Sarah lay ramrod straight under the sheet, her body vibrating with tension
as she listened to her breath whistle quickly in and out. Her hands curled
unconsciously into fists as her eyes darted from corner to corner, seeking
a shadow that shouldn't be there, a patch of night darker than the rest. A
man-shaped shadow, with a crystal on its fingertips. . .
There was nothing there. Nothing was ever there. Sarah counted breaths, forcing herself away from the threshold of panic as her head sank back into the pillow. From the twisted, tangled bedclothes she could tell it had been another restless night, although the tiredness in her muscles could have come from her abrupt awakening as much as anything else. She turned her head to look at the bare spot on the nightstand and willed herself not to go find the phone, call her parents, and demand that they check on Toby. When she'd noticed a few days ago that her hand was automatically reaching for the receiver before she was even fully awake, she'd hidden it in the bottom of her closet. He had always been there before, and this night would be no different. She hated this time of year. It stirred up bad memories.
Giving up on sleep for the moment, Sarah rolled out of bed and opened the slats on the shutters to peer out at the garden. She scanned the branches of the nearest tree and relaxed a little when she saw her own personal night watchman sitting on his usual perch. He kept an unpredictable schedule, but usually his appearance meant that tomorrow would be a good day. This time, she chose to take his presence as reassurance that Toby was snug in his bed right where he should be. Knowing that even owl eyes probably couldn't see her through the shutters, she waggled her fingertips at him anyway.
Although she guessed he had something to do with her adventure all those years ago, Sarah had long given up trying to puzzle out exactly why a snowy owl occasionally showed up outside her window. His ghostly shape reminded her of magic and made her think of the extraordinary potential hidden in everyday things. After all, there was nothing remarkable about an owl sitting in a tree in the moonlight. It was only magical because she allowed it to be, and that, she thought, was a very great secret indeed. That was why all her stories were for children. Most adults did not believe in letting themselves feel the enchantment that wound through hidden tracks in their lives.
As usual, she'd left a bit of her dinner on the post by the deck just in case her owl came by. Hoping he'd taken it, she put a hand to the latch and moved to pull back the shutters, automatically reaching out her other hand to catch the marble she placed so carefully each night. Her fingers closed on empty air and her heart skipped a beat. Kneeling slowly, she retrieved the cats-eye from the carpet and rolled it around her hand in unconscious mimicry of the thoughts jumbling in her brain.
She was sure she had set it in its usual spot - her routine was too engrained for her to miss something like that. Her paranoia paraphernalia, Karen called it, but really all it boiled down to was that Sarah liked to know when someone came into her house, and certain things might opt not to use the door. She pulled the shutters fully back and opened the window to stick her head outside. The air was hot and still. There was no feel of a storm, although she remembered hearing a crash right at the end of her dream that might have been thunder. Shivering despite the heat, Sarah craned her head this way and that but couldn't see anything untoward.
As she looked up at her owl, sitting unmoved on his branch, she muttered, "I don't suppose you noticed anything unusual, did you?" The yellow reflection of his eyes vanished momentarily as he blinked. "Didn't think so," she said, pulling the window closed. She had a feeling in her gut that something had been here, and even though it seemed to be gone it had destroyed any hope of sleep. On impulse Sarah stepped into her sandals, grabbed her notebook, and went downstairs. She opened the back door carefully (it creaked at an unfortunate pitch that always seemed to wake her neighbor) and slipped out into the moonlight. She was wearing nothing but flip-flops and the white silk set that Karen had given her at college graduation, but there was no one to see her except the owl, and she didn't suppose he would mind.
Settling herself cross-legged on the wreck of a deck chair, she tilted her face to the moon and let the bonds of reality slip away from her, words and pictures flow through her mind like water. Slowly, little rivulets of ideas began to draw themselves away from the greater current, and before she knew it she was scribbling madly. The light was too poor to see anything, but she wrote large and trusted the feel of the position of her hand on the paper. Some of her best ideas came when she was writing in the dark. She let the words flow for several minutes, then abruptly set down paper and pen and got up to stretch. She had to keep herself loose, that was the secret. Casting a glance at the post where she usually left her tidbits, she was pleased to find it empty, and that brought her mind back to the owl.
