Scott rose to his feet and began to clear away the dishes. “You might want to call a lawyer, Bev, just to make sure your privacy is respected. And you don’t have to talk to reporters if you don’t want to.”
“I should have declined to comment,” I replied. “What was I thinking?”
My mother approached me. “It’s not your fault. You couldn’t have known she was going to ask that.”
I couldn’t take it anymore. I needed to be with Louise, to hold her in my arms and reassure myself that she was okay. “Would you guys mind if I said goodnight? Please, don’t worry about the dishes. Leave everything and I’ll clean it up in the morning. Stay as long as you like, but lock the door behind you when you go.”
“Of course,” Claire replied with a worried look on her face. “But call me if you need anything.”
“I will.”
Making my way down the hall, I tiptoed into Louise’s room and slid into bed beside her. Her eyes fluttered open. In a sleepy voice, she said, “Hi Mommy.”
She rolled to face me and wrapped her tiny arms around my neck. I held her close as tears spilled from my eyes, across my temple, into my hair and onto the pillow. I felt such intense love for her, my heart was bursting with it—and such gratitude that she had come back from wherever she had gone.
A place she liked, where she could fly above the clouds.
Where she felt safe and happy.
I thought of my father then. I was only ten when he went to trim the hedge while Claire and I played in the yard, dancing through the cool spray of the sprinkler. I don’t remember much about it. Maybe I blocked out the images, but I’m told he slipped and fell into the ditch and impaled himself on the clippers. Mom called an ambulance, but my father died before he reached the hospital. He was thirty-six years old, and he had a mustache at the time. I remember how it tickled my forehead when he kissed me goodnight.
In that moment, with my daughter in my arms, I felt my childhood love for him, which had never waned over the years. Even though I was only ten when he was taken from us, I never forgot how he loved us. I remembered his laughter, and how I felt so safe whenever he walked in the door. He taught me how to ride a bicycle, how to swim, and he never refused to help me with my homework.
I wished I could thank him—not just for all that, but for what he did for me today. For sending Louise home to me.
Did that mean I believed what Louise had said? Did I believe she went to heaven?
I still wasn’t sure, and I wanted, more than anything, to hear more about what she experienced.
Tomorrow, I would suggest that we take Leo for a walk in the park where we might talk, alone.
Chapter Five
Bev
While Louise was in her room getting dressed the following morning, and Leo was curled up on the kitchen floor, I stood at the counter with my phone, scrolling through a series of news items about our sailing disaster. There was a great deal to absorb because all the bodies had been recovered and next of kin had been notified, so many of the news sites were releasing video segments paying homage to those who were lost. They were digging into the private life of the captain and calling him a hero for doing everything possible to save all the souls on board.
On top of that, the science of the extraordinary weather system was explained by meteorological experts all over North America. The authorities were still investigating, but everyone seemed to agree that what caused the ship to founder was a rare weather phenomenon that no sailing vessel could have possibly survived: a sudden and violent downdraft from the clouds. They also agreed it was not likely a case of negligence on the part of the captain or crew.
Eventually, I couldn’t bear to look at it because I’d met all the passengers who had died. I’d spoken to them, laughed with them, spent time with them at lunch. It ripped my heart out to imagine what their families must be going through today.
Then suddenly, I experienced a flash memory—as if I were back on the sinking ship, overcome with panic, climbing out of the hold and onto the slippery deck, searching for Louise as the roar of the waves and salty spray filled me with terror…
Stop it, Bev. Don’t think about it.
Setting my phone on the counter behind me, I shut my eyes and tried to calm my racing heart. I inhaled a deep breath and counted to ten, but could still taste the salt water in my mouth. An image of Louise’s tiny limp body as we pulled her into the rolling and plunging lifeboat caused a terrible commotion in me. I feared I might be sick. Resting a hand on my belly, I braced both my feet on the steady floor and pushed the memory away.
She came running into the kitchen just then, and my eyes flew open. I thanked God she wasn’t one of the bodies that had been recovered from the bottom of the ocean.
We’re both still here…
“Ready to go?” I cheerfully asked, because I didn’t want to pass my anxieties on to her.
Besides, I wanted this to be a good day. I’d never been so thankful to see a sunrise. All I wanted to do was love my daughter.
“Yes!” She got down on her knees and patted Leo’s thick golden coat. “Are you ready? Where’s your leash?”
Leo’s ears perked up at that, and we went to the front closet to fetch it.
* * *
Point Pleasant Park—made up of 190 acres of woodland with groomed walking trails—was a five-minute drive from our home. We pulled into the Tower Road parking lot and let Leo out of the back of the car. Louise and I then walked him to the wide shaded path where Louise always liked to run ahead. I kept reminding her to slow down and wait for us. Eventually, she walked beside me.
“Obviously, you’re feeling better,” I said to her. “As energetic as ever.”
“I feel okay.”
I noticed she was constantly gazing up at the treetops.
