My son stood three steps above me, one hand resting on the banister.<\/p>\n
I held the napkin between my fingers.<\/p>\n
"Where did this come from?"<\/p>\n
He stared at it.<\/p>\n
"I don't know."<\/p>\n
"Don't answer quickly. Think."<\/p>\n
"I am thinking."<\/p>\n
"Was it from school?"<\/p>\n
He shook his head.<\/p>\n
"Did somebody give it to you?"<\/p>\n
His eyes moved from the napkin to my face.<\/p>\n
"Maybe."<\/p>\n
That word made my stomach tighten.<\/p>\n
"Who?"<\/p>\n
He didn't answer.<\/p>\n
I climbed one step.<\/p>\n
"I'm not angry."<\/p>\n
"I know."<\/p>\n
"You're not in trouble."<\/p>\n
"I know."<\/p>\n
"Then tell me."<\/p>\n
He sat down on the stairs.<\/p>\n
I remained below him.<\/p>\n
For several seconds he picked at a loose thread near the cuff of his shirt.<\/p>\n
Then he said, "I think she gave it to me."<\/p>\n
I already knew who he meant.<\/p>\n
Still, I asked.<\/p>\n
"Who is she?"<\/p>\n
"The lady."<\/p>\n
"What lady?"<\/p>\n
He swallowed.<\/p>\n
"The one from when I was sleeping."<\/p>\n
A cold sensation moved through my chest.<\/p>\n
"The woman from your dream?"<\/p>\n
He nodded.<\/p>\n
I sat on the step below him.<\/p>\n
"Tell me about her."<\/p>\n
"I don't remember everything."<\/p>\n
"Tell me whatever you do remember."<\/p>\n
He looked uncomfortable.<\/p>\n
Not terrified.<\/p>\n
Not traumatized.<\/p>\n
More like someone trying to describe a place visited years ago.<\/p>\n
"There was a room."<\/p>\n
"The silver room?"<\/p>\n
His eyes widened.<\/p>\n
I regretted revealing that I remembered.<\/p>\n
"Yeah."<\/p>\n
"What did it look like?"<\/p>\n
"Shiny."<\/p>\n
"Metal?"<\/p>\n
"I guess."<\/p>\n
"Was it a hospital?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"A dentist's office?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Did you see tools?"<\/p>\n
He shrugged.<\/p>\n
"Some."<\/p>\n
I tried to keep my breathing steady.<\/p>\n
"Did anybody touch your teeth?"<\/p>\n
His tongue moved unconsciously against one cheek.<\/p>\n
"I don't know."<\/p>\n
"Did your mouth hurt?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Did the lady do something to you?"<\/p>\n
He looked at me.<\/p>\n
"She helped me."<\/p>\n
"Helped you with what?"<\/p>\n
Another pause.<\/p>\n
"Something was wrong."<\/p>\n
"What?"<\/p>\n
"I don't remember."<\/p>\n
"With your teeth?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Your head?"<\/p>\n
"I don't know."<\/p>\n
"Your body?"<\/p>\n
"Dad."<\/p>\n
His voice sharpened.<\/p>\n
I stopped.<\/p>\n
I had promised myself I would not interrogate him.<\/p>\n
I was failing.<\/p>\n
"Okay," I said. "Sorry."<\/p>\n
He looked toward the living room.<\/p>\n
"Can I go?"<\/p>\n
"One more question."<\/p>\n
He sighed.<\/p>\n
"Did the lady look like your mom?"<\/p>\n
He answered more slowly this time.<\/p>\n
"I don't know."<\/p>\n
"You've seen pictures."<\/p>\n
"I know."<\/p>\n
"Did she look like the pictures?"<\/p>\n
"Not exactly."<\/p>\n
That answer was worse than no.<\/p>\n
"What does that mean?"<\/p>\n
"She looked…"<\/p>\n
He searched for a word.<\/p>\n
"Older."<\/p>\n
My grip tightened on the napkin.<\/p>\n
"How much older?"<\/p>\n
"I don't know. Grown-up older."<\/p>\n
"Your mother was already a grown-up."<\/p>\n
"You know what I mean."<\/p>\n
I didn't.<\/p>\n
Or perhaps I was afraid I did.<\/p>\n
"Did she tell you her name?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Did she know yours?"<\/p>\n
"Yes."<\/p>\n
"Did she call you by it?"<\/p>\n
