Sleeping in her own bed the first night home from a long trip usually soothed Sharon's soul. She would always zombie-fall into her bed, conscious only long enough to murmur "ahhhhh" as the old-familiar mattress conformed to her travel-weary muscles, and she would slip into unconsciousness before her head touched the pillow. Then, blessed sleep like the dead. . .
       That's the way it started for Sharon, but it lasted only about three hours.
       When something awakened her in the dark. Sure, it was jet lag. Her body thought it was still in England, seven hours ahead of her in real-time here in her bungalow in Boulder, Colorado.
       And it's true, she awoke wide-awake, feeling sleep-satisfied even though her back ached and her gimpy hip throbbed and her eyes burned raw. At first she didn't know where she was. The dark was too dark. The dark space around her felt. . .empty. Cold. Damp.
       Something stirred beside Sharon, shocking her back to awareness. Her husband had been gone these last four years.
       It all rushed back in a blur: the trip to London to visit her archeologist daughter on the canal boat, the return late last night on the airport shuttle, the miffed yowl of a greeting from Sharon's Siamese-torti asking where in hell she had been these last two weeks.
       Disoriented, yes, but she was back in her own bedroom, in her own half-empty bed.
       She'd lived here in this downsized retirement bungalow for almost eight years, four of them alone, so she should know the place well enough by now. Even so, it felt different. Less empty. Probably on account of her highness, the cat.
       Her rumbling purr of temporary forgiveness had suddenly shut off, like a switch. Queen nestled on the pillow next to Sharon's head, and the down stuffing shifted as she lifted her head from her paws, staring into the dark. Staring at some unidentifiable point in the dark.
       Sharon stared too, but all she saw was the darkness. Damn, it was cold here. She pulled the covers up to her chin. Wasn't it still supposed to be summer? She hadn't been gone that long, for goodness sake, but it felt like a century. It was good to be home.
       Or was it?
       Sharon's daughter Deborah wanted Sharon to move to England now that she was alone. Deborah had married a Brit, and they would help Sharon apply for the appropriate visa. It was tempting, she had to admit, because what was the point of living without her family? And traveling back and forth on the biannual trips, under mounting security threats, was more and more of a drain, financially as well as physically and emotionally.
       But even if the paperwork went through, Sharon just couldn't move there. America was her home. The blood of her ancestors had paid for it. How could she turn away from her people's sacrifice? The ultimate price had been paid again and again, across the centuries--well, maybe decades--ever since her great-grandmother immigrated one hundred and thirty years ago. From a village no one had ever heard of in the midlands of England. But still. . .
       Sharon lay awake for what seemed like hours, staring at the cat, who stared at the darkness until she finally succumbed to her wakefulness and rose. The cold embraced her, and she switched on the lights to search out her robe from the back of the closet, brewed a pot of coffee, and sat down with her journal to recapture the details of her trip before its memory elusively flitted away forever.

July 3:
       Arrive today, descending through the bank of clouds that perpetually hover over England. Deborah and baby Mandy meet my plane, as Ellery is off to work, and the three of us train back to their canal, where their boat is moored. There's a riot of flowers at the dock, none of which I recognize, although the tall bushy ones resemble butterfly bushes and smell like lilacs. My nose finds ragweed, a full month before it'll bother me in Colorado. The different timing of the smells leaves me feeling displaced. Oh my. I am not at home anymore.
       Tea chases away the chill, and I settle into the guestroom of their narrowboat. It's not an actual room with four walls and a door as I know rooms to be, but a six-foot wide passageway connecting a galley kitchen at the front of the boat to their bedroom at the back of the boat, a room that is large enough to hold their queen-sized mattress and a footpath on two sides. The bunk bed baby Mandy will grow into one day suits me fine for now. It's been too long since I last saw my family, half a year ago at Christmas when the baby was six months old. We live too far apart. My fault, I know, for raising my daughter to be so smart. I wish I could take a piece of them back home with me when the dreaded time comes.

