Time Conjurer

Copyright © 2022 by Michael Arthur Kennedy

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

ISBN 978-1-66789-179-8 eBook 978-1-66789-180-4

Dedication

I want to thank Tara Bailey of Bailey Publishing House. On my initial outreach at a writers’ conference, she was the only person to consider the first draft of this book worthy. She spent countless hours as something I never knew existed before starting this process: a writing coach. As my first coach, she never responded to my mistakes with a furrowed brow.

Nessa Flax was my developmental editor. She tirelessly helped me realize that the voice inside my head was enough to fill the pages. Nessa helped me work more quickly and efficiently than I thought was possible.

I want to thank the founders of the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) in Boston. Their program gave me the chance to realize my dreams of higher education and medical school. I stand on your shoulders.

To my mother, Reverend Margaret A. Kennedy, affectionately known as PK, I thank you for molding me into the man I am. As a single mother, you raised my two older brothers and me and saw the necessity of getting me into the METCO program. Your journey inspires me, and the spark you placed in me still lights my way.

My wife, Kymberly Adams-Kennedy, has been patient as I disappeared with my iPad or laptop and escaped into a world of my imagination. Babe, I will clean off my desk eventually!

Most of all, I want to thank my Nana, Carrie Franklin. Before the internet, she had the foresight to cobble together parts of second-hand encyclopedia sets that helped me see the outside world I would later dare to touch.

Michael Arthur Kennedy

Bear, Delaware.

Contents

Prologue

Dreams

The Labyrinth

Nathaniel

Truths Accepted

Evil Genies

The Bottle

Prologue

The click of the television to off status and a deep sigh ended Dr. Kenny Lawson’s day and began his worrisome night. Would he dream of family members with horrible bodily derangements or of a strange little girl with joy and serenity as her playthings? Those were the only nocturnal offerings life had handed him since childhood. Alternating visions of misery or delight entered his world like fickle weather.

The sweet dreams of the little girl started when he was six years old and had enchanted him. After dreaming of her, his spirit was buoyed and his body fully rested. His first vision of physical suffering invaded his nights when he was ten years old and had frightened him. When he had those dark visions, his heart was heavy and his mind burdened.

Experiencing these extremes of nighttime apparitions confused Kenny. They made sleep such a mysterious and troubling game of roulette that he avoided sleep. After he had shown daytime weariness and anxiety about nighttime while in elementary school, his mother sought psychiatric care for him. Medication and counseling helped his anxiety but did not alleviate the troubling dreams. He had accepted his fate but continued to struggle with the disconcerting images he faced.

Despite years of therapy, at age thirty-six, Kenny was still apprehensive about sleeping. He tried to spend his days working as furiously as possible so he would exhaust himself. He had thought fatigue might lengthen his sleep duration, giving him deeper, more restful sleep and more pleasant visions. Kenny also tried minimizing the hours he slept. If he didn’t get enough REM sleep, he thought, maybe he wouldn’t dream at all. Neither technique worked.

Kenny did succeed at saving people he saw in his premonitions of torment. He had spent most of his life warning his dream subjects about their impending medical catastrophes. While he never regretted spending his life alleviating suffering, he wished he could control the visions that erratically announced his missions. If he could control when the dreams came, he could rest more easily and not need anxiety medication.

As Kenny sat with his back against the headboard, he tried unsuccessfully to count how many times he had seen someone suffering and, upon waking, contacted his family. The clock across the room read ten o’clock when his own snoring made him raise his chin from his chest. His weary eyes begged for a good night’s sleep—no, a peaceful sleep with no unforeseen directive to save someone.

Were Kenny’s visions spawned by the events of the day? He had not been able to prove or disprove the possibility, but he hoped this was not the case. His last psychiatric patient of the day had been hallucinating about child slavery.

Saving someone from that nightmare was a challenge Kenny did not want to face, so he did the only thing he could. He prayed for the happy little girl to visit his sleep instead. He sighed deeply again and lay flat. As his heavy eyelids shut, he hoped his prayers would be answered.

