These were the things that Flora had learned about being lost from reading TERRIBLE THINGS CAN HAPPEN TO YOU! Not that any of it was particularly relevant here. They weren’t lost in the woods. They were lost in the universe. Which, according to William Spiver, was expanding. How comforting.
“Ulysses!” shouted Tootie.
“Ulysses!” shouted Flora.
“It’s pointless,” said William Spiver.
Flora was carrying Mary Ann, and William Spiver was holding on to Tootie’s shoulder. Flora hated to agree with William Spiver, but pointless seemed like an increasingly appropriate word. Her arms ached from carrying the little shepherdess. Her feet hurt. Her heart hurt.
“Let’s see,” said Tootie, peering into the darkness. “That’s Bricknell Road up there. So we’re not truly lost.”
“I wish I could see,” said William Spiver in a sad voice.
“You can see,” said Tootie.
“Great-Aunt Tootie,” said William Spiver, “I am loath, as always, to point out the obvious, but I will do it here and now for the sake of clarity. You are not me. You do not exist behind my traumatized eyeballs. I am telling the truth, my truth. I cannot see.”
“There’s nothing wrong with you, William,” said Tootie. “How many times do I have to tell you that?”
“Why did she send me away, then?” said William Spiver. His voice shook.
“You know why she sent you away.”
“I do?”
“You can’t just push somebody’s truck into a lake,” said Tootie.
“It was a pond,” said William Spiver, “a very small pond. More of a sinkhole, actually.”
“You cannot totally submerge somebody’s vehicle in a body of water,” said Tootie in a very loud voice, “and expect that there aren’t going to be severe consequences.”
“I did it in a fit of anger,” said William Spiver. “I admitted almost immediately that it was a very unfortunate decision.”
Tootie shook her head.
“You pushed a truck into a lake?” said Flora. “How did you do that?”
“I released the parking brake, and I put the truck in drive, and I —”
“That’s enough,” said Tootie. “We don’t need a how-to-push-a-truck-into-a-lake lecture.”
“Sinkhole,” said William Spiver. “It was really a sinkhole.”
“Wow,” said Flora. “Why did you do it?”
“I was exacting my revenge upon Tyrone,” said William Spiver. “My name is William. William. William Spiver. Not Billy. I was Billy one time too many. I cracked. I pushed Tyrone’s truck into the sinkhole, and when my mother found out, she was incandescent with rage. I looked upon her rage, and you know what happened then. I was blinded by disbelief and sorrow.” He shook his head. “I’m her son. But she made me leave. She sent me away.”
Even in the darkness, Flora could see the tears crawling out from underneath William Spiver’s dark glasses.
“I want to be called William Spiver,” he said. “I want to go home.”
Flora felt her heart lurch inside of her.
I want to go home.
It was another one of William Spiver’s sad, beautiful sentences.
But will you return?
I came looking for you.
I want to go home.
Flora realized that she wanted to go home, too. She wanted things to be the way they were, before she was banished.
She put Mary Ann down on the ground.
“Give me your hand,” she said.
“What?” said William Spiver.
“Give me your hand,” said Flora again.
“My hand? Why?”
Flora reached out and grabbed hold of William Spiver’s hand, and he held on to her. It was as if he were drowning and she were standing on solid ground. According to TERRIBLE THINGS!, drowning people were desperate, out of their minds with fear. In their panic, they could pull you, the rescuer, under, if you weren’t careful.
So Flora held on tightly to William Spiver.
And he held on tightly back.
It was just like her dream. She was holding William Spiver’s hand, and he was holding hers.
“Well, if you two are going to walk around holding hands,” said Tootie, “I suppose I’ll have to be the one who carries this monstrosity of a lamp.” She picked up Mary Ann.
Above them, the stars were brilliant, shining brighter than Flora had ever seen them shine.
“I wish my father were here,” said William Spiver. He wiped at the tears on his face with his free hand.
An image of Flora’s father — hands in his pockets, hat on his head, smiling and saying, “Holy bagumba!” in the voice of Dolores — rose up in Flora’s mind.
Her father.
She loved him. She wanted to see his face.
“I know where we should go,” said Flora.
A squirrel flies in,” said Dr. Meescham. “This I did not expect at all. It is what I love about life, that things happen which I do not expect. When I was a girl in Blundermeecen, we left the window open for this very reason, even in the winter. We did it because we believed something wonderful might make its way to us through the open window. Did wonderful things find us? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. But tonight it has happened! Something wonderful!” Dr. Meescham clapped her hands. “A window has been left open. A squirrel flies in the window. The heart of an old woman rejoices!”
Ulysses’s heart rejoiced, too. He wasn’t lost anymore. Dr. Meescham would help him find Flora.
Also, Dr. Meescham might make him a jelly sandwich.
“Imagine,” said Dr. Meescham. “Imagine if I had been sleeping, what I would have missed. But then, always and forever, I have been an insomniac. You know what this is? Insomnia?”
Ulysses shook his head.
“It means I do not sleep. When I was a girl in Blundermeecen, I did not sleep. Who knows why? It could be some existential terror related to the trolls. Or it could be simply because I do not sleep. Sometimes there are no reasons. Often, most of the time, there are no reasons. The world cannot be explained. But I talk too much. I digress. I need to say to you: Why are you here? And where is your Flora Belle?”
Ulysses looked at Dr. Meescham.
He made his eyes very big.
If only there were some way to tell her everything that had happened: Flora’s mother saying that life would be easier without her, the universe expanding, William Spiver’s banishment, Flora’s homesickness, the writing of his poem, the typing of the untrue words, the stone squirrel, the sack, the woods, the shovel . . .
The squirrel was overwhelmed by everything there was to say and his inability to say it.
He looked down at his front paws.
He looked back up at Dr. Meescham.
“Ah,” she said, “there is too much to say. You do not know where to begin.”
Ulysses nodded.
“Perhaps it would be good to begin with a little snack?”
Ulysses nodded again.
“When the other Dr. Meescham was alive and I could not sleep, do you know what he would do for me? This man would put on his slippers and he would go out into the kitchen and he would fix for me sardines on crackers. You know sardines?”
Ulysses shook his head.
“Little fishes in a can. He would put these little fishes onto crackers for me, and then I would hear him coming back down the hallway, carrying the sardines and humming, returning to me.” Dr. Meescham sighed. “Such tenderness. To have someone get out of bed and bring you little fishes and sit with you as you eat them in the dark of night. To hum to you. This is love.”
Dr. Meescham wiped at her eyes. She smiled at Ulysses. “So,” she said, “I will make for you what my beloved made for me: sardines on crackers. Does this seem like a good thing?”