“Really? The toh-padh-thingy was as gentle as a teddy bear. He-or it-climbed up the face of the cliff like a monkey and stared at me for the longest time, ate some fruit I offered him, sniffed the heck out of me, then just walked away as though I were a mere annoyance. I was scared spitless, but he didn’t hurt me at all.”
Giahn looked at her and shook his head in disbelief. “Incredible,” was all he said.
“Yeah…” Annie leaned her head against the window and fought back the tears, which threatened to drown the little life left in her. Incredible? Wasn’t it just?
TWENTY-FOUR
In a fraction of the time it had taken Annie to boat over to the island, they were settling down onto the Draehl’s landing pad. Before Giahn had switched off the motor, Aeldorah, the twins, and little Adorie flew out the door to greet them. The police officer helped Annie from the plane and nudged her forward.
Aeldorah gathered her into a warm embrace. “Oh, Annie, Annie. Why did you run away? We were so worried. Oh, Annie…”
The fragile floodgates burst and Annie sobbed. Aeldorah didn’t scold or demand explanations, but led her into the house and into a chair, piled high with plump pillows. The twins watched mutely, as did their little sister, while Giahn sat down, facing the weeping girl. Aeldorah fetched a cool cloth and bathed Annie’s feverish cheeks and forehead. After a time, the sobs subsided, and Annie looked up at them with a semblance of composure.
Before they were able to question her, however, the door flew open and Craddohk burst into the room. One look at Annie and he fell on his knees beside her. He pulled her into his arms and hugged her with a fierceness that belied his anxiety. His face was stern and his eyes bright with emotion.
“Little One…” he choked. “What happened? What possessed you to leave like that? I searched and searched but could not find you and feared you had capsized the small boat and—oh, Little One, you gave us quite a fright. Please tell us why you ran away.”
Annie told her story with little enthusiasm. She felt like she was giving a report at school. She spoke in mono-syllables—eyes downcast. When she finished, each of the Draehls told his or her side of the story until the only one who hadn’t spoken was Giahn Zha Dohr.
“Well, I need not contribute to this family matter,” he cleared his throat, “since everything is as it should be…now. So, I will take my leave. Talk to me sometime this week, Craddohk as I will need to fill out a report.” He shook his head. “My first, involving an Earther. What will Tarah say?” He smiled, shook hands with his friend, and turned to leave. Pausing by the front door, he chuckled. “Oh, just one more thing. Ask her to tell you about her visits with the tohpadh and the cute little tahls. Quite a story.” He saluted then made his exit.
Craddohk waited until his friend had left then stared into Annie’s eyes. “You must believe me, Little One…if I had known how much grief I would bring upon you, I would never have brought you here. Never have come into contact with you those ten-plus years ago. Oh. If I could only turn back the clock. But what is done, is done. I cannot change what cannot be changed…”
“I don’t want to change anything.”
“Hosh, Little One, and hear with your heart what I have to say. You must return to your world…”
“I don…”
“Do not interrupt, Child. You must be reasonable. It is not in my power to allow you to do otherwise. It has already been too long. Your dear housekeeper will be waking from her—her sleep—and…there are too many days ‘missing’, as we speak. Both you and she will have great difficulty explaining the lost time if we tarry any longer.”
“No, I won’t. I promise. I’ll make up something so convincing that Mrs. Pra…”
“No, Little One. No, you will not.” he said harshly. Then, softening his tone, he continued. “You will not—cannot—because you will not remember. The physician will give you the correct dosage this time. You will…” He paused long enough to swallow with difficulty. “You will not remember us, Little One. But we…we will remember you. We…will…never forget…you…”
Annie looked at him with such wretched anguish in her eyes that Craddohk rose to his feet, mumbled something incoherent to his wife, and left the room. Aeldorah took Annie by the hand and together they slowly walked outside. Haelee and Halig followed, with Adorie, thumb in her mouth, not far behind.
Craddohk stood beside the hoverlight, gazing out to sea. Aeldorah hugged Annie, kissed her tear-stained cheek and whispered, “We love you, Annie-from-Earth. Be happy. Live in harmony. Tenuto. Con brio.”
