Dan stood in the kitchen, feeling helpless and frustrated. He knew Lyddia was right; if he appeared at the door, there was a good chance of triggering a confrontation.  He looked around, and picked a heavy iron skillet off the wall.  He glanced over at Dulce, and noticed that she had picked up a wicked looking serving fork.  There would be no confiscations today without a dreadful fight.  He put a hand on his son’s shoulder, keeping him still.

Lyddia opened the door.  Dan could hear the stress in her voice.  Could their visitor’s tell?  Probably not.  When the door closed, he stepped around the corner to make sure his wife was all right.  She had leaned back against the wall, her face turned a pasty white.  As he watched, she swallowed and pushed herself away from the wall.  When she opened her eyes, they blazed with anger.  When she spoke, her voice was steady and calm.

“Dan, I need to make some phone calls.  Something is not right about this.  Can you help Dulce get her sales goods picked up and see if any of it is salvageable?  We may need to contact her accounts to let them know there is a problem.  Protecting her income is essential for proving competence.  Dulce, do you have a birth certificate?”

The little gray woman wrinkled her brow in thought.  “I’m not sure what that is.”

Lyddia looked unsurprised.  Dan smiled inwardly.  His Lyddia was undaunted by 12 impossible things before or after breakfast.  She had to be reeling from the strangeness of it all–just as he was.  But here she was, taking charge, making it right; just as she always did.  He had picked an incredible woman.

“Social security card?  School records?  Deed to this house?”

Dulce brightened at that.  “Deed.  Yes, I do.  My aunt was very good about legal things.  I have a portfolio with everything for the house.”

Lyddia looked relieved.  “I’ll need to have a look at that.  We need to sit down and talk.  Dan, can you and Junior see to the living room?  Dulce and I need to talk quietly for a bit.  Dulce, is there a quiet place…?”

“I got the living room…”
“There’s an office…”

Dan and Dulce both started to talk at once.  Dulce laughed.  Lyddia smiled.  Nodded to Dulce, and followed her into the living room.  Dan and Junior trailed after.  For the first time, they really looked at the living room.  Its furnishings were sparse.  There was the bowl chair, a stone fireplace, an occasional table, and a low, padded bench.  The walls were painted with a mural featuring trees, vines and fantastical creatures.  Dulce touched a leaf on the wall, and it opened to reveal a pleasant room with a desk, large chair, and several small stools.  The two women went in, closing the door behind them.  Worried, Dan checked the wall.  He could find neither seam, button, knob or any other indication that it was anything other than a wall.

Although this worried him considerably, he turned to his son.  “Mommy will be back soon.  We’d better get our part done.”

Junior smiled at  his father.  “I know, Daddy.  Mommy likes stuff clean.  Think she’s gonna put those bad guys in time-out for making this big mess?”

Dan laughed.  “I think she is certainly going to try, and we are going to help her with what she needs.”

So Dan and Dan Junior began to set the room to rights.  As they worked, Dan laid the garments on the padded bench, sorting them out as undamaged, mend-able (in his estimation), blood stained, and damaged beyond fixing.  The irreparably damaged stack was the largest, but some of the merchandise would be recoverable.  They were just finishing their task, when Lyddia stepped out of the office, looking troubled.  Dulce followed her, looking serenely confident.  “Dan, this may be difficult.  There is a deed–and she has been paying taxes every year.  The receipts are here.  But the deed is in her aunt’s name; apparently the aunt is deceased.  And there is no record of Dulce existing.  I’ve asked for her original name, and she does not recall it.  She says all she knows now is Dulce.  This isn’t a good way to show that she is competent–or a legal resident.  Is there any way we can get more information?”

Dan thought for a moment.  “Yes…I think so.  We need to stay here till the moon rises.  In fact, I think we may need to stay here for a while.  I wish…”
He paused.  After old Tom’s tale, he thought being careful about wishes might be a good plan.  “That is, I think we need to have some of the things that are at our apartment.”

Dulce came out just in time to hear him.  “Oh!  Could you stay?  I had not even thought…. I have rooms you can use, and I will set them to your use.  I will set the office now so that all three of you may enter it.”  She touched a place higher up on the mural, and opened a small compartment filled with inks and paint.  She touched some fine lines in on the leaf she had used to enter the study.  She then showed Dan, Lyddia and Junior how to touch the leaf.  The door opened without a sound for each of them.

She thought a moment, then selected a flower with three petals, added a few brush strokes to it.  Each petal then opened a different room–one for each of them.  The parents could open each others and Junior’s.  Lyddia smiled at that little touch, but said gently, “I think he needs to be able to reach us if he should be scared at night.”

“Of course!” Dulce smiled, and added a touch to each of the other petals. “There!  All done.  Bring your things as quickly as you will.  I have my morning chores to finish, but I’ll be glad to help when I can.  If you have things that will not fit in your rooms, there is storage was well.”

Lyddia thought a moment, punching some buttons on her cell phone.  “We’ve got a little saved back…if it is ok with you, Dulce, I think I will call movers to have everything packed and brought here.”

Dan looked at her in surprise.  “This is big, Dan,” she explained.  “I’m afraid for all of us.  This house seems pretty well protected–who is going to be able to figure out magic leaves to find a room?  I want my computer, and I want to get stuff moved before those goons find our apartment.”

In a few minutes, Lyddia had been on the phone with their landlord and with a small moving company.  “Yes,” she had said over the phone to the landlord, “It is quite sudden.  The deposit?  Yes, we can forfeit that.  I am sure you will find it in good order…there should not be penalties.”

Her chores completed, Dulce curled up in her bowl-chair for a nap.  Lyddia pulled down the picnic table in the kitchen, and sat with Junior singing the ABC song, and inventing other educational activities.  By mid-afternoon, the movers knocked on the door.

Dulce awoke, and helped with opening rooms and storage compartments.  Soon Lyddia’s business computer was stashed in the office, their own rooms were filled with familiar furniture, and the kitchen supplies and other things that did not belong in bedrooms were stored.  By this time the sun was setting.  The two women set to work in the kitchen.  Dan and Junior sat at the table, where Dan took over the educational games.  Dan yawned.

“Sleepy, hon?” his wife asked.

“Yeah, but I want to be awake at moonrise.”

“Go sleep.  I have my cell phone alarm set for an hour before time.  Get some rest.  You worked all last night…I’m not surprised you are tired.”

Dan nodded.  “Yeah…just about this time yesterday I was getting ready to go work at a job I hated.  Amazing how things turn out.”  Yawning, he kissed his wife.  Dulce handed him a thick slice of bread and butter and a glass of the spiced milk.  “To help you sleep,” she said.  “Empty bellies make for restless sleep.”