Like Moonlight on Water: Chapter 3
Hidden Things
If you’re a new subscriber, welcome! I’m releasing Like Moonlight on Water in installments, and you might like to start here. —Jennifer
Hidden Things
I left Eileen’s room quietly, after untwisting her sheets and listening to her breathe. She was deeply and peacefully asleep, and her energy blanketed me like I was the child needing comfort. In the past weeks I’d gotten used to sleeping beside her on the cramped bed, and when Sal had returned to us—when I’d realized he would protect her—I’d asked him to stay. Waking beside her had helped me cope with the nightmares. I eased her door shut with a slow creak. Except now I knew they weren’t nightmares.
My hands slid under my shirt again, holding my stomach as I struggled to recall my Eileen kicking and stretching, sleeping and growing, until she finally decided she was ready to be born. I sagged against the wall. In fact, giving birth had nearly killed me. And when Sal had intervened, he’d altered my memories…and then, apparently, my own brain had rewritten them again. But now, every night, new wretched, distorted memories joined the others jostling around in my subpar cerebral tissue.
The Adam from tonight—the Adam in some parallel world I’d touched while sleeping—that man ached for the child we’d lost. And now I did too. Even though she was sound asleep on the other side of this thin wall. He hadn’t believed me. I’d seen it on his face, seen the despair beneath his loving tenderness. His wife was crazy and he loved her anyway.
I shivered and pushed myself upright. The dark house felt hollow and still as if forgotten by the sun. Back in my bedroom, I checked the time on my phone. Not even six yet. I could sleep for another hour if I dared.
Not a chance in hell. But I laid down and pulled the puffy covers up to my chin. The house was silent. Even the wrens and sparrows weren’t chirping to announce the new day. A lighter shade of black filled my windows—one, two, three—but dawn still seemed lifetimes away.
Probably not the best observation, considering. I turned my head, but the mirror over my dresser gleamed like polished obsidian—or a portal to another dimension. I closed my eyes and inhaled slowly through my nose and out through my mouth, feeling the expansion and contraction of my ribs and abdomen—but realized I was cradling my belly. I groaned and plopped my arms on top of the covers just as a flicker of light at the ceiling caught my eye. I sucked in a breath. Please, please, please…
One spark appeared, then a dozen, then more than I could count, each brilliantly white and infinitely small. You’re back, I sighed; and as if responding to my relief, their movements synchronized and coalesced into a miniature galaxy of stars spiraling around an unseen heavenly body.
An object vibrated at my hip and I yelped. Some of the angels sputtered as if laughing at me while I dug my phone from beneath the bedding. It was a text message. From Adam.
Are you awake?
The moral response would’ve been no response. To have called back during socially acceptable hours and talked with Cara, too. Or I could’ve told myself that I was so grateful to see my angels that I didn’t want to ignore their message again, as if that truth would absolve me. But a memory of Adam grinning as he flipped pancakes flashed to his hand reaching back to help me up a rocky trail flashed to my hand grasping his as three lives bled away in that overturned car.
Yes, I typed.
My phone rang, and I answered without speaking. The angels flared and then settled back into their tidal dance.
“I didn’t wake you?” Adam asked.
“No.”
“Couldn’t sleep?”
My mouth worked to shape an answer. “Watching angels.”
I heard a smile in his sigh.
“Good. Eileen said you hadn’t seen them the past few days.”
She knew? “It’s that way. Sometimes.” My voice caught at the end, and some of the sparks winked out. I cleared my throat. “What’s up? How’s Cara feeling?”
“Better, I thi—” He was cut off by a wet-sounding smack, followed by the unmistakable gurgle of a happy baby with a warm bottle.
Now it was my turn to smile. “Somebody’s an early riser like his daddy.”
“We don’t sleep much.”
God, how I remembered. Or at least, I thought I did.
“How did you do it?” he asked.
“The miracle of caffeine.”
He was silent for a moment while little Traveler sucked and burbled. The angels grew erratic and fitful.
“I talked to Ms. Bell,” he said.
“Who—oh, Miss Hester! How’s sh—”
“You didn’t tell me your grandmother died the day before you had Eileen.”
“Sounds like y’all had a cheerful conversation.”
He sighed. “Don’t do that. Please.”
