"...now I want you to go back a little farther. All the way back to the night when the lights came in through the window...can you see it?" Dr. Alister's voice was smooth and soothing in the darkened room. A little bit gravelly at the edges, but smooth as chocolate.

But Jane didn't think it was working. She wasn't going anywhere. She could still feel the coolness of the leather chair against her neck. She could still smell the wafting hint of his cologne. She could feel her feet inside her shoes. She wasn't going anywhere.

"Are you there? Tell me what you see."

"It's dark," she began. And it was. "And quiet. Everyone's asleep now. But I can't sleep and I want to. Maybe I should go into Mom's room, climb into her bed and sleep there. But she always moves me back, and I don't want to come back here."

Jane surprised herself with her own words. Did not believe her own eyes. She truly was, impossibly, back in her small bedroom and she truly was eight years old. She could see her flowered wallpaper exactly as she remembered it. She knew beyond doubt that, if she could crane her neck, she'd find the tiny beginnings of a tatter where it was peeling off just above her bed, where the wall met the ceiling. She could hear the trees rustling outside her open window.

But at the same time she was here, in New York City. She was 46 years old. She had two children, and she was wearing her favorite grey cashmere sweater.  She knew what she'd eaten for lunch today. It felt in all honesty like she was two people at once. And yet she was nowhere. In limbo somewhere between the two.

Suddenly, though, the child in bed saw the lights fill the window. Two blue, three red, three white, in exactly the formation she'd been scribbling  for months now. They were there, noiseless and getting closer and brighter until the glow illuminated her whole room.

She felt sweat on her brow and her heart began to race. Which heart? She couldn't be sure. She felt it in both places. A sudden attack of pure terror and a flood of eerie recognition.

Recognition! The child recognized the lights, too. Knew somehow exactly what they signified and exactly what was about to happen. She was too frightened even to scream. She had seen this all before. Jane was certain of it. So this wasn't even the first time? When had it started?

"They're back!" she heard herself scream. the voice sounded tiny but hysterical in her ears, not her own. "Don't let them take me! Please, I don't want to go back there! Don't let them take me! Don't!"

Now she heard her own voice, too, as though it were superimposed on the child's. It had the quality of stereo and echo in her ears.

"You're safe here," Dr. Allister's gravelly, chocolate voice said. "You are still here in New York with me. They can't hurt you. They won't take you. Just tell me what you see."

"It's hard to see," she heard her child voice again. "The light is too bright. But someone's coming in! Into my room! I'm hiding under my blankets now. But he knows I'm here. He just keeps coming...I can see his hand now, all white. But I still can't see his face....Mom! Don't let them take me again! Mom!"

"No one can take you, Jane. No one will hurt you. Remember, you're still here with me and all of this happened a long, long time ago. I can bring you back at any time. What's happening now?"

"Oh! He's got me! He's lifting me up right out of my bed like I'm light as a feather. He's tall and white. He's holding me against him like a baby. I can see his face now! His eyes are very, very big. His mouth is small. He doesn't talk. I can't tell if he's even looking at me... he has no hair and his skin is so warm. I want to scream, I want to call my Mom, but I can't talk now. He's taking me over toward the light. We walk into it. We walk right into it and out of my bedroom....we're walking on the lights now. They're like a road and I can't see anything else. Not my room, not my house, not my street. Nothing. Just a road of light. He's carrying me like he's going toward something. But all I feel is going away. I'm scared! I don't want to go!"

Jane sprang straight up on the leather chair, her eyes now fully open and her forehead beaded with sweat. Her heart was still racing, but, after a few breaths, she felt entirely here again. Whole. One person. 

She remembered everything.