Looking up at the tree, she noticed that his eyes looked much bigger from down here. They practically took up his whole face, and really didn't look very normal. In fact, as she watched she became more and more convinced that something was wrong. He didn't appear to be as healthy as usual - actually, he didn't seem to be breathing. If owls could go pale, then he had done it. Did owls have heart attacks? Alarmed, she moved until she was not quite underneath him (he was still a bird, after all) and waved her arms madly to try and get a response. It would have been horribly embarrassing if there had been anyone else up there, since the silk top was cut awfully low and she didn't even want to think about how much cleavage she might be flashing, but that thought was pushed out of her mind when the branch on which the owl was sitting suddenly snapped. His wings flailed wildly for a second before he slipped and fell, and Sarah was so equally torn between jumping to catch him and leaping out of the way of the falling branch that she stayed exactly where she was. He recovered himself in mid- fall and turned the tumble into a dive, then took swiftly to flight. Sarah caught a glimpse of his tailfeathers as he vanished into the night, suddenly worried that she might never see him again. She had never approached him before. Clearly he wasn't an average animal, but even above- average animals probably got spooked. She kicked the offending branch angrily, then bent down to look at its broken end. Funny, but it almost looked gouged, like talons had scored right through it. Frowning, she turned her head in the direction her owl had gone and hoped that he was all right.
Her vaguely worried mood stayed with her all day, which was unfortunate because this was the one day a year when teachers and students truly put aside all conflict and come together in one unified and glorious celebration of summer - the last day of school. Sarah had promised her class that they would all get to read their final creative writing projects out loud if they wanted, and she buried the pang of their impending promotion to the seventh grade under enthusiastic cries of "Miz Williams, Miz Williams, me first, okay?" She signed yearbooks like mad and hugged every kid who came near her, and when the last parents had reclaimed their sons and daughters for the summer, she sat in the chair behind her desk and slowly gathered the end-of-school presents together, lingering over each one. There were a lot of night birds that year, since they were known to be her favorite. Her kids were so sweet. A knock at the door pulled her out of her reverie. It was Bill Cribbins from 6B, holding an apple in his hand.
"Hey," he greeted her softly as he leaned against the doorjamb. "Looks like you got quite a haul."
Sarah snuffled in what she hoped was an unobtrusive manner and eyed her colleague from under lowered lashes. He could have been the long-lost twin of Mr. Walker, her old eighth grade teacher and her first big crush. Bill was tall with bushy brown hair that looked best when disheveled, and by the first week of March had already lost his winter pallor to the beginnings of a tan. He laughed easily, knew a lot about books and music, and was a few months shy of his thirty-first birthday. He was also obvious, in a sweet sort of way. If she had been any other woman, Sarah would probably have been blessing each and every one of her lucky stars, and she certainly appreciated the attention. She thought he was funny and charming and handsome, but in one critical way he was just the same as every other grown- up she knew. He didn't see the magic in the world, and he didn't understand why she wanted to.
Running her hand over a homemade pencil holder, Sarah heaved a sigh that repressed more than just nostalgia at seeing her second year of students advance away from her. "I don't know how parents do it. Watch their kids grow up, I mean." She leaned back and looked around her empty classroom.
"It gets easier," Bill said gently, moving across the room to lean his hip against her desk. "You realize that each year is an opportunity to start over, get to know more bright young faces. Hey, I talked to Betty and she said you were planning to stay next year."
"What?" Sarah said, startled. "Of course I'm planning to stay! Why would I not?"
The relief in his smile flattered her and made her feel guilty at the same time. "Well, you're a famous author now," he said, winking at her. "I loved it, by the way. No wonder your kids are crazy about you."
