She tries to hang up, but doesn’t know if she succeeded. She gets up, sweeps the paper squares into the toilet bowl and flushes. Standing in front of the sink, she feels her legs slacken. Good thing the woman’s waiting outside. She looks in the mirror, thinking Ilan must be getting worried. Sticking her hands under the hand dryer, she comforts herself with the hot air. Then she opens the door and it comes gushing down.

Cold water washes all over her. Cascades off her shoulders. Everything shrinks inside her; she tries to protect herself but doesn’t know how. Where is it coming from? Her body feels different, stiff. Soaked and freezing. She looks at her hands, baffled. She’s completely dry. There’s no water. And as quickly as the sensation appeared, it subsides.

She pauses, then stretches, trying to get her bearings. But she can’t shake off the confusion. “Say, what was in that sedative you gave me?” she asks the woman, but the woman isn’t there. Neither is she herself there. It isn’t the same hallway she came from. Black tiles, hazy daylight filters in through the dark windows. She tries to open the bathroom door. It’s locked. She notices a silver digital door lock on the wall. Doesn’t know the code. Wants to call someone but doesn’t know who. She tries Ilan, but he doesn’t pick up.

“Hello, I’m stuck,” she yells. “Hello?”

Nothing. She starts staggering along the hallway, trusting herself less with each step.

“Anyone here?”

No answer. She reaches out with her left hand and supports herself against the wall, wandering through the hallways, stumbling in and out of rooms. She has no idea where she is. Or how to get back.

And for the second time, all at once, water pours over her without leaving a trace. This time a gentle drizzle. And it’s no longer ice cold. It feels pleasant, almost caressing. The sensation is accompanied by a vague image. She sees her son in front of her, standing shirtless under a big waterfall, laughing and shivering in his gray underwear. It’s been years since she saw him like this, exposed.

She understands.

This isn’t her memory. It’s Ilan’s, the memory he had wanted to share with her, from the trip he and her son took two months ago. Only the two of them, to the Judaean Desert. She tries to fast-forward and rewind the image in her head, but can’t. All she feels is Ilan’s body emerging from within her, bent and stiff. She remembers what her son had told her about the day he entered Naomi’s body. How he felt her like he’d never felt her before. “It was like we were both in the exact same spot.”