CHAPTER 1

A beautiful wide-eyed, dark-skinned, eight-year-old girl in a white dress with an indigo sash and hair bow sat alone at a counter with a fancy glass bowl of strawberry ice cream. She spooned a big scoop of the ice cream and held it up to her smiling face, which beamed and showed her deep dimples. As she looked at the spoonful, a bite-sized portion vanished and reappeared in her mouth. She closed her eyes and savored it, moving it around before swallowing. She giggled as she scooped another spoonful from the bowl, anticipating its magical transference to her mouth.

When she held the last portion, she stopped smiling.

The ice cream on her spoon had morphed from a beautiful light pink treat with chunks of fruit to a deep brown blob with hairy green spots. Disgusted, she left the bowl and spoon and went around the counter to get more ice cream. She saw that the strawberry ice cream container was mostly full, so she lifted the door and leaned over to fill another bowl. As she scooped the ice cream, she joyously hummed her favorite nursery rhyme. When she finished, she stood up and held her bowl up to get a good look at it. As she beheld her delicacy, she saw a shadow out of the corner of her eye.

When she turned to look, she saw another girl sitting in her seat. She had thought she was alone, so her arms and body twitched when she saw her. She was further surprised to see that the other girl also had a bowl of strawberry ice cream. She looked at her own ice cream, and it again transformed into a foul composition. Searching for any explanation, she returned her gaze toward the stranger in her seat. She wanted to ask the intruder a question but couldn’t manage to.

The girl was the same height as her and had the same smooth dark-brown skin. Both had long black hair, wore white dresses with indigo sashes and hair bows, and had deep brown eyes. They held similar bowls of putrid ice cream. They resembled twins, but the seated girl spooned the repulsive blob into her mouth. After she swallowed, her eyelids fused and vanished. Her brows disappeared, her nostrils and lips sealed themselves closed, rendering her face a smooth blank slate. Without moving her head, she turned her body and walked directly to the door.

The girl behind the counter stood in disbelief and put her ice cream in the sink.

Who are you? What’s wrong with your face? she asked.

The lookalike ignored her and opened the door. After the door closed, the girl behind the counter ran around the display to the door. When she yanked the door open, her double was nowhere in sight. No matter how far to the left and right she looked, there was nobody around. There was, however, a trail of hairy green spots leading down the road. Following the trail, she ran as fast as she could until it led to an opening in a nearby forest. The forest was a good place for the other girl to hide. It was also a good place for scary animals to hide, so she stopped to consider entering. It wasn’t until she heard the echo of footsteps on twigs and leaves that she resumed the chase. As she went deeper into the trees, the forest darkened. She stopped again to listen for sounds of movement. A faint cracking sound led her further into the dense tree cover.

Light from an opening amongst the trees made her hasten her pace. When she arrived, she stood still and gasped. She saw a large black wolf with menacing eyes and raised fur on its back. It glared at her and growled. She slowly stepped backwards. The wolf stood over the lookalike’s body as if protecting its kill. She decided her only option was to run. After a quick pivot, she dashed through the trees toward the road.

Not today . . . not today. I ain’t home yet, she repeated between heavy breaths.

Turning around never occurred to her. If she turned, she might lose the advantage of her head start and her last vision would be of a menacing beast approaching and violently capturing her. She decided the ice cream shop should be the last image in her mind even if the wolf caught her from behind. Her only other advantage would be if the wolf needed to protect its kill instead of wanting a bigger feast.

The girl’s legs burned as she exited the deepest forest, but when she heard rustling behind her, she pumped her arms and legs faster. The beast wanted her after all. She heard the rhythmic sound of front and back paws treading on the soil, and she tried to move even faster. Some of her steps were unsteady on the uneven dirt and tree roots beneath her feet. She almost lost her balance a few times but recovered quickly.

The wolf’s growl grew louder. It was gaining on her.

