Page 144

She shrugged.

"I take it day by day now. Some days go faster than others. Some seem to take weeks."

"That sounds familiar," I said and she nodded. She glanced around the room.

"This was my room, you know,"

"I know,"

"It doesn't seem possible now."

"What?"

"That I lived here once. that I had a life here once. Maybe that's good. Maybe that's the way our minds protect themselves from really going mad. Forgetting is not such a bad thing sometimes."

She laughed and crossed to the bed.

"I used to think it would be wonderful for every day to really be a new day. I mean, to be born again each day. You reach a point in your life when you've grown as much as you will and then you start these multiple existences. Today. I'll be Megan. Tomorrow I'll be... Diane. The day after I'll be Clara, and it will be more than just a change of names. I'd have a different history each day and a different personality, too. That would be more fun, don't you think?"

"If that happened, how could you ever fall in love or be part of anything significant or become anything?" I asked.

"That's the point. You'd just start something and never finish and never, ever be disappointed. It would all end too soon for defeat and sadness.

"We become different people before we die anyway. Rain. I'm certainly not the person I was when I lived here. and I'm not the woman I was in college. I'm not even the woman I was last year, not now. anyway.

"You'll see." she said.

"Maybe I already have," I replied.

"Yes," she said, staring at me and nodding. "Yes. I think you have. Anyway. I'm glad you're okay. I can't even imagine what it must have been like with Victoria. She could be very cruel. She was never a happy person. never. I know she hated me."

"She envied you." I said.

"That's the same thing in the end. You get so you hate the things you can't have or can't be. It's true for me now," she nearly whispered. Then she shook her head as if that would shake out the bad thoughts and smiled. "So, what's this I hear about a wedding?"

"He's a madman,' I said. "but I love him and I'm pretty sure he loves me. No one else would want to do this."

"Fiddlesticks," she said. "You're a very pretty girl and a bright girl, too."

She sighed looked at a picture of Grandmother Hudson that was on the dresser and then turned back to me.

"I want you to know I really never blamed you for Brody's death. I mourned hard because I knew I was totally to blame not only for his death, but for your sense of guilt. I felt I had destroyed two of my children."

"Neither of them can hate you. Mother," I said. She smiled, softly.

"No. I'm the only one now who can do that, I suppose. I have no right to expect anything of you, Rain, but I'd like to come back and I'd like to try again to be your friend."

"I never wanted anything else," I said, Her smile widened,

"I'm looking forward to your wedding."

"I have something to tell you. Actually, two things you ought to know. I'm determined to shut secrets out of this house and my life from now on," I added.

"Good," she said. "I'll try to do the same."

"My father's coming to the wedding," I said.

"Larry?"