Like Moonlight on Water: Chapter 17
Flailing in the Deep
My friends, thank you for the encouraging messages these past few weeks! If you’re interested in the writing process and why this particular batch of 3,000 words was such a challenge, I’ve included a voice note at the bottom. 🤓🎙
And if you’re just joining us…welcome!
Like Moonlight on Water is the sequel to my speculative women’s fiction novel Daughters of Men. Spoilers await, but who cares? Pretend it’s Season 2 of that TV show everyone’s been talking about.✨
Flailing in the Deep
The woman was failing. Failing to learn anything useful. Failing to communicate openly. Failing to balance her responsibilities…and failing her daughter. Where once he had believed she was uniquely equipped to handle such a stressful situation—though really, what human is prepared for extraterrestrials to commandeer their life’s purpose?—she instead flitted between worrying about taking the child shopping for clothes and surreptitiously questioning him about dual-time and how many realities his kind existed in.
Not that her lack of focus was intentional. He was sure she was trying. Her efforts at meditation and timed naps had produced a few notable experiences.
His lips pursed. Notably negative experiences. From what personal details she had shared, most of her interactions with those she had come to call “alt-Adams” were so disturbing that Sal had distributed facial tissues throughout the house. Even hours after waking, she would suddenly tear up and either reach for her child or, now, a tissue.
Eileen preferred when her mother grabbed a tissue.
The first days back at school had not been easy ones for the child. Psychological development for adolescent humans was always fraught with missteps and extremes—and had Eileen been a normal child she would have benefited from her modulators’ calibrations.
Instead, every school-day drama was a tragicomedy in the making. Unbeknownst to Lila, he had slipped into the teachers’ lounge twice on Monday, and prevented Eileen from being expelled on Tuesday. After observing humans for thousands of years, only this child could make him laugh and want to electrocute himself with lightning at the same time.
As if he could. His modulators prevented him from intentionally attracting that much energy to his body. A fail-safe, apparently. Nikola had been most disappointed. And quite aggrieved when Sal refused to generate storms to increase the likelihood of random strikes.
And yet, this week’s weather was proof of Sal’s hypocrisy. And convenient in regards to Lila’s wardrobe selections. High-necked garments hid the worst of her injuries and makeup disguised the rest. But as of this morning the temperature had climbed in pace with the rising sun—and now one more misery compounded her others.
At least the clothing shop had a functional cooling system. Wasteful, but functional. Perhaps he could make some adjustments while he installed the lighting for tomorrow’s event. And perhaps…perhaps the child should assist. There was time enough to begin in the morning, and Eileen would learn more from him than well-meaning but ill-equipped instructors. It should not even require effort to persuade her to forgo school. He rather suspected she now regretted her insistence on attending—or, at least, her lack of autonomy once there.
Yes, time spent learning a practical skill—and, if he was careful, a trick or two with the modulators—would be better for everyone. And Lila could keep her occupied afterwards, freeing him to add caramelized pear and rosemary canapés to the event menu. Very nice.
Eileen was hopefully minding herself this afternoon. Her homework had been completed before he left, but her heart beat calmly in the periphery of his mind. She must have discovered the new sketchpad and compressed charcoal he had slipped into her schoolbag. He would have brought the child with him to the church, but, other than limiting his ingredients, she had no interest in culinary matters. And he rather enjoyed working alone in the large kitchen.
He liked the conductive stainless steel surfaces and commercial-grade appliances—and he particularly liked the weight of the knife in his hand. Chop, rock, slice…rhythmic movements that created orderly piles from the chaos of fruits, vegetables, and fungi before him. For several minutes he lost himself in his prep work, but gradually a susurration of voices drew his attention.
Amplifying his hearing, he isolated six females murmuring in near unison. The fine hairs on his arms lifted at their fervent words and he found himself drawn to a closed room down the hall. Prayers. Prayers for God to help a friend in need. Through the glass set in the door, he watched the circle of women, their poses a reflection of both piety and joy.
Young Tessa was among them. Eyes closed and with a smile lifted to the ceiling, she begged her god even as she rejoiced.
“Please touch him, God. You surround us in Your glorious light, but he’s lost in his darkness. Thank You, Lord, thank You, for leading him out of his darkness. Please take his hand and he’ll see Your light! Thank You, God!”
