Chapter One
Ten months ago…
Delaney
Silence startles me awake. Oh my God, I fell asleep. What have I done?
“Mom?” My call is loud, but I keep my tone as calm as possible so as not to frighten her.
I race through the small house and frantically search for my mother.
“Mom?” This time, fear taints the sound of my voice.
How could I do this? I’ve learned through experience that falling asleep during the day is dangerous.
A hint of relief soothes me a bit when I find the front and back doors closed with the security locks on. My racing pulse settles down some. Except when I get to our breezeway, my lungs tighten, and my heart pounds like it’s trying to escape out of my chest.
The door is open.
I run through it, my hands shaking. I search for Mom outside, moving my head from one direction to another, desperate to find her.
“Mom? Where are you?” Now, I’m shrieking. “Ouch!” Damn rock.
I forgot to put on shoes, but there’s no going back to remedy that. There’s no time to waste in my attempts to locate her.
I scan the immediate area and run through neighbors’ yards searching for her. As the minutes pass by with no sign of her, my anxiety rises.
“Please, God, don’t let her have gone near the pond.”
Tears stream down my face. I glance at my watch to see how long I think I was asleep. It was about half an hour.
Working until four a.m. each night when I need to be up with Mom by eight has caught up with me. How could I be careless enough not only to forget the security lock on the breezeway door, but to allow myself to doze off?
I run to the area where the retention pond is and scour the landscape, relieved when there’s no sign of her here. The fatalist in me taunts that maybe I don’t see her because she’s in the water, and my chest constricts with terror.
No! I refuse to entertain the thought.
I’m not sure which direction to go, but instinct tells me to head toward the path we walk most days to get her evening ice cream. I run that route and pass Mrs. Nicker’s house. As usual, she’s out in her flower beds. She’s a blur as I speed past her. After another fifteen feet, my brain registers that there were two people there, not only Mrs. Nicker. I stop and turn around. Relief washes over me when I see my mom sitting on a stool in the garden with Mrs. Nicker.
I run over to them, and Mom looks up from the daisies she was peering at. Her eyes widen at my intrusion into her afternoon.
There’s no indication she recognizes me.
A visceral squeezing grips my chest. On the days that Mom doesn’t know who I am, even though I’m aware it’s from the disease, it makes my heart ache. It frightens me, too. These times are happening more often.
I take a deep breath and let it out while I school my expression, so my panic doesn’t show and scare Mom.
“Hi. I’m Delaney. What’s your name?”
I observe her to see if her memory seems sparked, but it doesn’t happen. She confirms this with her actions that follow. She turns her head to look at Mrs. Nicker as if seeking permission to speak to me.
Mrs. Nicker nods at her.
“It’s okay, Hattie. Delaney is a nice young lady. You can talk to her.”
Mrs. Nicker glances at me, and she can’t hide the sympathetic frown she’s wearing.
“Hi, honey. I was just getting ready to bring her back. She’s been here about five minutes, and I figured you would be looking for her.”
