“Thank you,” I reply, before adding, “Wait. You said the cover was on it?”
He nods. “You just worry about getting well, okay?”
“I will, thanks again, Dale. And thank Tony for me,” I murmur, as Wyatt walks Dale out of the room to say goodbye. I watch them from my bed, can see they’re talking but can’t hear anything.
“I don’t know how the cover got on it,” I say once Wyatt returns. It’s disturbing, because the cover was absolutelynoton the painting when I passed out. If I didn’t cover it, and Dale and Tony didn’t…then who did?
“Cover?” he repeats, but he’s distracted. Running his hand through his hair the way he does when he’s thinking through a problem. I wonder what he and Dale were discussing.
“Never mind. It’s not important.” I turn to the PA. “So, when can I get out of here?”
“Waiting on some blood work, and then you’re cleared to go.Home,” she adds, with some emphasis. “This pregnancy needs to be your number one priority. At least for the next couple of days.”
“Naturally,” Wyatt says, nodding. His mouth is tight when he smiles at me. “Number one priority, right, Tilly?”
I nod and murmur yes, understanding that’s the correct answer. But my thoughts stray back to Room D. To the Leclerc. To the inexplicable tendril I decide to keep to myself for now, at least until I have a reasonable explanation.
A short time later, after I’m discharged and am changing back into my dress, I see something curious on my stomach. A small purplish bruise, dime-size and in the shape of a circle.
—
That night I dream of Charlotte Leclerc. She’s in a lab coat, covered in luna moths, whose wings beat softly, in unison. We’re in a cold, gray cinder-block room—a single metal gurney in its center.
“Where are we?” I whisper, then notice a disembodied hand on the gurney. Holding a…paintbrush? Suddenly, the hand comes to life, dipping the bristles into the pool of blood under it. Sinew and skin hang from the stump, flapping with the motion. Disgust fills me, and I recoil.
“Follow me,” Leclerc says, her voice different from what I expect. Low and deep, but crystal clear. I’m grateful to follow her, to leave the macabre hand behind.
With a single finger she beckons, down a long, dark hallway lined with steel doors, each bearing a symbol. A one-handed clock. A broken matchstick. A tipped-over hourglass. Then a shattered mirror. When I look into it, my eyes go wide. The shriek burns my throat but is halted at my lips, which are curved into a smile. The moths flutter chaotically, a stomach-churning kaleidoscope in the fragmentedmirror. A metal name tag is pinned on my white lab coat, iridescent in the darkness.Dr. Charlotte Leclerc.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” this image of me says. “We’ve been waiting.”
Who’s been waiting? For what?My mind screams, but my face—Charlotte’s face—bears no sign of alarm.
There’s a sudden pressure behind my eye, dull but relentless. I blink, then press my fingers against it. Something’s tickling my eyelid from the inside, pushing into my fingers. Slowly, I let my hand drop as a tendril—the tendril—pulses from the inner corner of my eye. Making the white sclera bulge as it resists. The tendril stretches farther, as though reaching toward the mirror, about to make contact and—
—
My watch wakes me up, buzzing due to my sudden elevation in heart rate. I rip it off my wrist. My throat burns, like I have a bad case of strep. Swallowing convulsively, I force myself to breathe deeply through my nose.It’s just a dream, Tilly. Just a dream.Eventually I fall back asleep.
By the next morning—a Saturday—I’m exhausted from my sleepless night, but the bruise has faded to a barely noticeable yellow dot the size of a pea. By midday, around the same time my first NourishBox arrives, it has entirely disappeared. I’m glad, because that bruise unnerved me. Obviously enough to cause a nightmare, whose terror and details have been somewhat neutralized by the daylight.
The experience of the tendril has similarly dimmed. Still, lingering questions—my pregnancy, my mental state, the oddities of Charlotte Leclerc’s paintings—haunt me, resisting logic. I want to believe it a delusion, brought on by my supposed dehydration (yes, I know the recommendation is one cup of caffeinated coffee per day), which led to me passing out. Except therewasa mark left behind, even if it’s now gone.
My watch alerts me to the delivery I’ve been waiting for. I’m quick to open the front door, an overwhelming sense of anxiousness that if I don’t hurry someone might take it away.
The white box, with the sunshine-yellow font, sits outside my front door. Waiting forme—I can see my name printed on the label. At thesame moment the neighbor’s door opens. It’s Becca—she’s quite pregnant now, her stomach like a bowling ball inside the fabric of her dress. With some difficultly she bends, trying to pick up her own NourishBox. She hasn’t noticed me yet and is grunting with the effort.
“Becca, hey!” I walk over, enjoying the ease with which I can still move about. “Let me get that for you.”
I am supposed to be resting, as per doctor’s orders. Not doing anything strenuous for forty-eight hours. But being a good neighbor is important, and besides, I feel normal.
Crouching, only a slightly restrictive pressure of my waistband against my stomach, I pick up Becca’s NourishBox.
“Thank you, Tilly. You’re a sweetheart.” She then sees what’s on my doorstep, and her mouth forms into an O shape. Swatting playfully at my arm, Becca grins. “Congratulations are in order, I see. Wyatt must be thrilled!”
“He is. We are.” This is the narrative that plays out these days, if a pregnancy occurs: be sure the dad gets recognized for his efforts.
“Come on in for a minute. Can I get you anything? Tea?”
