Alicen shrugged, a smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. These two were odd. Adorable but odd. “I suppose so.”
“You are the light of the world, Alicen,” Evie said. Alicen had almost forgotten she was there. “Shadows are only shadows.”
Roxie let out a joyous squeal. “Shadows are only shadows! I could explode from happiness. Don’t you feel like you could explode?” She threw her hands into the air and twirled around, laughter slipping past her lips.
Alicen shook her head, her mouth still gaping open. Her mind stuck. One part insisting this was nothing more than a dream. Another insisting it was so much more than she realized. All of it colliding and overwhelming her senses so that all she could do was wonder.
Something cooed across the river, and all the children turned their heads. Alicen did the same and spotted a piercingly white creature, small in stature, maybe two feet tall with wings that expanded from its body. It was perched at the bottom of a tree, looking at them all, cocking its head to the right and then to the left. A furry white bat. Alicen’s mind whirled as memories of her grandmother exploded through her psyche.
This isn’t real, something urged deep in the caverns of her brain.
Or is it? another thought whispered.
Roxie and Tate bounced in unison. “Oh—he’s so cute!” Roxie said. “I want to catch one and keep him.”
“You can’t catch them,” redheaded Beck said, stepping out from under the cover of trees. “And you definitely can’t keep one as a pet. Besides, they talk too much.”
Talk? Alicen heard the word but struggled to process its meaning.
“I think they’re funny,” Roxie said.
“You think everything is funny,” Beck said. He walked over and joined the group, making the band of children complete.
The white creature shifted once more and then turned its head to look right at Alicen. For a moment Alicen held eye contact with the creature. Then it winked at her and launched itself off the ground and into the sky so quickly that it seemed to disappear into thin air. Just like that, it was gone.
A small hand tugged on Alicen’s sleeve, drawing her out of her frozen state. Roxie smiled up. “He liked you; I can sense these kinds of things.”
Alicen couldn’t think, much less speak.
“Do you think if we caught one, he would teach us karate?” Roxie asked no one in particular.
Alicen returned her eyes to the sky that had a moment earlier held a bat. A bat that had winked at her. “My grandma used to tell me if I searched hard enough, I would see one,” she whispered, the insanity of her words echoing back to her. But it all seemed so real. “I never thought I would.”
“Well, they aren’t really from this place,” Beck said.
Alicen looked back to the children, who had all now turned their eyes to her. They were staring at her with as much excitement as they had given the small white bat. “Where are they from?” she asked.
Beck smiled. “That’s a story for another time.”
“It’s a great story,” Roxie said.
A crack of thunder crashed overhead, shaking Alicen from her numbed state. Her treacherous mind turned angry and violent. She yanked away from the children and stepped back. This isn’t real, she thought. None of this is real.
“Alicen,” Evie said.
“No,” Alicen replied. Wind whipped up around her, the air darkening as rain clouds appeared from nowhere and the sky opened up. Cold drops fell on her head, soft and slow at first. She took another step back as the rain began to quicken.
“Shadows are only shadows, Alicen,” Evie said.
“That doesn’t make any sense!” Alicen snapped. “Winking bats, imaginary children, and magic water.” She shook her head.
Get a grip, Alicen.
Act like an adult, Alicen.
What would your mother say, Alicen?
“You can see behind the shadows,” Roxie said through the howling wind. “If you want to, you can see.”
“Stop,” Alicen said. “This isn’t real. You aren’t real.”
“Alicen,” Evie said, stepping forward and extending her hand.
“No!” Alicen held her own hands out in defense. “I’m sick, and you’re my trouble. You’re my trouble for what I’ve done.” The rain overhead became weighted, as if it had turned to mud, as the realization of her situation pressed into her shoulders. Shame for who she was and the pain she had caused. The life she’d stolen.
“Don’t, Alicen. Remember, you are—” Evie started, but Alicen was finished with this nonsense.
“Enough! Enough! You aren’t real. I’m sick. You’re my trouble.” Alicen pressed her hands over her eyes. The rain fell harder, the wind harsh as it thrashed against her body. She sank to her knees and repeated, “You aren’t real. I’m sick. You’re my trouble.” Her face was damp, rain and tears combined.
Alicen.
The children’s voices had returned to the air, swimming around her head, tempting her to fall back under their spell. But she wouldn’t. This was just a dream, and she needed to wake up.
Get a grip, Alicen.
Act like an adult, Alicen.
What would your mother say, Alicen?
“Wake up, Alicen,” she said under her breath. “Wake up.”
Alicen, do you hear us?
She could see the lightning streaks through her closed eyes. The heavy rain still pelting her skin. The thunder rolling in waves.
Alicen, can you see us?
“You’re sick, Alicen; this is your trouble,” she said. “Wake up.”
Alicen.
“Wake up wake up wake up wake up!”
Alicen’s eyes snapped open inside her dark bedroom, her vision hazy, her head throbbing as her breaths came in shaky waves. Her face was pressed against something hard, but her arms were free, and she used them to push herself up. Her eyes began to adjust to her familiar surroundings, and it only took her a moment to realize she was lying on the floor. In her bedroom, fully clothed, boots on, shivering and wet.
