Free Forgotten: A Novel by Catherine McKenzie Page B

being Christmas, it would be best if you started in January.”
    “Sure, I understand.”
    “And we’d appreciate it if you’d do a bit of press in the interim.”
    “Press?”
    “We’ve had a request for you to appear on Cathy Keeler’s show.”
    “You want me to go on In Progress ?”
    “That’s right.”
    “But millions of people watch that show. Why does she want to interview me?”
    “It’s a great story, isn’t it? Everyone thinking you were dead, you being on the ground during the earthquake, your triumphant return to work.”
    I can hear the deep baritone voice-over already. When Emma Tupper set out on her fateful journey, burdened by grief, she hoped Africa’s beauty would heal her heart. She wasn’t expecting to fall afoul of illness and destruction . . .
    I hate those goddamn shows.
    “You really want me to do this?”
    “It would be great publicity for you.”
    Great publicity for TPC, more like it.
    “Yeah, I guess.”
    “Trust me, Emma, the benefits could be enormous.”
    Which means, of course, that I don’t really have any choice in the matter. Not if I want to start things off on the right foot.
    “Right, I understand. I’ll do it.”
    “Excellent. Her people will be calling you to set up the details for tomorrow.”
    My stomach flips. “Tomorrow? Isn’t that a little soon?”
    “There’s no time like the present.”
    Sure there is. There’s the future, when I’ve had time to get some decent clothes and my hair cut, and I’m not quite so fragile.
    I try to inject some confidence into my voice. “Sounds good.”
    “Good luck. I know you’ll be great.”
    We hang up, and I take a long look at myself in the mirror. My wheat-colored hair is six months past a haircut. My eyes have always been a little too round and far apart for my liking, and my face is thinner than it should be. My ordinary lips are still cracked from the sun, and the bridge of my nose is peeling. I look older than the last time I saw myself this clearly. As I stare and stare, I don’t know what I’m looking for exactly. My mother? Myself? The self before I became introspective and brittle? Well, she may have looked a lot like the girl in the mirror, but the person inside? The woman I was?
    She’s missing, presumed dead.
    I walk to the kitchen, needing caffeine but no longer hungry. I sip my coffee as I watch Dominic make scrambled eggs with chopped-up bacon and cheese mixed in like a professional. I can tell by the blue patch of sky out the window that it’s freezing outside.
    He serves me a large helping along with the newspaper. “Look who made the front page.”
    I look at it with trepidation. The headline reads MISSING LAWYER RETURNS UNSCATHED. There’s a TPC publicity shot of me staring at the camera with my arms crossed over my chest, a small smile playing on my lips. I look . . . ferocious.
    “You’re famous,” Dominic says.
    “I see that.”
    I put the newspaper down and start eating my eggs. They taste great, but my mind is preoccupied with the lingering disorientation the Dream always leaves, and seeing my life become front-page news.
    “What’s on the agenda today?” Dominic asks as he uses a piece of toast to shovel eggs into his mouth. “Christmas shopping? Skating on the canal? Making snow angels?”
    I nearly choke on a piece of bacon. “Making snow angels? Do I look like I’m seven?”
    He looks me up and down.
    “What are you doing?”
    “Trying to guess your age.”
    “This should be interesting.”
    He squints at me. “Thirty-four and three-quarters.”
    “What? That’s impossible.”
    “I’m right, aren’t I?”
    “How did you know?”
    “I’m psychic.”
    “No way I’m falling for that.”
    He taps the paper. “It says how old you are in the article.”
    I glance down at my serious face. It really wouldn’t hurt me to smile once in a while. Show a little teeth. “It says I’m thirty-four and three-quarters?”
    “I just added the three-quarters part for