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This time when the nightmares jolt Grace awake, she cannot help herself. She has to check on the kids. If she can just see them- just make sure they're okay, that they're accounted for, she can go back to sleep.
Careful not to wake her husband, she rises from bed and pads onto the squeaky floorboards of the hallway.
Boots and Lizzie’s room is the closest, door still slightly ajar since her girls like to fall asleep to a little bit of light.
Grace squints and locates their shadows in the dark, breathing softly under thin sheets in the Virginia heat. There. See? They're fine. Grace tells herself, mind already eased by their presence. She passes the staircase to head towards Gregor’s room next.
She isn’t sure whether she’ll find him awake or not— it’s a gamble with that boy.
She falters for a second when she registers that his door is wide open.
"Gregor, baby?" she asks in a whisper, poking her head in.
Her stomach drops. Her son's bed is empty, blankets on the floor. His desk is in disarray, everything on the ground like there was a struggle.
Her throat squeaks as a familiar terror washes over her. No. No. Not again! They cannot have taken her son again!
She stumbles from the room and bolts, frantic down the stairs, twisting her ankle hard as she misses the last three steps in the darkness of the ground floor. She doesn’t slow, her heartbeat deafening in her ears as she gropes around the front table for the car keys.
Where was the nearest cave system again? God, she’d been sure the house was far enough away that they would be safe! But they cannot have her family again, so she’ll have to rescue Gregor alone.
Keys located, she flings open the front door, and the doorknob strikes the drywall with enough force to punch through. She doesn’t care, is already running, barefoot towards the car through the wailing of the cicadas.
“Mom— Mom—”
She jumps with a startled shriek as she feels a hand touch her shoulder.
It’s Gregor, eyes full of alarm.
“Mom?” He repeats, softer as her erratic gaze drinks in his face. She hiccups on a sudden sob, and her knees give out. She slumps to the damp grass and bursts into tears.
“Are you okay?” Gregor asks, sinking down beside her. Grace pulls her son to her, holding him and stroking his hair with trembling hands. Her shoulders heave with sobs.
“Grace?” Can be heard from the house.
“Where were you?!” Grace demands as she pulls back from her embrace, “Where did you go!?” She snaps, shaking the boy’s shoulders. Her words come out angrier than she meant them.
“I was getting some tea, I couldn’t sleep.” Gregor says with the same cautious, gentle tone of voice he uses to orient his father after nightmares. “I was just at the kitchen table.”
“Your room— everything on the floor—”
“I-” this seems to pain him to admit. “I had some nightmares is all.”
“Lights— were all off—downstairs--”
“Mom...” He starts, not sounding like he wants to finish what he was going to say. Grace’s mind fills in the blanks.
Echolocation. That damned Echolocation. Of course the lights weren’t on in the kitchen. The boy hasn’t used lights at night in the last three years aside from when he’s reading.
“Grace!?” A more frantic call.
“Mommy!?” Lizzie’s panicked voice. Lights are flicking on in the girls’ room.
“We’re out here!” Gregor calls, one arm wrapping supportively around his mother’s shoulders.
“Can you stand?” he asks her.
Grace answers by letting him pull her to her feet. Her ankle stabs in protest, but she cannot bring herself to care, too pained by the sudden realization that her fifteen-year-old is taller than she is now.