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  She tried to remember what it felt like to be seven years old and to still have the ability to get excited about something as simple as fl oating on her back. In response to her silent query, Heather was suddenly gifted by a shock of forgotten feeling. She remembered sensations she’d experienced as a little girl and slowly began to look around the pool, trying to scope out the culprit who caused her subconscious to play out the memories. She wondered if there was a memory fairy who bestowed powers of remembrance and familiarity to those who’d forgotten.

  She vividly recalled a coloring contest she had won at Jack’s age. When the store manager had announced her name on the microphone, Heather’s legs had become wobbly and her heart pounded rapidly, each beat reminding her of the excitement of being singled out. As though her birth had been gifted with a genie that would bring her never-ending luck, Heather won every contest, raffl e and game that came her way. She wished her good luck still felt so prevalent.

  She remembered the feeling she’d gotten when she walked up to collect her prize. The memory was sweet until an unknown wave of sadness replaced it. Heather blinked her way back to reality.

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  She feared her boys would lose more innocence and more hope each year they lived. Watching the news or reading the paper any more was enough to send the average Joe in search of a razor blade. She felt powerless to keep them safe at every moment and cursed the fact she couldn’t save her boys from the ugliness they were sure to face.

  Another boy responded to Jack’s challenge and proudly fl oated by on his back. Her son beamed proudly and Heather realized there was no envy present. He even congratulated the other kid on a job well done. Heather pictured them both ten years from that moment and imagined their attitudes toward each other would be different under the same circumstances. She wished she had more faith in the world.

  “Can you dive?” Jack asked the boy.

  His excitement buoyed her and she watched as the other kid, lost in a head of red freckles and hair, dove in. He looked up at Jack as though they were new best friends.

  Never one to be outdone, Jack punctuated his previous dare with an upshoot of his arms before leaning forward and diving in.

  Heather was off the lounge chair in a quick burst of contracted muscle, applauding for him proudly. More impressive was that he had only learned to swim three weeks before. As usual, her youngest child did things in his own time but he always managed to take it far beyond expectations.

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  Everyone in the vicinity applauded Jack. A guy standing at the opposite end of the pool clapped his hands louder than the rest of the crowd and Heather squinted against the sun to see him. She tried to decipher the features on his face but couldn’t put them together enough to turn him into anyone recognizable. He remained nothing more than a blurry vision at the end of the pool.

  All she could tell was that the appreciative stranger was drenched from head to toe and she assumed he’d just gotten out of the pool. Squinting only made him less visible and she would have lost interest if he hadn’t continued to clap after everyone else stopped.

  “Who’s that, Mom?” asked Jack.

  He looked puzzled as he pulled his small, wet body up to the side of the pool.

  “I don’t know, sweetie,” she answered with a nervousness she refused to share.

  The incessant applause suddenly stopped and Heather’s head snapped upward, toward the loss of sound.

  She was more startled by the silence than she had been by the clapping. She discovered the man no longer stood in his previous spot and her heart began to palpitate. She reached into the water and pulled Jack out quickly before inhaling deeply. She didn’t want to alert her son to the fact that she was close to hyper-ventilating. Suddenly, Heather had the uneasy sensation that going public had plunged them into vulnerability she hadn’t foreseen.

  She wrapped a towel around Jack’s waist and tied it in a knot below his armpits before grabbing his hand. They 124

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  walked faster than she planned as Heather practically dragged him to the bathrooms.

  “Mom, that’s the ladies’ room. I can’t go in there,” he protested, mortifi ed.

  “Yes, you can honey; nobody will care,” she answered gently. There was no time to deal with his embarrassment just then. Jack’s safety was all she coveted at the moment.

  “Please don’t make me go in there,” he whined.

  Heather ignored him and chanced a peek behind them as they neared the locker room doors. Half expecting to fi nd a man, soaking wet and insanely applauding, she braced herself. Though no one stood there, Heather still felt a presence. Someone was watching but she didn’t know who it was or where they hid.

  She pulled clumsily on the door handle and nudged Jack in ahead of her. Before she took her own step inside, Heather heard a voice right behind her.

  “Excuse me, ma’am? Do you have the time?” a man asked.

  Without waiting for the familiar voice to utter another syllable, Heather rushed forward without a plan. Still holding Jack’s hand, she ran ahead of her son, pulling him behind her into the deserted bathroom. Heather miscalculated their speed and couldn’t slow down enough to stop herself from crashing into the wall that separated the mirrors and the showers.

  The wall was unforgiving in its painful reception.

  She heard the loud thud her body made when it slammed into the concrete and a scream escaped her throat as her 125

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  tailbone took the brunt of her weight. Heather felt a fl eeing sense of appreciation when she realized her son escaped harm because of a last minute maneuver. She let go of his hand and he missed his own collision by half an inch.

  Heather always feared failing her children in their most desperate hours but when it came down to it, she realized she always reacted in their best interests.

  “Mom!’ Jack screamed.

  “I’m okay, I’m okay,” she lied.