Haelee gave Annie a long hug and choked on her few words. “G-good-bye, A-Annie. I w-will miss y-you.”
Halig, most unlike himself, also displayed an abundance of emotion as he, too, gave her a fierce hug. “Keep playing your music.” he spat out as though in anger. “I will always remember you.” Then he forced a lopsided grin. “You’re pretty smart…for an Earther.”
Adorie took her thumb out and reached up with chubby arms. Annie swept her into a fervent embrace, covering her little face with kisses. “G’bye, Adorie. You be a good girl. Don’t forget me.”
After that, there was nothing more to be said. Craddohk helped her into the small plane, got in, and in seconds, they were off. The family stayed out in the open, waving after them until they were but a speck in the distance.
The whole process took less than an hour. Craddohk ushered Annie from the hoverlight, into a shuttlecraft. The space shuttle docked, and she was whisked from it into the main space ship, Spectrum. Then she hustled into the mohtoh and, finally, into sickbay. The same female doctor she’d seen when she first arrived directed her to a couch, and told Annie to lie down. Seven minutes later, Mahrah Tahn, Chief Medical Officer on the Starship, Spectrum, placed a cold, rectangular device against Annie’s neck. The last thing Annie saw was the concerned and loving face of Craddohk Draehl staring down at her. As the euphoria enveloped her in its familiar soft cloud of nothingness, Annie had a fleeting moment to smile up at the man she’d come to love like a father.
“Good-bye, Little One,” he mouthed.
TWENTY-FIVE
The insistent cawing of a belligerent crow woke Annie from a sound sleep. She nosed deeper into her pillow and moaned. It was chilly and she fumbled to pull the blanket up closer around her. It wasn’t there.
She opened her eyes and tried to focus. She was in the dormer room in her grandparents’ cabin in Maine, but she wasn’t under the covers. Instead, she was fully clothed and curled up on top of the bed. No wonder she was cold. She sat up, feeling groggy with a mouth that tasted like her gym socks—after a game. She was wearing jeans and her leaping dolphin T-shirt and smelled disgusting. Why hadn’t she undressed and put on pajamas? She must’ve fallen asleep while reading…or something. She lifted her stinging hand. It was covered in scratches.
“What the heck?” she mumbled aloud. “This is weird. When did I mess up my hand? And why, for heaven’s sake, why didn’t I put on my pj’s?”
Rolling off the bed, she stumbled down the hall to the bathroom. In less than four minutes, she’d showered, changed into clean clothes, and made her way downstairs. The kitchen was cold and empty. No savory smells greeted her. The kettle wasn’t on—nothing on the stove or in the oven. Outside, the world was damp and depressed from a night’s steady rain. Alarmed, Annie raced through the living room and over to Mrs. Pratt’s closed door.
She knocked, timidly at first, then with more force. “Mrs. Pratt? Mrs. Pratt? Are you awake? Are you all right?”
A muffled sound came from within, and Annie took that as permission to open the door. The housekeeper was in bed, but her eyes were open. She lay, blinking as though unsure of where she was. Annie walked over to the bed.
“Mrs. Pratt…are you okay? Everything was cold in the kitchen and strange—like-like nobody was here. Creepy.”
The older woman sat up stiffly and stared in confusion at her charge and then at the little bedside clock. When she saw the time, she g
asped. “Eight o’clock. My goodness. I never sleep in past six.”
Annie laughed once, then sobered. “It’s okay to sleep in once in a while, Mrs. Pratt. I’m sorry I woke you. I was just, I don’t know—I got freaked out when I went into the kitchen and it was so empty and cold…”
“Well, I’m getting up now, so you go on and turn up the heat. Start whipping us up something—how ’bout some pancakes? You know how to make them.”
“Sure. No problem. You take your time.”
Annie left the room and hurried back to the kitchen. She turned up the heat then pulled out the needed ingredients from cupboard and refrigerator. In minutes, she measured flour into a bowl, adding shortening and eggs. She opened the milk bottle, about to pour some into a cup when her senses protested. She sniffed the bottle and wrinkled her offended nose. “Yuck. The milk’s sour. I wonder why? We just bought it.”
