“I’m calling because something happened very recently, and I don’t understand it, but I remembered our conversation from months ago.” Katherine took a drink and cleared her throat when she drank too fast. “And I am so sorry if I seemed dismissive at the time. I admit, hearing about your… friend’s experiences seemed so out of the realm of scientific possibility that I was probably patronizing. I apologize for that.”
Hopefully that came across better than it sounded in her head.
Monica’s voice was cautious. “Professor Bassi, what happened?”
“Are you the friend, Mrs. Velasquez?” Katherine suspected, but she needed to know. She needed to know if Monica Velasquez could give her answers. “I need to know if you were using a common distancing tactic to—”
“Yes, I’m the friend I was talking about. I experience precognition through dreams.”
Relief. Immediate, unequivocal relief. “Then I need your help. Someone tried to commit a violent crime yesterday. A shooting. It could have been very bad, but it wasn’t. Because… I saw it happen before it happened. And I helped stop it.”
Even as she said the words, the images filled her mind again. Gunshots. Broken glass. Blood sprayed on walls…
“Okay. Katherine, I’m going to get your number and call you back in about five minutes with some friends of mine. Everything is going to be okay, but I have a feeling you’re going to want to talk to all of us.”
What? Why?
Relax. You’ve interrupted the woman’s night. Give her a few minutes. “Thank you. I don’t know what’s happening, but… thanks.”
“Trust me. You are not alone.”
Something tight in Katherine’s chest—something she hadn’t even been aware of—loosened and relaxed.
She wasn’t alone.
She walked into the kitchen to grab something to eat. She’d had a big lunch, but she’d forgotten to eat dinner. She briefly thought about ordering something in; then she spotted Baxter through the office doorway, gesturing dramatically and speaking quickly in Cantonese with his brother on a screen.
She quickly put together a fruit tray and some cheese and brought them into the office.
“Katherine!” Her brother-in-law, Oliver, waved from the other side of the world. “I told Baxter I thought it was Valentine’s Day in the States and he couldn’t remember. I think it is.”
“Is it?” She looked at Baxter with a frown. “What’s the date?”
“The fourteenth, I think.” His eyes lit up. “Oh! I suppose it is.”
“Happy Valentine’s Day.” She set down the plate of pears and manchego. “I got some pears at the farmers’ market. Is this enough for dinner? I have a call in a few minutes.”
“This is lovely, darling.” He squeezed her hand. “We always forget, don’t we?”
“I know, but then we don’t have to go to crowded restaurants.” She waved at Oliver. “We should set up a family chat this week. I miss the boys.”
“I’ll tell Lily to message you.” Oliver waved back. “Marco and Louis are in ten different directions these days. I have no idea what their social calendar is like.”
“I think that’s normal with teenagers. My sister says the same thing about hers.” Katherine leaned down and kissed Baxter’s cheek just as she felt her phone begin to buzz in her pocket. “Call’s coming through. Enjoy your game.”
She walked back to the kitchen as they continued their conversation. Once there, she grabbed the phone from her pocket and answered it. “Hello?”
“Katherine?”
It was Monica Velasquez again. “Hello. I’m getting something to eat. Do you mind the sound of chewing?” She’d had enough wine that she was feeling a little loopy. “If you do, it’s called misophonia and it’s completely valid, and I don’t want to dismiss it, but also I’ve had too much wine and not enough food today.”
“You’re fine. I put you on speakerphone with my two best friends, Robin and Valerie.”
“Just Val,” said one voice. “I’m psychometric.”
Katherine nearly tripped over her own feet. “You mean there’s more than one of you?”
“Three to be exact. We all have different abilities,” Monica said. “Precognition for me, obviously, which we’ve talked about.”
“And I’m Robin,” a third voice said. “I hope you’re doing okay. Get your food, okay? Make sure you eat something.”
“I’m getting some.” Katherine hurriedly put together a plate of cheese, crackers, and pears. “I tend to forget to eat.”
“My mother is the same way. My father constantly has to remind her.”
“I have to remind my husband. He’s even more absentminded than me.”
“I cannot imagine a house where people forget to eat,” Val said. “I think my boys eat six times a day. Maybe more.”
“They sound like teenagers.” Katherine took her plate to the deck and sat down.
“They are, and they’re hungry. Constantly. How about you? Any kids?”
“Just my students,” she said. “There are more than a few of those. And I have two gorgeous nephews in London and a niece and a nephew in San Francisco.”
“It sounds like you have a wonderful family,” Monica said. “Have you told your husband about any of this yet?”
“Oh no.” Baxter would immediately take her to a neurologist. “Absolutely not.”
“Does anyone know?”
“Um… you three know.” And it was possible that Megan and Toni suspected something, but that was a whole other problem she didn’t know how to deal with. “I think that’s all I can handle right now.”
“Why don’t you tell us about it?” Monica said. “Start from the beginning and describe what happened to you exactly.”
Katherine spent the next few minutes giving Monica, Val, and Robin an accounting of the incident the day before. She tried to include everything she could think of, including what Megan had said at the police station and her suspicions about Toni’s empathy.
“That’s a lot,” Robin said after she’d finished the story. “No wonder you’re feeling frazzled.”
“Frazzled?” She wouldn’t have used that word, but it was a pretty good description. “Yes. I’m frazzled. I don’t know what to do with any of this.”
“Now, other than human understanding, I don’t know how much we’ll be able to help you. I’m a medium—”
“A medium?” Katherine blinked. “As in… ghosts? Spirits?”
“Ghosts, I guess you’d say. I haven’t met any spirits that haven’t belonged to a dead person. Not that I’m aware of anyway.”
Katherine was extremely glad she didn’t see ghosts. “And Val said she’s psychometric.” She glanced at her neighbors’ deck, glad that they were rarely home. “So she reads memories and emotions from objects?”
“You got it,” Val said. “Have you studied this or something?”