She pushed herself all the way up to standing, her muscles aching and stiff. A soft tapping was echoing against her windowsill. Alicen moved to the window, pulled the shade aside, and saw soft rain falling across the backyard. And she was soaked through. She’d been out there. Alicen searched the darkened backyard, her heart thumping in steady rhythm with the rain. She was terrified she’d see them.
You’re sick. Get a grip, Alicen.
She let the shade fall closed and tried to steady her trembling hands. She was sick. She was troubled. Her mind was the cause of this. She wanted to believe that truth with every cell in her body. She wanted to pay and be free from this debt. But a small pocket of her heart had been tugged open, just enough for there to be a thin, fading feeling that maybe there was something she wasn’t seeing yet. A thin, fading feeling that maybe she had once believed something that she had long since forgotten.
17
The war inside Alicen’s mind was more violent than ever. One side larger, more established, combating claims of unseen children with compelling and realistic arguments. She was sick because she had let her daughter die; this was the price of shame. Her trouble. She was broken, losing all sense of herself to madness. It was normal to want to believe everything you saw was real, even if most of what you were seeing was fictitious. Then she could hide behind the lie that everything was fine. But it wasn’t fine.
The other side was small and weak. But brave, enduring slaughter after slaughter. More is happening here, it told her. The things you are seeing are for a reason. Shannon sees them. Grandma Joe saw them. What if this isn’t all fictional? What if there is a power that actually exists beyond what you can see? What if you know more than you realize? Had Grandma Joe known something real? Could Alicen?
She paused as she moved down the stairs from her bedroom. This was insane. The delusions had gotten under her skin, and now she couldn’t shake them. But she was an adult, and she understood the way the worl
d worked, and this was impossible.
But what if it wasn’t?
Alicen cursed out loud and slammed her palm down on the stair railing. It shook all the way to the end and rattled the wall and rocked a small square picture off its nail. It crashed to the floor, the glass plate covering the photo shattering across the bottom step. Alicen cursed again, moving down the final few stairs toward the broken frame just as Betty walked around the corner, concerned.
“Alicen?” she said, her eyes dropping to the fallen picture. “What happened?”
“Clearly it needed a new nail,” Alicen said.
“I’ll grab a broom,” Betty said.
“I can do it,” Alicen spat. She knew her tone was harsher than necessary, and she made a conscious effort to reel it in.
Betty cut her eyes at her daughter. “Don’t be so stubborn all the time,” she said before disappearing and returning a couple seconds later with broom in hand. The two women cleaned up the mess in silence, Alicen picking up the wooden frame that had chipped and cracked while Betty swept up the broken glass bits.
“So the picture just fell from the wall?” Betty asked, her tone saying more than her words. “Odd.”
Alicen bit her tongue. Anything she responded with would be from a place of anger and frustration. Betty would just end up as collateral damage. The last thing Alicen needed was to walk right into an argument with her mother.
In the kitchen, Betty tossed the broken glass into the trash, and Alicen laid the frame on the counter. The photo that had been sealed inside was one Alicen was familiar with: a Watson family photo, taken one summer when Louise was still in elementary school.
The picture held the four Watson members: Mr. and Mrs. Watson, Peter Watson, Louise’s older brother, and of course Louise. All smiles, all matching in light-blue tops, standing in front of the Watson summer home, looking like the perfect snapshot of a happy family. Alicen could nearly feel the love oozing from their gazes.
“Did we ever take a family photo?” Alicen asked out loud.
“What?” Betty asked.
Alicen waved the photograph and then handed it over to her mother. Betty grasped it and gave it a momentary glance before setting it down on the counter beside the broken frame.
“There wasn’t ever really a need. It was just the two of us; besides, I hate getting my photo taken,” Betty said. She walked into the tiny hall closet around the corner and tucked the broom away.
“What about Grandma Joe? She was part of our family,” Alicen said.
She noticed Betty pause for a moment before turning and stepping back toward the kitchen counter. “Why the sudden interest in family photos?”
The thoughts threatening to drizzle from Alicen’s mouth should have been contained, but she was losing the ability to keep her words at bay. Or maybe she was just losing the desire.
“I guess I figure if I’m going to be crazy like Grandma, I should know more about her. You completely stopped talking about her after . . .” Alicen let the words she died shrivel on her tongue because she could see the hint of pain in her mother’s expression.
“There wasn’t ever any point in talking about her,” Betty said.
“She was my grandmother, your mother,” Alicen said.
“I know who she was,” Betty snapped.
Alicen fell quiet as Betty took a deep, controlled breath and turned her face away from her daughter. The pain was familiar to Alicen. Loss, regardless of who it was, looked the same on them. Alicen knew the bitter sting and probably should have backed off, but she couldn’t. She spoke softly, hoping to earn her mother’s favor. “Can we talk about her? It might help me better understand what is happening to me. If we really are both . . .” Alicen let her words trail off.
Betty glanced back at Alicen, a chilly guard covering her face, something else Alicen knew well, and nodded. “What do you want to know?” Betty asked.
