"She's gone again, Mom."

Carolyn closed her eyes and moaned. Another ruined dinner. She shut off the oven and bid adieu to her carefully constructed souffle. It never failed--every time she tried to make something special, Sarah would pull one of her disappearing acts. She turned to her younger daughter, who stood in the kitchen doorway with the empty wheelchair.

"Okay, Al. Let's go find her."

Alyson was fifteen, just a mouse of a thing, with a pug little nose and braces. Though ordinary in appearance, she was exceptional in many other ways. She'd excelled in school since kindergarten, and her goals and ideals were higher than Carolyn had ever dreamed of achieving for herself. They had Sarah to thank for that. Alyson loved her older sister, despite the constant frustration and pain she caused the family. They all loved Sarah. She was their special child. "Someday," Al promised her sister, "I'll be able to help other kids like you. Someday all my Sarahs will get well." Sarah, of course, could not know the love behind those promises.

Finding Sarah wasn't the problem. They both knew where she'd be--where she always went for her seizures. In rain or snow or summer sunshine, when Sarah felt an aura coming on, she was drawn to the ancient apple tree. An orchard, untended for uncountable decades, lined the eastern edge of the property. At its heart grew what once was a stately monster of a tree. Years before the Mitchells moved in, lightning had split the tree into two perfect halves. They curled to the ground--one pointing north, one pointing south--and by some miracle survived. The cleft of this amazing abnormality was Sarah's cradle.

The wheelchair rattled through the mud of mid-spring. The fragrance of apple blossoms tickled their noses, and the entire orchard was crowned in a delicate pink mist of blooms. It took both mother and daughter to maneuver the chair over the remnants of stone wall at the property's edge and through the tangle of brambles into the orchard. Once past the perimeter, the shade of the old trees inhibited the undergrowth, and the task grew easier. It wouldn't be so easy to get the chair back out with Sarah in it. She was a big girl. But they'd had plenty of practice--they always managed.

"She's not done yet," Alyson said matter-of-factly as they approached the cleft tree. She stopped the chair against the trunk, and plopped into it to wait. Carolyn leaned against the tree beside her, one hand on Sarah's trembling body to keep her from rolling out of the tree.

In fact, she had just begun. The amount of drool that dribbled down Sarah's chin was still no more than a trickle, and her body hadn't gone totally rigid. She couldn't have been gone for more than a few minutes before Alyson had discovered her absence. How a girl who couldn't even roll over in bed managed to walk the two acres to the apple orchard every time she felt a seizure coming on was a mystery. Alyson called it a "medical miracle". Alyson always found a silver lining for Sarah's clouds.

****

"Mother, why can't I go back to the island with you?"

Sarah walked hand and hand with the Lady through the carefully tended apple trees. Pink blossoms scented the air with springtime, and she reached a hand to pluck a sprig of blooms from above. The women of the Sisterhood worked all around her, smiling their greetings to the young girl they had come to love so dearly. They groomed the trees, talking to them, thanking them for the bounty of delicious fruit that would reward their tender care in the fall.

"We've talked about this before, Sarah dear." The beautiful woman brushed back a strand of golden hair that had escaped from her windswept braid, and turned to gaze into Sarah's eyes. "You're holding onto that other world, even though you do not belong there. Until you let go, you can come no farther than the shore."

Tears spilled out of Sarah's brown eyes. "But here I'm normal. I can walk and talk and laugh and sing. There are no doctors, no medications. When you speak to me, I can answer you. There, when they speak to me, I try so hard. My heart screams to answer. I want to call out, 'Yes! I do hear you! I understand every word!' but nothing happens. My body won't do what my mind wants it to."

"I know, dear." The Lady caressed Sarah's cheek with her soft gentle hand. "You are a child out of time. You do belong here-- with us, with your true family. But we cannot bring you home as long as there is something holding you in that other age."