Sarah beamed at him. If there was one backdoor into her heart, her writing was it. "I hardly think one published work counts as famous," she laughed, "but I'll get there someday! There really is nothing like teaching kids to write, though, especially at this age. They're so fresh and full of imagination. Sally wrote this amazing story about a monster who lives under her sink, who guards the door to the kingdom of the dust bunnies so they can't get out and overrun everybody's house. . ." The slight shift of his eyes, the impatient movement of his fingers against her desk were more than enough to communicate his wandering attention. She'd seen him reading her book in the library, flying through it like wolves were at his heels. He hadn't enjoyed it, she knew. He'd been bored, and it wasn't his fault. With the fluidity of long practice, she shifted the conversation back to reality. "So, have you got any fun plans for the summer?"
This was much better territory for him. "Absolutely," he grinned. "I'm finally going to build that extension I've been talking about for so long. It's a nice location, but the house just isn't big enough for a family."
It was too obvious to be comfortable. Sarah realized that she was fidgeting and made herself fold her hands calmly in her lap. "That sounds great, Bill," she said.
"Yeah, I'm pretty excited about it. How about you?"
"I'm actually leaving the day after tomorrow to visit my family for a week or two, hopefully get in a little hiking. Although I dread to think what winter's done to my stamina," she said ruefully.
Bill tapped his heel against her desk for a moment before picking up a little stuffed screech owl and turning it over in his hands. "First things first," he said. "Let me take you to Betty's party tonight. Can I pick you up at seven?"
She'd been planning on going anyway, and it was just a party. Being with a date was more fun than going stag, and she could be careful not to lead him on. But the real reason she raised her eyes and said, "Yes, Bill, that sounds lovely," was that she was lonely, tired of feeling like an odd mix of very old and very young. Sarah knew there were wonderful, sensitive, moonstruck men out there somewhere - she just had to find one. And in the meantime, Bill was a good date.
He was at her door right on time, and she had to admit that he cleaned up really well when he wanted to. She looked pretty much the same as she always did, and as always, it took his breath away. Bill suppressed the urge to put his arm around her waist as he walked her to the car. Clearly they weren't at that stage yet, though god knows he wanted to be. She looked lovely, her understated style accentuating the elegance that imbued every movement, drawing attention to her beauty without interfering with it. He recognized the look of a woman who was dressing up for a man and he was enough of a realist to know that it wasn't him. Over many months of observation, he had decided that whoever the guy was, he wasn't coming back. And even though tonight she was dressed to the nines for someone else, he had faith that someday it would be for him. Bill firmly believed in the power of positive thinking.
As he opened the car door for her, Sarah could feel the tension emanating from her date. The evening had barely begun, and already she wondered if this had been a mistake. Mentally groping for a harmless topic of conversation, she turned her gaze out of the window just in time to see a flash of white. It had passed in a second, but the shape against the trees very much resembled that of a snowy owl in full flight, and suddenly her spirits soared. Her personal good luck charm wasn't going to abandon her after all! By the time they arrived at Betty's house she had caught another good glimpse of him as he kept pace with the car, and with that worry was laid to rest, Sarah decided to really enjoy herself.
Relief animated her more than she realized, and she was less guarded than she had planned to be. Poor Bill was a goner before the dancing even started. Just after ten (teachers being, on the whole, an early crowd), Betty's older son produced a collection of CDs and a banged-up boom box and everyone headed for the backyard to sway happily to eighties music. Sarah had her head on Bill's shoulder and his hands on her waist, contentedly zoned out as they rocked back and forth under the spitting of the bug light. It was all that a single girl could ask for - good beer, good friends, cheesy love songs to dance to. Her unfocused eyes floated up over the dipping heads, past the paper lamps strung across the fence, to the large elm in the neighbor's yard. Suddenly, she felt dead sober and ice cold.
Her night watchman was there, yellow eyes burning into her with a look of such intense hatred that it struck her almost like a physical blow. No - his look wasn't for her, it was for the man holding her! Sarah gulped and acted without conscious thought. "Oh, Bill," she said, her voice too high, "I'm just dying out here in this heat. Let's go in and get another beer, okay?"
