by J. R. Rain
“Are you still sick?” asks Tammy, her voice more whisper than speech.
I thread an arm around her and snug her close to my side. “I… think I’m just tired now.”
“But you’ve been in bed all day.” Tammy blinks.
“Well.” I boop her on the nose. “Sometimes if people sleep too much, they feel tired. Funny, huh?”
“Yeah, funny. But not ha-ha funny.”
I grin. “No, sweetie, not ha-ha funny.”
Chopping noises start up in the kitchen. The fragrance of fresh mushrooms, garlic, and scallions hit me hard, but it doesn’t activate my hunger. My nose even picks up the aroma of uncooked rice. Guess Danny’s making a pilaf.
The feeling that I’m an impostor―another person entirely, who snuck into this family’s house―gnaws at the edges of my consciousness. That sense I don’t belong here worsens at my son’s uneasy stare, as though I’m a stranger dressed up to look like Mommy.
My daughter appears to get the hint something isn’t quite right and cuddles at my side the way she did after I’d been shot on that drug raid. Truth is, I’m groggy and out of it, and I’m sure it’s showing on my face. No, I can’t see myself in the mirror to check, but the idea that someone could’ve written a nasty word on my forehead and I’d never be able to tell strands me on an island between wanting to laugh or freak out.
“Do I haveta go to peeschool?” asks Tammy.
I snicker to myself and comb my fingers through her hair. “Not until next week, sweetie. But you do need to go to preschool.”
“Why?” asks Tammy, while rubbing her nose. “I already know how to potty.”
Giggling, I explain the difference between pee and pre. “So you can learn things and grow up to be smart and do amazing things.” I worm a finger under her arm, tickling her side until she squeals into giggles.
“Your finger’s cold, Mommy! Like ice!”
I stop tickling, her words cutting straight to my heart. She’s right, of course. My fingers are cold. And so are my hands… and everything. Cold, like a corpse. I fight a new wave of depression. What the hell is wrong with me?
No, I think, shaking my head. Time to move forward. Time to reclaim my life, my happiness...
Anthony nods to himself, like some great matter of cosmic justice wound its way to resolution inside his mind. His coolness evaporates and I get a silly grin before he scampers over to continue playing with his toys at my feet. “Dino Man tried to eated the city, but Bwoo Ranger pra’tect the people.” My little boy prattles on about Dino Man’s attack, telling me how none of the other heroes could stop him (likely the other figures scattered about the floor). In between the sometimes-hard-to-decipher sentences of a two-year-old, Tammy peppers me with questions about preschool, her dread increasing moment by moment until she hits me with a bomb that makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time.
“How long’m I gonna haveta stay there?” Her eyes widen to epic cuteness. “Why can’t I stay living here?”
“Oh, sweetie!” I give her a squeeze. “You’re not going to live there. It’s just a few hours a day. Like when Daddy and I go to work. We come home every night, right?”
Her fear fades somewhat as her pleading stare notches back to an expression of contemplation.
“Not every night,” mutters Anthony, looking down.
I scoop him up too, and hold the pair of them in a hug, kissing them both atop the head. “I’m sorry for scaring you two. I’ll never be away from you like that again.”
“Mommy wanted to come home, but she got hurted,” says Tammy in a matter-of-fact tone. “She hadda go doctor.”
Anthony nods. “’Kay. Mommy, don’ get doctor ’gain.”
“I won’t, kiddo.” I poke him in the tummy.
I’m pretty sure I can keep this promise; that is, if what’s happening to me is really happening to me. And if it is happening to me, well, I doubt even doctors can help me.
That, of course, begs the question―what is happening to you, Sam? I shake my head and push the thought aside.
Loud sizzling in the kitchen precedes the smell of heated butter, garlic, and mushrooms wafting in. With each quite-audible scrape of a wooden spatula over Teflon, I become increasingly aware that all is not as it should be in Sam World. At least I don’t have any distracting awareness of Anthony or Tammy’s heartbeats; holding them in my lap feels about as normal as it ought to. The pair cuddle with me on the sofa, watching some crazy cartoon. I swear I’m getting old. This show makes utterly zero sense to me, but the kids are enthralled.
