Skylight Confessions by Alice Hoffman Page A

spoke.
    "Still brilliant," Arlie would inform her.
    On this they always agreed. Arlyn was now reading the entire Edward Eager series to Sam, stories that had all taken place in Connecticut. They were up to Half Magic, in which the wishes made never worked out as planned. William the squirrel, which had been to the vet in town for all the proper shots, perched on the bedpost and listened, making occasional chattering noises, turning the bedpost to wood dust with his gnawing.
    "Do you mind being fat?" Sam asked one night when he was being tucked into bed.
    "Not at all," Arlyn said. So much the better; John Moody didn't come near her. She laughed to herself.
    "I don't feel the way the children in those books do. They're hopeful. I feel that something bad is about to happen."
    Sam had lovely big eyes. When he was tucked into bed, you wouldn't think he was the terror his teachers said he was, the one who locked himself in a coat closet or drew on the walls with crayons and ink.
    "Well, you're a real-life child and they're fictional." Arlyn tested Sam's forehead for fever.
    "I wish I was fictional," Sam said.
    "Well, I want you just the way you are." Arlyn hugged him good night.
    "What about William?" Sam said.
    Arlyn laughed and patted the squirrel, then put him in his box for the night.
    "Sweet dreams to you both," she called.
    Arlyn wore the pearls to bed, enjoying the heat of them around her neck. Pearls were made of living matter, and so they continued to live. She had heard that George Snow was working in New Haven, that he and his brother had disbanded the business after the run-in with John Moody. As it happened, the new window washers weren't reliable; they were rather cowardly and refused to come and perch atop the Glass Slipper when there was inclement weather. The windows in the house were foggy on the outside, streaked with sleet. When Diana came up to help out as the time for the baby grew near, she complained about how dingy the house had become. The rooms were too big, the house too much for Arlyn to clean. As for Sam's room, it smelled of peanuts and dirt. Even worse, the toddler Diana had so adored was now a sullen six-year-old. Sam would not speak to his grandmother. He was withdrawn and shy.
    "What's wrong with him? I hear him talking to himself when I pass by his room."
    "He's perfectly fine," Arlie said. "He's just not like everyone else."
    "Good lord," Diana said. "These are real behavior problems.
    That poor darling boy. Where is John in all this?" "Cleveland." "I see," Diana said.
    The Moody men, Diana assured her daughter-in-law, could be detached, busy, in a world of their own. Well, maybe Sam was merely following that pattern, or maybe it was something more.
    Certainly, all was not well in this house. It was clear that the marriage was unhappy. Several times, Diana noticed a truck driving slowly by, late at night, headlights turned off. Once a man had gotten out to stand in the snow. Diana had watched from the kitchen window. The fellow disappeared soon enough, and there were no tire tracks when Diana went to look in the morning.
    Maybe he hadn't been there at all. Maybe she'd seen only the shadows the boxwoods cast along the road.
    It was snowing on the night of the birth. John was in Cleveland and so Arlyn called a taxi service. "You don't mind, do you?" Arlie said when she woke her mother-in-law to watch over Sam. Arlyn was already wearing her coat; her packed overnight bag was by the door. "And don't be upset if Sam doesn't talk to you when you send him to school. He's not a morning person."
    "Don't worry," Diana said. She was furious with her son, off working, leaving this poor girl to fend for herself. "I'll take care of everything here."
    Blanca was born at eight minutes after midnight, a beautiful pale child who looked exactly like George Snow. She calmly let herself be held and cradled and nursed. She was cool to the touch and she smelled sweet. John Moody was called in Cleveland. Though the