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Maggie pointed at the other drawing she had pushed toward Ann. This one showed Yaldabaoth in the same powerful pose— arms spread wide, lightning bolts shooting down at him—along with a figure that appeared to be the Michelin Man drawn in the same red-brown as Ruthie.
“Who’s this?”
“That’s Mr. Sheriff,” Maggie whispered.
Ann swore her heart was going to burst out of her eye sockets. She swallowed the pound of sand in her throat.
“Is Yaldabaoth being struck by lightning?” she asked.
Maggie shook her head. “He’s . . . I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Try. Maybe I can help.”
She looked into Ann’s face, her gaze shifting back and forth from eye to eye, then back at the drawing.
“He’s using their zoe,” Maggie said with a shrug. “Sometimes my brain tells me things, but I don’t know what they mean.” A tear trembled on her lower lashes and spilled down her cheek. She rubbed both eyes with her fists.
Ann patted her back.
“They’re both gone, aren’t they?” Maggie asked.
A cold prickle ran over Ann’s scalp, and heat dampened her armpits. “What do you mean?”
“Ruthie and Mr. Sheriff,” Maggie said, wiping again at her cheeks. “They’re gone, right?”
“They’re just out of town right now,” Ann said through the dryness in her throat and mouth. “When you saw them in your dreams, were they okay?”
Maggie shook her head.
“They were scary,” she said with a whimper. “They were okay at first, but when Yaldabaoth used their zoe, they changed and looked funny.” She pulled Ruthie’s illustration back out. “Ruthie was really skinny, and Mr. Sheriff was puffy.”
They were fine until he used the zoe. Ann knew the name Zoe, but not the thing zoe. Louise had mentioned the name the first time Ann went to see her.
“There’s a story you might know—it’s about the origin of the world?” Ann hoped Maggie was familiar with the story.
Maggie nodded slowly. Her eyes glistened with residual tears. “I think so. My baba used to tell me stories all the time.” She sniffled. “That’s the one with Yaldabaoth and Pistis Sophia, right?”
“Do you remember Pistis Sophia’s daughter’s name?”
Maggie twisted the crayon in her hand, then cocked her head up at Ann.
“Sophia’s daughter’s name was Zoe,” Ann said.
Maggie’s eyes widened. “Oh yeah . . . She made all the good in the world.”
Maggie’s insight surprised Ann. It was true, though. Zoe had created all that was good in the world when she countered Yaldabaoth’s creation of Death, who then created all the bad in the world; therefore, Sophia was indirectly responsible for all the good and all the bad, having been the mother of both Yaldabaoth and Zoe.
Human Pandora’s Box.
Sophia let it all out into the world.
“Maybe if we find out what zoe means, it’ll help us figure out the rest.” Ann got up.
“Where are you going?” Maggie asked.
“I’m going to ask your dad if I can use his computer.” She turned to go find Derrick, but he was already there, laptop in hand. Ann wondered how much of their conversation he’d overheard. Derrick handed her the computer but didn’t let go.
“I don’t even want to know what you two are up to,” he said. “Well, yeah, I do. I can’t say I’m not slightly jealous of what seems like a deep, philosophical conversation with my daughter.” He smiled. “So . . . what are you talking about?”
Ann glanced over her shoulder at Maggie who scribbled absently on a piece of paper. “Has she told you about her dreams?”
Derrick nodded. “They wake her up. They seem to be getting worse. Before they were about the lion man stealing her light. Now, she just cries and won’t tell me what they’re about. I’m beginning to wonder if I should take her to a therapist; maybe her nightmares are manifestations of abuse. Who knows what kind of life she had before she came to us.”
“I’m sure that’s not the reason,” Ann said. Derrick gave her a quizzical look. She ignored it. “Thanks for letting me talk to her and for letting me use your computer.”
Derrick released the laptop. Ann sat down and opened the lid and typed “zoe” into the search engine. About a million and one results returned
A Mexican band, an actress, and the meaning of zoe, which led to a baby names website. Ann shrugged. Why not? She clicked on the baby names link.
She read the page. “It says here Zoe means ‘life.’”
Maggie leaned closer and rested her head against Ann’s arm. A chill shuddered through Ann’s body.
He’s using their zoe.
He’s using their life? She thought back to the story Louise told her. If Zoe created all the good in the world, was Yaldabaoth using goodness? Her deduction got her nowhere. The helplessness started to return.
“What are you thinking?” Maggie asked.
“I’m just trying to figure out what it means for Yaldabaoth to use someone’s life.”
Maggie set her chin on her forearms. “He’s trying to get strong.” She shuffled through her papers and showed Ann what resembled a cave with a black circle inside. The crayon had been lain on so thick the paper wasn’t visible through it.
“What’s that?” Ann pointed to the black circle.
“The abyss.” Maggie looked at her again. “Another thing I don’t know. What’s an abyss?”
“A bottomless hole or something.”
“It’s scary.” She lifted the picture. “In my dream I fell into it.” Her eyes shifted to Ann’s. “You know how sometimes when you dream you trip and it wakes you up?”
Ann laughed. “Yes. I have those all the time.”
Maggie didn’t laugh. Her face remained serious. “If you don’t land, you don’t wake up.”
