The Book of Strings

2

"Oliver?"

The sound of her voice shook me from a mild sleep. I rolled over. It was pitch black. The only light radiated from a small alarm clock. It read 1:37 am. I breathed a sigh of relief. Anything to keep me busy.

"Charlotte? What's up?"

"I can't sleep."

I pushed the sheets off and sat up to wipe the sleep from my eyes.

"Yeah, me neither. Go get a sweatshirt or something. I'll meet you in the car."

The sound of her feet padding down the hallway was followed by her closet door opening. I switched on the bedside lamp and rubbed my eyes. The low hum of the water heater kept me company here. I stood and threw on the closest t-shirt. My room was small, my bed against the wall under the window. It had initially been an attic, but when Meredith was born, the room Sam and I shared wasn't spacious enough to hold a third.

I walked cautiously past Denise and Byron's room and down the stairs out the back door.

The Arizona heat hit hard, but the dark kept it on the cooler side. Palm trees lined the streets and nearly every lawn was dried to a light brown. Every roof was coated in red shingles, as was custom in not only the neighborhood but the entire town. When I got to the car, Charlotte already sat waiting in the passenger seat, hugging her knees to her chest. I climbed in and rustled her hair.

"Hey," I said in an undertone, "wanna talk about it?"

She shook her head.

"Okay, just try to sleep if you can. Seat belt?"

She strapped herself in and sat upright. I put the keys in the ignition and backed out of the driveway and onto the back road. Charlotte immediately rolled down the windows and opened the moon roof, sticking her arm out so she could feel the warm wind.

The highway from Tucson to Phoenix is endless -- a relentless stretch of asphalt cutting through the desert. Where the road meets the horizon is always a mirage and by night, sighting another vehicle is a rarity. It's a good hour and a half without a single turn. Charlotte drew her hand back in as the Subaru climbed onto the highway from the exit.

"Can I play music?" she asked.

"Yeah, sure. The discs are in the glove compartment."

She nodded and starting digging around. She resurfaced with a Bob Marley album and popped it in the CD player. The first track started and she leaned back in her seat, eyes open to watch the sky.

Charlotte had been five when she was medically labeled an insomniac. She also suffered night terrors, the kinds that would make her want to stay awake for fear of finding them waiting for her in her sleep. When she was younger, they would get to the point where she would be in tears, screaming and kicking without being able to wake up. I had been an insomniac for as long as I could remember. When Charlotte's night terrors became too much for Denise to contain, it was on me to snap her out of it. Driving worked for the both of us.

It wasn't until the album had ended and the first cars appeared on the freeway that Charlotte finally fell asleep. At this point, it seemed safe to take her home. The Subaru pulled back into the driveway and I switched off the headlights. What happened next was something I'd initially passed off as a side effect of fatigue or stress, but I knew what I saw was all too real. As I turned off the lights, something moved by the corner of the house. It was almost unnoticeable, but it was an undeniable motion. I flicked the headlights on again.

It wasn't what I'd expected.

Calmly and with an expression I hoped wouldn't betray my panic, I got out of the car and walked up to her.