1999: Echoes Across Time
In my fifties, I began having recurring nightmares. I was climbing a staircase, gripping the banister. At the top, a blinding light struck me full in the face, like flashbulbs exploding. I jolted awake, heart pounding, sheets damp with sweat.

The dream returned for eight or ten years, maybe more. Always the same climb and the same burst of light. I began to wonder if these dreams were an omen: the white light they speak of. It came so often it began to feel real. I would wake in the dark, the flash burning behind my eyes.

Then I muttered, “Not dead yet.”

Years later, while living on the West Coast, I heard about my fortieth high school reunion. Since I would be flying to New York, I decided it might be nostalgic to visit the estate a mile from my old school.

I searched city records and located the current homeowners. I wrote to explain that in 1959 and 1960 I had befriended a girl who called the mansion home and that, as preteens, we had wandered its rooms. To help them believe me, I shared details only someone who had truly known the house could recall. They responded with an invitation to lunch.

The house had stood vacant since the original owner’s death in 1985, its windows shuttered and vines overtaking the stucco until the new residents moved in and restored it.

I returned forty-seven years later. I turned into the driveway and thought I had come to the wrong house. The place I remembered, white, sleek, unmistakably Art Deco, was gone. In its place stood a red brick Colonial with columns, foreign to me. I nearly turned around, certain I had lost the home that had once claimed me.

But the lines were still there: the symmetry, the wings, the bones of the house were recognizable, though disguised.

Later, they explained that after sitting vacant for more than two decades, the house had to be refaced to preserve it. The shock was jarring, like seeing someone I loved appear in costume.

They were gracious, welcoming me with open arms. The moment I stepped through the doors, beams of white light poured through the round mosaic dome, casting a soft, holy glow and catching new gold embellishments along the cornices. I seemed to rise. How was this happening again? The house had not forgotten. Neither had I.

I felt at home, as though her embrace closed around me, whispering, “Stay this time.” It was a reunion; the place itself was alive in marble and walls, and I stepped into its breath.

This time, the garden tea room was in its true form. Venetian glass and fine china filled the shelves, and rich curtains dressed the tall windows with slim gold rods and finials. Upholstered chairs, imported wallpaper with faint gold tracery, polished wood, and European rugs restored the grandeur I had never seen as a child.

A voice with a Long Island accent broke the spell. “Before lunch, would you like to continue the tour?”

“Yes,” I said, thinking lunch was the last thing on my mind.

Then we entered the ballroom. The room was exactly as I remembered it. I paused at the center, absorbing its symmetry. Cherubs still drifted overhead, their painted gaze unchanged by the years. Tall gilded mirrors and fresh gilt on the moldings caught me in every pane, reflecting someone far removed from the girl who once twirled here. A stillness rose, and for a moment the years fell away. I longed to open my arms and waltz, but I held my composure. After all, I had only just met these gracious hosts.

Sensing their curiosity, I said softly, “You are lucky to have this ballroom. Its symmetry brings calm, even wholeness. It invites play, lightness, movement, joy.” They seemed satisfied, and we moved on. The ballroom faded as we continued the tour, five bedrooms and the right wing still ahead.

At the staircase, I recognized the worn paisley runner, faded yet still elegant. A chill ran through me as I grasped the banister, though I did not know why. Two tracks ran through my mind: one in the present, the other from dreams.

They chirped about crown moldings, wallpaper, window treatments, and the new gold accents on fixtures and frames. Their voices drifted from room to room, speaking to no one in particular.

Nearing the end of the second floor tour, I asked, “I have so many fond girlhood memories here. Would you mind if I explored the attic on my own?” They agreed, likely thinking, What could she possibly steal?

I gripped the narrow banister and climbed, still carrying a young girl’s hope that her first love might be waiting at the top. With each step, the brightness grew. Near the landing, I stumbled back, not in fear but in recognition. A burst of light stunned me, like flashbulbs constantly firing. Again?

It was high noon, the sun directly overhead, striking me full in the face. The skylight. That skylight. Not a warning. Not decline. Not death knocking. Just sunlight through the skylight pouring down three floors to the mosaic dome below.

I laughed out loud in the attic. 

They called up, “Are you all right, dear?”

“Yes,” I said. “I am fine. Really fine.”

“Oh good. Would you like a drink?”

“Actually, could you make me a hot chocolate?”

In that moment, the house and I were one again, bound by memory and light. Yet its story did not begin with me.