Angel Falls

“Sí. The memories, they are in you, Mikaela. Place this fotografía next to your heart and sleep well. Your heart will remember what your mind forgets. ”

Mikaela stared down into the eyes so like her own. Try as she might, she couldn’t remember holding this little girl, or stroking her hair, or kissing her cheek. “Oh, Mama,” she whispered, and at last she cried.

Chapter Twenty-one

Not long after lunch, Mikaela fell asleep.

She knew she was dreaming now. It was the first dream she’d had since waking up, and there was a comforting familiarity in the sensation. In her dream, the world was a hazy smear of blues and greens. A gentle summer breeze fluttered through the towering evergreen trees.

She was walking along a deserted road. Her body was working perfectly, no right leg dragging along behind her, no fingers that wouldn’t close. She came around a bend in the gravel road and saw an imposing wooden barn set on the crest of a hill. In the fields around it, there were horses standing in a group, munching contentedly on sweet green grass that came up to their hocks.

She kept moving, floating almost, past the barn, toward a beautiful log house.

A bank of gray clouds moved in suddenly, obliterating the lemon sunshine, casting the log house in shadow. It began to rain, spits of cold water that landed on her upturned cheeks like God’s own teardrops.

The front door opened for her.

She stumbled on the porch steps. Crying out, she grasped the railing and a splinter drove deep into the tender flesh of her palm. When she lifted her hand, she saw the bright, ruby-red trail of blood snaking down her wrist.

“No,” she tried to say, but the wind snatched her words away, and she was still walking, across the porch, into the house.

The door slammed shut behind her. She felt her way down the smooth wooden wall toward a staircase she somehow knew was there.

At the bottom, she paused, listening. Somewhere in this cold, dark house, a child was crying.

I’m coming. The words played across Mikaela’s mind but didn’t quite reach her mouth. She was moving again, running this time.

The cries became louder, more insistent. Mikaela had a fleeting, heartbreaking image of a little boy, red-haired, sucking his thumb. He was tucked back in a corner, waiting for his mommy to come for him.

But there were a hundred doors in front of her, and the hallway stretched for miles, fading out of focus at its end. She ran down the corridor, yanking open doors. Behind those doors lay nothing, yawning black rectangles spangled with starlight, breathing a cold winter wind.

All at once, the crying stopped. The silence terrified her. She was too late … too late …

She woke with a start. The ceiling above her was made of white acoustical tiles, their pattern sharp and bright after the hazy quality of her dream.

The hospital.

There was a man standing by her window. Her first thought was Julian—but then she noticed that he was wearing a white coat.

He turned toward her, and she saw that it wasn’t Dr. Penn. It was the other one—what was his name? He was a tall man, with longish blond hair and a nice fac

e. He reminded her of an aged version of that actor from Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. Jeff Bridges, that was his name. It disgusted her that she could remember an actor’s name, and practically none of her own life.

“You need a haircut. ” The words just popped out of her mouth, and she winced. What on earth had made her say that to this man?

He ran a hand through his shaggy hair and smiled, but it was a sad smile, and she wondered why he looked so … forlorn. “Yeah, I suppose I do. My … wife cuts my hair. ”

When he spoke, it sent a shiver through her. “You’re the voice,” she said softly.

He pulled up a chair and sat down beside her bed. He stared at her boldly, without apology, and there was something in his eyes—a yearning, maybe—that made her want to touch him. But that was crazy; she didn’t even know him.

“What voice?” he said at last.

“When I was asleep, I heard you. ”

He smiled again. “I didn’t know if you’d be able to. It seemed like I talked forever. ”

Forever. That word again. It teased her, tickled some forgotten chord. “Who are you?” she asked.