A flurry of thoughts shuffled through her mind. Now that the moment had come and she was being given the opportunity, she had a hard time grasping on to the right words. “I want to know more about how her illness manifested,” Alicen said.
Betty wouldn’t make eye contact with Alicen. Instead, she glued her eyes to the wandering wood lines in the broken picture frame between them and maintained a steady rhythm of breathing. Alicen waited patiently and, after a long minute of nothing, felt the itch to question her mother again. But she remained quiet.
“There was a time,” Betty finally began, hesitantly, “before she was sick. When I lived at home, before I left for adulthood. She was funny, knew everyone in town. We couldn’t go anywhere without running into a familiar face. I mean, we always had our differences, we never really saw the world the same way, but she was normal.”
“What happened?” Alicen asked.
Betty nodded slightly. “I don’t think anyone knows. She just changed. It happened slowly; small things at first, and then more dramatic. In the end she seemed to cause a scene everywhere we went.”
“She started seeing and talking to things that weren’t there?”
Betty nodded and swallowed.
Alicen could see how painful this was for her but pushed forward. “Did you ever ask her about the specific things she saw? Or did she talk about what they said? What about Grandpa? What about her family?”
Betty glanced up at Alicen, a spark of disbelief in her eyes. “How about one question at a time, dear,” she snapped. “No, I didn’t ask; we were encouraged not to engage with her delusions. As far as her family, she was an only child and didn’t have very much other family. When she changed, everyone turned away except for your grandfather.”
“You never talk about him, either,” Alicen said.
Something gentle and kind softened Betty’s face for a moment before disappearing as quickly as it had come. “He always protected me. He loved your grandma in spite of how crazy she got, and he shielded me from getting swallowed in the madness for as long as he could handle.” Betty shook her head and pushed away from the counter. “I should have done the same with you. I never should have brought you to this place.”
“You didn’t have a choice. Grandpa abandoned her,” Alicen said.
“This isn’t your grandfather’s fault,” Betty defended.
“He left you to care for her alone.”
“He tried everything he could think of to get her help, and she refused. Do you have any idea what it must have been like for him all those years? A person can only take so much. I don’t blame him for leaving.”
Alicen felt fury rise in her chest. “How can you not blame him for that?”
“He was just a man, Alicen.”
“And you were just her daughter!”
Betty huffed loudly and turned away.
Alicen shook her head in disbelief. “You always did this with Allen and me too. It was always my fault. The man was a joke of a husband, but somehow I was to blame for that.”
Betty swung back around, red-hot fire in her eyes. “Well, dear, you usually were.”
Alicen sucked in a deep breath as the few moments of comfort her mother had shown in the last week dissolved. They were right back where they had started. How many times would they do this? Enough that it shouldn’t hurt as much anymore.
Betty realized how cross she sounded and took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and raised both her hands in surrender. “I haven’t been sleeping well, and I have a pounding headache. This is a terrible time to be having this conversation.” A perfectly trained excuse for beating her daughter down and shifting blame to anything but herself.
Alicen was doped up enough, and angry enough, that she didn’t even care what fell from her lips now. “Of course, Mother, because me losing my mind is much harder on you.”
Rage washed over Betty’s face, and then she placed a shaky hand over her mouth and shook her head. As if she were holding back words she didn’t want to slip out. Tears brimmed in her eyes, and she turned them away from Alicen.
Gu
ilt racked the inside of Alicen’s chest, and her anger defused. Silence stole the air from the room as she tried to think of a way to apologize. Her first reaction was always to apologize, even if she wasn’t to blame. But then, wasn’t she always to blame?
But Betty spoke before she could. “This is terrifying for me,” she said, “watching the same thing that happened to your grandma happen to you. Knowing I could have stopped this if only . . .”
“I don’t think it works like that, Mom,” Alicen offered, trying to stop the spiral of self-pity that was coming.
Betty swallowed, her eyes twitching back and forth as if she were internally battling with what to say next. “Maybe I should have said . . . I didn’t know if it would be helpful . . .” Betty couldn’t seem to make a sentence stick.
“What are you talking about?” Alicen asked.
In a tone barely above a whisper, her eyes trained downward, Betty spoke. “She saw children too, your grandmother.”
“What?” Alicen said. She could feel the color draining from her face.
“They came to her in the forms of children, she would say, her guides on a holy mission.” Betty paused a beat before continuing. “You’re sleepwalking. I know. I heard you come back last night. She used to . . .” Tears threatened to choke out Betty’s words. “You can’t imagine what this is like for me, knowing that I caused this.”
Alicen’s mind whirled too fast for her to grab on to a single thought, much less a response. Images of the times she’d encountered the children played on repeat, like a scary movie.
“Children, of all things,” Betty said. “She put this disease in you because I let her.” Betty sneered and shook her head. “Children led around by a tiny little girl with pigtails—I mean, utter nonsense.”
The atmosphere in the room shifted, and Alicen’s mouth went dry. “Evie,” she muttered.
Betty stilled to a state that drew Alicen’s eyes because it was so eerie. “What did you say?”
“That was the name of Jane’s imaginary friend. She has pigtails.”
When Through Deep Waters Page 17