Okay, I had a really bizarre series of events happen to me. I’m not sure exactly what any of it means… especially that bit with the mirror. But, I’m here. This is my house and my family. I think that sense of not belonging here, the dread and anxiety, came from my being afraid of the unknown. Tell me a sane person could see their reflection in the mirror vanish―and stay gone―and not have at least a minor existential crisis.
Then again, would a sane person see their reflection vanish?
No, I think. No sane person would see their reflection vanish, because reflections don’t vanish. Not in the real world.
I veritably itch to check my reflection again. Just one more time. But I can’t bring myself to do it. I can’t face the emptiness again, can’t face the implications of what it means, either.
And what does it mean?
Well, it means that I’ve gone off the deep end.
Or…
Or what?
I don’t want to face that either. Ever.
Tammy’s gurgle tells me I’m squeezing them a little too hard. I ease back and mess with their hair a bit. Anthony keeps mashing the triceratops figure into Blue Ranger while staring at the TV. Tammy pulls a small blanket over and tries to wrap it around my shoulders. Smiling, I sit up a little so she can. Okay, crisis over. Or at least minimized.
I’m still me.
We watch the cartoon―a show about a kid named Arnold with a weird football-shaped head and blond hair―for a while in relative normality. The sizzling in the kitchen ceases, and Danny shuffles around amid the bumping of pots and the heavy, glassy clatter of a large baking dish. The fridge opens and closes. Hunger twists in my gut, but thankfully, it’s not from smelling either of my children. I lift my head, drawn toward the doorway and the smell of… meat.
“Mommy needs a moment,” I mutter, and scoot the kids off to the floor before standing.
Anthony dives back into his mess of toys while Tammy burritos herself in the blanket on the sofa, attention glued to the TV.
With one hand on my stomach, I drift like a ghost across the living room to the kitchen. The pervasive grogginess that’s been hounding me since my eyes opened lifts somewhat as I hone in on the large glass baking dish on the counter full of beef brisket. Danny’s hovering near it, mixing up something in a smaller bowl.
As if on autopilot, I glide to the dish, pluck the meat out of the way with one hand, and upend the baking dish to my mouth. Cow’s blood hits my tongue with the awesomeness of a full steak dinner, sending jolts of electricity down into my core.
Danny lets out a startled yelp and jumps to the side.
Maybe I snarl a little, but not at him… I feel like a starving mongrel fed after days in a cage.
There’s not enough blood here, but I keep licking the glass.
“Sam?” asks Danny, sounding rattled. “What are you doing?”
I glance at the empty dish in my left hand, the slab of meat dangling from my right hand. For a second, I feel like a tween caught watching an R-rated movie and my gaze darts about looking for an excuse, but all I can think about is my hunger. That trace of blood is a tease more than anything. I want more. I need more.
Again, I snarl.
Danny leans back. “Sssaaam?”
I shake off the feral urges orbiting the edges of my thoughts and blink at him. “Umm… Sorry.” After rinsing out the dish, I plop the brisket back in it and… lick the blood from my fingers
.
“Wow. It’s good to see you’ve got your appetite back at least, though that was a bit weird.” Danny approaches and slides an arm around my back. “At least let me cook it first.”
The garlic-onion-mushroom aroma of the pilaf is near overwhelming; how hadn’t I noticed that before? “Uhh, yeah, right. I’m still not quite feeling like myself.”
“Sam.” Danny grasps my shoulders and stares at me.
I give him my best innocent expression. “Hmm?”
He reaches up and caresses my neck, his fingertips sending tingles of lightning down my skin from the slightest contact. My eyes half-lid. Drinking in his scent gets me hungry again, but not for any kind of food.
“Your bandage is off,” says Danny in a weak voice.
My sex drive freezes and bursts into a thousand fragments.
He brushes my neck, the warmth of his contact gliding down to my collarbone. “There’s not a mark on you.”
