Suddenly I could no longer feel the mayor’s hand on my shoulder. I turned to find him, but he wasn’t there. I moved around the lens, uncertain, but not afraid, and that’s when I noticed something stranger—my body no longer felt like my own. I had a lightness in my joints, strength in my muscles. I could move more easily, more freely, and when I looked down at my hands, they were different too. My skin was smooth and wrinkleless, the skin of someone much, much younger.

I lifted my head and gazed into the lens, and as I peered into the glass, a reflection appeared, not of an old woman, but a vision from a different time . . . a girl from long ago. She put her hand to the glass, and I did the same, and as we touched the years were instantly wound back. Emotions from the past returned. Faded memories became clear again, and alongside those old memories new ones emerged, memories I didn’t recognize, memories that flickered and flashed inside my head like embers from an unseen fire, illuminating an experience I had long since buried and forgotten. But before I could make sense of everything, the girl in the reflection gently nodded her head and shifted her gaze. Her eyes drifted past me, behind me, down toward the beach.

Following her lead, I turned and approached the window, and there in the distance, beneath a dusty pink sky, I could see two ­figures—a boy and his horse. They were riding in the shallows, headed in the opposite direction. Moments after my eyes landed on him, the boy brought his horse to a stop and turned around. He lifted the brim of his hat and looked up at the lighthouse, and I looked back at him. We stared at each other for a while, neither of us moving, until his horse suddenly reared up on its hind legs and began stomping and splashing in the water, as though impatient to get riding again. The boy took off his hat and waved it high in the air, his smile visible even from the distant shoreline. I too raised my hand, waved, and smiled back.

•••

“Amy, can you hear me?”

“Pardon?”

“I said, are you ready?”

The mayor was once again standing beside me, his hand returned to my shoulder.

“Sorry, yes . . .” I lifted my head and squinted at my reflection in the lamp, trying to regather my thoughts.

“Are you feeling okay?”

I gave him a reassuring nod. “Yes, I am,” I said. “Now, please explain what I have to do.”

The mayor showed me around the lens and pointed out that everything had already been prepared—the lamp, wick, oil, and gas—all I needed to do was turn on a small green switch near the base, wired to light the fuse.

“You’re certain everything’s all right?” he asked again. “You seemed to disappear on me just now.”