When I’m done, I sit in my office. I’m frustrated and worried and I understand exactly why she said no. That’s part of the problem.
She’s looking at this as a parent who just restarted her life. I don’t blame her for wanting to stay put.
And I don’t want to draw her a word picture of what Marco will do to us. I don’t want her to live in fear, or worse, for that fear to infect Opal.
The truth of the matter is, I don’t want Opal to have to restart again either. She’s happy. I keep thinking of the night I met them, and her tired little face. How she was barely keeping herself together. The fevers, the sore throat, the misery. She’s thriving now.
How could I think to take that from her?
Opal brings me a drawing before she goes to bed. The three of us on the balcony. Crayon sun in the corner. She sets it on the edge of my desk without a word and goes.
We look happy. I sit with it for a while. Then I get back to work.
When I’m done, I go to the kitchen and stand at the counter for a moment. The apartment is quiet. Lena is reading in the livingroom, her feet tucked up on the couch, the particular posture she has when she’s fully settled into something.
I’ve disturbed her enough for the night.
I go back to my office, and I work until two. When I go to bed, Lena is already there, and her hand finds my arm in the dark the way it does, and I lie there and think about what comes next.
TWENTY-THREE
LENA
A shriek wakesme from a dead sleep, and I’m on my feet and out the door before I can think.
When I fling open her door, Opal’s already sitting up, arms out, illuminated by her nightlight. “Mama!”
I race to her and pull her into my arms. Dario’s footsteps follow down the hall, and when he gets to the door, I wave him off. No sense in both of us not sleeping.
He lingers for a moment, then goes back to bed.
I smooth her hair and ask, “What’s wrong, baby?”
But she just sniffles and cries a little. Finally, she says, “There was a ghost.”
I knew we shouldn’t have watched that Scooby-Doo. She loves that dog, though, so I didn’t have the heart to turn it off. But my baby doesn’t like supernatural things, and I did worry it would be too much for her.
Should have listened to my instinct.
“Remember how the ghost turned out to be a man in a costume?”
She nods, still sniffling.
“That’s all it ever is. People think it’s fun or useful to scare other people, but it’s always only a man in a costume. Ghosts aren’t real.”
“But… are you sure?”
I smile and nod and kiss the top of her head. “It’s always just a man. All the problems in the world are always because of some man pretending to be something he’s not. Pretending to be scary, pretending to be strong, they all play games, and that’s all it ever is. That’s why the police took him away in the end, remember?”
“Yeah.” She yawns.
“How about I stay in here for the night? I’ll keep watch.”
“Okay.” She scoots into the sheets, and I lie down in the narrow bed beside her and take her hand, and she falls back asleep in minutes. Her breathing evens out. Her grip loosens.
I don’t go back to sleep myself. All that adrenaline doesn’t let me. I’m still awake at three forty-seven when the power cuts.
It simply stops, and the apartment goes black in the way real darkness is. I’m glad Opal’s room has the good light—her window faces the city, so at least the city lights give me enough to see where I’m going when I get up to check the breakers.
