A glimmer of recognition crossed Nora’s face, followed by confusion. But Finn couldn’t contain herself. She pushed herself up to sitting and slung her arms around her mom’s neck. Nora’s body was stiff, unyielding.

“She doesn’t recognize us.” Zadie was kneeling next to her. Her eyes were puffy as if she’d just been crying. Finn turned back to their mother. The glimmer she’d seen a moment ago was gone. But despite the sinking feeling in her heart, she wasn’t ready to give up just yet. “Mom, it’s me, Finn.” She grabbed her sister’s hand and pulled her closer. “And this is Zadie. We’re your daughters.”

Nora’s eyes flicked back and forth between the two faces; then a wisp of a smile graced her mouth. “You’re here,” she said.

Finn and Zadie clamored into her arms, and Nora buried her face into Finn’s curls. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you two,” she said softly.

TWENTY-SEVEN

Two Thousand, Two Hundred, and Eighty Miles

Their mom didn’t return all at once. Zadie and Finn sat with her as she lay on the couch, propped up by tasseled pillows, watching her drip, drip, drip back into her body. Every time a new memory came to her, the flesh between her eyebrows would crease, and she would sound it out. At first her speech was slow and halting, like sleep talk, but the more she spoke, the more fluid it became. When Nora turned to Zadie with an impish grin and said, “Knock, knock,” Zadie knew she was going to be okay.

By that evening, Nora was more like her spiked-punch self. She remembered her daughters’ names and would break into a huge smile every time she said them out loud. When a funny story came back to her, she told it like it was the first time, and her daughters laughed because she was laughing. Zadie still had questions, but she didn’t want to break the spell of that moment.

Zadie and Finn stayed with Nora all day and night. They slept in her bed. Zadie woke briefly in the middle of the night to find her sister cuddled up against Nora’s right shoulder, dozing peacefully. She watched them for a few moments, their chests rising and falling in time with each other. Then Zadie felt the little Star stir inside her.

It’s okay, it seemed to say.

Zadie rested one hand on her abdomen, then slipped her head under her mother’s other arm.

Finn couldn’t take her eyes off her. Maybe it was the way the wind was spinning her mom’s hair into rope, the way her freckles looked darker in the sun, the way her toes curled as a wave washed over her feet; or maybe it was because Finn was afraid that if she looked away, Nora would vanish.