She pushed the picture back under another one of a dog—or some other four-legged animal.
“Who’s this?”
“Pinky. Brent’s dog. I saw her in my mind,” she said. “I’ve never met Pinky, and I don’t know who Brent is.”
“Dinner time,” Derrick called from the kitchen. “Ann, you’re welcome to join us.”
Ann thought about what Derrick had said. Teresa thought they were having an affair. She closed the laptop and stood. “No, that’s okay.”
“Please, Ann? Please stay.” Maggie gripped Ann’s hand.
The child’s expression made her change her mind. Maggie was terrified. Who wouldn’t be, with the nightmares she’d been having? With the load she had to bear? Ann didn’t think Maggie knew the full extent of what it meant to be the human manifestation of Sophia.
And yet, at times, the girl seemed so wise.
“Okay, fine. Dinner, and then I have to go.”
Maggie hugged her and bounced to the table. Ann waited for Derrick to sit. Then she sat as far from him as possible. An uneasy anxiety clawed at her belly. She sat up straight in her chair and cast glances toward the front door, fully expecting Teresa to burst in at any moment and catch her husband eating dinner with another woman. Her appetite was gone, but it had been so long since she’d eaten a nice home-cooked meal. She’d been surviving on frozen entrees since she got to town. Her stomach growled at the scent of spaghetti. She dug in and relished the flavor.
After dinner, Derrick offered dessert, but Ann passed. Maggie didn’t. He served her some ice cream. Ann struggled to find a graceful way to leave, but something kept her from going. Her duty to protect perhaps? It was in her blood, after all. She absently rubbed the mark through her shirt.
When Derrick took Maggie upstairs to bed, she had the perfect opportunity to leave, and yet she didn’t go.
What is it you think you want here?
Derrick came back and gave her a weary smile. “I’m worried about Teresa.” He sighed.
“Does she do this often?” Ann asked.
Derrick shook his head. “Never. She’s always home. I mean, lately she’s been venturing out a little more. That or she just doesn’t answer the phone when I call.” He slumped onto the corner cushion of the L-shaped sectional.
“That’s not what I meant, though,” he said. “She’s been . . . just . . . I don’t want to burden you.”
Ann didn’t say anything, but in the back of her mind she wondered if she would find Teresa’s like-human-umbilical-cord crispy substance in the near future.
“I’d offer you a drink, but Teresa doesn’t let me keep the stuff,” he said.
“That’s okay.” Ann leaned forward. “I should probably get going, anyway.”
“Stay,” Derrick said. Ann let out a laugh.
“Stay? What am I, a dog?” She got up.
“Please, Ann. I’ve been so . . . lonely these past few years. I don’t have anyone else to talk to.”
Dread flooded Ann’s body. She gazed at the front door—so far away at the end of the hall—then back at Derrick, dejected and weary.
He held up his hands. “I don’t want anything more than some adult conversation.”
Ann’s body relaxed. “Okay, fine. I’ll stay for a few more minutes, but if Teresa comes home . . .”
“She’d be home by now if she was coming.”
“Do you want to go search for her?” Ann thought about Ruthie and the sheriff. “Aren’t you worried she may have been kidnapped like Ruthie?”
“Have you found anything?”
A subtle change of subject. Ann shook her head. Maggie’s drawings lingered in the corner of her vision. The girl had stacked them back together and pushed them inside a folder, but the corners stuck out the side.
“Does Maggie talk to you about her drawings?” Ann asked. She flipped the folder open. The abyss was on top.
If you don’t land, you don’t wake up.
Derrick moved closer, sitting right next to Ann. His leg brushed hers. She couldn’t deny the rush of heat that raced through her, or her heart rate picking up, but she wouldn’t allow herself to get wrapped up in those feelings.
“She shows them to me, but she doesn’t explain them.” He flipped through the pages. “I didn’t think a parent was supposed to ask what a kid’s drawing is. I feel like I’m supposed to be able to figure it out, like asking would hurt her feelings, you know?” He turned his head.
Ann could see him looking at her out of the corner of her eye. He was too close. Far too close. She moved over half a cushion.
“I’m not sure how to explain this to you, Derrick—”
“I know, I know.” He moved a full cushion away from her. “I’m married—you’re not a home wrecker.”
Ann snorted. “That’s not what I was going to say. I mean, yeah, I refuse to do anything . . . like that. But what I meant was, Maggie is . . . special.” She cleared her throat and reached for the drawings. “Her dreams—there’s some truth to them.”
Yaldabaoth and Ruthie’s picture appeared in the stack Derrick flipped through.
“This one, see? She said that’s Ruthie.”
“She knows Ruthie from the diner,” Derrick said. “That’s not unusual.”
“Does she know Ruthie is missing?”
Derrick shook his head. “I haven’t told her. It would break her heart. She loves Ruthie.”
“She knows things she can’t possibly know.” Ann got up and grabbed her coat. “Keep an eye on her for me, okay?”
“Of course.” He walked her to the door.
Outside, the cold air felt good. She pulled on her jacket and walked home, letting her thoughts take over.
Yaldabaoth was using their life. But what did it mean? How did he use life to get stronger?
They’re gone, aren’t they?
Ann shivered at the thought of Maggie’s words and zipped up her jacket.