Before Rick spoke, I saw from his expression what was coming.
I said the words first. "The kids are gone again."
Rick dropped onto the other side of the couch, propping his brow on his hand. I couldn't see his eyes, nor could he see me.
It was just past midnight. All evening, after we'd seen our three kids safely tucked into bed, we'd stayed in separate parts of the house, busily working away at various projects, all of them excuses not to go to bed ourselves--even though it was a work night
Rick looked up, quick and hopeful. "Mary. Did one of the kids say something to you?"
"No. I had a feeling; that was all. They were so sneaky after dinner. Didn't you see Lauren--" I was about to say raiding the flashlight and the Swiss Army Knife from the earthquake kit but I changed, with almost no pause, to "--sneaking around like ... like Inspector Gadget?"
He tried to smile. We'd made a deal, last time, to take it easy, to try to keep our senses of humor, since we knew where the kids were.
Sort of knew where the kids were.
How many other parents were going through this nightmare? There had to be others. We couldn't be the only ones. I'd tried hunting for some kind of support group on the Internet--Seeking other parents whose kids disappear to other worlds--and not surprisingly the e-mail I got back ranged from offers from psychologists for a free mental exam to "opportunities" to MAKE $$$ IN FIVE DAYS.
So I'd gone digging again, this time at the library, rereading all those childhood favorites: C. S. Lewis; L. Frank Baum; Joy Chant; Ruth Nicholls; and then more recent favorites, like Diana Wynne Jones. All the stories about kids who somehow slipped from this world into another, adventuring widely and wildly, before coming safely home via that magic ring, or gate, or spell, or pair of shoes. Were there hints that adults missed? Clues that separated the real worlds from the made up ones?
"Evidence," I said, trying to be logical and practical and adult. "They've vanished like this three times that we know about. Doors and windows locked. Morning back in their beds. Sunburned. After the last time, just outside R.J.'s room you saw two feathers and and a pebble like nothing on earth. You came to get me, the kids woke up, the things were gone when we got there. When asked, the response was, and I quote, 'What feathers?'"
But Rick knew he had seen those feathers, and so we'd made our private deal: wait, and take it easy.
Rick rubbed his hands up his face, then looked at me. And broke the deal. "What if this time they don't come back?"
We sat in silence. Then, because there was no answer, we forced ourselves to get up, to do chores, to follow a normal routine in hopes that if we were really, really good, and really, really normal, morning would come the same as ever, with the children in their beds.
I finished the laundry. Rick vacuumed the living room and took the trash cans out. I made three lunches and put them in the fridge.
I put fresh bath towels in the kids' bathroom.
At one o'clock we went to bed, and turned out the light, but neither of us slept; I lay for hours listening to the clock tick, and to Rick's unhappy breathing.
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