"Mary Rosenblum - California Dreaming" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rosenblum Mary)

Again, the sense of lines being recited. “You’re remembering?” Ellen asked.

“I don’t know.” Laura’s eyes flickered. “I remember scenes or faces -and I
don’t know them, but I do. I’m not making any sense, am I?” Her laugh was fragile,
edged with hysteria. “Did our building bum down? I remember it burning and . . . I
remember picking up pieces of a broken vase and thinking how lucky I was. I keep
wanting to remember that it was a house, but it was an apartment, wasn’t it?”

Ellen took a quick breath. “Who’s Julia DeMarco?”

“I . . . don’t know. Do I?” Laura whispered. “Joseph . . . ? Oh, God.” She
buried her face in her hands. “Why do I want to cry? What’s wrong with me? I
don’t even know where we are or why we’re here.”

“Take it easy.” Ellen stroked Laura’s back. “You’ll straighten everything out
eventually.” Would she? Who are you? she wondered, but she didn’t say it out
loud.

“Hi, Mom.” Beth stuck her head through the doorway, a wet jug in each hand.
“What’s wrong?” She dropped the jugs, ran to the bedside. “Mom, what’s wrong!”

“Nothing . . . nothing.” Laura straightened, struggling to smile for her
daughter. “I’m still feeling . . . shaky.”

“Oh, Mom.” Beth clutched her mother. “You’ll remember again. You have
to.”

“Of course I will, sweetheart.” Laura buried her face in her daughter’s hair.
“It’s all right, Beth. Really.”

Was it? Ellen tiptoed out of the room. Perhaps it would be all right. Perhaps
Laura Sorenson would wake up tomorrow and remember the burning apartment.
And what about Julia DeMarco? What about Joseph? Not my business, Ellen told
herself fiercely. Not at all. She got a pot down from the kitchen cupboard, filled it
with water from the dripping jug.

“What are you doing?” Beth asked from the doorway.

“Fixing brunch.”

“I’ll help you.” Beth perched herself on the table. “What can I do?”

“Nothing just yet.” Ellen measured dusty flakes of oatmeal into the water.
“Why were you going to your grandfather’s house? Half the roads in the state are
closed. Why didn’t you and your more stay in San Francisco?”

“We . . . couldn’t.”

Aha. “Why not?”