He nodded.<\/p>\n
"Did she know who I was?"<\/p>\n
Another nod.<\/p>\n
"What did she say about me?"<\/p>\n
His eyes drifted downward.<\/p>\n
"That you kept me safe."<\/p>\n
Every question I had prepared disappeared.<\/p>\n
"What?"<\/p>\n
"She said you did a good job."<\/p>\n
Something inside me buckled.<\/p>\n
My ex-wife had once used almost those exact words.<\/p>\n
Not often.<\/p>\n
Once.<\/p>\n
Our son had been an infant, and I had spent an entire night walking through the apartment because he refused to sleep anywhere except against my chest.<\/p>\n
At dawn, exhausted and half delirious, I lowered him into his crib.<\/p>\n
She had watched from the doorway.<\/p>\n
"You did good," she'd whispered.<\/p>\n
I hadn't thought about that morning in years.<\/p>\n
Coincidence.<\/p>\n
It had to be.<\/p>\n
"What else did she say?"<\/p>\n
"That she was sorry."<\/p>\n
"For what?"<\/p>\n
He shook his head.<\/p>\n
"Did you ask?"<\/p>\n
"I think so."<\/p>\n
"What did she say?"<\/p>\n
His brow furrowed.<\/p>\n
"I can't remember."<\/p>\n
The napkin felt suddenly heavy in my hand.<\/p>\n
I opened it again.<\/p>\n
The message about remembering and forgetting no longer seemed philosophical.<\/p>\n
It seemed instructional.<\/p>\n
"Do you remember her writing this?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Then how did it get in your pocket?"<\/p>\n
"I don't know."<\/p>\n
"Have you worn this hoodie recently?"<\/p>\n
He nodded.<\/p>\n
"When?"<\/p>\n
"Yesterday. And maybe Monday."<\/p>\n
"Did anyone touch it?"<\/p>\n
"Dad, I don't keep a list of people touching my hoodie."<\/p>\n
Under different circumstances, I would have laughed.<\/p>\n
I stood.<\/p>\n
"Okay."<\/p>\n
"Can I go now?"<\/p>\n
"Yeah."<\/p>\n
He took two steps.<\/p>\n
"Buddy."<\/p>\n
He turned again.<\/p>\n
"If you remember anything else\u2014anything at all\u2014you tell me."<\/p>\n
"Okay."<\/p>\n
"Even if it sounds impossible."<\/p>\n
That made him study my face.<\/p>\n
"Do you believe me?"<\/p>\n
I almost answered automatically.<\/p>\n
Instead I considered everything.<\/p>\n
The fillings.<\/p>\n
The dream.<\/p>\n
The wrist marks.<\/p>\n
The melody.<\/p>\n
The note.<\/p>\n
"I believe you're telling me what you remember."<\/p>\n
It was the most honest answer I had.<\/p>\n
He seemed satisfied.<\/p>\n
That evening I photographed the napkin.<\/p>\n
I scanned it.<\/p>\n
Then I placed it in a plastic food-storage bag because I suddenly found myself thinking like someone in a crime show.<\/p>\n
I hated myself for it.<\/p>\n
This was my child, not evidence.<\/p>\n
But something was happening to him.<\/p>\n
I searched the handwriting against old birthday cards from my ex-wife.<\/p>\n
At first the samples seemed completely different.<\/p>\n
Her younger handwriting was loose and quick. The letters leaned forward. The message on the napkin was more controlled.<\/p>\n
Then I found a card she had written to my mother.<\/p>\n
There was something about the capital letters.<\/p>\n
The way the crossbars sat slightly too high.<\/p>\n
The shape of the lowercase g.<\/p>\n
I put the samples side by side.<\/p>\n
Similar.<\/p>\n
Not identical.<\/p>\n
I called my mother and sent photographs.<\/p>\n
She called back within two minutes.<\/p>\n
"Where did you get that?"<\/p>\n
"What does it look like to you?"<\/p>\n
"Her handwriting."<\/p>\n
"You're sure?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
That irritated me.<\/p>\n
"You just said\u2014"<\/p>\n