Lifting the bottle, she looked for the expiration date. It said the milk would be good for another three days. What a bunch of baloney. She thought in annoyance. Boy, when we go to the grocery again, Mrs. Pratt will really tell them off. We’ll demand our money back.
She pushed the bowl and utensils to the side and got eggs ready for scrambling. At least they could have eggs and toast. But, no milk for the housekeeper’s coffee and that was too bad. The older woman liked milk in her morning coffee.
As soon as Mrs. Pratt came into the room, Annie showed her the spoiled milk and its supposed freshness date. Mrs. Pratt sniffed. “Well. They’ll just have to replace that item. Or give me my money back. We’ll go in today. How’s that? Replenish our supplies. We have almost a week left of our little adventure. We’ll buy something decadent and really splurge. Sound all right to you?”
Annie grinned. “More than all right. My vote is for homemade chocolate brownies.”
They ate breakfast then cleaned up—tossing the pancake ingredients. Mrs. Pratt made a face at the waste. Shrugging into her wool coat and grabbing her purse and the half-filled milk bottle, the housekeeper headed out to the car. Annie followed at her heels.
They got into the rental car, and Mrs. Pratt put the key into the ignition. Giving it a twist she was surprised at the groaning sound of an-almost-dead engine. “What in tarnation?” she exclaimed. “Why won’t the darned thing start?”
“Maybe the engine’s cold,” Annie suggested.
“Well, maybe…but it hasn’t been that cold out, and I just drove it two days ago.”
“Maybe the rental agency gave us a lemon.”
“Hmm, maybe…” The housekeeper tried several more times before the engine turned over, and she revved up the motor. It finally hummed and she eased out of the parking spot and nosed the car down the driveway. In minutes, they were on the main road and heading toward the little seaside town.
They parked in front of the grocery-cum-general store and got out. Annie ran on ahead and opened the door for Mrs. Pratt, then followed her into the store. The older woman marched right up to the cashier and set the bottle on the counter.
“I would like a refund or another bottle of milk—this one’s bad,” she said politely but firmly.
The balding man behind the counter peered over his half-glasses at the milk and then at his customer. “What seems t’be wrong w’the milk, ma’am?”
“Smell for yourself,” Mrs. Pratt huffed. “It’s spoiled.”
The man lifted the bottle, looked at the expiration date, and sighed. “Well, y’ah, sure it is—seein’ it’s past due.”
“Past due. You’re out of your mind. Look at that date. It claims the milk’s good until June eighth.”
“Y’ah, and today’s June sixteenth. You been in th’ pickles lately?”
Mrs. Pratt glowered at the man and turned to Annie. “Anne Veronica, what’s the date today?”
“It-it’s June sixth…isn’t it?”
The man scratched his head, growing more perturbed by the minute. “Ma’am, I don’t know what you’re tryin’ to pull over me, but it’s June sixteenth. Look at th’ paper, if you don’t believe me.” He pointed a stubby finger at a stack of just-delivered morning papers.
Mrs. Pratt snatched one off the pile and examined it closely. Annie watched as the housekeeper scanned the headlines, coughed, replaced the paper—patting a crease—and marched for the door. Annie followed, without so much as a glance or word for the bemused clerk.
Mrs. Pratt got into the car and waited for Annie to slide in beside her. She clutched the steering wheel with white-knuckled fists and stared straight ahead. Annie swallowed her growing uneasiness and spoke. “Mrs. Pratt…?”
The housekeeper cleared her throat, muttered a ‘Heavenly Father, Blessed Mother, all the angels and saints, help me’ and turned to face her young charge. “I…do not…know…what…to make…of this,” she breathed out.
“Why? I don’t understand? What did you see in the paper? What’s today’s date? Tell me.”
“Today is…according to that annoying man…and the newspaper…June sixteenth.”
“But how could it be. We just got here day before yesterday…didn’t we?”
Mrs. Pratt leaned over and opened the glove compartment. She took out an envelope of papers and thumbed through them. Finding what she wanted, she scanned the paper, coughed, then put the envelope back in the compartment. She frowned and drummed a nervous beat on the steering wheel. “All right. The form that I signed, allowing us to rent this car—in my own neat but decisive handwriting, mind you—clearly states that I, one Elinore Wilby Pratt, rented said automobile on June third, in the year of our Lord…” She looked at Annie for a full minute in silence then added in a hushed tone, “My dear…we seem to have misplaced ten days…ten days. This wouldn’t, by any chance, have something to do with your…uh, secret?”