“Prayer’s a powerful thing.”
Sal started as the pastor joined him.
“God hears all prayers,” the man continued, “and answers them.” He peered into the room and placed a hand on the door as if he could feel the women’s energy.
“How can you believe that?” Sal asked. “Cruelty and tragedy abounds in this world.”
“He is a good man.” The pastor’s other hand covered his heart. “Trusted his doctor, who trusted a broken system. He doesn’t want to be an addict. He wants to take care of his children the way he used to.”
Sal frowned at Tessa’s beatific expression. “If there is a god, he ignores more prayers than he answers.”
“Or sends others to listen for Him.” The pastor smiled and patted Sal’s shoulder as he turned away. “Jerry was down by the parking deck this morning. Sleeps at the bridge most nights.”
“Mom!” Eileen hooked her thumb toward the woman at the register. “Child labor laws, remember?”
I hurried over, a cheerful laugh bubbling out from long practice. “Sorry about that! Not sure where my head is this afternoon.”
The woman returned my smile, as polite adults do, and passed me the necklace and earrings she’d chosen. “Would you mind wrapping these? My daughter’s birthday is tomorrow.”
“Of course!” Eager to make up for my poor service, I made an effort at small talk while I wrapped, then pulled a goodie bag from the stash behind the counter. “Here’s a little something for you, too. We’d love to see you at our customer appreciation party tomorrow night—but birthday festivities are more important!”
Eileen appeared at my elbow and beamed at the woman. “Moms make every birthday perfect.”
The customer’s lip curled at her oozing sweetness, and I grabbed another goodie bag.
“Wish your daughter a happy birthday from us! Thanks for shopping at The Urban Nymph!”
When the door chimes stilled, my child and I faced each other. Her mouth was set in a tight line that I knew mirrored mine, but her large brown eyes were dark and unreadable.
“This has to stop.” I was surprised my voice sounded calm.
“She asked you for help twice. I helped the last lady, too.”
“What lady?”
“You were staring out the window for half an hour.”
“I was cleaning the window, and that’s no excuse for—”
“Cleaning? With what?” She bent and poked around under the counter, popping back up with the squirt bottle and cloth. “With these?”
She shoved them at me, and I frowned at the very clean, very dry cloth. I could still smell the citrusy-vinegar scent of the cleanser in my nostrils…couldn’t I? I set the supplies down and tugged at my sweater. Were my armpits damp from working up a sweat, or from roasting near a sunny window?
My heart beat sluggishly in my chest, and I had the urge to go back to sleep. But I hadn’t been asleep…I’d been at the window…
“If you’re going to keep lying, you need to get better at it.”
Eileen grabbed her sketchpad from the stool and flipped it to reveal a young girl’s hauntingly-rendered portrait.
“Honey, that’s…incredible!” Maternal pride squashed my confusion. “I can’t believe how good you are after only—”
“I didn’t draw her.”
My fingertips started to tingle. “Sal…?”
“No.”
I licked my lips, suddenly parched in my heat envelope of wool yarn. “Who?” I croaked.
“You really don’t remember?”
My head turned left, then right. I was afraid even to blink as I tried to remember. Sal had brought her to the shop after school. I’d helped a couple of customers…I’d turned from the window…
Eileen broke eye contact first. “We were talking about my birthday…”
“Oh, sw—”
“Don’t.” She fixed me again with an all-too-adult stare. “Don’t try to make this okay.”
A low buzz rose in my ears, and I shook my head again. My daughter’s face tilted—or I did—and she thrust the sketchpad at me.
“Is this me?”
“What? No!”
The buzzing stopped.
My automatic reassurance sounded confident, but the drawing horrified and fascinated me. The similarities in the shape of the eyes…the bow of the upper lip. But I’d never seen the black energies around Eileen. And this girl, this child smudged and outlined in thick charcoal…suffered. Darting black orbs, ebony slashes and jabs and streaks, surged across her features like a horde of tiny demons—leaving only her eyes—her shockingly green eyes—unscathed.
“It is, isn’t it? This is what you see when you look at me.”
I looked up to see a tear trembling on Eileen’s cheek and dropped the pad.
