Wake the Hollow

Chapter Two

On the phone, the officer's formal tone cemented it. "At two thirty p.m. on August twenty-ninth, your mother's neighbor, Mrs. Betty Anne Haworth, noticed your mom's cat begging for food. She knocked on her door. She found her collapsed in the tub, Miss Burgos. I'm terribly sorry for your loss."

And so, my mother's lifeless body remained at the Westchester County morgue for seven days. The big September storm prevented us from flying in, so nobody came to claim her. After that, my father had to fly to Colombia again, said he was waiting for some money he needed before we could travel to New York. Eventually, Dad told me it was over—they cremated her. 

I never got to say good-bye. 

Staring at the note, I wonder—did Mami know something bad was going to happen to her? The way I know when the phone will ring? If she did, why would she contact me when I was too far away to help? Why not Betty Anne? Why snail-mail the note to Emily's house when she'd never even met my best friend before? 

I face my restless body to the wall and glance at my phone: 4:37 a.m. I never imagined I'd be sleeping here tonight, but Bram insisted on taking the couch so I could get the "good bed." I don't have the heart to tell him it's not that comfortable, but it does smell like him, which is nice in a weird way. Still, it feels strange sleeping here when my old house is only ten minutes away.

Blunt trauma to the head, the officer's voice echoes in my mind. She slipped in the bath tub, miss. An accident. What had it felt like in those last moments before she died? 

"I'm sorry I took so long to get here, Mami," I whisper in the dark, wiping away hot tears. I fling the note back into my bag and let go of a big, deep breath. If I think about it too much, it'll consume me. 

In and out through the nose. Quiet your mind, like Emily always says during yoga. Still, my disjointed thoughts pester me. Eventually, they blend into something continuous. It's not until the gray, early morning shadows begin melting into streaks of amber, when the image of my mother's ashes floating in the cold wind leaves me, do I finally fall asleep.

***

The woman glides into my dreams—a human in smoke form. She wears dark petticoats and an old-fashioned hairstyle, like buns on the sides of her head. In her arms is a small, soft bundle. No face to speak of again, just a swirling mask of fog, sobs echoing from a distant place.

He's leaving me.

Who? Your husband? I ask her.

She doesn't answer. On a table beside her, a stack of papers lifts into the air and flies about on its own, as if a window has just suddenly opened, letting in a swirling rogue gust of wind. The woman rises from her chair, bundle in arms, and flies high above a busy, foggy cityscape into the countryside, beckoning me to follow.

This is the part that always scares me more than anything. Where does she want to lead me? What if it's the so-called "light"? Please stop! I feel the apparition's force pulling me. I can't go with you!

Sleep paralysis sets in. I wish my eyes would pry open, wish my legs would budge. I want to scream in my sleep, outside my sleep, anything...but I can't move. Let me go! 

After more tugs, my real-life body rips forward, catapulting me into the middle of the bedroom. I stumble into the bathroom, covering my eyes, afraid I'll run into the ghost on the way, and hang my face over the sink. I pant and sweat until my terror dissolves.

Pressing a towel to my forehead, I mutter prayers to anyone who'll listen. Please let her be gone, please let her be gone. But when I look up, a face is in the mirror. I scream and bang my shoulder against the towel rack, and then a pair of strong arms wraps around me.