carried away. His father was doubly encumbered because there were plenty of men in town who saw Sundays as an opportunity to speak to the man who was their landlord or in a position to improve their fortune in some way. Poor Charles St. Andrew; I didn’t realize till many years later the burden he had to endure.
Where did I find the courage to do what I did next? Maybe it was desperation and the determination not to lose Jonathan to Tenebraes that compelled me to slip away from my father. Once I was sure he hadn’t noticed my absence, I made haste across the lawn, toward Jonathan, weaving between the knots of adults talking. I was a tiny thing at that age, easily hidden from my father’s view by the voluminous skirts of the ladies, until I went up to Jonathan.
“Jonathan. Jonathan St. Andrew,” I said but my voice came out as a squeak.
Those beautiful dark eyes looked on me and me alone for the first time and my heart did a little flip. “Yes? What do you want?”
What did I want? Now that I had his attention, I had no idea what to say.
“You’re one of the McIlvraes, aren’t you?” Jonathan said, suspiciously. “Nevin is your brother.”
My cheeks colored as I remembered the incident. Why hadn’t I thought of the incident before I came over? Last spring, Nevin had ambushed Jonathan outside the provisioner’s store and bloodied his nose before adults pulled them apart. Nevin had an abiding hatred of Jonathan, for reasons unknown to all but Nevin. My father apologized to Charles St. Andrew for what was seen as nothing more than the sort of skirmish boys get into routinely, nothing sinister attached to it. What neither father knew was that Nevin would undoubtedly kill Jonathan if he ever saw the chance.
“What do you want? Is this one of Nevin’s tricks?”
I blinked at him. “I-I have something I wish to ask you.” But I couldn’t speak in the presence of all these adults. It was only a matter of time before Jonathan’s parents realized there was a girl in their midst, and they would wonder what the devil Kieran McIlvrae’s oldest daughter was doing, if indeed the McIlvrae children harbored some strange intent toward their son.
I took his hand in both of mine. “Come with me.” I led him through the crowd, back into the empty vestibule of the church, and, for reasons I will never know, he obeyed me. Strangely, no one noticed our exit, no one cried out to stop us from going off together by ourselves. No one broke away to chaperone us. It was as though fate
