Saving Elijah

quilt over me. "He said the spirits of evil men can live on after death. He said demons have the power to taunt and deceive, and confuse. They lie about everything, the future and the past, and they mix up the truth with lies."
    "And you really think this—whatever it is— saved Elijah?"
    "I don't know what I think. I know it thinks it did. But Rabbi Leiberman said no ghost could fool God. He said that if the Angel of Death had been coming for Elijah, it would have found him."
    "That seems right," Sam said. "Exactly right."
    "It seems like it should be right. And I never know when the ghost is lying or telling the truth."
    "Well, I certainly don't." He rubbed his hand over his chin. "I don't think I know anything anymore. Why don't we go to sleep now? We'll talk about it again in the morning."
    He held out his arms and wrapped me within them, and we fell asleep that way together, nestled under the quilt.
    In the morning we did talk about it, we talked about it again and again for several days. Early Saturday morning before the children got up, Sam asked me again to describe for him the way the ghost looked.
    "Different ways," I said, sipping my coffee. "In the PICU it mostly looked sort of like Seth Lucien."
    "What was he like?"
    I sighed. "Not a nice guy. Let's just put it that way."
    Sam sipped his coffee. "Come on, you can do better than that."
    So I told him the whole story, all of it. I even told him about Seth's film. He made a joke about his wife, the porn star.
    "Ha, ha, ha," I said. "Could we please go back to the matter at hand?"
    "Oh, okay." A dimpled smile. "But I sure would have liked to have seen that movie."
    "I dumped his whole lovely film collection in the garbage. Now. Enough. I was describing the demon. Since Elijah woke up, it's been less substantial, I guess you could say. The other day on the street in New York, I think I saw its true form. It's made of tiny wasplike things, always diving, moving, flying. In our bedroom, it was more like inert light."
    "That thing has been in our bedroom," Sam said dully. "Boy, you are full of surprises. Has it been there when we were making love?"
    "Yes."
    "Oh Jesus, Dinah." He stood up and went over to pour himself another cup of coffee. "I'm sorry, I know it's not your fault. It's just so ..." He shook his head, at a loss. "I mean, I may have had the odd menage a trois fantasy, but this wasn't exactly what I had in mind."
    I laughed, but he didn't join me. "What does it want from you, Dinah?"
    "Possession. Or maybe love, though I guess to it, they're the same thing."
    "Mother of God."
    But I wasn't thinking about God, at least not directly. I was thinking about the visions. Sam and I had talked about them so much over the last few days, and I still didn't know which of the visions were truth and which were lies. Nor could I bring myself to ask Sam what he would have done if the worst of them had become reality, requiring a decision from us about the life support.
    Now in the kitchen as the day dawned, Sam muttered, more to himself than to me, "It's like a war." He looked at me. "And I think we need to take the offensive."
    I went over to him by the coffeemaker and gave him a hug. My husband was the rational sort, even in irrational circumstances
    "You'll help me then?"
    "Of course I'll help you."
    "You believe me?"
    Solemnly. "I'm not sure I believe, Dinah."
    "But what about Elijah? He believes. He told you about the ghost. The wasp man, he called it. You heard him."
    "Dinah, I want to believe you, but I can't help my nature. You could have described the ghost to Elijah, and he could be repeating what you told him."
    "Why would I do that?"
    "I have no idea. You know, Dinah, there are other explanations for all of this. It's hard for you to see them, I guess. For example, you tell me you never know whether this demon is lying or telling the truth. Let's just say, for argument's sake, that the whole thing is in your mind. Now, when the demon told you that Seth had poisoned your friend Jay, you automatically believed it was true. But if this whole mess comes out of you, is only in your mind, is made out of your imagination, and your guilt and your fear and whatever, it's reasonable that it would take credit for killing Jay. Because that's probably what you've always believed. You've probably always felt guilty about it, too, for not reporting what you knew to the police, for one thing, and now that guilt is haunting you, so to speak."
    I was impressed with my