“You went away and my heart went with you . . .

I speak your name in my every prayer.”

Strange, isn’t it? That Penelope, too, must have that someone. That someone you see when you close your eyes. That someone you’re still with even though you’re not.

Like being haunted.

Which is the same as being in love.

Chapter 31

We’re about a fifth of the way down the winding road when Penelope veers off to the right down a smaller path, saying a few kind words and a polite “Toodle-oo.”

Yes, my dream about her was terrifying. Yes, she has a tendency to enter whenever she pleases, wake me up too early, and say rude things out of the blue. But there’s no one else around here I can even think about speaking to. My condition, such as it is, is too debilitating. Perhaps someone else would have someone to help—a parent, a friend. But I’m fresh out of those.

And so, by virtue of the fact that she seems to feel entitled to interaction with me, she has it.

Which somehow reminds me of Zander. He insisted on my attention, my response.

He insisted on that argument that night. Wouldn’t stop because we had to talk.

No, not that. Don’t think about that.

This is supposed to be a morning of merrily strolling along, getting some fresh air and a new perspective.

I am supposed to be listening to the birds chirping and the bees buzzing, and enjoying the warmth of the sun on my face.

I resolve to spend the rest of my pastoral walk singing random songs and admiring the wildflowers on the side of the road.

“You went away and my heart went with you . . .

I speak your name in my every prayer.”

I always think one day I’m going to become an expert on flora and fauna, the type of person who can simply look at a plant and know its name by heart . . . but I never do it.

Maybe that’s what I could do. Buy a book on each flower and plant, memorize them, and then impress everyone with my extensive knowledge of the natural world!

Ah, yes, that must be an agave attenuata!

Oh, would you look at that willow acacia?

Ah, is that a red-tip photinia?!

Okay, that sounds more like a bird. But maybe that will be the next step. Bird knowledge. I’ll be a bird-watcher. A birder. A person who can simply hear the sound of a specific chirp and say, “Why that must be a black-throated green warbler! Oh, do you hear the mockingbird? Listen? Do you hear his many various songs?”

Somehow this fantasy of myself involves a lot of khaki.

Not exactly my color.

Maybe I’ll be a birder who wears black and hides in the bushes. Or the night. Maybe I’ll be an owler!

No one can stop me.

I laugh to myself and my fantasy future. My ability to fantasize an entire scene, an entire future . . . like a tonic. I learned how to do this when my mom left. Taught myself to.