"Okay," he murmured, missing the frightened look on her face. In his current state of infatuation and buzz, he'd have gone to the moon with her if she'd asked him. Steering them quickly inside, Sarah pushed him in the direction of the kitchen and pressed the heels of her hands to her forehead, pacing as she tried desperately to think. For some reason, she knew with absolute certainty that the owl out there was dangerous. And that was crazy, because she also knew that he would never hurt her, and she was pretty sure he would never hurt Bill. His eyes, though, had been filled with pure, white-hot hate, and she had no doubt that if looks could kill (and who said sometimes they couldn't?), Bill would be a pile of smoldering ash right now.
After she had had a minute to cool down, Sarah began to feel much calmer. The house was well-lit and they were surrounded by people, and thus were probably in the safest possible place. Telling Bill of the incident was a laughable idea, and the more she thought about it, the more it seemed that the best option was simply to act as though nothing had happened. When Bill returned with two bottles, he found her smiling and ready to stay inside and take advantage of the air conditioner for a while, and failed to notice her white knuckles or the tightness at the corners of her eyes. Sarah dragged them into conversation with a few of their older colleagues and made sure that the rest of the evening was spent indoors and in company.
After an hour of nothing but water, Bill drove her home and walked her to the door, working up his courage to ask for a kiss. Sarah saw the look on his face and neatly preempted him with a handshake and a smile to take the sting out of it. She felt mean, but that was that. The jaunty bounce in his step as he walked back to his car made her feel uneasy. Things had clearly spiraled out of her control tonight in more than one area.
Annoyed with herself, with Bill, and most particularly with all things avian, she stomped upstairs, took off her shoes, and threw them at the closet. Marching to the window, she opened it, stuck her head out, and glared at the empty tree across from her. "If you ever, *ever*," she repeated for emphasis, "do anything to hurt Bill, I swear I'll buy a rifle and shoot you myself!" Her anger fell heavily in the hot night, but sullen silence was the only reply. She listened until she started to feel foolish for talking to an absent owl, then grumpily closed the window and went to bed.
The next day was a busy one because she planned to be gone at least two weeks and had laundry, packing, and a host of little things to do. The great debate to call or not to call raged in her mind as she worked, and she found herself casting more and more glances towards the phone as the day wore on. The object of her dilemma solved it himself by ringing her up to ask her to dinner. She was so relieved to hear him alive and presumably not assaulted by owls that she almost said yes, but forced herself to take a rain check. There was too much on her plate right now, but when she got back they needed to sit down and have a long talk.
The dreams were bad again that night, and she woke aching to put her arms around her brother. Tomorrow brought the anniversary of her ill-fated wish, and whenever it was humanly possible, Sarah spent that day hovering over Toby like a hawk. It was a long drive north from Virginia, but she was determined. Their parents thought she was loony, but they were also glad to see her. Starting early to take advantage of the cooler temperatures, she loaded up her little Subaru, locked her front door, and waved a cheerful see-you-later to her neighborhood. Popping a mix into the tape deck, she rolled down the windows and sang along lustily. There was nothing like the feeling of being on the road!
Almost twelve hours later, she had to admit that there was also nothing like pulling into the driveway of your destination at long last. Climbing stiffly out of her seat, she limped around the back of the car to get her duffle and was immeasurably pleased when she heard Toby's voice cry, "Mom! Dad! She's here!" A battering ram of ten-year-old exuberance spilled out of the pristinely white screen door and vaulted the steps to slam directly into her stomach. With a joyful "Oof!" Sarah picked him up bodily and whirled him around.
"Wow, you're getting big!" she gasped as she put him down.
"I'm the tallest boy in my class," he informed her proudly. Grabbing her hand, he leaned all his weight against it to drag her towards the house. "Come see the train that Dad and I are building!" Bob and Karen emerged a moment later, Dad grinning as he hugged her around Toby and Karen giving her a friendly smile as she leaned in to kiss her on the cheek. Sarah let them pull her into the house, happier than she could say to be surrounded by family. Even if it wasn't the original model, it still felt like coming home.
