White Space Season 1

mouth. She wasn’t half as cracky as Mrs. Lindley, but she was cracky enough. Last night’s rambling was more than cracky, though, it seemed almost … candid, like she was telling Cassidy there was something black between her teeth.
    Vivian was snoring a few seconds after she said it, so Cassidy went to sleep wondering what in the hell she meant, and had risen the same. Cassidy would’ve blurted her question immediately, but the lingering weirdness she was feeling from her nightmares was holding her back.
    The last few nights had haunted Cassidy with dreams she couldn’t remember, no matter how hard she tried. As soon as sunlight streamed through the blinds, her mind went blank, even though chaos from the evening’s dreaming was still buzzing.
    Last night’s seemed especially important. Cassidy wanted to remember, felt hungry to know, somehow convinced it had something to do with Emma.
    Like the dream about Sarah.
    Or all the dreams from before.
    Cassidy had even gone to bed with a small spiral notebook on the nightstand, so she could scribble the first thing she remembered once she opened her eyes. Cassidy had the ball of her pen on the flat of her paper, just seconds after she opened her eyes, but five minutes of staring had left just two blue smears to mar the white of the page.
    Cassidy pulled a chair from the table, and set her half-empty glass of orange juice beside her mom’s bowl of oatmeal. She sat, then said, “So what were you trying to say last night?”
    Cassidy’s mom looked up from her oatmeal, curling four fingers around the handle of her spoon, the whites of her eyes trying to focus on Cassidy as they swam through the red of her hangover. Vivian’s nose twitched and her eyes narrowed, trying to center on Cassidy. She went bright, then dim, and for a few seconds seemed to skate along the lip of memory. Finally, the look faded, leaving her with an expression of someone who had lost their keys.
    “What?” she finally said, shaking her head. “Was I talking in my sleep again?”
    “Not exactly. At least it didn’t seem like that at all. It wasn’t like when your eyes shoot open in the middle of a snore and you’re yelling at me or Sarah to take out the garbage.” Cassidy took another sip of orange juice, swallowing it quickly. “Even though you were snoring by the end of the sentence, you were wide awake when you started talking about Emma. Since I seem to be the only one in the house worrying about our nine-year old girl gone missing, you were trying to convince me I was crazy for caring.”
    Cassidy looked at Vivian, holding her eyes to make sure she was listening. “You said the ‘people in the sky’ took her, and that I didn’t have to worry since they would bring her back, like they always do. Like they brought me back. Except you thought I was Sarah.”
    Vivian stared at Cassidy, the blank look back on her face, her nose twitching and eyes narrowing in an echo from a moment before, again skating at the edge of memory. Finally she laughed, with enough of a cackle to qualify as a bark. “You’re fucking with me, right?” she said, putting a craisin-heavy spoonful of oatmeal into her mouth. “I believe I called you Sarah.” She laughed, “I mean really, Cassidy. But the rest, I don’t think so.”
    “No Mom, I’m not kidding.” Cassidy shook her head. “And not only did you say it, you seemed pretty goddamn sure about what you were saying.” She took another small sip of orange juice, just enough to keep her lips busy.
    “Well hell, Cass, I’m always certain around midnight with a belly full of two-buck chuck,” she cackled again. “Must’ve been dreaming. What was on last night?” Vivian dropped her spoon long enough to scratch her head, then turned to Cassidy, “Must’ve been watching The X-Files or something if I was talking about people in the sky.” She patted the table, coming nowhere near Cassidy’s hand. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m sure it was nothing.”
    The craisins were gone from the oatmeal, and the conversation excused itself from the table. Vivian filled her mouth with nothing but oatmeal, then turned her eyes toward the window, settling the pair into several minutes of silence. Just as Cassidy was about to excuse herself for a quick shower, before she left to look for Emma, Vivian said, “Hey Cass, would you mind getting me my pain meds from the bathroom? My back feels like there’s a buffalo back there trying to mount