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reaction to the sensation of not having my
purse with me. But then I went with it, realizing that it was
exactly the right thing to do, if I had actually lost it. Mom
noticed my hesitation and body language and asked, “What’s
wrong?”
    I answered with appropriate concern, “My
purse. I think I left it.”
    We backtracked to where we had initially
been seated, before rising to stand at the rails like everyone
else. There was no purse, of course. I acted concerned and a little
upset, though its loss, including the actual purse itself, would
constitute no more than seven dollars of financial setback, I
estimated.
    Mom tried to soothe me by asking, “Honey, do
you think you may have left it in the car?”
    No. I smiled inwardly.
    “Maybe…I hope so,” I replied with real
nervousness, wondering if anyone was watching and listening to
this. I couldn’t tell for sure, and it was frustrating.
    We eventually made our way to the car. Hoyt
hit the button on the remote to unlock the doors and I climbed into
the back. It was nearly dark now. I stepped on something as my feet
came to rest behind my mom’s seat. To my amazement, and wonder, and
dread, I pulled up my recovered purse, placed for me where I would
think I’d left it, in my step-father’s locked vehicle, while I’d
been sailing on the river.
    Now I knew for sure that I would need to be
extremely careful, from this moment onward, because people with
tricks I couldn’t begin to imagine were watching me very closely,
and responding to my experiments.

Chapter 6 –
Trust
     
    Mom and Hoyt were already long gone for work
one morning. It was mid-July and I was still sleeping in late in
the mornings—part of the novelty of nowhere to be while school was
out for the summer. There was bright, annoying light flooding all
around the edges of my “room darkening” shades (a misnomer if ever
there was one) making me feel awake, when all I really wanted was
to keep dreaming.
    So now I was just lying there with a pillow
over my head. Adding to my annoyance with the present alignment of
the solar system, my own body was rebelling. My back was starting
to ache the way it does when I’ve been in bed for too long; a
similar phenomenon was occurring with my bladder.
    As I continued to lay there, laziness still
winning out over annoyance and discomfort, I heard the familiar
sound of the mail truck working its way up the street. My mind was
drifting and it reminded me of a conversation I’d once had with my
mom about Postal Service vehicles.
    “For one thing,” I began “you’d think they
would buy American.”
    Her expression remained politely attentive,
though she stared slightly through me.
    “You know, right side steering wheels?
British, obviously,” I continued.
    Her eyebrow raised a fraction.
    “And then they aren’t equipped with standard
mufflers, the kind that muffle sound,” I added with a smile,
amusing myself.
    “What?”
    Her reply was a little uncertain, as though
she was just now tuning in.
    “Think about it…the sound, I mean. You can
always hear the mail truck coming. Nothing else sounds like that,
right?” I ventured.
    She was looking at me but seeing something
far away now as I waited for acknowledgement of my important
findings. Refocusing her eyes on my face she offered, “I
gueeessss.”
    Her tone added the “Whatever sweetheart. I
wish for your sake that you weren’t so strange.”
    That conversation had taken place before
Grandpa died. I chuckled to myself imagining how different her
response would have been if I had brought it up more recently.
She’d be totally zoned in, and ridiculously enthusiastic. She’d
probably even throw me in the car and run me to the post office to
arrange a tour and a ride-with.
    I snapped back to the present.
    Was that the doorbell?
    As if in answer to my question, there was a
quiet knock downstairs. I jumped out of bed, fully dressed—from
yesterday. I didn’t go anywhere or sweat, so what’s