She was worried the wolf would overtake her. She was on the animal’s turf, and its paws were accustomed to the undulating earth. She knew four-legged animals ran faster than humans.

Where is that road? How long will it take me to get there? she wondered.

The road was a smooth straight path; she could be more surefooted and swifter there. When the wolf barked, she felt her heart skip. Where is that road? she thought more desperately.

In another moment, she reached the road and turned toward the ice cream shop. As she had suspected, her feet gripped the road better than the forest soil. She moved faster and more confidently. Her lips turned upward in a slight smile. It was too early to celebrate, but she felt she had a better chance of keeping her lead. Then she heard the clicking of claws behind her. She told herself that the road made the claws sound louder than the dirt had. That was the only way she could avoid falling into despair. If it was a lie, it was a necessary one. Another growl from her pursuer made her lips turn downward.

As her arms and legs burned and her chest felt as if it would burst, the shop came into view. Sweat poured down her face and soaked her clothes.

If I can see it, I can make it, she told herself and soldiered on.

A strange and hollow guttural noise from the animal echoed through her body like a passing train. Only a few more seconds to the shop . . .

To her surprise, she reached the ice cream shop safely and ran through the door she had left open. She shut the door quickly and leaned her back against it to assure it stayed closed. Her head throbbed and her legs shook while she struggled to catch her breath.

Suddenly, she heard scratching from the other side of the door. Then a loud, angry howl shook the door. She kept her body against the door as a barricade. When another howl pierced the air, she covered her ears with her hands.

No, no, no! the girl screamed. When the beast howled again, she screamed again.

If she could drown out the animal’s noise, she might calm down enough to prepare an escape plan. How could she get away with this monster waiting outside? How long would the wolf wait for her? How long could she wait for it to grow bored and return to the other girl’s body?

She sat on the floor with her back to the door and repeated, No . . . no . . . no . . . I just want to go home. I just want to go home!

After repeating the phrase four times, she noticed silence outside. She waited for a few moments, then removed her hands from her ears. She only heard the chirping of nearby birds and leaves rustling in the wind. She got up from the floor and walked tentatively to the front windows. She peered out from one edge of the window frame and saw no wolf. Now she felt more confident and leaned toward the center of the window, and her pursuer was still not visible. The pleasant sunny day beckoned her outside to frolic among the field of flowers across the road. But she didn’t know where the wolf was, so she walked to a booth and sat.

A tall glass bowl of strawberry ice cream rested in the center of the table. A spoon lay on a napkin next to it. The girl reached out to touch the bowl, but her sweaty hand shook uncontrollably. Her whole body shook. She was drenched with sweat, and her throat was dry from panting. The ice cream would certainly soothe her overheated body, her parched throat, and her terror-stricken soul, but her ordeal had started with a bowl of her favorite dessert. Maybe another lookalike would visit her again if she partook in the treat. She took the napkin from the table and wiped her brow and neck.

She turned to look out of the window again. Was the wolf watching from a hiding place nearby? Was the ice cream part of its trap and the other girl a lure to get her out into the forest?

Who was that other girl? Why did she look like me? What happened to her face? she wondered.

There were no answers. Her happy sanctuary had become gloomy, and it was time to leave. She sat long enough for her breathing to slow and her body to stop shaking. When she felt stable enough, she stood and walked to the counter where she had been sitting to eat her ice cream. She stared into the mirror behind the counter.

I want to go home! she tearfully said out loud. She turned to one side and walked along the counter to a side door. She opened it and exited, closing the door behind her.

Kenny abruptly woke from his dream and involuntarily yelled, No, don’t go there! He sat up and tried to make sense of what he had just seen. In his dream, he felt she had looked into the mirror as if through a window and stared directly at him. The angel who had brought him joyful images and restful sleep was now possibly prophesying death. Kenny had counted on her pleasant forays into nature to counter his visions of suffering. Now she was presenting him with a nightmare and death. None of his premonitions had shown him literal death or a predator close to doing bodily harm. The assaults he had seen were always from within the victim’s body.

