Then a loud crack and Kreskey fell to his knees, clutching his head. And there was Greta behind him, her walking stick raised like a baseball bat, ready to strike again. The homeless man wearing an army green jacket skittered toward the door.
Not Kreskey. Not even close. Half the size, wailing now with pain.
“Get out!” Greta roared again. “This is private property.”
Rain lay on the floor as the man rumbled out the door and crashed down the stairs, still yelling. “Bitch! Bitch!”
Not Kreskey. Just a homeless man she’d frightened.
Greta kneeled down to the cat, who was lying still, the kittens mewing in distress.
Rain leaned over and was sick.
She had a cut on her head that was bleeding, but she helped Greta with the injured cat and her kittens. They used a box that Rain had been planning to take to the recycling and made a bed with some of the nursing cloths in Rain’s diaper bag. Greta rode in Rain’s back seat, cradling the mother cat in her arms.
“Don’t you have the sense to know how dangerous it is to venture into a condemned building alone?” Greta asked irritably as Rain helped her establish the cat and kittens in Greta’s free-standing garage. “Mother knew you would go there.”
Rain didn’t say anything. Her head was pounding, and she wondered if she was going to be sick again. She had to go, get back to Lily. Call Greg before he had a nervous breakdown. How was she going to explain her head? Should she even be driving? The world seemed impossibly bright; the pain in her head growing more intense.
“Thank you,” said Rain. “For helping me.”
She wanted to get out of there, far away from the Kreskey house, from the crazy bird lady, from all the memories that were as powerful and frightening as they had ever been. She’d unlocked the box, and everything was flying out now, screaming furies surrounding her.
Still, she helped Greta get the kittens settled. The mother cat was alert but favoring her injured leg.
“I’ll take her to the vet,” said Greta.
“I have to go,” Rain said, moving toward the door.
“It’s a bad idea, you know,” said Greta with a deep scowl. “This story. What you’re doing. You’re going to regret it.”
It was another voice in the cacophony that played in her head all the way home.
“What happened?” Mitzi rushed to the door to greet her. “Oh, dear. Let me look at that.”
Lily reached for Rain, arms urgent, and Rain took the baby gratefully into her arms. Oh, her warmth, her wonderful softness, the scent of her hair. The contrast of her present life and her past was dizzying. How could she walk away from this to go there?
The baby bounced, giving Rain a wide two-toothed smile.
“This one,” said Mitzi, still frowning, worried, “is an angel. A real joy baby.”
“She is,” said Rain, her voice a hoarse whisper.
“Where’s your first aid kit?”
“I’ll get it,” said Rain.
“Boo-boo?” asked Lily. Rain fought back tears, but then they came anyway—welling, falling, a delayed reaction. She pulled Lily close so that she didn’t see her mommy cry. Had Lily seen her cry before? Did babies even notice that kind of thing?
“Let me,” said Mitzi. A warm hand on Rain’s shoulder.
“Upstairs, cabinet under the master bathroom sink. The far one.”
Rain put Lily on the ground and got down with her. Lily reached for and handed Rain an Elephant and Piggie book by Mo Willems, rock god of children’s literature. Gerald, an elephant, is afraid that he’s allergic to his best friend, Piggie. He sneezes magnificently.
Lily squealed with delight as Rain read: “AAAAAH-CHOO!”
She let the house, the sound of her daughter’s voice, the familiar smells of the fireplace, the organic cleaner she used to clean the wood table, the light from the window wash over her.
I’m home. Not in Kreskey’s house. Not on the path in the woods. Not at Hank’s loft. Home—the place I make with Greg and Lily, my little family.
When Mitzi returned, she got down on the floor with the two of them, nimble and fast for an older woman. She wiped at the blood on Rain’s head. The cut wasn’t very big; she’d inspected it in the car, wiped at it ineffectually with spit on a tissue, pushed her hair in front of it so that it wouldn’t be obvious.
“What happened?” Mitzi asked, when she seemed satisfied that the cut was clean.
“I—uh,” said Rain. “I walked into a door. Stupid.”