"I said it looks like hers. People can have similar handwriting."<\/p>\n
"But you noticed it too."<\/p>\n
Silence.<\/p>\n
"Yes."<\/p>\n
I sat at the kitchen table.<\/p>\n
"My son says a woman gave it to him."<\/p>\n
"What woman?"<\/p>\n
"The woman from the dream."<\/p>\n
My mother said nothing.<\/p>\n
I told her everything he had described.<\/p>\n
The bright silver room.<\/p>\n
The unknown woman.<\/p>\n
The apology.<\/p>\n
The fact that she seemed older than the mother he remembered from photographs.<\/p>\n
My mother's voice changed.<\/p>\n
"This isn't funny."<\/p>\n
"I know."<\/p>\n
"Are you saying you think his mother is taking him out of the house while you're asleep?"<\/p>\n
"I don't know what I'm saying."<\/p>\n
"Then call the police."<\/p>\n
"And tell them what?"<\/p>\n
"That someone has been near your child."<\/p>\n
"With no forced entry?"<\/p>\n
"That doesn't matter."<\/p>\n
"No security alert, no missing time, no witness, no physical injury."<\/p>\n
"What about the marks?"<\/p>\n
"They vanish within hours."<\/p>\n
"The fillings."<\/p>\n
"A dentist can verify those."<\/p>\n
"Exactly."<\/p>\n
I rubbed my forehead.<\/p>\n
"What if I'm wrong?"<\/p>\n
"What if you're right?"<\/p>\n
After we hung up, I checked every door and window.<\/p>\n
All locked.<\/p>\n
I inspected the outside of the house.<\/p>\n
Nothing looked disturbed.<\/p>\n
There was no plausible way for someone to enter my son's bedroom without crossing either the hallway outside my room or the staircase that creaked under the weight of a cat.<\/p>\n
We didn't own a cat.<\/p>\n
The stairs still creaked.<\/p>\n
That night, I left my bedroom door open.<\/p>\n
I slept badly.<\/p>\n
Every sound woke me.<\/p>\n
The furnace.<\/p>\n
A car outside.<\/p>\n
Pipes shifting.<\/p>\n
At 3:11 a.m., I thought I heard footsteps and rushed into the hallway.<\/p>\n
Nothing.<\/p>\n
My son's door was closed.<\/p>\n
I opened it quietly.<\/p>\n
He slept beneath a tangled blanket with one leg hanging over the side of the mattress.<\/p>\n
Completely normal.<\/p>\n
I stood there long enough to feel ridiculous.<\/p>\n
The following morning, he complained.<\/p>\n
"You came into my room."<\/p>\n
"How'd you know?"<\/p>\n
"You stepped on my controller."<\/p>\n
"I didn't."<\/p>\n
"Then somebody did."<\/p>\n
We found it beside the bed.<\/p>\n
The casing had a new crack.<\/p>\n
I remembered feeling something under my foot.<\/p>\n
"Okay. Sorry."<\/p>\n
He shook his head with theatrical disappointment.<\/p>\n
"Unbelievable parenting."<\/p>\n
I made pancakes.<\/p>\n
For several days, nothing happened.<\/p>\n
The silence should have calmed me.<\/p>\n
Instead it made me more alert.<\/p>\n
I began checking him every morning for marks.<\/p>\n
I inspected his teeth with a flashlight, though I had no idea what I expected to see.<\/p>\n
I checked the locks before bed, then checked them again.<\/p>\n
By Thursday, I understood that I could not continue indefinitely.<\/p>\n
I needed objective evidence.<\/p>\n
If someone entered his room, I needed to see them.<\/p>\n
If he sleepwalked, I needed to know.<\/p>\n
If nothing happened, maybe I could begin believing the dentist's mystery had a mundane explanation.<\/p>\n
That afternoon, I bought a small motion-sensitive indoor camera.<\/p>\n
I told my son I wanted to see whether he was sleepwalking.<\/p>\n
He frowned at it.<\/p>\n
"That's creepy."<\/p>\n
"Fair."<\/p>\n
"You're going to record me sleeping?"<\/p>\n