“That’s good, right?” I ask, not quite able to look him in the eye.
“It’s… something.” His arm drops to hang at his side. “Yeah, probably good. Did that really happen? The attack?”
I lean against him, face pressed to his shoulder. “Now I’m not so sure. It’s… surreal. Nothing makes any sense but I know I’m home with my family, and that’s all that matters.”
“I’m so glad you’re all right.” Danny wraps his arms around me. He starts in on a deep kiss, but pulls back faster than I expect, still smiling. “How do you feel?”
“Little tired. Hungry.”
“No soreness? Pain?” His eyebrows rise with hope.
“Not really.” I feel like yawning, but it’s as though my body forgot how. I could so go to sleep right here standing up, leaning on my husband. “Just tired… and hungry.”
“Well, dinner’ll be ready soon.” He tickles my sides. “You’re as bad as Tammy hovering around when there’re cookies in the oven.”
I laugh. Parents who complain about their kids pulling the ‘are we there yet?’ thing in a car have never been in the house with Tammy while baking is going on. “Yeah, yeah… That smells amazing, by the way.”
“Thanks, babe.” He kisses me on the lips, and again pulls back. “Are you sure you feel all right?”
“Other than groggy, yes, why?”
“Not cold at all?”
I shrug. “Not really, no.”
“Hmm.” He half shrugs and turns back to continue mixing up the seasoning for the brisket. “Strange.”
“Danny… everything about these past few days is strange.” I meander back to the living room where the kids remain engrossed in the TV.
Tammy grins at me and holds up the blanket as an invitation. I pad over, sit, and snuggle with her.
“Have we spent all day in our jammies?” I ask.
She nods, shrugging.
Ah, what a normal, lazy thing to do on a day off. ‘Normal’ being the operative word here. I can’t help but think everything about my life is about to get quite far from normal.
Quite far, indeed.
Chapter Four
Chilling
Since I met Danny, the smell of his cooking had always made me ravenous.
I guess it’s true what they say about some people having a knack for certain tasks. In his case, it’s cooking. Sometimes, I think the man ought to have become a professional chef instead of a lawyer, but his parents would never have approved of that.
I tease my fork around the mushroom rice pilaf he made, eyeing a few strips of brisket I snagged from the middle where the meat appeared rarest. As if I hadn’t been worried enough about what’s happened to me, that I can sit here and stare at this wonderful food and think on an intellectual level ‘yes, this is beautiful and smells appetizing,’ but I’m not experiencing any physical reaction, bothers me. The red meat comes closest to triggering a hunger-like response, though I ought to be inhaling this meal.
Instead, I take my time dicing Tammy’s portion of brisket into teensy cubes while Danny does the same for Anthony. We’ve still got the applesauce backup in case the boy decides he hates the real food.
Danny finishes cutting and gets Anthony started on his first mouthful. He emits a happy murmur and grabs a handful of pilaf before stuffing it in his mouth, rice dribbling down his cheeks onto his bib. Tammy takes her time, meticulously stabbing one cube of brisket on each tine of her fork before raising it to her mouth.
Not until Danny glances at me do I take my first bite. I don’t feel sick or anything, but something about this food is giving off a warning. Not knowing why I think eating it is a bad idea, I force down a mouthful of the rice―which is pretty good, but unsatisfying. A hunk of brisket appeals somewhat more, but within ten seconds of swallowing, World War Three breaks out in my gut.
Anthony starts rolling a mushroom around his plate, which distracts Danny away from noticing me gag. I grab the napkin, cover my mouth and fake a sneeze so Tammy doesn’t question why I made a funny face.
“Be right back.” I stand.
“Everything all right?” asks Danny.
“Oh, fine.” I force a smile over my rapidly building nausea. “Nature’s calling, and she dialed collect.”
He nods.
