Before I Wake

by Robert J. Wiersema

  Jamie

  Oh—Karen says hello.

  “Uh, hello. This is a message for Simon. Simon, it’s Karen. Listen, I just wanted to let you know that Jamie’s working on an article for the paper, for next Thursday. Sort of a, you know, a human interest, ‘where are they now’ kinda thing…I know you’ll be out of town, but I thought you might want to get a copy.”

  SIMON

  I woke to the sound of thunder, a throaty rumbling that rattled the bed. No, not thunder. The roar of waves, mere feet from my head. For a moment, I was completely disconcerted. Nothing about the room was familiar—the pale walls, the honey-colored trim, the chair, the beige carpet stretching to meet the sliding door onto the balcony. Then it came to me: Tofino. The Wickaninnish.

  We had driven up the night before, stopping in Nanaimo for dinner before addressing three hours of winding wilderness roads, the headlights illuminating only trees and undergrowth until we emerged on the west coast of the island. We had checked into the hotel long after dark, the clerk at the front desk the only person in the firelit lobby.

  Arriving at the room, we had fallen into bed, absolutely exhausted. The promised view was nothing more than a reflection of the inside of the room on the clean, slick glass.

  I rose from the bed, careful not to disturb Mary, who was still asleep, facing away from me, away from the view, huddled under the white quilt. The room wasn’t at all cold, but with a single flick I ignited the gas fireplace, which purred to life.

  “Oh my God.”

  “What?” Mary asked groggily, rustling as she turned to face me. “Oh, wow.”

  The hotel was built on a rocky outcropping along the water’s edge, the waves crashing against the slate-black, barnacle-encrusted rocks right before our eyes. The balcony seemed to dangle precariously over the waves. The sky was cloud white, and there was nothing in the distance save a thin line of silver where the waves met the sky. Out there somewhere: Japan.

  Every crashing wave spewed foam skyward, toward where we stood, always falling just short of the balcony.

  Writers and painters have been attracted to this coast for almost a hundred years, and now I understood why. The sensation as I looked out at the ocean reminded me of church, the tiny Anglican chapel my mother dragged us to when I was a boy, and the breathtaking cathedrals in Europe that Karen and I had visited during our backpacking trip in university. I felt awe, wonder and fear in the face of the sublime, and a limitlessness akin to weightlessness, as if some sort of internal gravity had been lifted away. Even behind the glass, I felt tiny, nearly overwhelmed by the roar and the spray.

  I could hear Mary’s footsteps on the carpet as she came up behind me, sliding her arms around my waist, the softness of her bare breasts and warm belly against my back. “This is amazing,” she said, looking out around me at the view.

  “Yeah.” I entwined my hands with hers.

  She kissed me just inside my shoulder blade, resting her face there for a moment. “I’m happy we’re here,” she said, her voice muffled.

  “I am too.”

  After a moment, she asked, “Do you want to go for a walk on the beach?”

  “Actually, I’d like to get some breakfast.” As if prompted, my stomach growled.

  “Always thinking with your stomach,” she said slyly. “I’ll call room service.”

  “No, let’s go out, find a little café.”

  “You do like going out for breakfast, don’t you?”

  “Best meal of the day.”

  “Do I have time for a quick shower?”

  “No rush at all.”

  “Good. I’ll see you in a sec.”

  She was just closing the bathroom door when I decided I needed a shower myself.

  “Jamie? Are you there? If you’re there, pick up. Shit. It’s Karen. Have you seen the paper? What the hell is this? Jesus Christ, the phone’s ringing off the hook, I don’t know what to say. What the hell happened? Where are you? Listen, give me a call. No, never mind, you won’t be able to get through—just get over here.”

  SIMON

  It was cool outside; not cold, but the moisture in the air and the wind chilled us right through as we hurried to the car. The air was heavy with the smell of the ocean. We drove the few minutes into Tofino along the winding coast road, and parked the car in front of a little restaurant called the Cranberry Café, weathered wood with white curtains in the front windows.

  Next to the door there was a busker—the typical West Coast, Generation X type with his rough goatee, knit toque, shapeless jacket and pants—driving out an old Bob Dylan song on a battered guitar. He couldn’t sing, and could barely manage the chords, but he swayed, eyes half-closed, as if in a trance. I dropped a few coins into the open guitar case at his feet as we went through the restaurant door. Mary looked a bit surprised.

  “Good morning,” called out the heavyset girl behind the counter as we came in. “Can I get you coffee?”

  “That’d be great. Where should we…?” I looked around at the tables. The restaurant wasn’t busy, filled mostly with what seemed to be locals, but there were a few couples like us, tourists making a long weekend of it.

  She waved her hand. “Wherever you like. I’ll be able to find you.” Her smile was infectious.

  We sat in the window, overlooking the rough street, the cracked pavement, the row of small stores. She was there with the menus and the coffeepot, filling our mugs, almost before we sat down. “So, how long are you folks in town for?”

  “For the weekend.”

  “Are you staying in town?”

  “Actually, we’re up the road.”

