Doubt was the last and biggest hurdle she circled around and around, never quite brave enough to attempt to clear it. At least the pace at which she ran around it had slowed from frenetic to familiar over the years. Her therapist was satisfied with that much. She didn’t share Evi’s disappointment in herself at her inability to be completely happy.
She had the perfect husband, the perfect child, the perfect home, the perfect job. Why could she not be perfectly happy? Was she ungrateful? No. Nothing could be further from the truth. Was she weak? Did she know deep down that she didn’t deserve any of it? That was her greatest fear—what if that one remaining voice of criticism was right after all?
“You have to convince yourself that voice is wrong,” Dr. Price had told her so many times over the years. So many times that Evi had long ago become too embarrassed even to bring up the subject anymore.
Leaving Mia’s room, she went downstairs to the living room and curled up in a corner of the sofa with her knitting, and turned the television on to keep her company and distract her from her anxiety.
The nightmares left an emotional aftertaste that lingered. She didn’t have them every night, or even every month. When she had gone without one for a long time, she could almost convince herself they would never come back. And once they returned, she despaired of their ever letting her sleep in peace.
A local channel was rerunning the ten o’clock news, showing the weather advisories and preemptive school closings. Temperatures were hovering just at freezing, with precipitation coming in a mix of rain and sleet. The only vehicles advised to be on the road overnight were the trucks from the Department of Transportation that were out laying down sand and salt in anticipation of intrepid morning commuters.
Mia would be disappointed not to have school. Unlike Evi, her daughter was a social butterfly, friendly and confident. Those were traits Evi had to work at. She loved her job and the kids she worked with. She was proud of the work she did and the accomplishments of the Chrysalis Center, but none of it came easily to her. Her daughter, on the other hand, had the confidence of a child who had never known what it was not to be loved completely. Mia would always have that. No matter what else happened in her life, she would always know that she was loved absolutely.
That had to be one of a mother’s greatest accomplishments, Evi thought. She wondered how differently her life would have turned out if she’d had that kind of unconditional love as a child.
No matter, she told herself, because her life had turned out like this: perfect. And as she thought it, and as she smiled wider, she felt the residual anxiety from the dream fade away.
She focused on her knitting: a winter scarf in shades of pink. She had a stack of scarves in a variety of colors and textures already stashed away in the gift closet, Christmas presents for the girls she worked with—her extended family of troubled teenagers.
“Isn’t the news depressing enough the first time around?” Eric asked as he came into the living room in red plaid flannel pajama bottoms and a faded black T-shirt that had been through the wash too many times. He slouched down onto the sofa beside her, blond hair tousled, a sleepy smile on his handsome face.
“I missed it the first time around,” Evi said. “I was doing your disgusting hockey laundry.”
“You are so beautiful,” he said. “Have I told you in the last two minutes how beautiful you are?”
He smiled at her like he was trying to pick her up, like he was sharing an inside joke, shining brown eyes always ready with a wink.
“You are the perfect husband. But your hockey laundry still stinks.” Evi chuckled. “FYI: Mia doesn’t have school tomorrow.”
As a firefighter, Eric was twenty-four hours on and forty-eight hours off. He took full advantage of his days off to be the househusband and be involved in his daughter’s life. He was, in the opinion of all Evi’s friends, the perfect modern man.
“If this sleet keeps up, we’ll all have the day off,” he said.
“I’ve got a big meeting—” Evi started.
Eric narrowed his eyes. “I don’t want you driving if the roads are bad. Never mind that you’re a safe driver. These first bad weather days leading into winter, people lose their minds. You’d think they lived in Miami and had never seen snow.
“Stay home and play Frozen with us,” he suggested. “Mia might let you be Elsa. Once. Only once. I get to be Kristoff and Olaf.”
“I’ve been informed I don’t sing well enough to be Elsa.”
“I love you anyway.”
“Thanks.”
“Trouble sleeping tonight?” he asked, trying to slip that in casually.
“I’m fine,” Evi said. “I woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep. A little TV, a little knitting . . . I’m fine.”
“It’s the pressure of being a local celebrity,” Eric said teasingly.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune had recently run a weekend feature story on Chrysalis and its work with victims of sexual abuse, domestic violence, and sex trafficking. In her capacity as the center’s senior social services case worker, Evi had been pictured and quoted, speaking out about the difficulties faced by victims who had aged out of the foster care system but didn’t meet the requirements for most women’s shelters.