Flying in Place by Susan Palwick

eyes. She was wearing an unironed blouse, and her hair looked as if small, dirty animals had been burrowing in it. “We can make breakfast, Mom.”
    “It’s all right,” she said, looking through me. “I’ll do it. He always burns the toast.”
    “I don’t. I’m good at making toast.”
    “Your sister was good at making toast,” she said, and started to cry.
    She’s dying, I thought. She’s dying and I didn’t even tell anybody, did I? But maybe I did. I shouldn’t have told Myrna that my body wouldn’t get used to it and that I didn’t want to go home. I shouldn’t have eaten with the Hallorans so often. I should have kept my grades up even though I’ve been spending so much time with Ginny. She’s figured it out, and now she’ll die.
    “Is she dying?” I said.
    My father sighed. “Oh, Jesus! No, she’s not dying. She’s just upset. She is not dying, Emma. Everything’s going to be all right.”
    “I’m sorry,” Mom said, sniffling. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be the fool of loss, I know I shouldn’t. I’ll be all right in a minute.”
    My father grimaced and started massaging her neck. “Pamela, would you please take some expert medical advice and take a Valium?”
    “I hate Valium,” she said, wiping her eyes.
    “I know you do.” He moved from her neck to her shoulders. “That’s why I haven’t given you any since the funeral, which is the last time you acted this way. But you’re coming unravelled and it’s scaring Emma, and it’s not making me very happy either. Please, Pam? You can’t teach like this. You know you can’t.”
    She smiled wanly. “Behold me, for I cannot sleep, a weight of nerves without a mind.”
    My father raised an eyebrow and cleared his throat. “Pam—”
    “All right, Stewart. It was just a quotation. Give me your pill.”
    He brought her a pill from the medicine cabinet, and she swallowed it without a murmur. Mom never took pills; she hardly even took aspirin. Was she going to turn into a drug addict now? That was one way people died.
    She looked up from washing the pill down with orange juice, and saw me staring at her. “I’m fine, Emma.” She didn’t sound fine, and I wasn’t reassured. “Go make the toast. You still have to get ready for school.”
    I was as ready for school as I was going to get, which wasn’t saying much, because to stop worrying about Mom I had to space out even more than usual. I glided through social studies in a fog, and was roused only by the teacher yelling at me. “Emma! Emma, wake up!”
    I opened my eyes with a start. Where had I been? At the lake. No, not quite. Somewhere over the woods, on my way to the lake, trying to find Ginny…
    “Emma, what’s the matter with you?”
    “Huh?” I said. Everyone was staring at me. “Nothing. I didn’t sleep well last night, is all. Guess I’m tired.”
    “Do you want to go to the nurse?” He stood over me, looking helpless, and I felt sorry for him because he didn’t understand anything and he didn’t have a lake to go to when life got horrible.
    “No,” I said. I wasn’t about to get anywhere near Myrna, not after the fight she’d had with my mother. “I’m sorry. I’ll pay attention now, really. What were you talking about?”
    “Rivers,” he said despairingly. “You didn’t hear a word, did you? We were talking about how rivers were roads for the early American settlers.”
    “That’s pretty interesting,” I said. “What were lakes?”
    “Parking lots,” said Billy, behind me, and everyone laughed. The teacher shook his head and went back to writing on the board. I felt a tap on the small of my back and jumped, but it was only Billy passing me a note. “Yo, space cadet,” it read, in his large, messy handwriting. “Jane won’t hate you forever just because your mom’s a witch. Here’s something I bet you don’t know: Jane gave Tad shit in the boat for calling you fat, and he said he liked skinny girls and that’s when he tried to