There was nothing there. Nothing was ever there. Sarah counted breaths, forcing herself away from the threshold of panic as her head sank back into the pillow. From the twisted, tangled bedclothes she could tell it had been another restless night, although the tiredness in her muscles could have come from her abrupt awakening as much as anything else. She turned her head to look at the bare spot on the nightstand and willed herself not to go find the phone, call her parents, and demand that they check on Toby. When she'd noticed a few days ago that her hand was automatically reaching for the receiver before she was even fully awake, she'd hidden it in the bottom of her closet. He had always been there before, and this night would be no different. She hated this time of year. It stirred up bad memories.
Giving up on sleep for the moment, Sarah rolled out of bed and opened the slats on the shutters to peer out at the garden. She scanned the branches of the nearest tree and relaxed a little when she saw her own personal night watchman sitting on his usual perch. He kept an unpredictable schedule, but usually his appearance meant that tomorrow would be a good day. This time, she chose to take his presence as reassurance that Toby was snug in his bed right where he should be. Knowing that even owl eyes probably couldn't see her through the shutters, she waggled her fingertips at him anyway.
Although she guessed he had something to do with her adventure all those years ago, Sarah had long given up trying to puzzle out exactly why a snowy owl occasionally showed up outside her window. His ghostly shape reminded her of magic and made her think of the extraordinary potential hidden in everyday things. After all, there was nothing remarkable about an owl sitting in a tree in the moonlight. It was only magical because she allowed it to be, and that, she thought, was a very great secret indeed. That was why all her stories were for children. Most adults did not believe in letting themselves feel the enchantment that wound through hidden tracks in their lives.
As usual, she'd left a bit of her dinner on the post by the deck just in case her owl came by. Hoping he'd taken it, she put a hand to the latch and moved to pull back the shutters, automatically reaching out her other hand to catch the marble she placed so carefully each night. Her fingers closed on empty air and her heart skipped a beat. Kneeling slowly, she retrieved the cats-eye from the carpet and rolled it around her hand in unconscious mimicry of the thoughts jumbling in her brain.
She was sure she had set it in its usual spot - her routine was too engrained for her to miss something like that. Her paranoia paraphernalia, Karen called it, but really all it boiled down to was that Sarah liked to know when someone came into her house, and certain things might opt not to use the door. She pulled the shutters fully back and opened the window to stick her head outside. The air was hot and still. There was no feel of a storm, although she remembered hearing a crash right at the end of her dream that might have been thunder. Shivering despite the heat, Sarah craned her head this way and that but couldn't see anything untoward.
As she looked up at her owl, sitting unmoved on his branch, she muttered, "I don't suppose you noticed anything unusual, did you?" The yellow reflection of his eyes vanished momentarily as he blinked. "Didn't think so," she said, pulling the window closed. She had a feeling in her gut that something had been here, and even though it seemed to be gone it had destroyed any hope of sleep. On impulse Sarah stepped into her sandals, grabbed her notebook, and went downstairs. She opened the back door carefully (it creaked at an unfortunate pitch that always seemed to wake her neighbor) and slipped out into the moonlight. She was wearing nothing but flip-flops and the white silk set that Karen had given her at college graduation, but there was no one to see her except the owl, and she didn't suppose he would mind.
Settling herself cross-legged on the wreck of a deck chair, she tilted her face to the moon and let the bonds of reality slip away from her, words and pictures flow through her mind like water. Slowly, little rivulets of ideas began to draw themselves away from the greater current, and before she knew it she was scribbling madly. The light was too poor to see anything, but she wrote large and trusted the feel of the position of her hand on the paper. Some of her best ideas came when she was writing in the dark. She let the words flow for several minutes, then abruptly set down paper and pen and got up to stretch. She had to keep herself loose, that was the secret. Casting a glance at the post where she usually left her tidbits, she was pleased to find it empty, and that brought her mind back to the owl.