“What are you seeing up there?” I asked, wanting to steer the conversation toward the things she’d told me in the helicopter.
“Just the sky,” she replied.
We continued walking, and Leo stopped to lift a leg and pee.
“Are you thinking about what happened yesterday?” I asked Louise.
Still looking up, she nodded her head.
“Which part, specifically?”
She gave it some thought. “How it’s different here, and what it’s like there.”
My belly erupted into a swarm of nervous butterflies because this was a weighty subject and I was a bit afraid of what she knew and believed, and how it might change her life. It was all a mystery to me. How could I be a good mother when I knew nothing and she knew everything?
Or maybe something had happened to her brain—something neurological that I should be worried about. “Can you describe it to me?”
“Well…” She looked around at all the trees in the forest and the ground beneath her feet. “It was kind of the same, but nicer.”
“Nicer, how?”
“More colorful. The water was really bright blue and the trees were really green, and there weren’t any trees like those ones.” She pointed at some skeletons of dead trees that stood without leaves or branches.
“What else was different about it?” I asked. “And how did you even get there? Do you remember?”
She nodded. “When I couldn’t breathe in the water, I floated out of my body. Then I crossed a bridge.”
“What kind of bridge?”
She bit her lip, as if she had to search for the right way to describe it. “It was made of stone. And curved like this.” She made a motion with her hand.
“When did you fly over the clouds?”
“Just before I got to the bridge.”
“And what was on the other side of the bridge?”
She skipped a few times, then slowed to a walk again. “Grampy was there waiting, and there were others too. They were nice. I liked them.”
I cleared my throat and tried to think of the next question I should ask, which wasn’t easy because I had so many of them. “Did the nice people talk
to you?”
She considered that for a moment. “They didn’t really talk with their mouths. But I could hear them in my head.”
“I see. And what did they say?”
“First, they said welcome and they hugged me, and then they took me to some pretty buildings, but we didn’t go inside.”
“What did the buildings look like?”
She walked along, looking down at her sneakers. “They were shiny and white, and really huge!” She raised her arms up over her head and spread them in a giant arc to show me how big.
“Wow!” I replied. “That does sound huge.”
“Yes, and there were other buildings that were really tall with shiny glass. One pretty white building had white steps and there were other kids there, and some dogs.”
“Dogs? There were dogs in heaven?”
“Uh huh. They were wagging their tails, and they were really happy to see me. I liked it.”
“No wonder. It sounds like a great place.”
“It was.” She looked down at the ground again.
Leo stopped suddenly, and sat down. Only then did I realize that Louise’s chin was quivering.
“What’s the matter, sweetheart?” I dropped to one knee and took hold of her hand. “Can you tell me what’s wrong?”
She stepped into my arms. I hugged her and rubbed her back.
“I miss it. I didn’t want to leave.”
“Then why did you?” I asked, knowing it was a dangerous question. I certainly didn’t want her to feel it would have been okay with me if she’d remained there, even if she liked it better. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
“Grampy said I was supposed to be with you. He said you needed me.”
“Well, he was right. I do need you. I would have been very sad and lonely if you didn’t come back.”
“He said I’d stop missing heaven after a while. He said I’d forget how nice it was, and that it would feel like a dream, but I don’t want to forget.”
“Then maybe you won’t. Maybe when we go home, you can draw pictures of it to help you remember.”
She wiped her tears from her cheeks and nodded. “Grampy said I would come back later. After I’m old.”
I smiled gently. “Grampy usually knows what he’s talking about.”
It felt odd to speak about my late father in the present tense…and yet, it didn’t seem all that strange…
“Grampy knew everything, and he wanted me to tell you that he’s proud of you and he can’t wait to see you again, and that he loves you, Gramma and Auntie Claire.”
All at once, my heart squeezed in my chest and I was overcome with emotion. I pulled Louise into my arms and held her tight. “I’m so glad you came back to tell me that. Thank you. Thank you for coming back.”
I cried as I held her and couldn’t stop the tears from flowing. It was a great flood of feeling, brought on not only by the things she’d just said about my father, but by the trauma of the previous day when I’d almost lost her.
She let me hug her for a long time. Then I drew back, cupped her sweet face in my hands and looked into her eyes.
“It wasn’t up to me,” she told me.
At first, I had no idea what she was talking about. I frowned with confusion.
“Something pulled me back,” she said. “It was like a vacuum cleaner that sucked me away from there. Really fast.”
Nothing about this was easy to believe, yet I found myself believing her, nonetheless. “A vacuum cleaner? That was the sensation you felt?”
“Uh huh. It didn’t hurt, but I didn’t like it.”
All I could do was blink at her, in stunned silence.
She turned from me then and started running toward the grassy clearing where we sometimes watched Shakespeare by the Sea theatrical performances on sunny weekend afternoons. Whenever there was nothing going on in that secluded section of the park, we freed Leo from his leash to let him run, and we climbed all over the antiquated military ruins.
I climbed to the top with Louise and watched her play happily with Leo while boats came and went from the harbor in the distance.
