Page 85 of Sleeper: The Palisades Edition

SHANE: Oy vey.

SHANE: Gotta go. They’re calling me back inside. See you at dinner.

I can’t stop smiling.I could be in the center of an actual shitstorm while being attacked by aliens, and a text from Shane Miller would still put a smile on my face and make me feel like I can face the rest of my day. I slide the phone into my pocket and look up to tell the kids that it’s time to move on to the next garden.

But the kids aren’t on the lawn where I last saw them.

They aren’t anywhere that I can see.

I even made sure they were wearing brightly colored clothes today—both of them are wearing sunflower-yellow tops.

I instinctively reach for the heart pendant that Shane gave me, stand up, and do a slow spin around to survey the entire rose garden. It’s not all that crowded. They could certainly be on the ground, ducking beneath the rose bushes. I call out their names. No answer. I jog over to the covered patio and call out for them again. I go into the ladies’ room, check under the stalls, calling out their names. I open the door to the men’s room and callout for them, but no one answers. I go inside to check under the stalls—empty.

Their legs are shorter than my arms. They could not have gotten very far in the couple of minutes that I was looking at my phone. There’s no need to panic. I just need to walk around. I just need to scour every inch of this 150-acre property as quickly as possible. The first logical place to look is the snack bar, but I see that there’s a miniature train stopped outside the rose garden, so maybe they went to check it out.

I run over to the enchanted fucking railroad station, but I don’t see Summer or Lucky anywhere.

It occurs to me that maybe I should return to the bench where I was sitting, in case they go back there to find me.

I run back to the bench in the middle of the rose garden and sit there, calmly, for thirty seconds. Thirty-one seconds later, I’m in full-on panic mode. Thirty-two seconds later, I’m sprinting to the snack bar near the entrance to the gardens. I check the restrooms near the snack bar. I check all of the tables on the patio. I check the gift shop nearby. I run back to the Japanese Garden and the tea house, because maybe they wanted to go back there.

Or maybe I should go back to the bench again so they know where to find me?

I should have told them to meet me in a specific place if we got separated.

Shit.

How do single parents handle more than one kid?

“Are you all right, dear?”

I spin around to find two sweet elderly ladies lookingat me with concern and realize that I’m practically hyperventilating.

“I…I can’t find my kids.” Oh shit, I’m tearing up. This is so unprofessional.

“Oh no. How old are they?”

“Five. They’re five. They’re wearing yellow shirts, a boy and a girl.”

“Well, we haven’t seen them, but you should talk to the people in the front office. I’m sure they have a way of dealing with this kind of thing.”

“Yes. Yes—good idea.” I run back to the front entrance, but I mean—it’s not a supermarket. They can’t make an announcement on a loudspeaker telling them where to meet me. Can they?

On my way to the front entrance, out of the corner of my eye, I see a flash of yellow.

“Lucky!”

Lucky is wandering around the tables on the patio by the snack bar, his lower lip quivering, but he’s trying so hard not to look upset.

I grab him and pick him up. As soon as he’s in my arms, he starts crying. Summer is not with him.

“Oh, honey, I got you. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

“Summer said to follow her, and then I saw a lizard and I followed the lizard.”

“Ohhh, okay. You followed the lizard and then what?”

“He went into the woods and then under a rock.”