They came to the edge of the orchard, and brilliant sunshine touched Sarah's face and dried her tears. It sparkled on the azure waters of the lake. She gazed across the surface at the island in its center, the walls of Avalon gleaming like alabaster in the warm spring sun. The Mother stepped into the boat, where another of the sisters awaited her. Sarah clung to her hand across the water.

"I must go back now, Sarah. And so must you." The Lady kissed Sarah's palms, and their fingers slid apart as the boat glided from the shore.

****


"Dr. Montgomery will see you now."

Alyson, ever the faithful sister, wheeled Sarah's chair through the door behind her parents. The receptionist smiled and pushed it closed behind them. Sarah's monthly visits to the doctor had become routine. Al rolled Sarah to the exam table and watched while the doctor and his assistant lifted her sister from the chair.

"Well, hello there, Miss Sarah," Dr. Montgomery was cheerful and kind, and he tugged playfully on Sarah's pigtail as he greeted her. "Haven't seen you in a while. How've you been?"

He turned his gaze toward her parents as he asked the question, and one eyebrow lifted in query. Sarah would never answer, but he respected the family's hope that she might hear and understand in some subliminal way.

Alyson looked from her parents to the doctor and back, waiting for the inevitable. They would, of course, tell him -- despite Alyson's pleas that they keep the changes within the family.

"She seems to be getting worse." Bill's voice shook as he spoke, and his wife avoided the doctor's sympathetic eyes. "The seizures are coming more frequently. If only she'd stay put when they start, or if I were home more to help. . . . "

Carolyn subconsciously rubbed the ace bandage that wrapped around her wrist, and the doctor's gaze dropped to the movement.

"Did she do that?" he asked.

"Not directly, really. I sprained it trying to lift her back into her chair yesterday. She fell from the tree during a seizure. . . . "

Dr. Montgomery spun toward Sarah and started to examine her for injury.

"Oh, she's all right. I'd have called you right away if she'd been hurt." Carolyn took a step toward him. Worry lined her face as she waited for him to confirm her words.

He nodded. "Only a few scratches." Patting Sarah's cheek fondly, he turned to his assistant. "Stay with her for a minute, Stan. Come on into the office, folks, I think we should talk."

The door to the doctor's inner office shut behind them with a click. Dr. Montgomery, without even asking, began to unwrap the bandage from Carolyn's hand.

"Now hold still--just want to see for myself that it isn't broken this time."

"That wasn't Mom, doctor, that was me," Alyson offered, a tinge of fear in her voice.

"I know that, Al." He examined the hand closely, and wrapped it again, satisfied. "Not so bad this time. But two months ago it was a broken finger for Alyson, now a sprained wrist for you, Carolyn. Sarah is getting harder for you to handle, and Bill is having to spend more and more time on the road to help pay for the doctors."

"We're still fighting that pre-existing condition clause in the new company's insurance." Bill stepped toward his wife and twined his fingers through hers.

"I know. But these things, when they amount to anything at all, always take time. How many bills will you accumulate in the meantime?"

"We're managing. . . . "

Dr. Montgomery nodded toward Carolyn's injured hand. "Doesn't look like it, Bill. Sarah's a big girl, and like many children with such disabilities she's disproportionately strong. If you were home to help, things might be different. Carolyn and Alyson just aren't able to cope with her alone. I wish you'd reconsider my offer. Gordon House has trained professionals living there 'round the clock, who know just how to help young people like Sarah. She'll have the best of medical care, a highly skilled staff and caretakers, and they get a good portion of their expenses paid by the state. They're good people, they really care."

"Sarah needs us," Carolyn insisted, tears in her eyes. "We're her family."

Dr. Montgomery closed his eyes and sighed. He removed his wire rimmed glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. He hated to do this, but someone had to say it. "Bill, Carolyn --Sarah doesn't know you're her family. Nothing we've seen in the seventeen years of her life indicates that she has any idea that you're there. I know this is a heartbreaking decision, but please try to accept the fact that it's not her heart that will be breaking. Try to think of what's best for her."

