Page 45 of Memories of the Lost

“Ugh. I forgot about it.”

He nodded. “You don’t have to.”

His eyes were as calm as a lake in midsummer. Tillie never trusted anybody, but she trusted him. “No, I have to keep working at this before I get an ulcer.”

“Close your eyes,” he said, and something shifted a little in his voice. It was softer, deeper, maybe. “Take a deep breath, and let yourself sink into the bed, heavy and comfortable.”

She followed his instructions, taking pleasure in the weight of his hand on her body, his leg against her own. As she lay there, he pulled the comforter over them, and it gave her a sense of protection.

“Imagine the scene in the painting that started everything. Really see it, as many details as you can.”

Easy enough, since she’d been obsessing.

“When you’ve got it clear, let it get as big as a room, and imagine that you can step into it.”

Something quickened in her blood, but she did as she was told, feeling herself step into the world of the artist.

“Look around,” he said quietly. “What do you see?”

A porch. A stone house, a step.

“No hurry. Take your time.”

It allowed her a moment to breathe, and she felt a tension draining from her body, giving her space to look around. A road led to a deep forest of pines and mixed deciduous trees, as thick and mysterious as a fairy-tale wood. The word came to her clearly, awood, not aforest.

A garden surrounded the stone cottage, a classic style, pinks and blues and fluttery leaves. Roses. She didn’t know the names of the others spilling over a little stone fence, but the big plant along the porch came to her. Rhubarb. Cut it and eat it, sharp and piercing, or cook it in a pie pan with sugar.Crumble.

As she stood there, she saw that the weather was gray and misty, and she was wearing a thick sweater. She looked down at her body, touched the hand-knitted garment, the skirt beneath it. She saw rubber roots on her feet, muddy and battered, but she felt a swell of love for them. Puddles and mud.

A girl appeared. Her imaginary friend, Sunny, with dark hair and bright blue eyes and freckles on her nose.Where have you been?She asked.Let’s play fairy tale.

Abruptly, Tillie fell from the vision into the bed, as sharply and abruptly as if she’d been torn out of that world. She fell hard, gasping, her eyes on the stained ceiling. She clutched Liam’s hand fiercely, as if he alone would keep her from tumbling into a void.

“Easy,” he said. “You’re safe.” He brushed hair from her brow. “You’re safe.”

She took in a breath, felt her body recognize where it was in time and space.

“Did that give you anything?”

“I think that the girl who died might be the imaginary friend I’ve had all my life. I call her Sunny. My mother used to tell me that I had talked about her from the time I could speak.”

“Do you think she was imaginary?”

She fronted. “I don’t know. She doesn’t feel imaginary in that visualization.” She called back the image. “I could see a lot of detail about her, about the house.” She thought of the sweater she was wearing, theboots. “It doesn’t seem like Southern California, either,” she ventured. “Rainy. Colder.”

“That’s good.”

Next to her thigh, his was bare and warm. His eyes were calm and beautiful. “Thank you,” she said. “Bet you wished you’d found somebody easier to have a New York fling with.”

He waited a beat, his thumb on her cheek. “Is this a fling?”

She looked at him, unsure of her answer.

“That’s not what it feels like to me,” he said.

A swoop of longing moved in her body, surging toward the places their bare skin touched. “No,” she admitted, “but I know better.”

“Do you? What do you know, Tillie?” He swung down to kiss her, looked at her mouth, kissed her again, lightly. She loved the feeling of his lips, as if it they were cut to fit hers. “That love is an illusion? That we’re all jaded and no love is real?”