He sighs. “Your husband, Katharyn. I’m your husband, Lars.”
Lars? What a peculiar name. I cannot think of a single person I’ve ever met called Lars. I half smile, thinking about my oh-so-imaginative brain. It couldn’t just invoke a Harry or an Ed or a Bill. No, ma’am, my mind has fabricated a husband named Lars.
“All right,” I say. “Just give me a moment.”
He squeezes my hand and releases it, then leans over to kiss my cheek. “I’ll take her temp while we’re waiting for you.” He rises and leaves the room.
Once again, I close my eyes. Now the dream will shift, surely.
But when I open my eyes, I’m still there. Still in the green bedroom.
I see no alternative, so I get up and cross the room. With its clerestory windows above the bed, its sliding glass door that looks as though it leads to some sort of patio, and its large, adjacent bathroom, I deduce that this room, were it real, would be part of a rather modern residence. More modern—and presumably bigger—than the one-bedroom, 1920s-era duplex that I rent in the Platt Park neighborhood of Denver.
I peek into the bathroom. The fixtures are light green, shiny and chrome-accessorized. The long vanity has two sinks and a gold-flecked white Formica counter. The vanity is composed of blond wood cabinets that gently taper downward and inward toward the wall, such that the vanity is deeper at the countertop level than it is near the floor. The tiled floor is a fresh mosaic of mint green, pink, and white. I have no idea if I’m in Denver anymore, but if so, this certainly is not old-time Platt Park, where nothing new has been built since before the war.
Examining myself in the mirror over the dresser, I half expect to see some entirely different person—who knows who this Katharyn is? But I look exactly like myself. Short, buxom, with exasperating strawberry-blond hair that cowlicks itself over my forehead and frizzes everywhere else, no matter how often I go in for a wash-and-set. I put my fingers through it, noting that on the ring finger of my left hand are a sparkling diamond and a wide gold wedding band. Well, naturally, I think. And how optimistic of my brain to have invented a husband who can afford a nice-size rock.
Foraging in the closet, I find a navy-blue quilted bathrobe that fits me perfectly. Belting it around my waist, I enter the hallway, on my way to find the oddly named Lars and his unwell child Missy.
On the wall directly in front of me, clearly positioned so that it can be seen from inside the bedroom, is a large color photograph. It shows a mountain scene: the sun sunk over the horizon, the peaks backlit with pink and gold tones. Ponderosa pines rise the length of the photograph on the left-hand side. I’ve lived in Colorado my entire life, but I have no idea where this is, or even if it’s the Rocky Mountains.
I’m trying to decode this mystery when I am tackled around the waist on my right side. I struggle to regain my balance and keep from falling over backward.
“Ouch!” I say as I turn around. “Don’t do that. Remember to support yourself entirely. You are too big now to lean on other people and expect them to hold you up.”
What in the world? Who is this woman saying these things? It can’t be me. These words don’t sound like anything I’d ever say, or even think.
Looking up at me is a small boy. He’s got Lars’s piercing blue eyes and a neat, short haircut that nevertheless can’t hide a reddish-blond cowlick over his brow. His peaches-and-cream face is scrubbed clean. He looks like he could be in an advertisement for milk or Popsicles. Yes, he’s that cute, and I find that my heart melts a bit, looking at him.
He releases me and says he’s sorry. “I just missed you, Mama,” he says. “I haven’t seen you since yesterday.”
I am speechless. Then, reminding myself that I am, after all, asleep, I smile at the boy. I lean down and give his shoulder a squeeze. I’m just going along with this dream now. Why not? So far, this is a pleasant enough place to be.
“Take me to your father and Missy,” I say, grabbing the child’s soft, plump hand.
We walk down the hall and go up a half flight of stairs. At the top is a girl’s bedroom, with carnation-pink walls, a little white wooden bed, and a low bookcase filled with picture books and stuffed animals. Sitting upright in the bed is an equally angelic child, a female version of the boy who holds my hand. Her expression is forlorn and her cheeks are flushed. She is about the same size as the boy. I am terrible at deciphering children’s ages, but I’d guess they are around five or six. Twins?
“Mama’s here!” Cherub Boy says, climbing onto the bed. “Missy, Mama’s here and you’re going to be fine.”
Missy whimpers. I sit next to her and touch her forehead, which feels distressingly warm under my hand. “What hurts?” I ask her gently.
She leans toward me. “Everything, Mama,” she says. “My head especially.”
“Did Daddy take your temp?” I can’t believe how easily these words, these motherly actions, are coming to me. I feel like an old pro.
“Yeah, he’s washing the ther-mon-eter.”
“Thermometer,” Cherub Boy corrects her. “It’s a ther-MOM-eter. Not a ther-MON-eter.”
She rolls her eyes at him. “Mind your own beeswax, Mitch.”
Lars appears in the doorway. “One hundred one-point-six,” he reports.
I am unsure what that means. Oh, I know it means her temperature is 101.6 degrees Fahrenheit. But I do not know what it means in terms of medication, bed rest, staying home from school.
Because I do not have children. I am not a mother.
I don’t mean to imply that I never wanted children. Quite the contrary. I was one of those little girls who loved baby dolls, who fed them pretend bottles and changed their pretend diapers and pushed them around in a tiny doll-size pram. An only child, I begged my parents for a sibling—not because I wanted to be a big sister, but because I wanted to be a little mother to somebody.