Once again, Kenny tried to correlate this horrific scene with something that had happened the day before. But nothing came close to terrifying him as this dream had. Even a patient’s delusion about child slavery didn’t appear to be linked to this dream. Although the thought of such bondage sickened Kenny, it was familiar history and didn’t frighten him.

What also bothered Kenny was that he knew the girl wouldn’t find her way home exiting from the side door. He was confused as to why he knew it, but this was one of several conundrums swirling inside his mind at 5:30 a.m. He also could not understand why the girl had stared at him, but it bothered and scared him. In his lifetime of dreams, she had never before looked at him. Kenny had always observed the girl and lived vicariously through her travels. This time, her stare bore into his soul like he was a voyeur who had been caught.

The girl’s glance also felt like a finger pointing at him through millions of miles of space and time as if accusing him—he had witnessed the killing of the girl in the woods and was beholden to act on it. Her facing him communicated that he could not be a bystander anymore. As he had with his premonition dreams, he needed to discover what that action would be.

The happy visitations with the girl were over. They had been permanently tainted by their dark turn.

The only thing Kenny knew was that his nightmares turned out to be broadcasts of someone’s suffering. That usually meant a family member was imperiled, but he didn’t recognize the girl as being in his family. He had never seen anyone who resembled her or any children in his family. Was the second little girl a relative he had not yet met? And what was the malady? A face that morphed to nothing could mean disfigurement as in a fire. Loss of eyes and mouth could mean someone becoming a blind and mute. A stroke? But the girl was too young for a stroke.

The first thing Kenny had to do was identify who was at risk. Figuring out who was at risk on the basis of this dream would be Kenny’s greatest challenge yet. His past visions had shown him pain and suffering that represented medical conditions lurking inside a relative’s body waiting to steal life. On the basis of on this understanding, he had acted to save scores of people from morbid conditions and mortality.

Kenny had first saved a family member when his premonitions began at age ten. Sleeping in Philadelphia, he had seen his uncle Allan devastated by unrelenting abdominal pain. Because the dreams persisted, he compelled his mother to call her brother-in-law in California. The man was still alive thirty years after Kenny’s warning had led him to visit his doctor whose testing detected pancreatic cancer—frequently a death sentence when found. He went on to save scores of other relatives across the country because of similar dreams.

After his premonition about his uncle Allan proved true, Kenny became obsessed with the well-being of family members near and far. With every call or visit, he inquired about everyone’s health. This ongoing concern won him the moniker of Papi, a beloved term of endearment. Kenny embraced the term and wore his responsibility like regalia.

Decades of experience with dreams, training in psychiatry, and years of psychotherapy had not prepared Kenny for this night’s dream. The dread he felt with this dream was worse than with any other, and it told him someone might be about to die immediately. He worriedly got out of bed and paced the room to think.

Who is it now? he wondered.

Kenny’s first thoughts were of his immediate family. Because he had dreamt of this girl for so long, he considered that she must represent the females he had known the longest in his life: his mother, aunt, or grandmother. If the dream didn’t denote a female, it could represent the male he had known the longest in his life: Brandon, his only brother and lifelong bully. Their father died when Kenny was in his mother’s womb. If the dreams of this little girl were representations of his mother or brother, this might be a chance to convince them how valid his dreams were. If this dream was wrong, however, it would open him up to even more ridicule.

While Kenny’s grandmother and aunt Lovey had encouraged him to welcome his power as a seer, his mother had referred to his dream gift as nonsense that was being fed into his mind by lunatic relatives. She never accepted he was clairvoyant or in tune with the paranormal. She chastised Kenny for trying to delve deeper into the occult and Hoodoo, a religious practice rooted in African spirituality and adapted by slaves in the Americas. Mama had warned her mother and sister to not teach him this practice. She whipped him with a belt out on the front porch the one time he brought a gris-gris home after a visit with Nana. Soon thereafter, she marched him to a trash truck to put the item into the compactor and made him watch it disappear with the city’s filth.

