The next morning, I heard the sound of leather soles on solid rock as Rikki climbed the four semicircular fieldstone steps at the front of our little stone house on her way back from walking Kyle down to the school bus. An icy wind blew in as she opened the heavy oak door and stepped into the living room. She looked over at me huddled on the couch, clutching one of the pillows to my chest, and a look of concern clouded her face. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“Are you all right?” Rikki asked, moving quickly over to the couch and sitting down beside me.
I gritted my teeth and gripped the pillow tighter, trying to stay composed so she wouldn’t worry. But as our eyes met, tears welled up and I began to tremble.
I shook my head and whispered, “I don’t think so.”
Rikki’s composure crumbled, and she burst into tears and threw her arms around me. “Oh, Cam,” she cried. She held me tightly as I clutched the pillow, her soft face next to mine, her warm tears running down my neck as she cried with me. Rikki hadn’t taken off her olive-green leather jacket, and the collar felt cold against my chin. She held me tighter, and the sound of the jacket stretching made me think of cowboys and horses. “Shhh,” she whispered, rocking me gently back and forth. “Shhh.”
Even though January’s brutal chill penetrated the cracks and seams of our old stone house, the room was still very warm, and I was sweating. With her coat on, Rikki was getting warm, too, and as we rocked, I felt the heat from her body escaping from under her collar.
When the surge of tears was over, she held me in silence, the soft whirring of the heater the only sound in the room. Inside me a tiny earthquake hit—shudder, switch, gone—and Clay was there.
“W-will y-you read me a b-book?” Clay stuttered.
Rikki let go of me, leaned back, and studied Clay a moment. Clay looked down at the floor.
“Clay?” she asked, checking.
He nodded.
Rikki patted him gently on the shoulder and said, “Clay, I need to talk to Cam for a minute, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Cam?” she called to me. “I need to talk to Cam.” Shudder, switch, back.
“Yeah,” I said weakly. My eyes were focused on the pattern of blue stripes on the couch. I shook my head twice, trying to come back. My stomach felt ripply and heavy, like I’d swallowed a bag of sand, and my jaw felt like it needed oiling. Very slowly and deliberately I said, “I don’t think I’m doing too well.”
Rikki placed her slender hand on my shoulder, and I could feel her gaze. “I’m going to call the office and tell your brother you can’t come in,” she said. “Then I’ll get a book and read to Clay; he asked me if I’d read him a book.”
“Okay,” I replied flatly, my gaze still focused on the lines on the couch.
Rikki got up quickly and walked to the wall phone in the kitchen. She picked up the receiver and punched the speed-dial button for my office.
“Hi Diana, it’s Rikki. Oh, okay. Is Tom in yet? Yeah, please. Thanks.”
A few seconds went by while she waited for my brother to pick up, then she turned toward me, leaned against the white Formica kitchen counter, and spoke into the phone in a clipped tone.
“Hi, Tom ... Not so good. Look, we need to talk. Cam’s having a really hard time here, and I don’t know when he’s going to be able to come back to work.” Rikki wormed her finger through the telephone cord and sighed. “The truth is,” she said, “I don’t know if he’ll be able to come back ... ever, or at least for a long time.” Rikki picked a pencil up from the counter and began fidgeting with it. “Tom,” she said gravely, “you know all this stuff that’s been happening with Cam? Well he’s really sick. He’s been diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder. It’s Multiple Personality Disorder with a new name ... I know. It’s incredible. I can’t believe it either ... Yeah, just like Sybil. Well, sort of. You always said he seemed like two different people.”
Rikki absently tapped the pencil on the counter. “Uh huh ... Yeah, Dr. Morelli seems to know exactly what she’s doing, thank God ... Yeah, we’ve got some money ... I think so, if we cut back ... I thought I could come to the office to help out some ... As soon as I can, but I can’t leave Cam today. He’s not doing well at all today.” Rikki looked over at me and frowned, a small gully forming between her eyebrows. “There’s a lot more I need to tell you about, Tom, some things that happened last night ... well, I can’t now. I should really get back to Cam ... Thanks ... Yeah, I’ll call you later ... Sure I will. Bye.” Rikki replaced the receiver.