****


The pink spring blossoms had given way to delicate green leaves. They laced the air above with whispers of a newborn summer. Sarah and the Lady sat on a stone bench beneath the apple branches. A carpet of pink and white ground phlox lined both sides of the path, their pastel hues soothing to Sarah's troubled mind.

"Why, they said no, of course!" Sarah scuffed a toe in the gravel of the path, and marveled at the way her foot moved when her mind told it to. "My family wouldn't leave me in the care of strangers like that."

"Your family was never meant to be your family, Sarah." The kindness in the Lady's crystal voice was touched with sadness. "I do not know why you are where you are, but you are meant to be here and now--with us. You know that, don't you?"

Sarah nodded. When she walked with the Lady in the Orchard, all was right. She was a normal seventeen year old girl, who could dance and sing and laugh. There was no need for wheelchairs, no trips to doctors, no entombed mind screaming out to communicate to ears that would never hear it. Through the trees she could see the blue sparkle of the Lake, and beyond that the gleaming towers of the Abbey. Home.

"But they love me." Her voice cracked hoarsely from her throat and hot tears burned in her eyes.

"I know. An unfortunate love it is." The Lady stroked her hair. "You live in two worlds, two times. This is wrong, Sarah--can you not feel how very wrong it is? You must let go of one of those worlds to be whole."

Sarah looked around her. Peace surrounded her, the calm content of a world in balance, a world as it should be. She looked down at her hands -- normal hands whose fingers moved and bent and grasped when she wanted them to. She gazed at the Lady. She opened her mouth to speak. Words came forth. That never happened in her other world.

"I love them, too. And I love you. How can I choose?"

****


Lights flashed everywhere. Red. White. Red. White. Sounds surrounded her--voices of strange men and women, the purr of a motor. She strained her senses further. Her nose would have wrinkled if she had been able to force it to do so. Urine. She had wet herself again.

It was not Sarah on the stretcher. Sarah lay in the grass alongside the driveway, covered by a blanket. Her wheelchair was on its side, one wheel turning slowly with the strong breeze that blew across the yard. Two strangers dressed in white had come to bring her from the orchard this time--and they had carried Alyson out as well. When the second violent seizure in an hour had thrown her from her chair, they'd been too busy to do more than cover her and ask her mother to watch after her. Carolyn knelt beside her now, face lined with worry and fear, tears dried on her cheeks but still brimming in her eyes.

The stretcher was in the driveway, and if Sarah could have turned her head, she would have seen the blood that clotted Alyson's dark hair. Paramedics were leaning over her, bandages passed between them, one held an oxygen mask to Alyson's face.

"Will she be all right? Oh God, oh God. . . . " Carolyn began to rock back and forth. Back and forth. "Oh God, oh God. . . . "

One of the medics, a young woman with a comforting smile, walked over and sat in the grass beside them. "I think she'll be fine, Mrs. Mitchell. The cut isn't as deep as we first thought, and she looks like she's coming around. She's going to need a stitch or two, and will probably have to stay in the hospital overnight."

A car skidded over the hill and around the corner and raced into the Mitchell's long driveway. It pulled onto the grass to leave room for the ambulance to exit, and Bill came flying out of the driver side door.

"God, Carolyn! I got here as fast as I could! Is Alyson all right?"

He ran to the youngster on the stretcher, and Carolyn breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the trembling hand that reached for him. She jumped to her feet, leaving Sarah alone with the paramedic, and rushed to join her family. Alyson, face streaked with blood, was nonetheless smiling weakly.

"Hi, Mom. I'm okay." Her voice was weaker than her smile. "I have a terrible headache. Is Sarah all right?"

"Sarah?" Carolyn swallowed the lump that hit her in the throat as she looked toward her older child. "Sarah is fine,” she said softly, “Sarah's always fine--just another seizure."

The pain that touched Alyson's gaze wasn't a physical pain. "Mom, Sarah can't help it. Don't blame her, please."

Bill looked from daughter to wife and back. "Tell me what happened. When I answered the beeper call they just said Alyson was hurt."