  “Nice place,” the waitress nodded. “Anyway, the specials are on the board,” she gestured to a dusty chalkboard on the wall behind the counter. “I’ll be back in a few minutes to take your order. If you get bored waiting for me, just wave.”

  She turned to walk away.

  “Uh, before you go, do you have a copy of today’s Sentinel that I could take a look at?”

  Her smile turned teasing. “I thought you were supposed to be on vacation?” She shook her head and winked at Mary, who shrugged. “I’ve got one at the counter. I’ll bring it when I come to get your order.”

  Mary looked around the restaurant. It was a cute place—tablecloths on all the tables, lots of plants, plain walls with lots of natural wood trim, decorated with watercolors. “I like this place,” she whispered.

  “I like you,” I said without even thinking about it.

  I wasn’t usually prone to emotional blurtings like that.

  She reached across the table and laid her hand across my own. The gesture seemed utterly natural. “I like you too.” She grinned, and blushed a little. “I like this.”

  “Me too.”

  We sat looking out the window, until the waitress returned, setting a folded copy of the New Sentinel on the table in front of me. “Are you guys all ready to order?”

  “I think I’ll just have some pancakes—butter on the side, please.”

  The waitress turned to me, jotting down Mary’s order. “And for you?”

  “Bacon and eggs, sunny-side up, hash browns, multigrain toast and a glass of tomato juice.”

  She scooped the menus up and headed back to the kitchen.

  The folded copy of the New Sentinel lay on the table between us. Mary smiled and shook her head, watching me deliberately not looking at the paper.

  I took a sip of my coffee. Neither of us said anything for a long moment.

  Finally, Mary broke the silence. “You might as well read it.”

  I shrugged. “I’m not in any hurry.”

  She grinned at me. “Well, I’m in a hurry. I’d like you to read it so that we can get it out of the way and get on with our weekend, okay?”

  “Well, if you insist…” I unfolded the paper. “It’s not like there’s going to be anything new.”

  I skipped the front section entirely, guessing that the story Karen had called about would be in the Li
fe section. “I expect it’ll be the typical six months later—”

  My voice caught. Under the fold, C3. A small picture of Sherry, and a headline that I couldn’t believe even as I reread it.

  “Holy shit,” I muttered.

  “What is it?”

  I couldn’t stop reading to explain. “Oh my God.”

  Victoria New Sentinel

  Thursday, December 5, 1996

  Miracles?

  Can injured girl cure the dying?

  ~Todd Herbert~

  According to one grateful woman, four-year-old Sherilyn Barrett is much more than the victim of a tragic accident last spring. “She’s an angel,” says Pamela Harding, 28. “She’s a miracle.”

  The miracle is that Harding is alive to say anything at all. According to Harding, two months ago she was informed by her doctor that she had mere weeks to live. “It was cancer,” says Harding. “I lost both breasts, but it was all through me. The doctor said that there was nothing he could do. He said that I was going to die.” Today her doctor confirms that no cancer remains in her system. “It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen,” says Dr. Eugene Katz, oncologist at Royal Jubilee Hospital. “There seems to have been a complete remission. I can’t explain it.”

  But Pamela Harding thinks she can explain it. “It’s a miracle, and it’s all because of that little girl.” According to Mrs. Harding, who is married with two young children, she was taken to the Barretts’ Fernwood home by a friend who had also been healed by Sherilyn Barrett. “She told me that her lung cancer had completely disappeared. I didn’t believe her, but I thought, Well, it can’t hurt.”

  According to Harding, her contact with Barrett took place almost two weeks ago. By the following morning, her cancer had disappeared. “It’s a miracle,” Harding says, radiating her newfound good health. “I’ve got my life back, and it’s all because of that little girl.”

  Calls to the Barrett residence went unanswered yesterday. According to Harding, “They’re trying to keep it all a secret. They don’t want anyone else to know. But I had to tell you: it’s a miracle, and everyone should know.”

  SIMON

  “Simon? What is it?”

  Unable to speak, I handed her the newspaper. “Here,” I said, tapping the article. “This.”

  As Mary scanned the article, I punched in my home number as quickly as I could. Busy. Of course.

  I dialed again.

  “Holy shit, Simon. What is this?”

  Still busy.

  “I have no idea.” I dialed again.

  Still busy. “Goddamn it!” I slammed the phone to the table. The other patrons turned to look.

  Mary stared at me as the waitress came rushing over.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked, her face creased with concern.

  “No.” I shook my head, clearing my throat and trying to pull myself together. “Just a…”

  Mary’s eyes lowered to the table, and she shook her head. She touched the waitress’s arm. “Actually, could we have our breakfast to go, please? It turns out we need to head back into town.”

  “Sure, sure. Of course. No problem. Right away.”

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “We’ll stop at the hotel, grab the stuff and head out. If we drive straight through we should be back in Victoria by”—she stopped, checking her watch—“3:30 or so.”

  Without even thinking about it I looked at my own watch. “Yes, but—”

  “You need to be home for this. Your daughter needs you. Karen needs you.”

  “Mary—”

  “If nothing else, they probably need a lawyer.”

  I could see how hard she was trying to hold on to her calm facade. “You need to be there, Simon. It’s as simple as that. We’ll get away some other time.”