Mama, you came from South Carolina, but he was born in Philadelphia. That voodoo stuff is old and backward. My son is not gonna walk around killing chickens, waving cats over his head, and chasing spirits around old houses. He’s gonna be a doctor one day! she used to say.

Mama frequently misused the word voodoo in place of Hoodoo. This was as much out of carelessness as ignorance of the difference between the two. Kenny’s brother Brandon didn’t believe Kenny was a seer, either. At one point, Brandon changed his little brother’s nickname to Ralphie after the local dog the cancer society trained to sniff out cancer in patients. Whenever he heard Mama object to the concept of being a seer, Brandon would just call him Ralphie and laugh so hard Kenny’s soul would shrink and search for a place to hide.

Kenny felt choked by anxiety because he wanted to check on his mother and brother first. He needed someone to strengthen his resolve so he could make the calls, but it was too early to call his therapist. Even though Dr. Bosley had told him to call him anytime, a 5:30 a.m. call was too much of an intrusion. The only person he could entrust his concerns with was his grandmother, Nana. Nana had soothed the fear his first premonition caused and counseled him through subsequent ones. While he had thought he was having bad dreams, Nana told him he was picking up on someone reaching out through ephemeral transmissions.

Nana had explained that messages were sent out for interpretation, but some were less clearly received than others, distorted by distance and white noise. As a result, the source and the message were hard to decipher. Further, she had taught him that the deceased always existed amongst the living, and he was sensitive to their attempts to communicate. Nana’s grandmother had once told her in the language of the Gullah people of South Carolina, De ole people b’leebe sperit walk de nighttime.

Nana was his mother’s mother, who had left Charleston in the 1950s for Philadelphia. She had learned how to contact others’ spirits and still reached out to ancestors regularly via an altar in her home. Nana had taught her oldest daughter, his aunt Lovey, the Hoodoo traditions. This included the creation of and wearing a talisman called a gris-gris and working with plants to create concoctions for healing. Workin’ the roots was the Hoodoo term for it. Kenny sought Nana’s advice on natural methods to treat common physical maladies.

While still in high school, Kenny created a remembrance table with pictures of living and deceased relatives, especially the ones he had helped like his uncle Allan. But he never displayed keepsakes of the deceased, incense, offerings, or candles as were on Nana’s or Aunt Lovey’s altars. His mother tacitly accepted this table, but once out of her home, he had never updated his home altar to reflect his freedom. He had become comfortable with his limited practice.

It was now 2019, twenty-six years after his first premonition. Kenny had trembled then, and his trembling now was even stronger. He thought of reaching out to the ether and contacting spirits who might be reaching out from the pictures on his remembrance table. Maybe he still had a connection to the people he saved and one of them was reaching out to him again. He had never used his table in this way and was reluctant to try something so foreign to him now. Right now, he needed something he could be sure of. He needed Nana.

Kenny was afraid to call Nana because, if she was the subject of his dream, his world would be irrevocably ruptured. But he needed to be sure that wasn’t the case, so he slowly picked up the phone and called.

After his grandmother answered, Kenny found the words stuck in his mouth. N-N-N-Nana, is everything OK? I had that dream again, but this time it was different . . .

Nana was familiar with his lifelong dreams of the little girl. When Kenny had discussed them, she never seemed unnerved. Sensing something was wrong, she asked, The little gal? Ain’t those dreams the good ones? his grandmother asked in her Southern drawl.

Yeah, b-b-b-but she . . .

Kenny? What’s wrong, baby? Nana knew her drawl soothed Kenny, so she let the first syllable in the word baby float a little longer than usual.

Sh-sh-sh-she is in the ice cream shop again, but . . .

So, what’s different this time, sugah?

Well, sh-sh-sh-she looked at me. She saw a girl who looked like her twin, and then the twin was killed by a wolf that chased her back to the ice cream shop. What does that mean?

