I wondered if I could trust myself, wondered how I’d been so wrong. No one, apart from the police officers, had looked deeply into my eyes. No one had even felt at ease in my presence, probably because I’d felt so uneasy myself. There’d been no conversation like the one with Ray, no seeing the chickadee movements behind anyone’s words. And what I had seen had only confused me. The extra space around me, my expanded hearing and vision, had only made me more remote from my family rather than bringing me closer to them. If my visit had been a practice run, a preview of what my return from the woods would offer, then there was no reason to return. From somewhere, hundreds of miles behind me, I heard Andrew. He’d always told me the last place I would feel comfortable was with my family. That’s the finals of Wimbledon, he’d said after my return from Italy. You need to start off with warm-up tournaments, with easier competition. Nearly everything with Andrew was a sports metaphor, and he was nearly always right.