  Heather’s hand fl ew up to her left eyebrow and she felt a stickiness that hadn’t been there before. She forced herself to look up at her refl ection in the wall length mirror and noticed blood rushing from a new gash that ran from her eyebrow to her hairline.

  “You’re bleeding!” her son screamed.

  His expression was a mixture of raw concern and mild horror. The throbbing pain in Heather’s eyebrow didn’t compare to her desperate need to remove the pained look from Jack’s face.

  “Look, baby,” she said, forcing light humor into her tone. “It doesn’t hurt at all. Watch this.”

  She looked back into the mirror and placed light pressure to the bottom of her wound. They both watched as blood began to ooze freely from the cut and Jack’s expression contorted into one of stark terror. Heather grabbed a handful of toilet paper from the closest stall.

  She had planned to prove that her gash didn’t hurt but had succeeded in freaking him out even more.

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  Heather played with the idea of using the moment to teach him how to numb out pain but decided against it.

  Heather realized the lesson was possibly more damaging.

  As much as it hurt her, her sons needed to experience pain so they could grow to appreciate their usual lack of pain.

  It was a shitty balance but one that couldn’t be ignored.

  Heather thought she would crumble into a sniveling mess when Jack kissed his fi ngers, leaned in and touched them to her face. He was mimicking his mother’s actions to his own boo boos and Heather wondered if he would copy her words as well. He seemed unaffected by the blood on his fi ngers and he made direct eye contact when he spoke to her.

  “Okay, there you go,” he said gently. “That kiss should take about fi ve minutes to work.”

  Jack’s intense stare told her that he was feeling brave and his rigid posture spoke of the protective fe
elings he had for her. His soft expression said that he loved her.

  “God, I love you so much,” she blurted out, unaware the words had even formed inside her head yet.

  Heather realized the locker room was unusually quiet and wondered where all of the gossipy women and their noisy little girls were. It was only then she remembered why they had been running in the fi rst place and she quickly pulled herself upright.

  Heather’s eyes darted from the entrance to the exit.

  She ignored the blood that threatened to blur her vision if she didn’t wipe it away immediately.

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  “Let’s go, baby,” she said to Jack, trying to hide the quiver in her voice.

  She grabbed his hand and faced the entrance door hesitantly. It seemed like a smarter choice as it led to the group rooms and was likely to be more congested with health nuts leaving their yoga and nutrition classes.

  “I have to go to the bathroom,” Jack said, pulling his hand from hers.

  Heather fought the urge to pick him up and run with him through the doors. She had already bloodied her face and risked injury to her child running from a man because he clapped for too long and asked her for the time. If she gave into the paranoia that threatened to control their movements, Heather knew she would be less aware and less prepared when a real threat was present.

  “Okay, honey, go!” she said, scooting him toward the closest toilet. She closed the door and decided she had neglected her own bladder for too long.

  Opting for the stall next to his, Heather walked inside and began singing him a song about a kid who peed soda.

  Her chest muscles started to relax when she heard him laughing and she reminded herself to stay calm for his sake. When she heard one of the outer doors creak open, Heather stopped her song mid-lyric.

  “Mom?” Jack asked.

  The panic in his voice was impossible to miss.

  “Ssh!” she answered.

  Heather strained her ears for voices and prayed to hear the usual complaints about aching muscles but she 128

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  heard nothing. The silence didn’t make sense as someone had obviously come in.

  She felt the same heavy presence that she had outside the locker room and the only thoughts that hadn’t been suspended were the ones that told her to climb beneath the wall and protect her child. The thought of Jack struggling alone with fear was unacceptable to her.

  Wet feet slapped against the tiled fl oor only feet away and Heather imagined whoever it was now stood before the closest wall of mirrors. There was no whir of a blow dryer coming to life and there were no groans from a hairbrush getting entangled in wet scalp. Heather thought it was strange that the lack of sound could be so noisy.

  Her bladder froze and her need to use the toilet disappeared. She pulled her jeans up roughly but didn’t fasten them. Instead, she bent down to the bottom of the wall that separated her from Jack. Heather heard footsteps getting closer and fought against the instinct to kneel down and pull her son into her stall by his ankles. She was afraid to make eye contact with the monster on the other side of the doors and felt as long as she didn’t look into his eyes, they still had a chance.

  Instead of slithering under the stalls herself, she shoved her hands under the wall and motioned for Jack to come to her.

  “Mom, what are you doing?” he asked laughing.

  Heather fought between two powerful needs. She wanted to keep Jack laughing so that her enemy wouldn’t realize they’d been alerted to his presence. She also 129

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  wanted for him to stay quiet so that she could pinpoint their intruder’s whereabouts.

  “Come here, honey. I want to play a game. Just take my hands and lower yourself down. Crawl into my stall,”

  she directed. She spoke in a half whisper and worked hard to control the panic that threatened to maim her voice box.

  “Did you hear someone, Mom?” Jack asked. His tone wasn’t as playful as before. All she wanted was for him to be with her inside her stall before shoes appeared beneath the door.

