I showered before Brian arrived home from work. It was a thorough cleaning from my head to my feet - especially my feet. Afterwards, I scrubbed the footprints off the carpets. I planned to tell Brian everything about my dream, except for the carpet; maybe later, but not now. For now, I’d prefer to think I had walked in my sleep, walked into my bedroom and moved the paper bird to where it now resided, walked outside into our backyard by the garden where Brian tossed the charcoal powder burned off by his grill.
I had inspected the area thoroughly after putting Rosie back to bed and found not a single footprint in the dirt, but maybe I had missed something.
Or perhaps the paper sky had drawn closer. Perhaps it was evolving from a dream into a reality. Perhaps someone, or something, wasn’t happy in its prison. Perhaps it wanted out.
I checked up on Rosie every few minutes, and each time I found her sleeping quietly. Brian arrived home at a little past six, and I sat him down seconds after he walked through the door.
I told him everything about my dream, and finished it off with the mystery of his moving origami bird creation.
“Think you might have sleepwalked? You did have the bird in your hand during your dream,” he said once I had finished.
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Still.” Brian looked toward Rosie’s room. I’m sure he could see the bird from where he sat. “It was a dream about the paper sky. They need to be taken seriously. You should tell my mother about it. Give her a call, she’s home.”
“Have you had any more dreams?” I asked him.
“About the paper sky? No. Not for a long time.”
“Brian, remember when we talked about the boy locked in the refrigerator? Remember how I was sure I was there and you said that I was the paper bird who led you to him? Remember that?”
“Like it was yesterday,” he replied.
“Why were you so certain of that? Why were you so sure I was the bird?”
Brian sighed and leaned back in his chair. He looked once again into Rosie’s room before he spoke.
“Because you told me, Lori. I’d forgotten about it. Truthfully, I tried to forget about it. I thought I was going nuts. I was just a kid remember. Anyhow, I heard your voice in my head afterwards. After I got the boy out safely, I heard your voice.”
“What did I say?”
He turned back to me. “You told me your name and…” Brian hesitated. “You told me you would need my help. You said he had found you and was coming for you. You said you needed my help to get out. No. Wait.”
Brian stood up suddenly. “That wasn’t it. You said something else.”
He put his hands to his forehead and rubbed hard. “What was it? What…?”
Brian brought down his hands and stared at me. “It doesn’t know love,” you said. “It doesn’t know love and…” His head turned to Rosie’s room, to the paper bird lying there.
“And I will need your help to defeat it.”
I thought I might be afraid of the night, afraid of the mysteries it held, but I wasn’t.
Charly came over that evening. There would be no talking of her dreamland, my paper sky, over the phone lines. No. This latest development required eye
and
hand contact. Something had happened in this dream world, something of concern.
An evil we had thought vanquished had returned. Charly was sure of it, and now so was I. The dream messages were a foretelling. My dream earlier in the day brought it all home.
The scarecrow was back. And he was stronger than ever.
I told Charly what I kept from her son. I told her about the footprints.
“Oh, Lori,” she said as her eyes filled with tears. “Such a burden you carry on your shoulders.”
“It’s up to me, isn’t it?” I asked.
“Yes, I think it is. I wish I knew more. I wish I could help, but I’m not strong enough. Your mother was the strong one, not me.”
“And he still got her,” I added. “Even as strong as she was, he still got her.”
“We don’t know that for sure, Lori.”
“I do.” I said. “When I go back there, the next time I see the scarecrow, I’m going to end it, once and for all. I’ll end it for those gone ahead and for those still here.”
As if on cue, Rosie started crying. “I’ll end it for my mother, my father, for you, for Brian, and for Rosie. Especially for Rosie. I don’t want her to ever have a nightmare.” I stood up to get my daughter.
“It knows of her, and for that it must be destroyed.”