Nana exhaled deeply and paused before responding. Did you see a girl die?

N-n-n-no, but I saw her dead body. The wolf was standing over it after she was dead. I never saw that before. What does it mean?

Trying to get as much information as possible, Nana asked, But both girls didn’t die?

N-n-n-no, Kenny managed to say.

Nana sighed, offered, Hmph, and thought for a moment.

So who’s gonna die, Nana? I can’t figure this out.

After Kenny sniffled a few more times, Nana said, I don’t think this lil’ gal was helpin’ you see the future. She was tellin’ you ’bout sump’n as it happened.

So, I’m too late? Somebody already died?

Nana sighed again and sniffled herself. Her voice cracked as she said, Yes, baby. Your aunt Lovey died early this mornin’ at University Hospital.

CHAPTER 2

Kenny was silent for a moment and then screamed, Oh, no. No! I was t-t-t-trying to get home last night, but we had d-d-d-difficult admissions in the hospital, and I was working s-s-s-so late I . . .

Aunt Lovey was Kenny’s favorite aunt. She was the closest relative he had after his mother and grandmother. Lovey Greene could perceive a soul in need and could tell exactly what they were lacking. Her infectious and generous personality made Kenny feel like a prince when Brandon belittled him like an unworthy servant. Aunt Lovey was the closest thing he had seen to a politician as she deftly negotiated a man’s world. She could walk into their city councilor’s office and walk out with enough influence to get trash cleaned from an empty lot, get a street repaved, or get a new roof for a school. And she never flaunted her access to power or enriched herself with it.

In her third year of eligibility, she was elected head of the teachers’ union. She won teacher of the year honors at her school almost every year. Despite her schedule, Aunt Lovey always had time to make her husband and sons the center of her world, and she brought Kenny into that world.

I never got a chance to say goodbye, Nana. I never t-t-t-told her how much I’d miss her, Kenny lamented. She always said she wanted to d-d-d-die in her bed, covered by her favorite quilt with all of us around her. Instead, she died in some plain mechanical hospital bed that somebody else probably died in the week before. D-d-d-disgusting! Kenny raised his voice.

It’s OK, Kenny. It’s OK, Nana said. She hadn’t heard Kenny stutter in years and knew it only happened when he couldn’t control his stress. He had learned to control his emotions with therapy and years of practicing stress management, but now he sounded like the scared seven-year-old bullied into submission by his older brother and teased Ralphie by the other boys in the neighborhood.

Nana sniffled slightly, then gently whispered to Kenny. Shhh. Just breathe . . . breathe and slow down. Breathe with me. She took in slow, deep breaths and exhaled just as slowly. She could tell Kenny was breathing with her and said, That’s it . . . That’s it. She repeated the coaching for almost five minutes. When she heard Kenny murmur that he was OK, she whispered, All right, now. Let’s talk.

So are you saying that my d-d-d-dream was about her? But how? When I dream of people suffering, I see the actual person or somebody who looks a lot like them. Aunt Lovey isn’t a little kid.

Some of those transmissions you been gettin’ might get a little mixed up, honey. Maybe this was one of those times.

But, Nana, I know my dreams.

But there’s a lot you don’t know, Kenny.

Of course there is, but not only did this little girl have a twin who was killed, she was also lost. She spoke about wanting to get home. She walked out of the shop, but something tells me she’s not gonna find her way home and she never will.

Nana was silent for an uncomfortably long time. Kenny picked up on this and probed further.

Nana? Is there something you want to tell me? When his grandmother didn’t answer, he asked her again with a shaky voice. He sensed there was a deeper meaning to his dreams that Nana was holding back. He was afraid to ask but was more afraid not to know what might be hinted at by her silence. He asked again, Nana?

You should come by after work. Imma talk to you then.

