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CHAPTER FOUR

T he first thing that happened when I set foot on the bridge was that it felt like someone gave me a violent shove. I stumbled forward and almost fell—but I managed to catch myself on the wooden handrail.

Then I heard the unmistakable sound of a door clapping shut behind me.

“Oh, no!” I gasped.

Whirling around, I saw the heavy oak door was already beginning to fade. Even as I reached for it, it became transparent…and then disappeared completely.

“It’s gone! Now what are we going to do?” I demanded, turning towards Sebastian.

My cat turned his head back to me for a moment and said,

“Mmmroww!”

Then he continued down the wooden bridge. It was as though he was telling me to follow him.

Since I didn’t have any other choice, I did.

The bridge was long and straight and it ran over a narrow brook that was murmuring quietly to itself. Looking over the wooden railing, I had another bright flash of memory.

I saw myself standing at this exact same place, but I was somehow much shorter—my head didn’t even reach the top of the railing.

I was looking through the space between the wooden rails and down into the water.

A little toy boat was skipping along on the water, weaving and bobbing as the current carried it under the bridge and beyond…

Then the memory was gone as quickly as it had appeared. I blinked and looked up to see that Sebastian was already at the end of the bridge. He was looking over his shoulder at me as if to say, “Are you coming or what?”

“All right, all right—I’m coming,” I told him.

Another gust of chilly wind whipped past me, making me shiver.

Being a Florida girl, I have pretty thin blood and I was only wearing a short-sleeved t-shirt and a pair of yoga pants.

(I pretty much live in yoga pants—it’s one benefit of working from home.)

I hurried to the end of the bridge and caught up with my cat, who was now making his way down a dirt path shadowed by towering, colorful Maple trees.

The foliage was even more exquisite up close.

I reached out and plucked a bright red leaf bigger than my palm and examined it.

The intricate tracery of veins convinced me I wasn’t dreaming—which I had been half suspecting from the moment the door was drawn in the middle of my apartment.

What kind of dream had such elaborate detail?

The dirt path led to a house, just as I had suspected. It was an English Colonial style—two solid stories built directly on top of each other with an attic above. A narrow sidewalk led to the house through the surprisingly well-tended front lawn.

I looked at the house, studying it. There was a broad front porch and four white columns supporting a portico.

The windows looked like eyes but not in a bad way—they almost seemed to smile at me.

The faded paint and white trim made me think of an ancient Grandfather for some reason.

I didn’t have any feelings of foreboding—actually, I felt almost at once that I would be welcome here.

Sebastian seemed to feel the same way because he sashayed right up the front sidewalk and sat on the porch. Then he looked back at me again as if to say,

“Well? Come on!”

“Wait a minute,” I told him. “Let’s just be sure this is, uh, Grandma’s house.”

A glance at the mailbox at the end of the sidewalk convinced me, however. It was clearly marked as #1 Crooked Lane. Apparently this was the house I’d inherited.

I walked up the sidewalk and as I did, I had the strongest feeling of déjà vu I’d ever experienced in my life.

People talk about remembering past life experiences—that was what it felt like.

I could almost see my younger self running around the front lawn—jumping into piles of leaves in Fall…

stomping in puddles during Summer…building a snowman in the Winter…

picking flowers in the Spring… So many memories popping around my head like flashbulbs going off. It was hard to keep track of them all.

There was no doubt about it—I knew this house. The question was—did it know me?

“Well, only one way to find out,” I told Sebastian.

I walked up to the front door, which was painted a dark green that somehow worked with the periwinkle blue clapboard and the white siding. I looked for a keyhole at first, since I still had the heavy iron key in one hand. But I couldn’t find anyplace to put it.

At last, I gave up and just put my hand on the outside of the door. Was it my imagination or did it vibrate slightly at my touch? I tried the knob, but it wouldn’t open—it wouldn’t even turn. How was I supposed to get in?

“Talk to him.”

The voice was faint—a barely-there whisper in my ear. It might have been another Autumn breeze but somehow I didn’t think it was.

“What?” I looked around, wondering what was going on.

