Leaving Time

Alice discusses elephant empathy. She mentions how an entire herd will figure out a strategy to get a youngster out of a tricky situation. In one case, an elephant with a mutilated trunk was fed by other members of his herd. In another instance, a matriarch chose to allow a lioness and her cubs to cross her path without charging them.

Despite these instances of generosity, elephants will usually refuse to nurse an orphaned calf because milk is a scarce commodity meant only for biological offspring. However, Alice recalls one instance when a matriarch comes across an abandoned calf. She tries to drive him away but ultimately relents and adopts him. Alice concludes that this is proof of the special empathy elephants have for mothers and babies.

Serenity recalls her own mother’s death after Serenity became famous. Even though she helped many who had passed on, Serenity is never able to contact her mother. One day, her mother materializes in the passenger seat of her car, looking the way Serenity remembered her as a child, and not as a frail and aged woman. Serenity believes spirits appear to the living in whatever form they choose.

Serenity goes to an Apple store because her printer is jammed. The techie who tries to fix it releases a print queue of gibberish except for one word: Jenna. Serenity takes this as a sign, but she doesn’t know what it means.

Serenity calls Jenna and suggests they go back to the place where they found Alice’s wallet. Virgil is also part of the team and skeptical that Serenity can help. As they again search the preserve, Serenity tells Jenna that spirits don’t always wait around for their loved ones on the other side. Souls exist at various levels of development, and some move to a higher level more quickly than others.

When the trio arrives at the pond where Nevvie was trampled, Serenity draws their attention to an object in the mud. Virgil retrieves a pebble necklace that once belonged to Alice. Jenna says that Alice never took it off. Virgil suggests that they visit Thomas in the asylum to see if the necklace can jog his memory about what happened that night.

Serenity isn’t pleased by the prospect of visiting a mental institution, as she recalls the time when she checked herself into a psych ward years earlier. She considers that she “may be coming face-to-face with people who can’t control a natural gift I’d kill to have once again” (154). Eventually, the psychic deals with her own issues and agrees that they should all visit Jenna’s father.