I know that face. I’ve seen it. Or some version of it. Older, much older . . .

“Better put her down, John. She’s getting too big to carry.”

The man lowered me to the ground and patted my head, telling me to watch my step. As I turned, the first thing I saw were stairs. Concrete stairs leading up to a massive door.

I know that door.

The mental hospital. I looked down the street and saw hulking sedans from the sixties. The buildings were in ill repair, some of the doors boarded over. The grounds were halfheartedly kept, with weeds already poking through the pavement. Mother Nature starting a tentative takeover, seeing if anyone cared to oppose her.

“It doesn’t look very nice, does it, baby?” the woman said. “It used to have flowers and pretty lawns. I hate the thought of Aunt Isolde living here.”

Isolde. The gravestone.

“It won’t be much longer,” the man said.

A deep sigh from the woman. “I know.”

They led me up the stairs. I looked down at myself. Long dark hair lay straight over a miniskirted dress. Tiny, gleaming shoes. From what I could see, I wasn’t more than four.

The man reached for my hand and pushed open the door. When he did, my legs locked. I seemed to waver there, in control of the body and the mind. Then it was like falling into that grave. I stumbled and pitched forward, and this time, when I recovered, I was still there, still standing, but my thoughts had been pushed to a small corner of my brain, and hers had taken over, and all I could feel was absolute terror.

“Come on, baby,” the woman said. “I know you don’t like it here, but your aunt Isolde will be so happy to see you.”

“She doesn’t know me,” the girl whispered. “She doesn’t know anyone.”

A firm hand gripped my shoulder. “Of course she does. Now, none of that.” The man bent and whispered in my ear. “This is important to Mommy, Pams. Do it for her. Please.”

Pams.

I could no longer move the girl of my own volition, but I could see the woman out of the corner of my eye. See her face, soft and pretty and worried.

I know that face.

Grandma.

A stream of memories shot back, of a kind, quiet woman in a long skirt. Grandma Jean. She’d called the man John. That was my grandfather’s name, though he’d died before I was born. John Bowen. Daere Jean Carew. Which made me . . .

Pams.

Pamela.

My mother.