"Only for a few nights."<\/p>\n
"What if I pick my nose?"<\/p>\n
"I'll preserve the footage for your wedding."<\/p>\n
He threw a pillow at me.<\/p>\n
Humor helped.<\/p>\n
For about ten minutes.<\/p>\n
I mounted the camera where it could see his bed, window, and bedroom door.<\/p>\n
I tested the motion alerts.<\/p>\n
They worked.<\/p>\n
That night, he went to sleep shortly after ten.<\/p>\n
I sat downstairs with the television on but barely watched it.<\/p>\n
At midnight, nothing.<\/p>\n
At one, nothing.<\/p>\n
At two, still nothing.<\/p>\n
I almost turned off the monitor.<\/p>\n
Then, at 2:37 a.m., my phone vibrated.<\/p>\n
MOTION DETECTED.<\/p>\n
I opened the live feed.<\/p>\n
My son's room appeared in grainy low light.<\/p>\n
He was asleep.<\/p>\n
The door remained closed.<\/p>\n
The window remained shut.<\/p>\n
No person stood beside his bed.<\/p>\n
I almost laughed with relief.<\/p>\n
Then the blanket shifted.<\/p>\n
My son moved upward.<\/p>\n
At first I thought he was sitting.<\/p>\n
He wasn't.<\/p>\n
His entire body rose from the mattress.<\/p>\n
Slowly.<\/p>\n
Silently.<\/p>\n
His shoulders lifted first, then his hips, then his legs.<\/p>\n
Within seconds, there was empty space between his body and the bed.<\/p>\n
I stopped breathing.<\/p>\n
No one touched him.<\/p>\n
Nothing supported him.<\/p>\n
He floated horizontally in the darkness, arms hanging loosely at his sides.<\/p>\n
The clock on the camera continued counting.<\/p>\n
2:37:12.<\/p>\n
2:37:13.<\/p>\n
2:37:14.<\/p>\n
I watched my sleeping child remain suspended in open air.<\/p>\n
Then a faint light appeared near the base of his skull.<\/p>\n
Not in the room.<\/p>\n
Under his skin.<\/p>\n
A tiny silver pulse.<\/p>\n
Once.<\/p>\n
Twice.<\/p>\n
The video distorted.<\/p>\n
For less than a second, the entire image filled with static.<\/p>\n
When it cleared, my son was descending.<\/p>\n
He settled gently onto the mattress.<\/p>\n
The blanket fell around him.<\/p>\n
He never woke.<\/p>\n
I ran upstairs.<\/p>\n
His door was still closed.<\/p>\n
I entered and touched his shoulder.<\/p>\n
Warm.<\/p>\n
Breathing normally.<\/p>\n
No wound.<\/p>\n
No visible light.<\/p>\n
Nothing.<\/p>\n
"Dad?"<\/p>\n
He opened his eyes.<\/p>\n
"I'm here."<\/p>\n
"What happened?"<\/p>\n
"Nothing."<\/p>\n
He blinked sleepily.<\/p>\n
Then he looked past me toward the camera.<\/p>\n
"Oh."<\/p>\n
"What?"<\/p>\n
His eyes closed again.<\/p>\n
"You saw it."<\/p>\n
Every hair on my arms lifted.<\/p>\n
"Saw what?"<\/p>\n
But he had already drifted back to sleep.<\/p>\n
I remained beside the bed until sunrise.<\/p>\n
When morning finally came, I knew one thing with complete certainty.<\/p>\n
The dentist had not made a mistake.<\/p>\n
And whatever had happened to my son was bigger than two unexplained fillings.<\/p>\n
My son stood three steps above me, one hand resting on the banister. I held the napkin between my fingers. "Where did this come from?" He stared at it. "I … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2227,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chapter-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2230"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2230\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2242,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2230\/revisions\/2242"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thechapterstory.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}