few hours later, Elizabeth shut down her computer, tidied her desk for the twentieth time, and left her office for the day. Becca and Poppy stood together staring into space. Elizabeth turned to see what kept their attention.

"It's doing it again," Poppy sang nervously.

They all watched the chair spinning around unaided.

"You think it's Mr. Bracken?" Becca asked quietly.

Poppy imitated Mrs. Bracken's voice. "Chair-spinning isn't what Mr. Bracken would have wanted."

"Don't worry, girls," Elizabeth said, trying not to laugh. "I'll get Harry around tomorrow to fix it. You two head off home."

After saying goodbye, Elizabeth continued to stare at the chair spinning in silence. She neared it slowly, inch by inch. As she got very close to it, it stopped spinning.

"Chicken," Elizabeth muttered.

She looked around the room to ensure she was alone and slowly she grabbed the handles of the chair and lowered herself into it. Nothing happened. She bounced up and down a few times, looked around and under the seat, and still nothing happened. Just as she was about to get up and leave, the chair began to move. Slowly at first, until gradually it began to pick up speed. Feeling nervous, she contemplated leaping off, but as it spun faster and faster she began to giggle. The louder and louder she laughed, the faster it went. Her sides ached. She couldn't remember the last time she had felt so young, legs up, feet out, hair blowing in the breeze. After a few moments, it slowed to a stop and Elizabeth caught her breath.

Her smile slowly faded and the childish laughing began to die down. All she was left with was complete silence in the abandoned office. She began to hum and her eye scanned across Poppy's disorganized desk full of books of material, paint sample tubs, sketches, and house interior magazines. Her eye fell upon a gold photo frame before her. In it was a photograph of Poppy, her two sisters, three brothers, and parents all squeezed together onto a couch like a football team. The resemblance between them all was obvious; all had little button noses and green eyes that narrowed to slits when they laughed. In the corner of the frame was a strip of passport photos of Poppy and her boyfriend, both of them making faces to the camera in the first three of them. But the fourth was of them staring lovingly into each other's eyes. A moment between them eternally caught on camera.

Elizabeth stopped humming and swallowed. She had known that look once before.

She continued to stare at the frame, trying not to remember those times, but she once again lost the battle, drowning in the sea of memories that flooded her mind.

She began to sob, quiet whimpers at first that soon exited her mouth as pain-filled wails that had worked their way from the depths of her heart. She could hear her own hurt. Each tear was a call for help that had never been answered before and that she didn't expect to be answered now. And that made her cry even more.

At nine years of age, Elizabeth marked off another day on her calendar with a red pen. Her mother had been gone for exactly three weeks this time. Not the longest amount of time so far, but long enough for Elizabeth. She hid the calendar under her bed and got into it. She had been sent to her room by her father three hours ago, as he had grown tired of her nervous pacing in front of the living room window. Since then she had been battling to keep her eyes open. She needed to fight sleep so that she wouldn't miss her mother returning. Those were the best times because her mother would be in one of her happy moods, delighted to be home, telling Elizabeth how much she'd missed her, smothering her with hugs and kisses so much that Elizabeth couldn't remember ever feeling sad.

Her mother would float through the rooms of the house almost as if her feet didn't touch the ground. Her words were big whispers of excitement, her voice so hushed that it made Elizabeth feel that every word her mother breathed was their big secret. Her eyes glistened and danced with delight as she told her daughter of her adventures and whom she'd met along the way. Elizabeth certainly did not want to risk missing all that while she was sleeping.

Elizabeth jumped out of bed again and splashed ice-cold water over her face from the sink in her room. Stay awake, Elizabeth, stay awake, she told herself. She propped her pillows up against the wall and she sat up straight on her bed, staring out through the open curtains to the dark road that led into blackness. She had no doubt that her mother would be back tonight, because she had promised her. And she just had to keep that promise, because it was Elizabeth's tenth birthday the next day and she wouldn't miss that. Only weeks ago she had promised her that they would eat cakes, buns, and all the sweets they wanted. And they'd have balloons in all Elizabeth's favorite colors. Her mother promised that they'd bring them all out into the field, let them go, and watch them fly away up to the clouds. Elizabeth hadn't stopped thinking of it since her mother had left. Her mouth watered for fairy cakes with pretty pink icing and she dreamed of pink balloons attached to white ribbons floating up to the blue sky above. And the day was almost here, no more waiting!

She picked up Charlotte's Web, a book she had been reading at night to keep herself awake, and she turned on her torch, as her father wouldn't let her keep the lights on past eight. A few pages in and her eyelids grew heavy and started to droop. She slowly closed her eyes, only intending to rest them for a little while. Every night she fought sleep, because it was always sleep that allowed her mother to slip away into the night and it was sleep that missed her big arrivals. Even when her mother was home she fought it, instead choosing to stay outside her door, sometimes watching her sleep, other times protecting her and guarding her from leaving. Even the rare times that she did sleep, her dreams shouted at her to wake up, as though she were doing wrong. People were always commenting to her father that she was too young to have such dark circles under her eyes.

The book fell away from Elizabeth's hands and she was lost to the world of sleep.

The front gate creaked.

Elizabeth's eyes shot open to the brightness of the early morning and her heart beat wildly. She heard the crunching of footsteps over gravel as they approached the front door. Elizabeth's heart did cartwheels across her chest with delight. Her mother hadn't forgotten her; she knew she wouldn't have missed her birthday.

She leaped out of bed and did a little dance around her room, not knowing whether or not to open the door for her mother or to allow her to make the grand entrance she loved so much. She ran out into the hall in her nightdress. She could see the blurry image of a body through the rippled glass of the front door. She hopped from foot to foot with nervousness and excitement.

Elizabeth's father's bedroom door opened. She turned around to face him with a grin. He gave her a small smile and leaned against the door frame watching the door. Elizabeth turned her head back to the door, twisting the hem of her nightdress in her little hands. The letter box opened. Two white envelopes slid through and landed on the stone floor. The figure at the door began to fade again. The gate creaked and closed.

Elizabeth dropped the hem of her nightdress from her hands and stopped hopping. She suddenly felt the cold of the stone floor as though it hadn't been there before.

She slowly picked up the envelopes. Both were addressed to her and her heart quickened again. Maybe her mother hadn't forgotten after all, maybe she had got so caught up in one of her adventures that she couldn't make it home in time and had to explain it all in a letter. She opened the envelopes, careful not to rip the precious paper that could contain precious words from her mother.

Both were birthday cards from distant, dutiful relatives.

Her shoulders slumped and her heart fell. She turned to face her father and shook her head slowly. His face darkened and he stared angrily into the distance. They caught eyes again and for a moment, a rare moment, Elizabeth and he shared the same knowing feeling and Elizabeth didn't feel so alone anymore. She took a step forward to give him a hug.

But he turned away and closed his door behind him.

Elizabeth's bottom lip trembled. There were no fairy cakes or buns that day. The pink balloons floating up toward the clouds remained nothing but dreams. And Elizabeth learned that imagining and fantasizing did nothing but break her heart.