recreational room, a good-sized room filled with tables, games, and two television sets, one at each far corner. Some older people were watching television, and a half dozen children with counselors beside them were playing board games and card games. My mother was near the window, sitting at a desk and painting with watercolors. She had her back to us. Her hair was cut short, and she wore a plain blue dress with sandals.
"I don't expect she will have any idea who you are," Dr. Morton said. "Don't be upset."
"I won't," I assured her, and we walked across the room.
"Good morning, Celeste," Dr. Morton said, and my mother looked up from her painting.
The painting had no recognizable shape. It looked as if she was simply intrigued by the mixing of colors and the odd shapes she could create. Perhaps it made some sort of sense to her.
She smiled at Dr. Morton and my mind did flipflops at the power of that smile to resurrect a torrent of memories. It actually brought hot tears to my eyes, tears I kept trapped beneath my lids despite how they burned.
"I have a guest for you today," Dr. Morton said, and my mother looked at me for the first time in nearly a dozen years. If there was any recognition, she kept it well locked up behind her childish smile. "I'm going to leave her here a while to talk to you, okay?"
My mother didn't answer. She returned to her painting.
Dr. Morton looked at me with that all-toofamiliar arrogant doctor's expression of "I told you so."
I looked away, and she told me she would be nearby if I needed her.
I waited for her to leave, and then I pulled a chair closer and sat.
"What are you painting?" I asked.
She looked up at the window as if the question had come from there.
"Tomorrow," she said.
"Tomorrow? You can see tomorrow?"
"Uh-huh."
She returned to the painting.
"Can you tell me what you see? Is there someone there?"
She lifted the paper so that I could see it better, and she smiled.
"Yes, I see someone," I said.
She widened her eyes.
"She's coming from faraway in time. She's coming back to see you. She's grown up now, and she wants to see you very much. She hopes you'll remember her, if not today, then maybe the next tomorrow or the next. Do you know who she is?"
She nodded and went back to her painting.
"Can you tell me?"
She didn't answer me. I sat there in silence for a while, and then, as if he were whispering in my ear to tell me what to do, I heard him hum, and I began to hum the same tune and then to sing it. It was something my grandmother sang to Celeste and to Noble and eventually to me.
If you go out in the woods today, you're sure of a big surprise.
If you go out in the woods today, you'd better go in disguise.
For every bear that ever there was will gather there for certain because
Today's the day the teddy bears have their picnic.
She turned slowly and looked at me, this time long enough so that our eyes met and held.