Moondance (43 page)

Finished, she printed the chart and the letter, and put the pages in a metal bowl. Downstairs, Sophie’s solarium was cool and silent. Cradling the metal bowl under her arm, she stepped outside onto the grass, which was covered in white crystals created by the late-autumn
frost.
A little bit of magic
, she thought.
The universe is magic. We create our own realities. With our thoughts, our feelings, our emotions. With every choice we make. Every day
.

Her breath misted against the black sky as she walked across Sophie’s
patio, past the willows, to the path.

The crunch of her steps echoed in the silence, awakening a memory. When she thought she heard footsteps behind her, she turned, but she was alone. Five minutes later, she stepped into the circular clearing. The small lake extended before her, like indigo glass, breaths of air weaving quilts on its surface, welcoming her as the sun set and the moon rose. A string of lights winked on the far shore, completing a circle, her body part of the illusion, her feet firm on the lake’s circumference. The soft gurgles of waves lapped. A duck moved close, and as she sensed it, it took off, its wings ruffling the water’s surface.

Althea removed her shoes, the sand cold and soft under her feet. She walked along the narrow beach, observing the setting sun as it cast a distorted shadow of the swing set tucked into the trees.
Come play
.

Placing the metal bowl on a weather-aged picnic table, Althea lowered herself on the wooden seat. Standing, she took three steps back, stood on her toes and let go, the air catching under her hair. Leaning back to get more height, her legs stretched out and up, then her stomach flipped as she reversed direction.

With each swing, she gathered momentum, and as she moved, each reversal created a new thought, a new recollection of
her life, flashes of memory. A picnic with Sophie while she was in remission, taking the picture of the hawk just before starting at White Light, grief and anger after discovering Tori and Kevin, sitting on Kevin’s lap, her legs over his, sharing kisses.

She opened her eyes and the tree that before had seemed just out of her toes’ reach, seemed closer, magnified by the moon, which was now out in full. She leaned back and stretched, her toes up, back in time
almost there
and she felt her life before the dreamtime as she imagined
remembered,
the series of choices, the anger, the denial, the pain, the thousands of small actions that kept her fixed and frozen
around and around and around
.

With her toes in the trees, she remembered the invitations she had received and did not accept, the blame she placed, the constant approval she sought from others, denying herself again and again. She remembered believing that what she most desired would always be just beyond her reach. She remembered those to whom she had given away her power, and through whom she had created a skewed image of herself.

We’ll remember
, a part of her had said, the part of herself she had been rejecting for so long, the part that had loved her and wanted her back enough to haunt her to the edge of her sanity. She remembered her wish, then the seduction, falling in love with the manifestation of herself, her sensitivity overpowering her, her dreams becoming more vivid, two realities blurring, and then fading into one long white path, a place of no judgment. She remembered the choice the universe had provided her, and most of all, she remembered love.

The trees whizzed past, her hair blew over her face, and she could hear the swing’s metal base straining in the sand. She leaned back fully then, reaching her toes up as far as she could, watching the world upside down, the blood rushing to her face, loving the exhilaration of it. Leaning back, her world spinning, she envisioned her chest opening to the sky, inviting the moon, the upward pull, and she could see it, feel it, taste it, touch it, in her heart, the present and future one. She swung fluidly
This was freedom
and she nurtured the feeling, allowing the energy to flow through her, the now familiar upward pull warming the air around her, her past released, making room for a new path about to open.

The swing creaked and slowed and her heels touched the earth.

She retrieved the metal bowl, and walked into the water, the reflection of shimmering white circles of moonlight all around her. Under the light of the moon, she read her letter to her guides and the description of her soul mate aloud with calm certainty. Scrunching each piece of paper gently, she placed them in the bowl and lit a match. The red-orange flames burned the paper quickly, emanating an intensity which eclipsed the moon.

When only the ashes remained, she sprinkled them into the water
and washed her bowl clean with sand, her heart bursting with gratitude.

chapter 73

THE SECOND DAY OF her month off, she visited Sophie in the morning, and then printed and re-read her book that had begun with a series of random scenes that she wrote in a rocky nook by the ocean. Three years later, the scenes were woven together and appeared throughout the book almost exactly as written.

She read her own words shyly at first, then she got into the flow, editing and making corrections, and adding notes in the margins. Six hours later, she turned to the final words she had written before she got stuck.

She let go
.

Althea sat at her computer. Her fingers were still. Right after Tori’s funeral, and after writing her intentions and burning them at the lake, it was as if her imagination was popping with bursts of creative energy. Now, she couldn’t recall what that felt like.

• • •

TWO HOURS PASSED. SHE stared at her screen.

She let go
.

The words were from one of the scenes she had written in Portugal in which a woman swung from a shimmering swing set adorned with red and gold flowers.

She read the last page again.

Years ago, Althea saw an author interviewed on television, who revealed that he wrote his first drafts with his computer screen turned off. Sitting in the dark in front of the television screen, Althea had imagined that. A direct link between the brain and the fingers, not interrupted by critical thinking: pure creative flow.
Like free-fall
.

She turned off her screen. The page remained as blank as her imagination.