“No, angel. No.” I pulled her close and breathed her in, kissing her temple because somehow she’d grown too tall for me to kiss the top of her head. “I promise.”
“Then who is it?” she snuffled, “I didn’t even know you could draw!”
“I can’t, sweetheart.”
She stiffened, and a wave of love curled me around her.
“It’s going to be okay, honey. We’ll figure th—”
“Stop!” She shoved me back. “What do you mean you can’t draw? I watched you! You think I’m lying? You’re the liar!”
“No, honey! That’s n—”
Eileen snatched the pad from the floor and shook it in my face. “This is me, isn’t it?!”
“Honey, you need to calm—”
“Calm down?!
“Eileen, just listen, honey! You don’t even have green eyes!”
“What?!”
I sucked in a breath and tried again, “I’ve never seen this girl before. Period, full stop.”
Her sudden silence was a gift, and as the energy between us shifted and dissipated, I sighed in relief. But then, for the first time in her life, my daughter backed away from me—not in a moody rage or childish annoyance—but in fear.
“’Leenie?” I reached for her again, but she slipped around the other side of the counter and pushed the now-rumpled, smudged picture toward me.
“How do you know the color of her eyes?”
I glanced down, and for a second the strokes seemed like random marks on paper. I blinked, and the illusion of a face coalesced again. Charcoal dust and a few stray crumbles littered the textured surface of the heavyweight paper—white defined by black and gray.
“I don’t know how to draw.” It felt important to say that again.
“You said Mimi taught you. You were teaching me…at first.”
We both heard the longing laced in her fear, and she looked behind her as if checking for an eavesdropping customer. But the shop held only us, insulated from passersby outside. Just a vulnerable thirteen-year-old and a hopelessly inept, amnesiac, screwed-up mother.
“Must’ve been strange?” I tried a soft joke, “You’ve known more than me since you learned to read.”
“It was…nice.” She toyed with the edge of the sketchpad, and my hands slid across the counter, meeting her halfway.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart.” That was more important than all the questions I wanted to ask. “Please don’t be afraid of me.”
She shrugged, eyes down. “I’m not.”
“I would be, sweetie. If my mom was going nuts and there were aliens and weird shit happening. Especially if I was as smart as you.”
Her teeth worked her bottom lip.
“I love you, honey.” My fingertips touched hers. “We’ll get through this. You and me.”
Eileen nodded. “Is this what Mimi looked like at my age?”
“I’m not sure, honey. I don’t have many photographs of her.” That I remembered anyway.
“Sal will know.”
Disconcerting, but true.
Finally, her hands accepted mine, and I tried not to squeeze as hard as I wanted to. It was enough to feel her warmth and see…dirt? I flipped her palms upward.
“You’re filthy!”
“Duh.” She dipped her head toward an assortment of charcoal sticks I hadn’t noticed.
“My hands are clean.” I frowned at her, and she yanked free.
“Seriously? I’m not the liar, remember?” She rolled her eyes and pointed to the back of the store. “You washed them. And fixed your hair.”
My mouth flopped open as I patted my head. Sure enough, the hair that usually hung around my face was gathered in a rough, chunky clip. I worked it free and stared at the foreign object in my palm.
“Seashells?” I grimaced.
“It looked…pretty.” Eileen rattled the basket of hair accessories by the register, and I dropped it in.
“Touristy, though.”
“Yeah.” She managed a small grin. “Not you.”
Her observation hung between us until I finally asked what I was most afraid to know.
“How long was I…not myself?”
She shrugged and glanced behind her again.
“It’s just us, honey. It’s okay.” Listening Servants already know.
“About an hour, I guess.” A faint flush of pink blossomed on her cheeks. “I was being kind of…” Her shoulders lifted again. “You didn’t get mad.”
Definitely not me, then. “What about?”
“Um, you know…my birthday. Family.”
I tensed. “And…?”
“And you listened.” She fiddled with a stick of charcoal. “You said you would talk to Adam. Try to fix things. You said it was supposed to be different.”
“Well.” I swallowed hard. “Now that’s some bullshit.”
Her eyes widened, and I added a derisive snort for good measure.
“We’ll see what Sal has to say about all this. Damn aliens broke my brain.”
She frowned, and I grinned.
“One mother is enough, don’t you think?”