“Introduce yourself,” the tiny voice suggested.

Was I going crazy? Imagining things? Or had I been wrong before and I really was dreaming?

Whichever it was, I decided there was no harm in following the voice’s suggestion. After all, what did I have to lose?

“Er, hello, uh Morris?” I said, feeling silly to be addressing a house like it was a person. “I’m Sarah—the granddaughter of Elvira? I have her will right here,” I added, waving the crumpled document, which I was still hanging onto. “It says I, er, own you now.”

That sounded wrong, though—rude, I thought. Sebastian seemed to agree because he gave me the side-eye and made a hissing sound.

“Er, not that I’m trying to say I’m your owner or anything,” I backtracked, trying to make amends.

“But I’d be grateful if I could stay here for a while.

I don’t know where I am and the door to my apartment disappeared.

Also, I’m going to lose the apartment anyway since my rent just doubled and I lost my main job. I can’t?—”

Before I could finish the sentence, the front door trembled again and I heard a faint click, as though a lock was turning somewhere inside. Then, to my mingled relief and trepidation, it swung open.

I stood there for a moment, not sure if I ought to go in or not. Sebastian, however, had no such worries. He stepped right over the threshold as though he owned the place.

I looked inside as he did. The interior wasn’t gloomy at all.

The door opened into a short foyer that led up to a set of stairs.

An antique side table was pushed against one wall and there was an old-fashioned lamp with a white frosted globe painted with pink climbing roses.

It was glowing softly, as though to light my way inside.

Since nothing bad had happened to Sebastian—his bushy tail was currently disappearing around the corner—I got brave and decided to step inside myself.

“Okay,” I muttered, mostly to myself. “Here goes.”

As I stepped over the threshold, I thought I heard the little voice again.

“Welcome home, child,” it breathed.

“Uh, thank you,” I said, looking around. But no one answered.

I was afraid the door might swing shut behind me and disappear like the one on the bridge, but it stayed open, which was a relief. If it had slammed shut, I would have felt immediately trapped. I caught myself thinking that maybe the house knew that and it—or he—didn’t want to scare me.

I tried to push the idea out of my mind, but it wouldn’t quite go. I made my way deeper into the house, passing by the stairs and following Sebastian around the corner.

I found myself in a cozy living room. There was a big, overstuffed couch upholstered in a faded floral print with three hand-crocheted lace doilies across the back. A fireplace at the far end of the room already had a pile of logs in it, as though it was waiting for someone to light it.

“I don’t know anything about making a fire,” I remarked aloud. “I’d be afraid I’d burn the house down—I don’t think I’ve ever lived anywhere with a fireplace in my life.”

But even as I spoke the words, I had another bright flash of memory.

I was sitting on the worn carpet in front of the fireplace while someone carefully untangled and combed my hair.

I could see the flames flickering in the grate and feel their warmth on my face.

I was wrapped in a towel and my hair was damp—I’d just had a shower or maybe a bath…

Then the memory was gone but the implications were clear—I had lived here before, or at least visited. In fact, it seemed like my entire lost childhood was somehow tied to this house.

Deciding to explore further, I left the living room and went around the corner to the next area, which was a formal dining room. There was nothing to see here except a large, oval dining table with six chairs.

The only odd thing was the chair at the head of the table—it was way bigger than the other five chairs and it was built more solidly too—its wooden legs were as big as my thighs.

And believe me, I have some thick thighs.

It looked like it could support someone much bigger and heavier than your average human being.

I frowned. Had my Grandmother had giant friends come to visit? Who in the world besides someone the size of a professional wrestler would need a chair this thick and sturdy?

I waited to see if I would get any flashes of memory to answer the question, but when there were none forthcoming, I decided to wander into the next room of the house.

It was the kitchen and if you’ve heard the term “grandma kitchen,” well, that’s exactly what it looked like.

There was an old-fashioned stove/oven in one corner with black burners ringed by aluminum foil—presumably to keep them clean.

Beside the stove was a long countertop with a sink in the middle.

There was a window in front of it which looked out into a large, sloping backyard filled with more Maple trees and a stream running at the bottom.