The house a woman creates is a Utopia. She can't help it - can't help trying to interest her nearest and dearest not in happiness itself but in the search for it.

Marguerite Duras

As the car tumbled over and over, it’s like the life I knew was gone. Faded from memory. And I crashed.

It’s dark. I pawed at the controls, trying to get her to respond. But she’s out. I’m encased in her, with whatever air I have in here, in this cabin built for travel across worlds.

Before panic could set in, I found my breath. Took them slowly, pacing myself, counting them.

Then came a cracking sound, a yawn of steel and plastic. Light poured in.

“Are you alive?” That’s what she asked me.

I didn’t know how to answer. So I asked, “Am I dead?”

“No,” she said. “You’re not. Can you move?”

I tried. Not much happened. “I think my leg is pinned.”

“May I help you?”

“Yes, please help me.”

She stepped in and put big hands on me, soft but also strong and capable. She pulled at the harness and snapped it loose, then pushed back the pieces of my loyal car that were driven into my legs.

It hurt.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t know it would hurt you like that.”

I nodded. “It’s fine. I think I’m losing a lot of blood, though …”

“Yes, you are. I have to get you to All Mother straight away.”

“Okay, yeah, let’s do that.”

She carried me out of the car and put fast feet to the ground, running me across the bright outside.

I blinked a few times to see the plains and the purple skies. Hills met us on the road, and she took to them in a leap.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“My name is Antandre, daughter of All Mother.”

“Yeah, you mentioned her before. She’s the leader, I’m guessing? Of this place.”

“She’s our wisest mother and nurturer of our world.”

“Yeah, okay, that’s what I meant.”

Antandre smiled at me. “What’s your name?”

“Teresa.”

We crested the tallest hill and I saw it: the home of the All Mother. Her estate was not walled or guarded. It was a low, open expanse of field, dotted with beautiful plants and natural rock formations. The light of the purple sky bathed the area in a serene sort of glow, as day turned to night.

Antandre carried me close. Her heavy breathing slow and even. I could hear her heartbeat strong and regular. I was fading out, next to it.

“Do not sleep, Teresa.”

“I’m trying, Drea. But I’m pretty drowsy.”

“Why did you call me that?”

“What? Drea?”

“Yes.”

“I give people nicknames.”

“Why?”

“I dunno. Just a thing I do.”

She didn’t say anything back, so I asked, “Is that all right?”

“Yes,” she said. “I am not certain I like mine, but I will see.”

I smiled. “Never heard that before, but okay.”

She knelt down and set me against a rock, soft with moss or something like it.

“I need to speak with All Mother alone. Then I will bring you to her.”

I gave a thumbs up.

She stared at my thumb, then me.

“Okay,” I said. “No problem.”

Drea smiled, then left me there by the rock.