She took a deep breath, pursed her lips and blew out. Then she turned on her heels, walked over to the staircase, and went quickly upstairs. In a moment she came back down with a pile of books in one hand and Kyle’s light green down comforter and pillow tucked under her other arm.
Goody, books. Thank God. Thank God for Rikki.
I laid my head down on Kyle’s pillow, and Rikki covered me up with his comforter. She sat down by my head and placed all the books but one next to the blue ceramic lamp on the old oak end table. She shifted her body to get comfortable, put her feet up on the ottoman, and began to read Mickey’s Flying Lesson aloud. My head sank into the fluffy pillow, and I tucked the warm comforter under my chin. A tiny smile crossed my lips ... and my heart.
I faded into the distance while Clay listened to Rikki’s soothing voice as she read Mickey and the books that followed. Every so often I’d become aware of her voice, and when I did I’d wonder where I’d been. Winnie the Pooh? I thought she was reading Mickey. I turned my head and looked up at the dust motes pirouetting in the sunlight. They didn’t care that time was slipping.
At 11:30 Rikki asked if anyone was hungry. “I’m r-real hungry,” Clay said, although I didn’t feel hungry at all.
Rikki put the book down and said, “Would you like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and some juice?”
“Mm hmm. I have to g-go to the b-bathroom.”
“Sure,” she said. “It’s right around the corner there.”
Clay nodded. Rikki got up and went into the kitchen, and Clay stood up to go to the bathroom with me in tow.
“I’m w-way up high,” he said, amazed, looking down the length of my adult-sized body.
“What do you mean?”
“Big. I’m b-big.”
“Ohhh,” Rikki said, remembering what Arly had told her about alters having to get used to being in a different body. “Yes, you are big.”
When Clay finished washing his hands, he glanced in the mirror over the sink, and from somewhere inside, I peered out through his eyes at the reflection. He’d caught sight of my face in the mirror, and I felt his muscles tighten and heard a guttural sound in his throat. He quickly looked away, confused. I felt nothing but the faint registering of a bizarre fact: The person looking in the mirror isn’t me. Clay toweled off and returned to the living room.
Rikki was at the kitchen counter making sandwiches. “Chips?” she asked. “Would you like some chips with your sandwich?”
“Y-yes, please.”
“Would you like orange juice or water?”
“J-juice.”
“Okay. Come and sit down at the table.”
Clay and Rikki ate in silence, and from a distance, I could vaguely hear the chewing sounds Clay made as he ate. It was like lying out in the grass at midnight, looking up at the starry night and not being able to tell where you end and the rest of the universe begins.
Clay mostly gazed down at the red maple kitchen table while he ate, but sometimes he’d look up and take in the room, noticing for the first time things I was familiar with: Rikki’s driedflower wreaths—one hanging on the kitchen wall, the other over the fieldstone fireplace—the framed pictures of Kyle on the rough-hewn log mantle, the bumpy nap of the white Berber carpet, the Mission-style oak chair and writing table.
Rikki studied his face.
“You look sad, Clay,” she said.
“I am,” he nodded, without looking up at her. “I’m tired and sad.”
Rikki got up and walked around the table to him and gently stroked his back. “Can you tell me why you’re sad?” she said sweetly.
A jolt of electricity shot through Clay’s body. His hands gripped his thighs and his upper arms pressed tightly against his chest. A low groan emitted from his throat and he began to rock back and forth.
Rikki pulled back, shocked. “What’s the matter?” She had the impulse to call for me to come back, but she resisted it. If I came back, Clay would still be in agony. She stuck with him.
Clay groaned, “I s-saw in the m-mirror.” He continued to rock as Rikki’s mind raced to understand what he was talking about.
“I s-saw in the mirror,” he moaned again.
Then a thought clicked in Rikki’s mind. The bathroom. Before lunch, in the stillness of the house, she’d thought she heard him make a similar guttural sound. She put her hand gently on Clay’s back and spoke cautiously. “You looked in the mirror when you were in the bathroom, didn’t you.”
“Y-yeeaah,” he groaned, his whole body tight as a high wire.
“It’s okay, Clay,” Rikki comforted, bending down close to him. “It’s okay. Try to relax your body and take a deep breath, like at Arly’s. It's okay.” Clay inhaled deeply and slowly let it out.
