Introducing Shelby

Shelby did not need to even look up from her book when the phone rang, "Dad, it's for you. Tom Dryer to gush about his new boat." She wondered for the nth time whether her dad was so oblivious that he did not realize that she just gave him information she should not have known, that it was more comfortable to pretend that all was normal in his little world. Or was he well aware, and chose to not rock the boat, to not upset his fragile wife further.

Her mother, who cringed whenever she heard Shelby do this, and yet at times caught herself in the last moment on her way toward a phone that had not rung yet. Her mother, for whom doors opened without being touched if she was preoccupied enough not to pay attention to what she wanted.

They had never discussed it. Shelby wondered whether dad or mom would be the better choice to approach first. No, both were the wrong choice for different reasons. He wouldn't know, she clearly didn't want to know.

Putting down her book, Shelby passed her dad just as he was discussing weekend plans to meet Tom at the lake this weekend with some fishing rods, and stepped outside onto the back porch. Feeling the breeze on her forearms, Shelby wondered yet again why she was different, and how. Was she just plain crazy? She had heard her dad's side of the conversation that so clearly matched what she had told him, but what if she was imagining it all including the conversation and the ringing phone?

They said insanity ran in her mother's family. A grant aunt was supposedly still locked up in a mental hospital, if she was still alive. Shelby was sure no one would find it worth mentioning if she just died, just relieved she was gone, the old bat. But what if her greataunt was not mental after all, what if none of them were? What would that mean? And how could she find out?

With a sigh Shelby returned inside, noticed the room was empty now, and the book she had been reading continued to lie on the couch. Almost absent-mindedly she tossed the book toward the bookshelf, where it filed itself in the empty slot between the other two books in the series.