  It was clear that neither of us completely believed what she was saying. We both knew that our lives had changed again in a single moment. The waitress returned with two takeout containers and neither of us said anything more.

  RUTH

  It was even worse than I had feared. By the time I got to the house at 8:30 that morning, the front yard was surrounded by reporters, bunched together on the sidewalk, at the edge of the lawn, in the driveway. They all turned to watch me as I drove up, and rushed toward me when I got out of the car.

  “Are you the nurse?”

  “Can you comment on…?”

  “Have you seen any…?”

  “Mrs. Page!”

  “Ma’am, what about…?”

  “Has Karen Barrett ever…?”

  I tried to be polite, but they pressed around me, a wall of voices, shoving and pushing. I walked as quickly as I could across the front yard, opening the door with the key Mrs. Barrett had given me, slamming it behind me.

  I wondered how long it would be before she asked for the key back.

  All of the lights were off, except one in the kitchen.

  I hung my coat on the hook. “Hello?” I called quietly. “Hello?”

  Karen was sitting in the dark in Sherry’s room. She didn’t flinch when I turned on the light. I was the one who jumped.

  “Mrs. Barrett.”

  She stared at me without saying a word, a folded newspaper on the table next to her.

  “I’ve been on the phone all morning.”

  “Mrs. Barrett—”

  “It just kept ringing and ringing. Finally I just left it off the hook.”

  “I can explain—”

  “Can you?” she asked, turning to me. “Can you really?” Her face was pulled so tight it looked like she might tear.

  I sighed. “I can try.”

  She stared at me, waiting.

  “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.” When the words started coming, I could do nothing to slow them. I told her everything, from my retirement to when I had first noticed that there was no longer any pain in my hands.

  “I couldn’t believe it,” I said. “I had lived with that pain for so long. I’d tried all the treatments. Nothing worked. I couldn’t figure out what had happened, until one day…” I stopped. I hadn’t told anyone. I didn’t want to sound ridiculous. “I was giving Sherry her bath, and I was holding her head to wash her hair, and I saw my hand on her forehead. I’m not a Bible-thumper or anything, but I couldn’t…I couldn’t think of anything else that explained it.”

  Then I told her about Sarah, and inviting her to the house, about Sarah’s remission and about opening the door to find my sister on the doorstep with her dying friend Pam.

  She didn’t say anything when I was done. Unable to bear the silence, I busied myself with Sherry’s routine as if it were any other morning. The curtains were drawn, but with all the reporters outside I didn’t want to open them. My hands were shaking as I wrote the notes in her file.

  “Did you have any problems with the reporters?” she finally asked.

  “No. No. I just got into the house as fast as I could.”

  She stood up and peered through the crack in the curtains. “They’re staying out on the sidewalk,” she muttered. “I could call the police and complain about trespassing if they came into the yard.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “When did you know about the article?” she asked, her back still turned.

  I hesitated a moment. “I thought that Jamie’s article was going to be in the paper today, so I bought a copy.”

  “You didn’t know?”

  “I didn’t know that Pam had told.”

  I couldn’t say anything more. I had betrayed Karen, betrayed Sherry. I stared down at the carpet.

  “I’m sorry, Karen. If I hadn’t invited Sarah in, none of this would have happened. But…she’s my sister.”

  She sighed, and turned to face me. “Ruth, did you leave her—either of them—alone with Sherry?”

  “I would never do that. They were never alone with her.”

  “I can’t…I can’t be lied to anymore,” she said.

 
“I’m sorry.”

  “There has to be honesty here. Here,” she stressed the word. “I have to know that there’s someone, one person, I can count on.”

  She didn’t seem angry; she seemed close to tears. “I’m so sick and tired of being surprised by things. Of always being the last to know. Do you know what I mean? I can’t, I just can’t…”

  I nodded. “I won’t. I won’t lie to you again.”

  She nodded, and looked at me without saying anything for several seconds.

  “I made tea,” she said. “I’ll bring it in here.”

  She turned to leave the room.

  “Do you…” I stopped her. “Do you want me to come to the kitchen with you?”

  She turned back to face me. “You’re asking if I still trust you alone with my daughter?”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “I’ll bring the tea in here,” she said.

  I sat down heavily, my eyes wet.

  When she came back, she set the tray on the table and reached out to me.

  “Take my hand,” she said.

  “What?”

  She wiggled her fingers a little. “Take my hand,” she repeated.

  Gingerly, I took hold of her extended fingers.

  “Squeeze it.”

  “What?”

  “Squeeze my hand. As hard as you can.” Our eyes met, but I didn’t quite understand what I saw there.

  Without breaking our gaze, I squeezed her fingers as hard as I could. I saw her jaw clench, saw her flinch with the pressure, until finally she jerked her hand away. “Jesus,” she muttered.

  “I’m sorry,” I started.

  “And last winter…”

  “You should see my cupboards at home. I had to go out and buy all those gadgets, like the can openers with the big rubber handles, so I could get a grip. But now…” I gestured toward the tea. “Even my ulcer isn’t troubling me.”