Looking up at the tree, she noticed that his eyes looked much bigger from down here. They practically took up his whole face, and really didn't look very normal. In fact, as she watched she became more and more convinced that something was wrong. He didn't appear to be as healthy as usual - actually, he didn't seem to be breathing. If owls could go pale, then he had done it. Did owls have heart attacks? Alarmed, she moved until she was not quite underneath him (he was still a bird, after all) and waved her arms madly to try and get a response. It would have been horribly embarrassing if there had been anyone else up there, since the silk top was cut awfully low and she didn't even want to think about how much cleavage she might be flashing, but that thought was pushed out of her mind when the branch on which the owl was sitting suddenly snapped. His wings flailed wildly for a second before he slipped and fell, and Sarah was so equally torn between jumping to catch him and leaping out of the way of the falling branch that she stayed exactly where she was. He recovered himself in mid- fall and turned the tumble into a dive, then took swiftly to flight. Sarah caught a glimpse of his tailfeathers as he vanished into the night, suddenly worried that she might never see him again. She had never approached him before. Clearly he wasn't an average animal, but even above- average animals probably got spooked. She kicked the offending branch angrily, then bent down to look at its broken end. Funny, but it almost looked gouged, like talons had scored right through it. Frowning, she turned her head in the direction her owl had gone and hoped that he was all right.
Her vaguely worried mood stayed with her all day, which was unfortunate because this was the one day a year when teachers and students truly put aside all conflict and come together in one unified and glorious celebration of summer - the last day of school. Sarah had promised her class that they would all get to read their final creative writing projects out loud if they wanted, and she buried the pang of their impending promotion to the seventh grade under enthusiastic cries of "Miz Williams, Miz Williams, me first, okay?" She signed yearbooks like mad and hugged every kid who came near her, and when the last parents had reclaimed their sons and daughters for the summer, she sat in the chair behind her desk and slowly gathered the end-of-school presents together, lingering over each one. There were a lot of night birds that year, since they were known to be her favorite. Her kids were so sweet. A knock at the door pulled her out of her reverie. It was Bill Cribbins from 6B, holding an apple in his hand.
"Hey," he greeted her softly as he leaned against the doorjamb. "Looks like you got quite a haul."
Sarah snuffled in what she hoped was an unobtrusive manner and eyed her colleague from under lowered lashes. He could have been the long-lost twin of Mr. Walker, her old eighth grade teacher and her first big crush. Bill was tall with bushy brown hair that looked best when disheveled, and by the first week of March had already lost his winter pallor to the beginnings of a tan. He laughed easily, knew a lot about books and music, and was a few months shy of his thirty-first birthday. He was also obvious, in a sweet sort of way. If she had been any other woman, Sarah would probably have been blessing each and every one of her lucky stars, and she certainly appreciated the attention. She thought he was funny and charming and handsome, but in one critical way he was just the same as every other grown- up she knew. He didn't see the magic in the world, and he didn't understand why she wanted to.
Running her hand over a homemade pencil holder, Sarah heaved a sigh that repressed more than just nostalgia at seeing her second year of students advance away from her. "I don't know how parents do it. Watch their kids grow up, I mean." She leaned back and looked around her empty classroom.
"It gets easier," Bill said gently, moving across the room to lean his hip against her desk. "You realize that each year is an opportunity to start over, get to know more bright young faces. Hey, I talked to Betty and she said you were planning to stay next year."
"What?" Sarah said, startled. "Of course I'm planning to stay! Why would I not?"
The relief in his smile flattered her and made her feel guilty at the same time. "Well, you're a famous author now," he said, winking at her. "I loved it, by the way. No wonder your kids are crazy about you."