Brian stayed up with me for the longest time. We lay in bed and talked about everything except the paper sky. We made love, a rarity on a weeknight. Afterwards, I insisted he try to get some sleep. It was after midnight when he finally dozed off, his arms wrapped around me, holding me close.
I watched him until I was certain he was sound asleep before I slowly backed out of his grasp. He mumbled something and then turned on his other side. I slithered out of bed and crept across the carpet to a chair, next to my closet, where I had laid out a set of clothes. I slipped on a pair of jeans and a flannel shirt that I had borrowed from Brian. Lastly, I slipped on wool socks and a new pair of tennis shoes. I didn’t know what the night held, but if I did find myself in the paper sky I would not be barefoot. I tiptoed through the bedroom door, down the hall, and into Rosie’s room.
My daughter slept soundly in her crib. I bent down and kissed her gently on her forehead.
If I should die before I wake.
“Remember me,” I whispered.
I glanced at the paper bird as I walked away. “Protect her,” I said.
Laying in bed, on my back, facing the ceiling, I thought about each of my journeys to the land of the paper sky. I had the sight, strong in my mother and strong in me. I had the ability to see things that others could not, to go to places others would never find. I thought it possible that at one time this power might have been a blessing. Now, it felt like a curse.
The light from the hallway grew dimmer, as I watched the room darken around me. A flickering of light and then it was gone, and I was in darkness, but not for long, not for long at all.
It didn’t surprise me when I returned to the paper sky that evening. What did surprise me was the location of my arrival. I found myself in the backyard of the house of my childhood, facing the field where I first saw the scarecrow. Everything was the same as before. The grass in our backyard was red. The trees around me were yellow, their leaves purple. I turned to my house. It was a riot of colors as it was when I first dreamt of this place.
It was then that I noticed that not everything was the same. I looked around me. There were no other houses in sight. The houses surrounding my home had vanished. In their place were fields, barren and dusty, stretching as far as I could see.
“Where am I?” I asked myself.
“Home,” said a voice from behind me.
I swiveled around. A girl stood behind me, too far away to see her face. “Who are you?”
The girl walked toward me. She had blond hair that fell across her shoulders. She wore a flowery dress and white sneakers on her feet. She looked to be around twelve years old. Her hands were behind her back.
She looked familiar as she stepped closer. “Where have I seen you before?”
“Nowhere,” she replied. “This is the first time we’ve met.”
Then she stood in front of me. “I have something for you. She brought her hands from behind her and held them out toward me. She opened her left hand and a flower appeared in it. Her right hand opened and revealed a rosary. I recognized both objects.
“Those are my mother’s. How did you get them?”
“I didn’t steal them, if that’s what you think. She gave them to me to give to you. She said they would help you.”
I moved closer to her. “When did she tell you that?”
“This morning,” the girl answered.
“That’s impossible. My mother passed away years ago.”
“Was your mother’s name Mary?”
“Yes, that’s her name.”
The girl had a puzzled look on her face. She stared at her hands for a few seconds, then her face broke into a smile.
“I think I got it,” she said. “Miss Mary told me that she was my grandmother. If you are her daughter, then you must be my mom.”
The girl lurched forward and hugged my waist. “Mom. I thought I’d never see you. He told me I would but I didn’t believe him. He lies so much.”
I stood in a state of shock. “You can’t be my daughter. My daughter is only two months old.”
The girl held me tight. “My dad told me that’s how old I was when you left us. He said I was just two months old.”
“When I left you? I never left you.” I could feel my heart pounding in my chest. “I’m dreaming, and when I wake up, we’ll be together again.”
She pulled away from me, just a little, and raised her face toward me. “But my grandmother told me this is where I’d find you. She gave me these gifts for you.” The girl held her hand in the air. “She said they would help you find the man who says he’s my friend, but I think he’s lying. He lies a lot.”
Her face, so familiar. I took the rosary and the flower from her hands. “You haven’t told me your name,” I said.
