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light of the sun begin to fill the studio. I see the back of Grace’s canvas and the new painting it contains. I see the couch and the harvest table and I see our bed, the covers and sheets tossed about. As I soak in the vision, I sense the darkness coming on. It’s a like a total eclipse of the sun, only not as achingly slow.
    We enter back into the apartment, hand in hand.
    â€œWhen I was sleepwalking,” I say, “I was asleep. But I could see.”
    â€œHow can that be?” Grace asks. “What difference does sleeping make?”
    We approach the bed and I sit myself on the edge, then lie back, feel the small cuts and scrapes from the shards of the broken rooftop tiles.
    â€œBecause there’s nothing wrong with me,” I say, my chest filling with a strange sense of optimism.
    â€œHow can there be nothing wrong?” Grace asks. “You spend most of your life in the dark.”
    â€œThere’s nothing physically wrong. There’s only my memory. I fell asleep last night to some bad remembrances.”
    She lies beside me, curls into me.
    â€œWhat remembrances, Nick?”
    I see the little boy . I see the bodies that surround his . I hear my voice ordering the bombing. I hear the jet and see the rockets shooting out from below its straight wings. I feel the concussion of the explosions.
    â€œNever mind,” I say, as I close my eyes. “I just can’t talk about it yet.”
    Grace exhales but doesn’t respond, as if to make another sound will somehow send me back up onto that roof. With the sun coming up and bathing our top floor studio in radiant warmth, I once more feel exhaustion invade the blood that swims through my veins, and I surrender to a deep sleep.

Chapter 10
    WHEN I WAKE UP again, I smell coffee.
    The good news: I’m still in bed.
    The bad news: Grace is gone.
    I reach out for her, but she’s not there.
    I have no idea how long I’ve been out. A few minutes or half the morning. I feel exhausted, but somehow energized that I’m alive and not being dragged from the bottom of the feeder canal. As expected, the sight has left my eyes again. But it is not replaced with complete blackness this time, as if a war is being waged inside my brain between the power of the light and the power of darkness.
    As I crawl naked out of bed, feeling the scrapes and cuts from my rooftop sleepwalk, I decide to let the opposing powers go ahead and duke it out. I have no control of the outcome. I have only the memory of that little boy killed in the bombing. Maybe if I can learn to forget him, or at the very least figure out a way of storing his memory away inside a brain-vault, I can one day lose the blindness forever.
    But forgetting the death of a little boy…forgetting the thin coat of dust that covered his face, his wide-open blue eyes, the star-shaped hole in his chest, or the way his feet were so distorted…forgetting something like that would be like living without breathing.
    * * *
    The smell of oil paint, turpentine and freshly brewed espresso fills the air of the studio when I make the six steps to its center. The smells tell me Grace is painting. If I look in the directions of the open French doors, I can make out the dark silhouette of Grace sitting at her easel. She is surrounded by light. I can almost feel the fire burning off of her as she creates an image I can only hope to see one day.
    â€œGood morning, sleepy head,” she says, the tone of her voice having entirely lost the stress and panic that filled it just a little while ago.
    â€œWhat time is it, Grace? How long have I been asleep?”
    â€œIt’s eight-thirty. You slept for another two hours after I saved your life.” She laughs.
    â€œYou saved my life?”
    â€œThat’s my story.”
    I hear her get up from off her stool.
    â€œCoffee,” she says.
    â€œKeep painting, Gracie,” I say. “I can manage—”
    â€œâ€”to