“Gooood. Now again.” Rikki said, rubbing his back gently. Clay took another deep breath. He was still rocking back and forth, but she could feel his body begin to relax.
“One more time,” she said.
Clay took another breath and let it out.
“Ver-ry good,” Rikki said, pulling a chair next to Clay. She wondered what Arly would say next.
“Clay,” she began carefully. “The person you saw in the mirror is Cam. He’s you, all grown up. When bad things happened to you—remember what you told Arly about?”
Clay stopped rocking and nodded.
“After bad things happened, you went inside, inside Cam’s mind. And while you were inside a lot of time went by. Cam grew up. He married me. He even has a son. Kyle is Cam’s son.” She paused again. “Clay,” she repeated, “Cam is you all grown up. That’s why you were so surprised when you looked in the mirror. You thought you’d see a kid in the mirror, right? You.”
Clay nodded sadly. “Y-yeah,” he whispered, and a single tear trickled down his cheek. Rikki caught it with her knuckle.
“Yeah,” she said softly, her hand on his shoulder. “Would it be all right if I gave you a hug?”
Clay nodded, and as he did, his shoulders shook and the tears came more freely. Rikki leaned over and gently pulled his face against her shoulder. She softly caressed his hair, and Clay let go and sobbed the tears of a lost child.
After a few minutes he began to calm down. Rikki handed him a paper napkin and he blew his nose. Then she stood up, held out her hand, and, looking down at him with a gentle smile, said brightly, “Come on. We'll go look in the mirror together.” Clay timidly took Rikki’s hand and she led him up the stairs toward the master bedroom, where a full-length mirror hung on the door. They paused at the top of the stairs to look out the large double windows facing the ridge behind the house. Not more than twenty feet away, a doe and two fawns were nibbling at a scrawny bush. They looked up, startled by the movement. Sensing no danger, the fawns went back to nibbling, but the doe pawed the ground twice to keep them alert.
Then Clay pointed and said excitedly, “There's d-deer.” The fawns jerked their heads up, and the three deer bolted effortlessly up the hill and out of sight.
“D-deer,” Clay said.
“We have lots of ’em here,” Rikki said, smiling. She gave his hand a slight tug and they turned and walked down the short hall past Kyle’s room toward hers.
They entered the big bedroom and she made a sweep with her hand and said, “This is where Cam and I sleep, Clay.” She paused and added, “And it’s your room, too.”
Clay looked around nervously and nodded. Rikki closed the bedroom door and, taking him by the shoulders from behind, gently guided Clay in front of the full-length mirror. She could feel his body tense immediately and she softly said, “It’s okay. Take a deep breath and just let it out slowly.” She did it with him. “Now one more.” His body relaxed a little.
“See, Clay?” she said, pointing at their reflection in the mirror. “This is what you look like now.” They stood silently while he took it in. Tall—bigger than Rikki. A grown-up. Then a thought occurred to him.
“W-where’s my m-mom?”
Rikki puzzled over the question for a moment, searching for the right words. Clay had his hands clasped tightly together and was rocking back and forth slightly.
Rikki looked at him in the mirror, gently touched his hand said, “While you were inside ... somewhere ... Cam grew up. A lot of years went by. Now he lives here with Kyle and me. He doesn’t live with his mom anymore. She doesn’t live here, Clay, but you do ... and nothing bad is going to happen to you.”
Clay glanced at his reflection and said, “Oh. N-nothing b-bad?”
Rikki shook her head and smiled. “Nope. Nothing bad is going to happen to you. Like Arly said. Remember Arly?”
“Um hmm.”
“It might seem like bad things just happened to you, but really they happened a long, long time ago. Nothing bad is going to happen here. Ever.” She patted him on the shoulder. “You're safe here.”
They stood in silence, Rikki's hands softly touching Clay's shoulders, while the strange concepts trickled over Clay’s eightyear-old mind.
Rikki said, “It’ll take some time for you to get used to this, but it’s gonna be okay, Clay. You’re welcome here.”
Clay stared into the mirror for a moment. Then, with his head tilted slightly to one side, he nodded almost imperceptibly.
“I’m w-welcome here.”