School for the Blind by Dennis McFarland

Author:Dennis McFarland [McFarland, Dennis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4804-6507-7
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2013-12-18T15:32:00+00:00

Fifteen

“I HONESTLY DIDN’T THINK much about it,” says Muriel, in her imagination, to the kind psychotherapist. “I didn’t really stop to consider anything like fear.”

It was early Monday morning. Deirdre had arrived and was running the vacuum. In the back yard, Muriel had pulled a chaise longue into a triangle of shadow cast by the roof of the screened porch. Her eyes were closed.

“Still,” she hears the therapist say, “you seemed to know instinctively to take a friend with you.”

“That’s right,” says Muriel, feeling pleased about that. “I asked Billie to help me.”

“And who went up the stairs first?”

“Come to think of it, Billie did. I even let her get all the way to the top, and then she turned to me and said, ‘Well, aren’t you coming?’”

“But you weren’t feeling afraid?”

“Not consciously,” says Muriel. “But here’s the interesting thing. The whole time we were up there looking for pictures, I never went into any of the rooms. I let Billie do that. I stayed out in the hallway, rummaging through the old cedar chest.”

“So you felt you were protecting yourself from something?” asks the therapist.

“I don’t know.”

“‘I don’t know’ is not much of an answer.”

“But I really don’t know.”

“Do you want to look into the rooms again—in your imagination?”

“No,” says Muriel, “I don’t think so. Not today.”

“Muriel, dear,” said a voice.

She opened her eyes and could see, in silhouette, her deceased mother looming above her, blinding beacons like bolts of lightning discharging from either side of her head. It was the dark tunnel with the bright light at the end that Muriel had so often heard about, and her worst nightmare had come true: her mother was there, in the tunnel, to greet her.

“You’ve fallen asleep, sleepyhead,” said Billie. “You’re getting as bad as Ned.”

“As bad as Ned …” Muriel mumbled, and then the world came back to her.

Back yard.

Billie.

The sun.

Monday morning.

Still alive.

“Come inside,” said Billie. “Get a cup of coffee and we’ll play. You do want to play, don’t you?”

“Play,” said Muriel. “Oh, the piano. Of course. Yes.”

As they gained the porch, Muriel said, “My goodness, isn’t that odd? I was out cold.”

Over coffee in the kitchen, Billie said, “Frank called Ned yesterday, did you know?”

“Ned?” said Muriel. “Why?”

“Said he wanted to go deep-sea fishing, which of course tickled Ned to death. He’s been looking for somebody to go with him for over ten years.”

“Deep-sea fishing?” said Muriel. “Francis has never been a fisherman.”

“Well, he said he wanted to go. Ned said he sounded dreamy.”

“Dreamy?”

“That’s what he said. I thought Frank had the flu. I thought it rather strange of him to be calling about going deep-sea fishing when he had the flu.”

Deirdre, looking pallid, appeared in the doorway.

“Deirdre,” said Muriel. “You don’t look well.”

“I’m fine,” Deirdre said, not at all convincingly, almost bitterly. “Can I use the phone?”

“Of course,” Muriel said. “Billie and I were just about to play the piano in the parlor. Why don’t you close this door behind us so you won’t be disturbed.”

Muriel noticed Billie eyeing Deirdre suspiciously as they left the kitchen.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.