Sarah beamed at him. If there was one backdoor into her heart, her writing was it. "I hardly think one published work counts as famous," she laughed, "but I'll get there someday! There really is nothing like teaching kids to write, though, especially at this age. They're so fresh and full of imagination. Sally wrote this amazing story about a monster who lives under her sink, who guards the door to the kingdom of the dust bunnies so they can't get out and overrun everybody's house. . ." The slight shift of his eyes, the impatient movement of his fingers against her desk were more than enough to communicate his wandering attention. She'd seen him reading her book in the library, flying through it like wolves were at his heels. He hadn't enjoyed it, she knew. He'd been bored, and it wasn't his fault. With the fluidity of long practice, she shifted the conversation back to reality. "So, have you got any fun plans for the summer?"
This was much better territory for him. "Absolutely," he grinned. "I'm finally going to build that extension I've been talking about for so long. It's a nice location, but the house just isn't big enough for a family."
It was too obvious to be comfortable. Sarah realized that she was fidgeting and made herself fold her hands calmly in her lap. "That sounds great, Bill," she said.
"Yeah, I'm pretty excited about it. How about you?"
"I'm actually leaving the day after tomorrow to visit my family for a week or two, hopefully get in a little hiking. Although I dread to think what winter's done to my stamina," she said ruefully.
Bill tapped his heel against her desk for a moment before picking up a little stuffed screech owl and turning it over in his hands. "First things first," he said. "Let me take you to Betty's party tonight. Can I pick you up at seven?"
She'd been planning on going anyway, and it was just a party. Being with a date was more fun than going stag, and she could be careful not to lead him on. But the real reason she raised her eyes and said, "Yes, Bill, that sounds lovely," was that she was lonely, tired of feeling like an odd mix of very old and very young. Sarah knew there were wonderful, sensitive, moonstruck men out there somewhere - she just had to find one. And in the meantime, Bill was a good date.
He was at her door right on time, and she had to admit that he cleaned up really well when he wanted to. She looked pretty much the same as she always did, and as always, it took his breath away. Bill suppressed the urge to put his arm around her waist as he walked her to the car. Clearly they weren't at that stage yet, though god knows he wanted to be. She looked lovely, her understated style accentuating the elegance that imbued every movement, drawing attention to her beauty without interfering with it. He recognized the look of a woman who was dressing up for a man and he was enough of a realist to know that it wasn't him. Over many months of observation, he had decided that whoever the guy was, he wasn't coming back. And even though tonight she was dressed to the nines for someone else, he had faith that someday it would be for him. Bill firmly believed in the power of positive thinking.
As he opened the car door for her, Sarah could feel the tension emanating from her date. The evening had barely begun, and already she wondered if this had been a mistake. Mentally groping for a harmless topic of conversation, she turned her gaze out of the window just in time to see a flash of white. It had passed in a second, but the shape against the trees very much resembled that of a snowy owl in full flight, and suddenly her spirits soared. Her personal good luck charm wasn't going to abandon her after all! By the time they arrived at Betty's house she had caught another good glimpse of him as he kept pace with the car, and with that worry was laid to rest, Sarah decided to really enjoy herself.
Relief animated her more than she realized, and she was less guarded than she had planned to be. Poor Bill was a goner before the dancing even started. Just after ten (teachers being, on the whole, an early crowd), Betty's older son produced a collection of CDs and a banged-up boom box and everyone headed for the backyard to sway happily to eighties music. Sarah had her head on Bill's shoulder and his hands on her waist, contentedly zoned out as they rocked back and forth under the spitting of the bug light. It was all that a single girl could ask for - good beer, good friends, cheesy love songs to dance to. Her unfocused eyes floated up over the dipping heads, past the paper lamps strung across the fence, to the large elm in the neighbor's yard. Suddenly, she felt dead sober and ice cold.
Her night watchman was there, yellow eyes burning into her with a look of such intense hatred that it struck her almost like a physical blow. No - his look wasn't for her, it was for the man holding her! Sarah gulped and acted without conscious thought. "Oh, Bill," she said, her voice too high, "I'm just dying out here in this heat. Let's go in and get another beer, okay?"