All the while, I wondered if her experience had been real. Or had it just been a vivid dream?
How would I ever know?
* * *
When Louise and I pulled onto our street, there was a white news van and a number of unfamiliar cars parked in front of our house. I wished I’d had the presence of mind to hit the brakes, turn around and go somewhere else, but foolishly, I pulled into my driveway with the notion that there was something going on in our neighborhood that had nothing to do with us.
“Are you Bev Hutchinson?” a woman in a red blazer asked from the sidewalk as I got out of my car and opened the back door to help Louise out of her booster seat.
The woman started up my driveway, while a cameraman and reporter with a microphone spilled out of the news van across the street.
“Is this your daughter?” she asked.
Feeling immediately threatened, I held up a hand. “Please stop. This is private property.”
She didn’t back off. “Can I just ask you a few questions about your daughter’s experience?”
She was halfway up my driveway while the TV crew stood anxiously on the sidewalk, filming me.
“I don’t have any comment. Please leave us alone.”
In a panic, I unbuckled Louise, picked her up to carry her on my hip, and I let Leo out as well. He trotted to the front door while I hurried to follow, ignoring questions from the reporters who were lined up on the sidewalk, shouting at me.
As soon as we entered the house, I shut the door, locked it behind us, and set Louise down.
“Mommy, who were they?” she asked, her cheeks flushed with color.
I moved to the front window to close the blinds, then discreetly peered between the slats. “They’re reporters, honey.”
“What did they want?”
“They just want to ask us some questions about the accident yesterday.”
She watched me while I continued to keep an eye on things out front. At least the reporters were staying back. They weren’t on my property.
“Why wouldn’t you talk to them?” Louise asked, moving closer.
I faced her and pasted on a carefree smile. “Because I already spoke to one on the phone last night.”
“But why don’t you want to speak to those ones?” She pointed toward the front yard, while I fumbled for an answer.
“Because they shouldn’t have come to our house. It’s not very polite.”
“Would it be polite if they called you on the phone?”
“Yes, that would be better.”
The phone rang just then, and my heart turned over with dread. I strode to the kitchen to answer it. “Hello?”
“Hi, may I speak with Bev Hutchinson?”
My heart began to race. “This is her.”
The woman on the other end of the line introduced herself as a producer from CNN in New York, and she wanted to know if I’d be willing to talk to Jack Peterson. Live. On the air.
My knees nearly buckled because Jack Peterson was a celebrity host of his own prime time news program. For a few seconds, I was star struck. Was CNN really calling me? How did they get my number?
“About what?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer to that question.
“We’d like to talk to you about your daughter and what she experienced while you were performing CPR on her. We’d also like to ask her a few questions as well, if you’d be willing to let her appear on air?”
Suddenly, the spell was broken. It didn’t matter that it was CNN or Jack Peterson. What I needed to do was protect my daughter from all this media attention. What happened to her was private.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “I can’t allow her to be interviewed, and I don’t want to be on television. Please don’t call here again.”
As soon as I hung up the phone, my cell phone started ringing.
“M
y God, what is it with these people?” I hurried to retrieve it from my purse and was relieved to see that it was Claire. I quickly swiped the screen. “Hello?”
“Hi, Bev. Have you been watching the news? They’re talking about you on every station. They even have video of you and Louise getting out of the helicopter.”
“What? No way.” I ran into the living room, picked up the remote control and turned on the television.
Sure enough, there we were, getting out of the Coast Guard chopper.
“I’ll call you back,” I said to Claire, and set down my phone.
The video showed paramedics wheeling Louise’s gurney to a waiting ambulance while Claire and I followed. Thankfully, you couldn’t see my face, and my hair was flat and wet, so you’d never know I had frizzy blond hair.
They cut to a priest being interviewed via satellite, talking about heaven and the pearly gates, and referring to members of his congregation that he’d counseled after near-death experiences.
“Mommy, what’s happening?”
I jumped when I realized Louise was standing beside me. With wide eyes, she watched the priest on the screen. I quickly shut off the TV.
“It’s nothing, sweetheart. Just more news about the accident.” I reached for her hand. “Let’s get a snack in the kitchen.”
I led her out of the room, thankful that they hadn’t mentioned our names, because it was very important that I protect our privacy.
Chapter Six
Emma
Oak Bay, British Columbia
After a long day at work, I drove to Luke’s house, poured a glass of wine for myself, and collapsed on his sofa to wait for him to come home. I switched on the television. It was my usual habit after work to go straight to a news station, just to see if anything major had happened in the world. Once I felt caught up on the current events of the day, I’d scroll through the channel guide until I found a sitcom like Hot in Cleveland or Two and a Half Men, just to give myself a little time to decompress.
On the news stations that night, they were still covering the ship that sank off the coast of Nova Scotia the day before. I was about to change the channel when the anchorwoman mentioned a five-year-old child who had drowned, but was brought back to life by her mother who knew CPR.
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