“I’m surprised she remembered. She’s not exactly a spring chicken anymore, though you’d never know it by—”
“The woman who raised you died, Lila. And you nearly died in labor the next d—” I must have made a noise, because he rushed now, “Eileen told me Sal was there. And you told me your husband was killed in a car crash that same day.”
My fake-memory husband who’d fake-served me with fake divorce papers the day after his fake death. The aliens had been busy with that one.
“Lila, he was there and then he left you alone.”
“Who?” Feigning confusion wasn’t a challenge.
“What do you remember?” A strange note of pleading crept into his question. “You’ve been alone since she was born, and—”
“Are you feeling okay?” I interrupted, sharpening my voice. “What’s wrong?”
“Noth—”
“Because you didn’t call me before dawn to talk about being a single parent.”
And just like that, the angels disappeared.
“Not to be a jerk or anything,” I rolled onto my side and curled into a ball. “But you don’t sound like yourself.” He sounded exactly like himself. “How long has it been since you’ve slept?”
After what felt like an eternity, the strained silence was broken by a loud baby belch.
“Eileen has a birthday soon.” Adam’s words sounded forced. “And I’d like to—”
“I haven’t planned a party yet, but we’d love for y’all to come.”
“Right. Sure.” His tone softened at a contented sigh from little Traveler, “I just…I’d like to take her out on the boat or something. It doesn’t have to be on her birthday.”
Sal had been right. Adam sensed it. Somehow.
My finger traced the memory of salt on my lips. Hazel eyes, green with tears, had implored me to remember. To mourn with him. To love fervently and passionately because she had been created from that same love, and that’s how we survived…together. A soundless cry twisted my body in a knot so tight I thought my bones would break.
“Lila?”
Tell him! Tell him!
My own voice screamed in my head, but I couldn’t do that to him! And so I shoved the phone under my pillow and sucked air in and out until my throat was my own again. And then did what I had to do.
“Sorry…bad connection.” My fingers gripped the phone like claws, but I spoke carefully and cheerfully. “That sounds like fun! She’d love it.”
Silence. Not even baby noises. Then, “I’m worried about her.”
“She’s—”
“I’m worried about both of you. And I know it’s not my place.” With perfect timing, his baby uttered a fitful little cry. “And I know you don’t need me to tell you,”—sounds of rhythmic patting contrasted with the urgency in his voice—“but something’s wrong. She’s different.”
I started to say something pithy about aliens and teenage hormones, but he was more right than he knew. For some reason, Eileen hadn’t told him about her modulators.
“I’m not trying to interfere,” he insisted. “But she kept sending these texts tonight—and wouldn’t answer when I called.”
“Tonight was rough,” I admitted. “I’m sorry she spread the drama.”
“Lila, it’s more than that; and you know it.”
“Yeah, I do know it. She wants to go back to school and—”
“And you want her to stay with him. While you pretend everything’s normal and go back to work.”
I curled up in a ball again. “Nothing is normal, Adam.”
“Lila, I’m not saying that to be an asshole. It just doesn’t make sense.”
The room had grown lighter. Dawn had finally come.
“Sal just got back,” I lied. “And I need to get ready.”
“So he has a key now.”
“Pretty sure he doesn’t need one.”
“Don’t trust him, Lila! I know they’re listening and I don’t give a damn. You cannot trust him.”
“I have to go.”
“Lil—”
“Thank you for being her friend. She needs you.” I hung up before I said I needed him, too.
A promising warmth accompanied the pink glow at my windows, but the day ahead seemed as dark as the night. Six minutes after six. I reset my alarm for tomorrow—and moodily searched my library for a new wake-up song. Nina Simone was too hopeful. I changed the setting to random and tossed the phone on the nightstand. Surprise me, I dared the universe.
Nothing to do now, except get the hell up.
I shrugged into my robe and plodded into the living room. Sal was sitting at the kitchen table looking out the window.
“Jesus, Sal. Don’t you knock?”
His head swiveled, eyebrows raised. “You told Adam that I did not need a key.”
I stalked over and lowered my voice. “That was a private conversation.”
Unfazed, he offered me one of the two steaming mugs waiting on the table. “There are no private conversations,” he said quietly. “As Adam mentioned.”
A retort died on my tongue as I studied his clear gray eyes. Morning’s soft light added an apricot warmth to his golden features, but his gaze was cool. Waiting to see what the stupid human said next. I sank into a chair and gestured toward Eileen’s room.
