The Sky Beneath My Feet - By Lisa Samson Page 0,59

my hair? Or something else entirely? Something I can’t even begin to imagine?

I take my mug inside, pausing at the door.

“Good night, Rick.”

A little wind, a little birdsong, leaves rustling across the lawn. But no reply from the shed. I wash out my mug, find room for the historical novel on the bookshelf, and retreat upstairs, full of the sense of possibility. Why shouldn’t this be my time?

The only question is what to do with it. Not what I’ve been doing, I know that much.

On the nightstand, Stacy’s key.

I really should have insisted on her taking it back. This key has become a symbol of derailment, the alternate autumn I was meant to live. It’s a painful reminder.

I squeeze the floaty in my hand. Hard.

It smells of plastic, and when I drop the key, my hand smells of plastic too. But when I bring it to my face and inhale the scent of my skin, I pretend what I’m smelling is the salty, crashing sea.

chapter 11

Only Trying to Help

Blame everything on the dream.

Or rather, me waking up in the middle of the dream.

At five in the morning, stumbling down the hall from the bathroom, Jed or Eli (I don’t know which) must have knocked something over (I don’t know what). I hear the crash just as Mother Zacchaeus removes one of the enamel pins from her shirt to stick it onto mine. The sound startles her, and she drives the sharp back right through the fabric of my top and into my skin.

“Ouch,” I say, only to find myself bolt upright in bed, blinking in the dark.

When your dreams run their course, you remember them the next day as dreams—assuming you remember them at all. When you wake up in the middle, though, the dream stays real. I can feel Mother Zacchaeus’s presence in the bedroom with me, not to mention the pain in my chest from where she stuck the pin.

What had she been doing? Giving me an award for distinguished service.

“You saved that girl, Beth. You are a good Christian woman.”

Disoriented, I switch on the lamp. It’s strange not to find Mother Zacchaeus in the room. Then I remember that crashing sound. What was it? Swinging my legs over the side of the bed, I step into my slippers and creep into the hallway to investigate. My toe collides with something on the floor. Whatever it is, it’s light enough to go skidding over the floorboards.

I switch on the light. From the ground, St. Rick stares up at me. The nail he used to hang from is there on the floor too. Eli must have pounded it straight into the plaster, which has a tendency to crumble, and at a right angle. The weight of the painting, though slight, would have been enough to work the nail out over time. I keep a lecture on file in my brain: the evils of not using the special plaster hangers to put pictures on the wall. But it’s five in the morning. I’m not going to wake him up to go over the fine points of decorating.

Besides, no harm done. Not much anyway. I pick the painting up to inspect for damage and find one of the corners dimpled from impact.

I frown at St. Rick. “Serves you right.”

The next morning, while I’m digging through the drawer where I keep the plaster hangers, Holly calls. Before she can give me a hard time for my no-show at the book club, I butt in with Marlene’s unexpected visit.

“I’m a little worried Jed has a crush on this girl,” I tell her. This makes it sound like I’m sharing because of Jed, not to get off the hook.

But Holly’s not interested in my son’s love life. I missed more than a bodice ripping last night. The book barely came up. The ladies were too busy talking about the latest scandal.

“It’s probably better you weren’t there,” she says. “Apparently the drug-sniffing dogs at Eli’s school found marijuana in a lot of kids’ lockers. Including two who are in the youth group at The Community. Thanks to zero tolerance, that’s an automatic suspension. One of the kids posted on Facebook that all of his friends do it, and it’s unfair to single out only the people who got caught.”

While she goes on, describing the reactions at the book club, all I can hear is the blood pounding in my head.

“Who are the kids?” I finally ask.

She mentions the names, but I don’t recognize them. Eli