"Sarah disappeared again. Usual thing -- usual place. We thought she was done with the seizure, and Alyson tried to get her out of the tree. She had her half-up, and Sarah went into another burst of convulsions. She thrashed, and threw Alyson right up against the tree trunk."

Bill shook his head for a moment, eyes shut tightly. When they opened, a single tear spilled out. "I'll get Sarah ready and meet you at the hospital. You ride with Al, hon'. I'll call Dr. Montgomery and see if he can meet us there, too."

A sob escaped before Carolyn forced her anguish back under control. "He was right, wasn't he?"

Sarah's body went rigid. No! No! No one heard her cries.

****


"She's gone again, Mom."

Oh, no, not today! Carolyn turned to the familiar sight of her younger daughter standing in the kitchen doorway with the empty wheelchair. There was a bandage on Alyson's head, and fading bruises all along one cheek. Dr. Montgomery would be meeting them at Gordon House in just under two hours. Why did Sarah have to run off today?

At least Bill was home. He could get Sarah out of that tree and back into the wheelchair much easier than Carolyn and Al could.

"Bill!" she called up the stairs as they headed for the door. "Sarah's in the orchard again!"

"Wait for me--I'm on my way!"

Half a moment later, he came down the stairs. His shirt tail was untucked and his belt not yet buckled. He wiped shaving cream off a half-shaven face with a wet towel. No annoyance sparked in his eyes -- only grief. Grief of an intensity that only a parent who felt as if he were abandoning a child could feel.

He sighed and took the wheelchair from Alyson. "She would have to do it one more time, wouldn't she? That's our Sarah."

The ground had hardened in the heat of the summer sun, and the huge wheels of the chair bounced roughly across the yard. Bill had cleared some of the brambles at the edge of the orchard, but they were already growing back. The chair was light enough for him to lift over the remnant of stone wall, but the thick wild raspberries scratched at his hands and arms.

Alyson ignored the thorns. She pulled aside the bushes so her father could get the wheelchair through. Carolyn followed, her hands clasped tightly before her, pain in her blue eyes.

The old apple orchard seemed darker than usual, as its heavy canopy of summer greenery blocked the sun. As the branches enclosed them, a strange silence did so as well. The birdsong sounded distant and foreign, as if drifting through from another world. Gnarled branches laden with tiny new crabapples dipped before the family, blocking their progress. Alyson continued to forge to the front, moving limbs aside for her sister's chair.

The great injured tree came into view, and they stopped in their tracks when they saw it. For the first time that they could remember, the old monarch bore no leaves. Branches that should have long ago been barren had finally succumbed to the lightning wound. The tree was dead.

Alyson shuddered.

"This is really strange. I know that tree was alive last time I was down here."

They moved forward again, winding among the trunks of smaller trees to come into sight of the cleft.

Sarah wasn't there.

****

Long after the tracking dogs had been called home and the sheriff's search parties had ceased to scour the surrounding woods, Alyson would come to Sarah's Tree. It was spring once again, and once again the old tree surprised her. It had borne no pink blossoms that year, as did its surrounding cousins, but life was sprouting from death. A tiny vine, delicate thorns gracing its slender trails, grew from the depths of the cloven trunk. Alyson tended the vine through the spring, waiting to see what it would become. It grew swift and strong, trailing brilliant green serrated leaves and tiny thorns, winding new life among the dead branches of the tree. In the summer it formed buds--deep purple, almost black, and velvety soft. When the petals unfurled, the buds became roses.


There is an island in the midst of an ancient lake, crowned by an emerald hill. Crystal blue waters reflect the shimmering image of the holy sanctuary which crests the island's rise. On the landside shore of the lake grows an orchard whose trees are tended with loving care by the Sisterhood that dwells within the island walls. Where the apple trees come down to touch the water, a small flat boat launches from the shore. Seated in the boat are the beautiful Lady of the Lake, and a healthy, laughing teenage girl.

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 11.04.2010

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