The empty plate comes back wet as the storm rages on. I’m fishing for my journal again when suddenly, with a mournful wheeze, the power goes out. And when the lights die this time, they don’t come back.
I count sixty-three heartbeats before I decide, Screw this.
My legs wobble when I swing them over the mattress. An oversized robe hangs from the bedpost. I cinch it around my belly, fabric straining over the growing swell. The floorboards creak as I shuffle toward the door with one hand braced against the wall for support.
Darkness clusters in the hallway. I know these turns by now—right at the crack in the plaster, left where the grandfather clock ticks. Thunder snarls as I reach the stairs from the second story to the ground floor.
A faint, guttural Russian curse rolls up from the sha
