What happened to your fingers?” Christopher’s mother asked when she picked him up.
They were in the parking lot of the 3 Hole Golf course, standing with his friends and their mothers. The sun had finally set. The air was cold and crisp. Like a sensitive tooth.
“Nothing. Just some splinters,” Christopher replied.
“From a plastic sled?”
“A kid from school let us use his wooden one.”
Christopher’s mother looked at him for a quiet moment. Suspicion was too strong a word for the look in her eyes. But it was a close enough cousin.
“Which kid?” she asked.
“Kevin Dorwart. He’s in my homeroom,” he said without a blink.
That ended the questions for now. Just as he knew it would. Because there was something else he brought with him out of the imaginary world along with the splinters and the memory of the conversation that his body had with his three friends in the tree house. His mind was only in the imaginary world for an hour, but ever since he left it, there was this…
Itch.
An itch on his nose that he just couldn’t scratch because it wasn’t on his nose. It was in his brain. But even itch wasn’t the right word. Because an itch doesn’t also tickle and whisper and scratch. An itch doesn’t leave thoughts behind. The thoughts were like his old flash cards.
2 + 2 = 4
The capital of Pennsylvania is…Harrisburg.
But these flash cards were different. As he looked at his friends and their mothers, the itch flipped the flash cards quickly, like the man he saw playing three-card monte on the street.
Special Ed’s mother is…
Special Ed’s mother is…a drunk.
Mike and Matt’s moms are…
Mike and Matt’s moms are…seeing a couples therapist.
“Christopher, are you all right?”
Christopher turned around. All of the mothers were staring at him. Worried. Christopher smiled a reassuring smile.
“I’m fine. Just a little headache,” he said. “I want to keep sledding.”
“Yeah. Can we?” the boys asked.
“Sorry, it’s getting late,” his mom said.
“Yeah. Say good night, boys. I have a bottle of white Zin at home with my name written all over it,” Betty said.
They all said their goodbyes, and Christopher got into the car with his mom. He turned the car vents onto his face and let the hot air melt his cold apple cheeks. He looked over and saw his mother furrow her brow.
“Hey, Mom. What are you thinking about?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she said.
My mother is thinking about…
My mother is thinking about…the splinters in my fingers.
When his mother pulled onto their street, a shudder went through his body. He remembered the things he saw on the imaginary side. How it was like a one-way mirror that lets you spy on people on the real side.
And know things.
He tried to distract himself from the things he saw by looking at the houses, but the itch only got louder. They passed the old house on the corner. Christopher’s mother told him that a young couple had just bought it. The wife was painting over the red door.
The house on the corner is…
The house on the corner is…
Nothing. His mind was blank. There was no answer. Only the itch and the scratch. Christopher’s mother pulled into their driveway. She hit the automatic garage door opener with the remote and forced a smile.
My mother is…
My mother is…worried about me.
Christopher watched his mother put soup on the stove. Chicken with the little noodles he loved. And grilled cheese sandwiches. Like she used to make for her late husband.
My father had…
My father had…voices in his head. Like me.
The whisper scratch lingered, then died. Christopher had a little headache and a slight fever. But it wasn’t too bad. He felt cozy in the kitchen, slowly filling up with the smell of soup and grilled cheese. When his mom asked if he wanted to watch The Avengers or Bad Cat, he said no. He didn’t want to watch a movie at all. No television, either.
“Then, what do you want to do?” his mother asked.
“Can we look at my baby book together?”
Christopher’s mother smiled, surprised. They hadn’t looked at it in years. And maybe this was the perfect night for it. With snow on the roof and soup on the stove.
“Of course. What made you think of your baby book, honey?”
“I don’t know.”
And for once, he didn’t. He had no idea why the baby book was suddenly so interesting. He just wanted to look. So, when the soup was done and the grilled cheese was perfectly golden brown and toasty, his mother got down the baby book.
My mother knows…
My mother knows…I am different than I was.
And they sat on their new sofa.
My mother knows…
My mother knows…I am smarter than I should be.
With a fire in the fireplace.
My mother knows…
My mother knows…I am keeping secrets from her.
“This is really good grilled cheese, Mom,” he said to make her smile.
“Thanks, honey,” she said, pretending to.
Christopher just wished that he could give his mother the power he brought back from the imaginary side. He wished that she could see the thoughts that played hide-and-seek between people’s words, and she would know what was really going on inside his mind.
I can’t tell…
I can’t tell…you what is happening, Mom.
It would…
It would…terrify you.
The nice man said that he had to be careful. The more time he spent on the imaginary side, the more he would know on the real side. But the power would come at a price. At first headaches. And then fevers. And then worse. He made Christopher promise to stay out of the tree house for a few days to recover.
He didn’t want to train him too quickly.
So, Christopher put his head on his mother’s shoulder and tried to forget the things he saw on the imaginary side. The man in the Girl Scout uniform near the bushes in the cul-de-sac. The other man rolled in the hollow log near the billy goat bridge. Luckily, it was daytime, and the imaginary people were sleeping. The nice man said that at night, the imaginary world wakes up.
And then it gets really scary.
“So, never come in here without me. Never be in here at night. Promise me.”
“I promise, sir.”
Christopher gave his eyes to the baby book, but his thoughts went back to the sunset. It was only two hours ago, but it felt as far away as Michigan. When sunset had come, the nice man brought Christopher back to the tree house. He apologized for not answering him for so long, but said he couldn’t risk it because the imaginary people were getting suspicious of him. He said to be very careful if Christopher had a bad dream because bad dreams were the imaginary side poking around to see if you knew about them. So, if things got really scary in a dream, Christopher was supposed to just run to the street.
She can’t get you if you’re on the street.
“Who?”
“The less you know about her, the better. I don’t want her to find you.”
Christopher then asked the nice man to come to the real side with him, but the nice man said he couldn’t. He had a job to do. Then, the nice man mussed his hair and closed the door.
In an instant the cotton candy smell turned back to cold air. Christopher returned to his body on the real side. He saw Special Ed with the tree house door open in his hand.
“Come on, Chris,” Special Ed said. “It’s almost six. We’re going to be late.”
“Yeah,” Mike said. “We gotta get back to the golf course.”
“We don’t want to get grounded again,” Matt agreed.
Christopher followed his friends out of the tree house. He was the last one out. He closed the door behind him, shutting the imaginary world inside like a coffin. Then, he climbed down the little 2x4s like baby teeth. When they reached the ground, Christopher looked at the white plastic bag back on the low-hanging branch.
And he smiled.
Because he wasn’t alone.
“Christopher, are you okay?” Matt asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Your nose is bleeding.”
Christopher reached up and dabbed at his nose. He brought his fingers back into his field of vision like rabbit ears and saw them spotted with blood.
The power will…
The power will…come at a price.
“It’s nothing. I’m fine. Let’s go.”
Then, he knelt down to wash the blood off in the pure, white snow.
“Christopher, are you asleep?” his mother asked.
Christopher followed her voice back to the present. He didn’t know how much time had passed, but his mother had already reached the end of the baby book.
“No, I’m wide awake,” he said.
Then, he asked her to go back to the beginning of the baby book and look at the old pictures again. It was the only thing that made his brain stop itching.
He had no idea why.