The girl looked around her before she spoke. “I lied to the man about my name. He lies to me so I lied to him,” she said in a voice barely above a whisper.
“I told him my name was Maggie, but my real name is Rosie. I like that better than Rose, don’t you, Mom?”
I felt faint. “Rosie? No. My daughter’s two months old.”
She ignored me. “Is this the house you grew up in? My dad’s shown me pictures of it. Of course it didn’t have all these colors. I like it better this way, don’t you?”
I dropped to my knees. “Rosie, what’s happening? Why are you here? Why are you older?”
“I visit here often, Mom. You look like her pictures. I should have seen that at first.” She slapped her hand against her forehead. “Silly me,” she said.
“I like this place,” she continued. “So many colors. And they change all the time. I never know what to expect.”
She put her hands to my face, moving them around as a blind person might do. “I don’t like the man though. He says he’s my friend, but I don’t believe him. He lies.”
“What does he look like, this man?” I asked her.
“Oh, different each time I see him. Sometimes he’s young, sometimes he’s old, sometimes he’s tall, sometimes he’s short. His face changes too, but his clothes always stay the same. Weird, huh?”
“A red plaid shirt, jeans, and work boots?”
“Yep. That’s him all right. I always know when he’s around, even when I can’t see him.”
I could barely feel her hands. Her touch was as light as a feather. “How do you know that?”
She brought a hand to her nose and pinched it. “His smell,” she said. “He smells like smoke.”
“Is he here now?” I asked.
“Not now. I can smell him when he gets near, but I’m sure he’s around here someplace. He’s never far away.”
A sadness swept over me, as strong a sensation as I ever had. “You can’t be Rosie. She’s just a baby. You’re too old to be her.”
“I know you’re my mom. I know from the picture of you in my room, next to the bird,” she replied.
I nearly fell backward. “The bird?”
“The paper bird that Dad made a long time ago. Do you remember it?”
I knew then. “How old are you, Rosie?”
“Twelve, born on June the second, but you knew that, right?”
The sadness gave way to fear, “Yes, I knew that. Rosie when I left you minutes ago, you were only two months old. You were a baby.” I shook my head. “No, I must be dreaming. It feels so real but it’s a dream, isn’t it, Rosie? Tell your mom she’s having a dream.”
She started to cry. “I can’t. I’m sorry. I love you, Mom. I want you back, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”
“Maybe it’s your dream. Am I in your dream, Rosie?”
She rubbed her eyes with her fists they way she did when she was tired, before I laid her in her crib.
“It’s not a dream, Mom. I wish it was. I wish I could bring you back with me but I can’t. I’m sorry.”
I took her in my arms, and when I felt her heartbeat next to mine I was no longer frightened, I was no longer sad. “Don’t be sorry, honey. I love you.” I brushed away the tear running down her cheek. “And I never left you. I’ll be there when you wake up.”
“Mom….”
I put a finger to her lips. “Shhh. It will be okay. I need to talk to your friend, the man who smells like smoke. Then, after we talk, I’ll come home. Okay?”
“Okay. Mom.” Rosie cocked her head to the side. “I need to go now. Dad’s calling me.”
“You can hear him in your sleep?”
“In my sleep? I’m not sleeping. I’m wide awake.”
I tried to smile but I couldn’t. “But, I’m in your dream, Rosie. We’re in a dream world.”
Rosie looked around again. “I’ve got to go, Mom. Dad gets worried when I don’t answer right back.”
She kissed my cheek. “Love you mom, and miss you, too.” She backed away. “It’s just me and dad, now. He really misses you. I can tell.”
“Don’t let him know where I’m at, Rosie. Promise me that, okay?”
“Okay, Mom.”
She turned and began running.
“Wait!” I yelled. “How did you get here if you’re not sleeping?”
“The bird,” she shouted back without turning. “I touched the paper bird.” I only heard the words. Rosie had already vanished in the colors of the sky.