Annie leaned back against the seat and stared out the windshield in total bewilderment. A middle-aged lady and her two teen-aged sons went into the grocery. They laughed and talked, behaving like nothing was wrong, or mixed-up, or upside down in their world. They didn’t appear to be worried about losing an incredible ten days out of their lives. She glanced at the housekeeper.
“I don’t know…honest. I can’t even remember why I wanted to come all the way up here. Really, I don’t. I hate this place. I…the whole thing is crazy. What do we do now?”
“We go back to the cabin and make some very strong tea and sit down and…”
“And what? What are we going to do? Are we both going crazy? Are we suffering from radon poisoning or carbon monoxide or something? What? Is it me? Have I done something to cause this? Am I bewitched?”
“Calm down, Annie. You’re getting hysterical. We’ll go back, just like I said, make some tea, and think this through carefully…carefully.”
They drove back to the cabin in complete silence. It had started to rain again and the rhythmic twit-twot, twit-twot of the windshield wipers was like a mocking voice in Annie’s mind. “Ten days. Ten days. Ten days.” it seemed to taunt—over and over.
True to her words, the first thing the housekeeper did when she marched into the cabin was to put the kettle on. Five minutes later, they sat in the cozy living room, looking out the window at a gray, restless ocean.
“All right, Annie…we have to accept that something, uh, strange is going on.” Mrs. Pratt took a slow sip of her tea. “First, somehow—somewhere—we have lost ten days. I remember going to be bed on June fifth. I remember reading in bed—four chapters, in fact. I can even tell you where I left my bookmark…the next thing I remember is you knocking on my door this morning.”
“That’s basically how I remember it. I went to bed on June fifth—only I didn’t get undressed for some reason…”
“You didn’t?”
“No. I remember feeling…feeling weird—I don’t know how to explain it. I just lay on top of the bed. I was going to put on my pajamas later. But when I awoke this m-morning…I was still in my jeans and…”
For the first time that morning, Mrs.
Pratt focused on Annie’s right hand. She frowned. “How did you hurt your hand? I don’t remember you cutting it up like that.”
Annie looked at her hand in complete bewilderment. “I don’t know either…it was this way when I woke up. And now that I think of it, my clothes were extra dirty, too.” She looked up in horror. “You don’t think I’ve been walking and doing things in my sleep, do you? I’ve heard of people who do that.”
“No, no, and anyway, it wouldn’t explain why I’ve lost the days, too. Oh, this is strange…so strange…” The older woman set her cup down on the table and stood up. “Well. We can’t solve the mystery today. We need to pack up and go home. Our return flight to Atlanta is on June seventeenth, and I had planned to make it a leisurely day. And here we have to drive all day, stay at a motel or drive half the night—which I don’t want to do. Let’s get moving. We can’t miss our plane, and we want to leave the cabin just like your grandmother left it.”
Two hours later, Annie and Mrs. Pratt were in the car and on their way back to Portland. The housekeeper’s face looked set in granite, and deep grooves ran from nose to mouth. She looked like someone facing a huge insurmountable obstacle looming up before her. She looked old.
Annie felt like she’d been chewed, swallowed and vomited up again. Was she somehow to blame for the mysterious lost days? She couldn’t shake the conviction that she was responsible. She just wished she knew how. Too tired and confused to think, and deciding to leave the driving to the older woman, Annie closed her eyes and slept.
TWENTY-SIX
They returned the car to the rental agency and then took a taxi to a motel close to the airport. Mrs. Pratt was exhausted and complained that her neck and shoulders were giving her a lot of pain. Ordering room service, they ate, bathed, and went to bed. If it hadn’t been for the alarm waking them up the next morning, they each could’ve slept through the entire day.
A shuttle delivered them to airport check-in, and after the usual routine of checking ID and baggage, they found the correct gate and sat down to wait for their plane. Neither one had done much talking.
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