I push the book off with my eyes tightly closed, braced for impact. But the crash and the tremors, when they come, are far away and deep in the earth. When the page falls open I read:

… if the salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.

I can smell the salt and fat, now. I race upstairs to find Ted. Sure enough, he is in bed, eating French fries with one hand. I leap on him with high abandon, landing foursquare on his belly. The LORD never lets me down.

He gasps. “You startled me, kitten.” He drops what he has been playing with in his other hand. A blue thing, too thin for a scarf, more like a silky necktie or something. I settle on his stomach for a purr. Ted and I are very happy together these days. Yes, I think everything is returning to normal.

TED

The past is close tonight. The membrane of time bulges and strains. I hear Mommy in the kitchen, talking to the Chihuahua lady. Mommy’s telling her about the thing with the mouse. That was where all this started. I stop up my ears and turn the TV up, but I can still hear her voice. I remember everything about the thing with the mouse, which is unusual. My memory is Swiss cheese, in general.

Each homeroom had a pet. It was like a mascot. One homeroom had a startled-looking corn snake, which was so cool, and obviously better than a white mouse with bloody little eyes.

The kid with the moles was supposed to take the mouse home that weekend, but he hadn’t been in school on Friday. His mother said he had a cold but everyone knew that he was getting the moles on his face removed. Anyway he couldn’t take the mouse and I was next in the alphabet. Snowball, that was his name. The mouse, not the boy.

I took Snowball home. I had to sneak him into the house. Mommy would never have permitted it. Domesticated animals were slavery. Then the thing happened, and I did not bring him back on Monday.

I didn’t get in trouble. There was nothing anyone could do or say. It had been an accident, after all—the cage door had come loose. I was really upset about it, but there were other feelings, too, which were more pleasant. I had discovered a new part of myself. I remember the look in my teacher’s eye, that Monday. It had new reserve in it. He saw me for who I was. That I was dangerous.