On That Dark Night

Julie had lived her life at 912 Linton Street. But the things she was telling me now had nothing to do with Linton Street. She dragged a sled up a snowy hill behind her house...but there was no hill on Linton Street. She scratched patterns with her fingernails on frosty windowpanes that looked out on a brick courtyard that was not on Linton Street. People came and went around her with the rustle of long skirts. Pleasant memories of some childhood that the Julie Wintcomb I knew had never known. But not all memories were pleasant...