Why does that hurt me?
I’m safe, in my bed, down the hall from my parents, but something’s not right between us.
The recurring dream. It hits me like a wall of wind. The dream about the car accident isn’t a dream. It’s a memory.
I lift my eyes to Grandmother’s chair in the corner and see there’s no door beside it. “I’m dreaming right now,” I say. “This is a dream too.”
“No.” Grandmother shakes her head, a gray-streaked section of hair falling across her forehead. “This is a memory, inside of a dream.”
“A memory,” I murmur to myself, sinking down in my sheets.
“You were fourteen when I told you this story.”
“That’s right,” I say, though my mind’s still foggy. “The story didn’t make sense to me then.”
“Does it now?” she asks.
“I . . . I don’t know,” I manage. “At least the part about trust, and how parents can fail. That makes sense.”
“Ah,” Grandmother says, folding her hands in her lap. “So we’re here already.”
“Where?” I ask, trying to shake the fog from my head.
“At the part of the story where your trust is broken,” she says.
“You knew?”
“Girl, how many times have you told me I know everything?”
“All the stories,” I say. “They didn’t mean anything when you told me them, but they all apply later, don’t they? Like prophecies.”
“Like prophecies, yes,” she says. “But not prophecies. Like parables, but not parables.”
“You’re even behind a smoke screen in my dreams,” I say.
“That’s your fault, isn’t it? You can’t blame me. I’m not really here.”
“How does this work—a memory inside a dream?”
“Exactly like the nightmare, I assume. You’re remembering a story I told you and conflating it with the current events of your life to parse out meaning.”
“Now you sound like Alice.”
“Well, you’ve got a little bit of her stored up in here too. You keep everyone you love close, Natalie. You keep bits of them within you. You let every person you meet affect you.”
“I wish I didn’t let them affect me so much.”
“You must be feeling uprooted now that you know the truth about the accident,” she says. “Like your family is no longer a safe place, and if they aren’t, what is?”
“If you say so, I must. Since you’re just a product of my consciousness.”
“You’ve got some nerve, girl,” she says.
“I learned from the best. Before you left me.”
Grandmother’s knowing smile falters. She leans over her knees toward me, reminding me of Alice. “I’ll never leave you. Don’t forget that,” she says.
Did she actually say that? I try to remember. I don’t think she did, but still, it feels so real I believe her, this dream version of Grandmother. I must really think that, deep down, or at least want it, to be able to conjure up those words from her now.
“Now sit back and let me tell you this story,” she says.
“Again,” I point out.
“Again. One day God spoke to a man called Abraham. ‘Abraham,’ he said, ‘take Isaac’—or Ishmael, depending on who’s telling it—‘your son whom you love more than your own life, and go to Moriah, where you will sacrifice him on a mountain.’
“And hearing and knowing God, Abraham obeyed, taking his son and two servants on a journey to Moriah. When he saw the mountain God had chosen, Abraham told his servants to wait at the bottom while he and Isaac went to worship. ‘Then we will come back to you,’ Abraham told his servants, for he knew God would not lead him into danger. He wouldn’t cause Abraham pain.
“As they climbed, Abraham chose wood to build the sacrificial fire. He passed it to Isaac, who said, ‘Father, where is the lamb to be offered?’
“‘God will provide,’ Abraham told his beloved son, and they kept climbing. When they reached the summit, Abraham strained his ears, listening for God’s voice, but when he heard nothing he built the altar and bound Isaac to it. Though he began to be afraid, he still trusted that God loved him, that he would not lead him to slay his son without reviving him again. And so he raised his knife over Isaac’s heart, and finally he heard God speak again.
“‘Abraham, Abraham,’ God said. ‘Set down your knife. Do not harm your son. I’ve seen your heart, and I know you withhold nothing from me. You know my face as that of your father. You recognize my love for you, as you know your own for Isaac. You know what you would do for your child, and you understand that is what I’d do for you.’
“Abraham released his son then, and when he looked up to the bramble, he saw a ram with its horns caught in the brush. Together, they sacrificed the ram, which had been sent to take Isaac’s place. From then on, they called that place God Provides.”
“Why did they have to sacrifice anything?”