My daughter was too intelligent not to recognize a lame attempt to infuse humor into drama, but one side of her mouth quirked upward.
“So!” I flipped the sketchpad closed. “The party’s tomorrow and I still need to clean the windows—for real this time. How about checking on the flowers for me?
The child joined him on the sidewalk outside the flower shop.
“Stalker,” she greeted. “Why didn’t you do something?”
“What help could I have provided?”
“Okay…so you’re useless. Good to know.” The sarcasm contradicted her pounding heart, and he extended his hand to her thin shoulder.
“Her brain is not broken, young one. She will learn to control her abilities.”
Eileen glared at his hand, and he withdrew it.
“Do you know what may have triggered her?” he asked. “The Servants will review what they recorded, but if you recollect anyth—”
“Weren’t you watching?” Confusion replaced her irritation. “Couldn’t you hear us talking?”
“I arrived after you confronted her.”
Eileen’s eyes narrowed, and Sal pressed his lips together—hoping she would do the same. I heard your call. I came as quickly as I could. The Servants must not know.
If she received his thoughts, she gave no indication. Perhaps heightened emotion was necessary to initiate this as-yet-unexplained telepathy. He had surmised their shared modulators enabled some sort of quantum-level connection, but perhaps…perhaps it was a talent only Lila’s daughter possessed.
“Mom didn’t draw that picture for me,” she declared.
“You stated that she was teaching y—”
“Don’t be stupid, alien.” Eileen turned away. “She’s trying to tell herself something.”
Lila was, indeed, trying to tell herself something. When Sal entered the store, the sketchpad was open again and her lips moved as if in silent conversation with the portrait.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
She started, eyes wide at finding him before her. He noted her dry, flushed face and sighed.
“You are dehydrated again.”
He went to the thermostat and laid a finger on the digital panel. Instantly, the compressor fans hummed and the air handler pushed chilled air through overhead ductwork. Mesmerized again by the drawing, Lila did not react, though her hair stirred in the artificial breeze.
Eileen’s backpack held an empty water bottle, and after refilling it in the small lavatory, he set it on the counter.
“Drink,” he commanded.
It was not yet five o’clock, but he reversed the sign and locked the door. He heard Hester regaling Eileen with a colorful story from her youth, and the child’s heart rate had steadied. Just as with Madeline so many decades ago, Hester’s enthusiasm for life brightened the darkness. He was…grateful.
Turning back, he considered the unremarkable scene. The pad of paper fixed in place by Lila’s gaze. The afternoon sun glinting in her eyes. The antique cash register aglow like molten gold instead of tooled brass. Dust motes sparkling and drifting in the slanted sunbeams. Nothing that would indicate why she had Wandered for some minutes before taking charcoal to paper.
“What do you remember?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she sighed. “I don’t even remember talking to her after you left.”
That surprised him. “You were…not present? All afternoon?”
She traced the portrait’s right eyelid and then wondered at the black transferred to her fingertip. “I thought this was Mimi, at first.”
“Eileen saw herself in the features.”
Lila turned her head slightly, a breath trapped in her bruised throat. She knew there was another girl who had shared genetic traits with her daughter. One who might have been beleaguered by the…things…only Lila could see. The Servants would deduce this as well.
“You drew Aislyn.”
Lila’s eyes closed, and she still held that one stale breath.
“Have you ever met Aislyn? In your transits?”
Her mouth shaped a silent no.
“Eileen thinks you are trying to tell yourself something, and…” he chose his words carefully, “I believe the Servants will agree.” Tell me something that we can use. “Why do you think a fractal was so determined to—”
“Because she’s a good mother.”
Lila opened her eyes and closed the sketchpad.
While she cleaned the windows, Sal leaned against the door and watched. His earlier assessment had been too lenient. She was not simply failing, she was flailing. Drowning, like when her fractal abandoned her in the ocean. Drowning like a child clinging to her father’s bloated corpse.
She had known how to swim. Once.
Or perhaps…another Lila had.
Why this chapter took so dang long to write…
Thank you for reading and listening!
I’m curious if you’d like to share…
Have you ever found yourself in an unreal (or surreal) situation? Did you struggle to reclaim normalcy as quickly as possible…or did you embrace the weird? 👽💫
Chapter 18, “A Lightening” is next…