"Okay," he murmured, missing the frightened look on her face. In his current state of infatuation and buzz, he'd have gone to the moon with her if she'd asked him. Steering them quickly inside, Sarah pushed him in the direction of the kitchen and pressed the heels of her hands to her forehead, pacing as she tried desperately to think. For some reason, she knew with absolute certainty that the owl out there was dangerous. And that was crazy, because she also knew that he would never hurt her, and she was pretty sure he would never hurt Bill. His eyes, though, had been filled with pure, white-hot hate, and she had no doubt that if looks could kill (and who said sometimes they couldn't?), Bill would be a pile of smoldering ash right now.
After she had had a minute to cool down, Sarah began to feel much calmer. The house was well-lit and they were surrounded by people, and thus were probably in the safest possible place. Telling Bill of the incident was a laughable idea, and the more she thought about it, the more it seemed that the best option was simply to act as though nothing had happened. When Bill returned with two bottles, he found her smiling and ready to stay inside and take advantage of the air conditioner for a while, and failed to notice her white knuckles or the tightness at the corners of her eyes. Sarah dragged them into conversation with a few of their older colleagues and made sure that the rest of the evening was spent indoors and in company.
After an hour of nothing but water, Bill drove her home and walked her to the door, working up his courage to ask for a kiss. Sarah saw the look on his face and neatly preempted him with a handshake and a smile to take the sting out of it. She felt mean, but that was that. The jaunty bounce in his step as he walked back to his car made her feel uneasy. Things had clearly spiraled out of her control tonight in more than one area.
Annoyed with herself, with Bill, and most particularly with all things avian, she stomped upstairs, took off her shoes, and threw them at the closet. Marching to the window, she opened it, stuck her head out, and glared at the empty tree across from her. "If you ever, *ever*," she repeated for emphasis, "do anything to hurt Bill, I swear I'll buy a rifle and shoot you myself!" Her anger fell heavily in the hot night, but sullen silence was the only reply. She listened until she started to feel foolish for talking to an absent owl, then grumpily closed the window and went to bed.
The next day was a busy one because she planned to be gone at least two weeks and had laundry, packing, and a host of little things to do. The great debate to call or not to call raged in her mind as she worked, and she found herself casting more and more glances towards the phone as the day wore on. The object of her dilemma solved it himself by ringing her up to ask her to dinner. She was so relieved to hear him alive and presumably not assaulted by owls that she almost said yes, but forced herself to take a rain check. There was too much on her plate right now, but when she got back they needed to sit down and have a long talk.
The dreams were bad again that night, and she woke aching to put her arms around her brother. Tomorrow brought the anniversary of her ill-fated wish, and whenever it was humanly possible, Sarah spent that day hovering over Toby like a hawk. It was a long drive north from Virginia, but she was determined. Their parents thought she was loony, but they were also glad to see her. Starting early to take advantage of the cooler temperatures, she loaded up her little Subaru, locked her front door, and waved a cheerful see-you-later to her neighborhood. Popping a mix into the tape deck, she rolled down the windows and sang along lustily. There was nothing like the feeling of being on the road!
Almost twelve hours later, she had to admit that there was also nothing like pulling into the driveway of your destination at long last. Climbing stiffly out of her seat, she limped around the back of the car to get her duffle and was immeasurably pleased when she heard Toby's voice cry, "Mom! Dad! She's here!" A battering ram of ten-year-old exuberance spilled out of the pristinely white screen door and vaulted the steps to slam directly into her stomach. With a joyful "Oof!" Sarah picked him up bodily and whirled him around.
"Wow, you're getting big!" she gasped as she put him down.
"I'm the tallest boy in my class," he informed her proudly. Grabbing her hand, he leaned all his weight against it to drag her towards the house. "Come see the train that Dad and I are building!" Bob and Karen emerged a moment later, Dad grinning as he hugged her around Toby and Karen giving her a friendly smile as she leaned in to kiss her on the cheek. Sarah let them pull her into the house, happier than she could say to be surrounded by family. Even if it wasn't the original model, it still felt like coming home.
