Suzy Q

Susie remembers when it started. She shook her new teacher's hand at open house and saw the accident that put his bride in the hospital and killed his newborn son.  Just a flash, a moment.  She remembers what she was wearing when she ran out of the room.  Her red cordoroy romper with brassbuttons and the red and blue plaid shirt with short sleeves felt suddenly scratchy and burned her skin.  She would have run straight home if she were certain she could find her way.  She settled for the bathroom down the hall.  She was too little to know she didn't need to unfasten them in order to undress when she realized she had to go really bad.  She was crying big gulpy sobs that made it hard to catch her breath.  She fumbled with her buttons through her tears, but it was too late.  She tried to wash up but that only made her wet spot worse.  Her mommy came in and picked her up without a word, just "shhhhh" and kisses in her hair all the way to the car.

Moments like that haunt her every day. Moments like that are the reason she left Toronto the second she graduated.  She drove her little GM down I95 and didn't stop until it did.  Over the next few years, she'd waited tables in every restaurant the Shidel's owned and touched a lot of customer's hands.  A lot more than she'd like.  Despite her move to a sunnier climate, moments like that followed her.  They are unpredictable as hell, and they come every day.  Sometimes she's right, as in Mr. Bluhd's sons rattle found on the side of highway 57 a mile north of the blue chevy Mrs. Bluhd was driving that night.  Or the way she saw her own smile, sunlight glinting off her own hair the first time she touched John's hand. Yeah, that one was pretty cool.  Sometimes, though, she's way off.  Seriously, wolves chasing Thalia in a catwoman costume? Yet she saw it clear as day.  And Renaldo's boy, PC, leading the charge with the arm from a werewolf costume holding a broadsword, his right arm, mind you.  The one that can't hold a stick of gum.  She is starting to think she really needs to lay off the coffee.

She's really ready for the snowbirds to head home in May, to be left alone with her visions, to be able to watch Days of Our Lives in the shop without families dripping saltwater and pralines and cream all over the tile.