“She is asleep,” he confirmed.
I wrapped my hands around the mug and winced as my scars reacted to the hot pottery. Fingertips only…much better. Damned if I’d ask how he’d made coffee without me hearing him.
Finally he spoke. “I have been here for hours. You did not see me, in the dark, but I was sitting here.”
“Peeping Tom,” I muttered.
A hint of a smile lifted one cheek. “My sight is only slightly better than yours, now.” The amusement faded. “But my hearing is still exceptional.”
“Sal…don’t.”
He raised his mug. “Would you like to know what I did last night?” He sipped, watching me through a wisp of steam.
“Shower and a laundromat?” He was wearing the same clothes, without a trace of mud anywhere to be seen. On impulse, I glanced under the table. “And a little shopping. Wrong time of year for boots, isn’t it?”
He lifted his shoulders. “They suit the bike.”
I nodded sagely, “Of course. Eileen will be so pleased.” Whatever game he was playing, I wouldn’t be the one to blink first.
“You are not drinking your coffee.”
“I need to brush my teeth.” But I didn’t move to get up.
“And your hair.”
“Okay, fine.” I rolled my eyes. “What did you do after you left? Either time, or both. I’m all ears.”
Surprisingly, he frowned down at his coffee before answering me; but just as I opened my mouth again he looked up.
“After cleansing, I entered dual-time.” His voice was level, neutral, but a red flush appeared above the V in his t-shirt. “I do not believe that I have explained that process to you, yet?”
I shook my head, glancing from his still-steaming coffee to mine, now only comfortably warm to my scars. I’d made him mad. Again.
“My kind needs very little sleep. Our modulators constantly repair our bodies, and sleep is more akin to a…psychological reset than a physical requirement.”
“Do you dream?” Beads of sweat had popped out around his hairline; but he lifted his mug and drank again, eyes unblinking above the rim. “Right, okay. No questions until you finish.” I swigged my own coffee and made a face at the mix of deliciousness and mouth scum.
“We need very little sleep,” he repeated, “but when we must, it is a signal to the Servants that they may access our modulators and…coordinate us. Our bodies are immobilized. Our hearts stop beating. Our lungs contract with a final exhalation. Every muscle is stilled…but electrochemical reactions continue.” He evaluated what must’ve been a blank expression on my face. “Synapses fire. Our brains are active.”
My mouth was suddenly too dry to swallow; the mug too heavy for my hands.
“With so few of us left,” he continued, “synchronizing across realities is simpler than it used to be. Entanglement can be achieved within one hour if we are each compliant.”
My head swung side-to-side in denial of the torture he called sleep.
“After…our thoughts merge.” His brow furrowed again, as if puzzling out how to translate advanced physics to an amoeba. “Experiences, emotions, observations…all are shared amongst us. But the process is imperfect.”
“That sounds hor—”
He silenced me with a gesture, the red flush racing up his neck to his face. “Once our modulators entangle, our brains function as one. There is no separation of thought—or self.” An emotion I didn’t recognize flashed in his eyes and then vanished. “It helps to compose our thoughts before the process begins, so that information we believe to be most important is prevalent in our minds. The technique facilitates sharing of pertinent information.”
His voice was now as taut as the tendons in his hands, and I wondered whether his control or the pottery would shatter first.
“So you choose what to share.” That’s how you lie to each other. I knew they lied. He’d admitted it during our…experience. He’d told me that his servants—the others—couldn’t know about him giving Eileen his own modulators.
“Sometimes what is most prevalent is simply that which arouses the strongest emotions in one of us. While we are linked, our modulators do not regulate emotion—the echo effect nearly killed us all the first time.”
I felt my heart skip a beat. “So, if you’re worried, for example…”
“So, when one of us has committed murder, rape, genocide, or worse…this is their opportunity to relish it. To remember the vivid details and savor their rage and lust, to delight in their hatred of humans. And we all experience it together. As our own.”
My stomach lurched, and he nodded.
“Dual-time is unpleasant.” The mild term contradicted the rivulet of sweat running from his right temple. “The physical trauma abates once the Servants release our modulators, allowing them to repair our bodies and restore normal function. But the sense of…violation…persists. Even after eighty-seven thousand, four hundred, and sixty-six events.”