  “People come in and out, honey,” she whispered loudly. “It’s a public bathroom; now, take my hands.”

  Heather felt her son’s warm hands grabbing onto hers and she longed to hold him. From her position on her knees, she guided Jack downwards and helped lower him to the fl oor. When he was lying on his side, he peeked up at her.

  Footsteps started making their way toward them.

  To protect Jack from turning to face the lower half of a monster, she made funny faces at him. He wiggled as she helped maneuver him from his fl oor to hers.

  As Jack began to rise to his height, Heather saw the feet appear on the other side of the door. She stifl ed the instinct to scream but noticed that Jack was just as aware of their visitor as she was. Heather mimicked a shushing motion but didn’t include the usual sound effect.

  She pulled Jack to her and closed her eyes tightly.

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  arms enclosed him and she kissed the top of his head leaving a drop of blood in one of his black curls.

  “Excuse me, ma’am?” came the familiar voice right outside the thin door.

  The chill that froze her in her spot had nothing to do with the fear of any danger to herself. Heather worried only about what intentions the stranger might have with her child. She shoved her hands beneath Jack’s armpits and stood him up on the back of the toilet in reaction to the vision she had of a hand pushing itself underneath the door. Heather moved to block the toilet on which her son stood.

  “What do you want?” she called out in a raspy voice.

  “Do you happen to have the time?” he asked. She could hear the amusement in his tone.

  His southern drawl made her envision a large, grinning mouth without many teeth and she feared answering him almost as much as she feared not answering him.

  Jack whispered behind her.

  “That’s a man, Mom.”

  Laughter erupted from the other side of the door and Heather watched as Jack’s expression fell. He knew something was very wrong.

  She darted her eyes around nervously and her glance fell on her purse still sitting by her feet. She wondered if their guest would pluck her hand from its wrist before she had the chance to pull anything out. Not sure whether to 131

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  pray for a cell phone or a steak knife, Heather closed her eyes and wished for both.

  Deciding that inaction was their enemy, she reached out and snatched the purse off the fl oor. She shoved her arm inside and felt around with panicked fi ngers.

  The laughter stopped abruptly as Heather grasped and released several different items in her frantic search for anything useful.

  The door handle began to turn but its mission halted when the latch caught itself in the lock. Attempts became louder and Heather realized that the stranger’s efforts had gotten increasingly aggressive. The door began to shake under the pressure of the fi sts that pounded on it. Heather looked at Jack just as her fi ngers wrapped themselves around her cell phone.

  Although shaking almost to the point of uselessness, Heather still managed to press the button that would call the front desk of the recreation center. Luckily, she had programmed the number into her telephone when checking into membership fees a week earlier.

  “Body Salon. How can I help you?” asked a soft female voice. Heather knew it belonged to the petite blonde who greeted customers out front.

  “I’m in your bathroom by the basketball court right now,” Heather’s whisper through clenched teeth turned quickly into a scream. “Someone is trying to attack us.

  Come to the bathroom!’

  “Is this a joke?” the blonde asked playfully.

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  “No, help us!’ Heather screamed. She got even
more nervous after hearing the sound of her own voice. It reminded her of a horror movie she had once seen where the girl’s throat was slashed a short time later. Even the dumb receptionist couldn’t miss the grave sound in Heather’s voice.

  “Okay, ma’am, it’s all right,” she said more softly.

  After another fi ve seconds of rustling noises and background chatter, the woman at the front continued. “I just sent the security guard to the bathrooms. He’s on his way to you right now, okay?”

  Heather hit the speaker button so the monster had fair warning about the cavalry on its way.

  “Please repeat that!’ she screamed into the speaker.

  “I said we just sent the security guard to the bathrooms. He should be to you any minute now,” the woman comforted.

  Heather let the phone hang by her side. She refused to disconnect the call because she knew she might need the ditzy blonde as a witness later on. At the thought of there being something to witness, Heather decided silence was in their best interest until help arrived.

  She’d never have guessed that a fantasy of the doughy rent-a-cop bursting through the door with his gun drawn would ever be a drug free thought in her head. Heather didn’t know if he were up to the task or if he would bail on them when he passed the snack machine in the hallway but she subconsciously placed him in a heroic role just the same. Luckily, their guest wasn’t as curious about what 133

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  would happen next because he stopped shaking the door and his feet disappeared.

  She wasn’t sure how much time had gone by when they heard the entrance door slam open and crash into the inner wall. Heather and Jack both jumped and she had to quickly block the toilet to prevent her son from falling off.

  She gave Jack her best attempt at a smile but was pretty sure by his startled reaction that it came out as more of a frightening grimace. She put a fi nger to her lips again to let him know that it wasn’t safe to talk yet.

  “Hello? Is anyone in here?” It was the hesitant voice of the guard.

  Heather disengaged the stall lock and pushed on the door so fast that she was forced into a stumble. She staggered out of the stall like a wino at the end of his bottle.