Cora falters on her porch step, twisting around to look at me with the widest, most enchanted eyes I’ve ever seen. She steps down to join me on the walkway, holding out her arms and looking up with me. “Oh, my God. Do you think…?” Her voice trails off and she starts to laugh. She laughs. Delirious laughter pours out of her as she spins around in circles, her nose pointed towards the heavens. “It’s her, Dean. She’s saying goodbye.”

I think my goddamn heart might explode.

I suck in my emotions, blowing them back out into the chilly air. I’m not sure what’s got me more choked up—Blizzard’s parting gift to us or watching the way Cora is floating around and around in clumsy circles, sheathed in white, looking utterly enraptured and lost in the moment.

Healing.

She looks like healing.

We find our way inside and strip out of our soggy winter wear, collapsing onto the couch, mentally and emotionally drained. Blizzard always used to sit right between us on the couch—always. It became a running joke that she was trying to prevent us from killing each other.

Now I wonder if she was trying to tell us something.

I shake the thoughts away and lean my head back against the cushions, my eyes closing on instinct as the long, tiring day takes its toll. I almost completely pass out when I feel a hand squeezing my knee.

“Go lie down. You look exhausted.”

I make a ‘hmmph’ sound which is code for, ‘that sounds great, but I don’t want to move’. Cora seems to decipher the noise and starts tugging on my legs, stretching them out until I’m sprawled out, taking up the full length of the sofa. Fleece envelopes me and I tuck the blanket around me, noting the faint aroma of daffodils as I tug it up to my chin. I start to drift away when I feel her lips against my cheek, just as light as before. A tickle, a whisper, a fleeting kiss.

Healing.

She feels like healing.

A scream forces me upright on the couch, disoriented and bleary-eyed, as I try to figure out where the fuck I am.

Mint walls, a coral couch, a shag rug beneath my feet.

Daffodils.

Cora.

I’m on Cora’s couch.

Cora is screaming.

I jump to my feet and sprint down the hallway to her dimly lit bedroom, where I find her tossing and turning, kicking at the covers, gripping the bed post between both fists behind her head.

She screams again. “No! Please, no…”

Her eyes are closed, squeezed tight, but I know she can see.

She sees all the same horrors I see when I close my eyes at night.

I rush to her bedside and cautiously slide myself onto the mattress, careful not to startle her. “Cora… Corabelle, you’re dreaming.” I slip my arm around her waist and pull her close, whispering into her ear, “Come back to me.”