I hurry off down the hall to the bathroom with Mount Vesuvius rumbling inside me. Within seconds of the door closing, I start retching… but a couple forkfuls of rice and a hunk or two of meat does not contain much fluid. I have horribleness stuck inside me and it can’t go anywhere. My face hovers over the toilet for a moment, surely as red as a tomato. Panic starts to set in due to the feeling of a brick wedged in my throat, but it’s not because I can’t breathe…
Fumbling at the sink, I grab the plastic cup, fill it to the top, and force myself to chug it. I barely get the cup away from my lip before the geyser starts, spattering the mirror, sink, floor, and toilet.
Rice and meat bits go everywhere.
I swoon to my knees, hugging the toilet. It’s been a few years since I found myself in this position… not since college. Convulsions rock me for a little while more. After they stop, I cough and pluck rice out of my hair. The room spins, and I catch myself gasping for air. Wait, did vomiting fix something?
What if…
Holding my breath stabs a dagger of sorrow into my heart. There’s no sense of urgency; I feel like I could sit here for hours and be fine. Guess that panic while throwing up didn’t come from not being able to breathe.
Damn. Better get back out there before Danny worries.
I spring to my feet, grab a fistful of TP, and wipe down the spray as best I can in a rush. The truly strange part of this is the vomit doesn’t stink like anything repugnant. It smells no different from how it had on the plate. Granted, it hadn’t stayed down very long, but there ought to at least be a trace of bile or something.
What is wrong with me?
Once the bathroom no longer looks like a drunk college roommate exploded all over it, I hurry out the door, but grab the cup on my way. Danny and the kids look up from their food as I swoop in and resume my seat. Both my husband and daughter give me worried stares until I take a giant forkful of rice and brisket and make enthusiastic ‘mmm’ sounds.
As soon as Danny looks away to check on Anthony, I spit the food into the bathroom cup, which I conceal under the table. There’s no sense alarming the children, and I’m not quite ready to make Danny feel bad, thinking I don’t like his food. Faking it isn’t too difficult, since as long as I don’t attempt to swallow anything, it does actually taste pretty good. Eventually, the kids are back in the living room and Danny’s at the dining room table on his laptop doing work stuff. As is our usual routine, since he cooked, I deal with the dishes and cleanup. And by cleanup, I mean dumping my chewed-up mush into the trash. I’m tempted to throw the whole damn cup in there, too, but I suspect many more uneaten meals were going to end up in this thing.
I’m so distracted by worry, it doesn’t occur to me that I’ve run the water ridiculously h
ot until the steam wafting up from the sink is thick enough to interfere with my vision. It’s near-painful to touch, but not so much that I jerk my hands out of the water. It’s also not turning my skin red.
My brain can’t process any more weirdness tonight, so I ignore it and wash.
Danny glances over the laptop screen every so often. He seems haunted, or worried, but doesn’t do anything more than cast furtive glances. Rapid key clicking continues for most of the time I wash dishes, pots, and such. I’m still hungry, but I’ve got no temptation whatsoever to pick at the leftovers.
With the dishes complete, I head to the living room and toss on The Lion King for the kids. Danny rushes typing another line or two, probably in an email, and darts over to join us on the couch. For about an hour and a half, the four of us snuggle on the sofa and I almost manage to forget my attack.
At least, until a sudden onset of anxiousness grips me.
I fight through it, gasping at times, running my fingers through my hair at others. My toes curl. I blink and rub my eyes and wonder what the hell is happening to me. I want to get up and pace, but that would only attract more stares and more worry. I fight through it―until I reach a point where I am certain I will need to stand and make an excuse to leave the room… and then, just like that, the feeling leaves.
And I know. Boy, oh boy, do I know why.
I can almost see it in my mind. How, I don’t know, but there is a part of me that knows that the something planetary had just occurred. Something epic and beautiful and perfect. The sun had set.
And I couldn’t be happier.
***
I am perplexed, horrified, intrigued.
After all, the veil of pervasive fatigue that had been weighing on me all day evaporates right around the time the windows go dark. A few hours ago, I couldn’t help myself and slurped up blood. The daylight is painful to my skin… Now, I feel alive as soon as the sun goes down.