Later, she went to the hospital and Sophie stared at her with unblinking eyes. Later, she was back at her computer.
Just write
, she thought.
Anything
. She typed
the end of the beginning is the beginning of the around and around and around they spun
, consciously holding herself back from correcting what she wrote, because sometimes when she did this, just let the words flow, sometimes the connection inserted itself into what she was doing and gently guided her.

• • •

A WEEK LATER, SHE had managed to piece together a few scenes. They didn’t flow. There was no popping of images, no silken threads that channeled her heart. Each day, she was more anxious. She knew it was fear, and she knew it was stopping her. She didn’t know what to do about it.

So in between the times she sat at her computer, she went on long walks. She meditated. She poured over her chart for answers. Sometimes she chose to sleep, inviting her dreams that had previously been rich. Instead, real life found its way in.

She wondered if this was the right time to try to finish. Sophie was deteriorating. Althea only had three more weeks left. She knew she was making excuses. She tried harder.

At four in the morning, she couldn’t sleep, so she got up and made some tea. Earlier that evening, she had been on a roll for a few pages, but it was as if there was something inside her that held back.
What was she missing?
She carried her tea into the living room, the moon casting a soft glow over her furniture, the sky appearing black and glassy beyond.

She had created intention around her life and her writing was part of that. This book was part of it. She had felt it, deep in her soul. She had felt, seen, tasted, created a clear intention about her future, and now she was trying to take action, and she was still blocked. She leaned up against the glass, looking out. It was snowing, big fluffy, glistening-white flakes.

“Be with me tomorrow, okay? Help me write and if you can’t do that, help me see what I’m missing, okay? That’s all I ask.”

As she stepped back, she saw a movement behind her and she jumped. It was the reflection of her own face. Albert’s chuckle came just as the phone rang.
Sophie
. She rushed to the phone, her heart racing.

“Hello?”

“Al.”

“Daniel?” Althea sat down in her office and put her hand on her forehead. Her heart was still racing.
Not Sophie. Not that ending
.

“I’ve been wanting to talk with you.”

“Uh huh. You know what time it is here, right?”

“Yeah, sorry about that. Did you get my emails?”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t answer.”

“I’ve had a few things going on lately, Daniel.”

“I’ve been thinking about you.”

“You mentioned that.”

“You are a good friend, Al. You know me better than anyone.”

“So you’ve said.”

“You’re one of the only people I really trust.”

As Althea listened to Daniel’s voice, her impatience rose. She didn’t
have time for this shit.

“What the
fuck
is going on with you, Daniel.”

“What do you mean?”

“Have you been drinking?”

“No.”

“Then what —” Daniel talked quickly.

“Francis walked out. But that doesn’t matter. Every time I was with Francis, I thought about you. Do you think about me?”

“Why are you calling me?”

“Do you think about me?”

“Daniel —”

“I want to try again, Althea. Just say the word. You can come here, get some experience in Asia.”

“Daniel, don’t you get it? You really hurt me when you left. It was really hard getting over you. I found out about Francis third hand. How do you think that felt to me?”

“I know, I fucked up. But with Francis, the sex just went downhill. It’s not the same as in the beginning, she’s not into oral and she’s really —”

“I don’t want to know about that Daniel —”

“Okay, okay. If you had answered my emails, I wouldn’t have had to call you.”

“Daniel, do you know why I didn’t return your emails?”

“No I don’t.”

“Because you are using me to escape.”

“We’re friends.”

“We aren’t friends. I don’t even have your home number!”

“Francis is jealous, she doesn’t like me having women friends. Especially women I was involved with —”

“Well if you married a woman that’s a little bit jealous maybe you created it that way.”

“I don’t ask her to be jealous.”

“Yes, and you don’t give her a chance to be trusting, either.”

“What, so you’re mad because you don’t have my home number?”

“It’s more than that. Did Francis even know we were still in touch?”

“No.”

“Why do you think that is?”

“I told you —”

“Yes, there’s what you say, then there’s the truth. Here’s my guess. You get off on the sneakiness of it. You want to pull
me
into your mess. That way, you never have to look closely at yourself, and you never have to take responsibility for your life — or for your marriage.”

“That’s not fair —”

“You have never been curious about my life, my feelings. You want to be friends on your terms, when you want it.”

“Al, I care about you.”

“No Daniel, you care about
you
. You know, I
used
to get a little bit of a vengeful thrill knowing about your personal life, that you’d call me with your problems, weirdly
flattered
with the idea that maybe you still wanted me a little bit, but you know what? I’m not glad anymore, I am not flattered. I see a little boy with one foot in and one foot out of real-life. What you want from me isn’t friendship, it’s based on deception and half-truths, and your marriage is your problem, not mine. It sucks my energy. I’m not judging you, I just choose not to be involved any more.”

“You said in your letter that you’d always —”

“That was almost three years ago!”

“You didn’t answer my emails —”

“Well I should have, I should have been clear.
Now
I’m clear. That was my mistake. I’ve let this go on for too long.”

“Yes you should have. If I knew how you felt, I wouldn’t have emailed. I thought you still cared, I thought we were friends.” Daniel’s voice had taken on a defensive and whiney tone. For a moment, Althea pictured him as a child.