Kenny mulled this over briefly and asked, So you’re gonna tell me there’s a secret out there that I should know and I have to wait all day to find out? Don’t do this to me! I just saw somebody die and another person barely escape death. Then you tell me Aunt Lovey is gone? Kenny’s voice quivered as he tried to be polite while being honest with his grandmother.

What I know can’t be shared over the phone. I got to tell you and show you, Nana said with the grace and power of her years.

Kenny stifled a bold response out of respect. Yes, Nana. He sniffled and then wept. He wanted something to help him reconcile what he had seen and soothe him in this time of uncertainty. I wish I’d had a chance to say goodbye.

Sensing his vulnerability, Nana asked calmly, Papi, do you want to pray with me?

Nana calling him Papi always sounded like music to him. Almost everything she said sounded musical and reminded him of the soothing walks they used to take together. After agreeing, Kenny listened as Nana recited a prayer she created in the moment:

Life brings us danger,

Life brings us hope.

Life brings us people,

And takes them away.

It chains us with anger.

And frees us to float.

So much to teach,

So much to say.

Nana repeated the prayer three times, slowing down with each successive recitation, and finished with Ah-shay, the Yoruba word that ended a statement, chant, or wish and imbued them with life force to happen.

Ah-shay, Kenny repeated into the phone. He had stopped stuttering. Auntie would have loved that. Thank you, Nana. I’ll see you tonight.

After hanging up the phone, Kenny wondered what else his dream revelation meant. If he could sense agonizing events as they were happening to those close to him, there was potential for misery to follow and shackle his soul forever. He thought for a moment that one of yesterday’s patient’s hallucinations of child slavery had spawned last night’s nightmare. If this were true, it would be the first time he had made such a connection. He hoped it would be the only time.

Dr. Kenny Lawson had to go to work. Although everyone would understand his grief, he didn’t want to stay home. Wallowing in his loss and the confusion of possible dream interpretations would only exhaust him to his core and fracture his hold on reality. He was in the practice of helping others keep their feet firmly planted in the real world when something inside them pulled at their attachments to it. He was, after all, a specialist in disorders of the mind. He had to go to work, or his connection to this world would be severed like weak tree roots. Work would be his sanctuary from insanity today.

Psychiatry would keep Kenny from breaking down and crying over his favorite aunt. He immersed himself in his patients’ problems—anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, depression, narcissism, obsessive compulsive disorder, personality disorder, or schizophrenia. Prescribing medications and minimizing their side effects, adjusting expectations of patients and family members, and trying to change the negative attitudes of the world toward mental illness was consuming. But this was his calling, and it kept him focused on others’ suffering instead of his own.

After arriving at the medical center, he conducted himself as earnestly as always. Bedside interviews, diagnosis lists, treatment plans, resident education, and repeat. The only break was the lunchtime lecture, which he gave after drinking an uncharacteristic second cup of coffee. The caffeine and breather helped him to avoid breaking down.

When he finished giving the lecture, he whispered to himself, Ah-Shay, and returned to his office to gather his thoughts and reconcile his feelings.

Kenny considered Nana’s explanation only speculation. Aunt Lovey was well versed in Hoodoo tradition and could have used her knowledge to reach out to him in a more refined and direct way. Although she had known of the little girl inhabiting his dreams, she shouldn’t have needed her as a surrogate to contact him. She had always been receptive to Kenny’s needs and never held her tongue. For her to present her plight to him as a savage demise was so crude it seemed beneath her capabilities and sensibilities. The closeness she shared with him suggested that, if his aunt was reaching out to him, the message must have been distorted somehow. Of all Nana’s explanations, he clung to that one firmly. He had been receiving messages his whole life but never had to work at sharpening his skills at receiving them. Maybe he would change that to make sense of the visions.

Currents of doubt, confusion, and fear swirled inside Kenny’s head. He craved help to quell and make sense of them but hadn’t made the time to talk to his psychiatrist. If after talking to Nana he couldn’t reconcile all that had happened, he would call Dr. Bosley. Now, he had to finish the work day. He resolved to not lean on any colleagues and corral one of them for a quick counseling session or a prescription. This was known as a professional courtesy, and he wanted to save it for when he really needed it.

