Dance Of Reality -

The cost mounted. Migraines. Gaps in her memory—not of the other realities, but of her own. She would find herself standing in her kitchen with no recollection of how she got there, a teacup in her hand that had been empty a moment ago and was now full. Once, she looked in the mirror and did not recognize her own face for a full ten seconds.

Her colleagues grew worried. Her few friends grew distant. She was becoming thin, translucent, as if the constant shifting between worlds was eroding the boundaries of her self. dance of reality

The first time she stepped fully into another reality, she was forty-two. She had been thinking about her father—not missing him, exactly, but wondering. Wondering what he would have made of her life. Wondering if he had danced, too, in his final months, when the cancer made him too weak to leave his chair but his eyes would track invisible patterns on the ceiling. The cost mounted

Mémé had known. That was why she had danced only in brief, stolen moments, alone in the kitchen, never stepping fully through. That was why she had pressed her finger to her lips and said nothing. She would find herself standing in her kitchen