When he checked his buzzing cell phone, he saw a text message from Nana that she would be at his aunt’s home to console Lovey’s husband and sons. Nana stated she’d meet him there and finish their conversation afterward. Kenny realized that he hadn’t spoken to his mother yet. He had no idea if she had heard or how she’d take the news. Mama was not close to Lovey, but they were sisters. He called his mother but had to leave a message when she didn’t answer.

Mama, I’m sorry if I’m the first to tell you, but Aunt Lovey died last night. Nana and I are going to see Uncle Phil, Tommy, and Ritchie after work. I hope to see you there. Let me know you’re all right. If you need me, just call, OK?

After he had navigated as much of the afternoon as he could take, Kenny advised his staff and colleagues of his aunt’s death and his plans to leave early. Everyone was shocked that under the circumstances he had completed all of his obligations and showered him with condolences.

How could he explain his premonitions, his pleasant dreams, and the new intersection of the two in a brief encounter? Whom would he trust to share his gift as a seer with? Whom would he trust the Hoodoo context of his visions to? Exposing that much of himself would be too complicated. Even revealing all of this to Dr. Bosley now seemed absurd. There was no psychiatric chapter on Hoodoo in his texts. He excused himself at three o’clock.

The living room in Kenny’s craftsman home was his retreat from the world; he headed there after locking the garage door, putting down his carry bag, and kicking off his shoes. The quiet room decorated with photographs of his travels, African art, and refined comfortable modern furniture were all he needed to disconnect. Although music was his favorite escape, it would be an intrusion now. Reclined in his plush chaise lounge, he fought off the pangs of guilt over not visiting Aunt Lovey after work last night. And he wrestled with Nana’s notion that his aunt was contacting him through the mysterious little girl in his dreams.

Kenny couldn’t lay still, because his attention oscillated between his desire to connect with Aunt Lovey and the possibility that she did not want to connect with him, according to Nana’s experienced opinion. He sat up and grunted in confusion. He and his aunt had never had difficulty communicating with each other. Although he didn’t know how she would do it from the afterlife, Kenny felt she would find a way to contact him.

Kenny had always been able to talk to his aunt. He could bring any problem to her, and she would listen, console, and educate him on how to produce solutions. She had always found ways to resolve problems, and her resourcefulness amazed him and inspired him. The more he thought about this, the more shame he felt. Aunt Lovey had taught him to never feel helpless. Solutions were always somewhere inside you; you just had to work the problem and extricate them from the boxes your mind had created to obscure them.

Now Kenny began to search inside the compartments in his mind. The first box presented him with a question: If you could always reach out to your aunt before, why can’t you reach out to her now?

There is no reason, he told himself.

He had gone to her as a child with clouds of insecurity and loneliness fogging his soul. The visions had made him feel strange and disconnected from his peers and unable to navigate simple problems. Furthermore, his stuttering had made him a laughing stock. Aunt Lovey’s consultations were like pleasant winds and pushed the self-doubt out of his consciousness. The first step to solving his problems had been to reach out to his aunt. This moment was like all the others. The first action he needed to take was to find a way to contact his aunt. The first question was, How?

Aunt Lovey and Nana had used their altars to reach out to souls of the living and dead. Even though both women had invited him to try it, the fear of chastisement from his mother and brother had stopped Kenny from trying. If he had been caught practicing any Hoodoo at home, he would have been as abused as if he was a Satanist. That fear remained in him like a memory that jabbed him in the heart whenever he thought about it.

But that was then, Kenny said to himself. He was no longer a child, and he had the closest thing to an altar: his remembrance table.

Nana and Aunt Lovey had taught Kenny he didn’t need to reproduce their altars. His remembrance table was a sofa table filled with rows of family photographs. He had filled it with objects imbued with a sincere connection to the