       How Sharon always dreaded that first day back at home, after night finally gave way to day, and she could give up the charade of sleeplessness and wander through her empty life. Sorting accumulated mail. Throwing out moldy bundles from the refrigerator. Listening to her voice mail--nothing but scams, solicitors, and politicians. Unpacking dirty clothes she never wanted to see again. Running to the grocery. Re-starting life all over again.
       She couldn't quite put her finger on what was different about her house. There was a smell she didn't recognize, like dead, stale air. The housesitter must've kept the house closed up. Maybe didn't clean the litter box until the day before Sharon's return. Was there a dead mouse that Queen stashed in one of her hiding places? Sharon opened up the windows and let the nectar of Rocky Mountain air sweep through the house, cleansing it, leaving behind a layer of pollen and dust.
       Piles of mail and newspapers loaded down the dining room table, so Sharon carried her deli chicken dinner to the coffee table in front of the nightly news on television. The world hadn't changed during her absence. War. Wacky weather. Financial melt-downs. More war. Same old same old.
       She stayed up till seven the second night, when her bones ached so bad she barely had enough strength to drop some kibble into the cat's dish and her own bag of bones into bed.
       Sometime later, her body awoke again, feeling rested, as if she'd had a full night's sleep. Green numbers from the clock on her dresser glowed 10:23. Three hours of sleep, that's all she'd had. Like clockwork. The night had barely begun, and she felt wide-awake. Next to her on the pillow, the cat stared off into the dark. Sharon heard it, too. A faint tap-tap-tapping sound. Soft chatter. Had she left the television on? She climbed out of bed and shivered in the cold sweet air, smelling like lilacs.
       No, that was wrong. Lilacs didn't bloom this time of year. And July wasn't usually this cold, not even when it cooled off overnight. She'd left the windows open. Tying her robe around her, she moved to the windows and fumbled against the screen for the crank. Then she reared back with surprise. It felt distinctly warmer over here against the screen. As if the cold air somehow sealed inside the house.
       She left the windows alone, open as they were, and stumbled through the dark toward the hall. In the kitchen, she turned on the kettle. Might as well fix a cup of tea to take the chill off. Tea here was never as good as it was there. The chatter had faded away. It wasn't the television left on. The voices she'd heard must've come from someone in the street. Teenagers, no doubt. Her tongue did the "hallelujah" dance inside her mouth, murmuring thanks for having made it through those troublesome teen years, unscathed. She was so proud of her own Deborah. Even though the original Deborah, Sharon's great-grandmother, was probably turning over in her grave right now at the thought that the bloodline had returned to its origins, a place the first Deborah had chosen to reject. Like so many others, seeking liberty in the promised land.
       Sharon stirred her tea and sat down at the kitchen table with her journal.

       Today is baby Mandy's first birthday. I awake refreshed. No jet lag on this end. It must be on account of the soothing, subtle motion of the boat, rocking me overnight like a cradle.
       There will be no fireworks today, no reminders of American independence. I remember the stories of my great-grandmother, the first Deborah, who left this country in search of her own independence, sailing for the land of opportunity. Today will be a good day to honor her memory and yes, her bravery. How brave had she been, setting out on a journey like that, all alone? Leaving behind her family forever. At least I get to see mine twice a year.
       Deborah, Mandy, and I walk twenty minutes through little India to the train station, wait another ten for the slow train to London, ride another fifteen to Paddington, rush with the crowds and shooshing wind through the tunnels to the connecting Circle line, ride another ten (or is it less? I forget.) to Embankment where we finally emerge into thin, watery sunlight. But there is sun today, and along with it an air of gaiety. Steel drums tinkle from one of the bridges. Laughter. Sweet smells of waffle cones. Business people always in a rush whisk past the tourists, click clicking their way to their mover and shaker meetings, god knows why. Diesel smells and barge horns toot.
       The world slows down by the Thames. The tide is out, and we stroll along, past accordion players and selfie-taking tourists and cooing pigeons and skipping children.
       "Let's go down to the beach," Deborah says. "We're lucky the tide is out."
       Skeptical, I look down at rocks covered with ooky, black slime. Debris lodges between the rocks. There is a dead fish smell. What beach? The Thames is just a river, tidal, and it's seen a lot of history wash in and out, but still. Someone is carving dragons out of an island of sand that has washed up against a sea wall. A tip jar sits beside his whimsical masterpieces, destined for ruin.
       "Okay," I say, letting the playful mood capture me. Crumbling cement steps lead down to a bed of gravel and silt. I pick my way carefully down them, overwhelmed by the ghosts of centuries who've raced up and down these very steps. Somewhere around here was the dock where my great-grandmother started her journey.
       Deborah picks up a piece of trash and studies it with her archeologist's eye. "It's part of a sole from a leather shoe. Pretty good condition, I'd say. At least three hundred years old. Maybe four. I'd have to check. Look at those hobnails."
       She shows me, and my lungs seize. My daughter is casually holding in one hand a piece of history. Mandy points at it and exclaims "ga!"
       "You find all sorts of things washed up here," Deborah says with a shrug. She hands the piece of history to me.
       Gingerly, I take the damp piece of withered, wrinkled leather. The hobnails look like pinheads, driven in a uniform line around the perimeter of the sole. There is a precision of craft rarely seen from today's machines. Whoever wore the shoe or boot this sole once attached to--a woman, from the delicate shape, I'd say--had worn it long before leather, hobnail shoes ever found their way to Colorado.
       "This should be in a museum, shouldn't it?" I say.
       Deborah laughs. "We have better samples, and most of them are logged and boxed away in basements. No one would want this. It's just trash."

       Someone else's trash was another's treasure.
       Sharon unpacked her souvenirs on her third day home. She'd wrapped the hobnailed sole carefully in tissue paper, but already it was drying out into a brittle piece of leather here in the semi-arid air of Colorado. She couldn't afford much: a few postcards, a paperback novel, her oyster card and a few pounds left over for her next trip. The little illicit piece of stolen history was definitely her biggest score, and she gave it a place of honor atop her dresser until she could think of something better.
       Queen was unimpressed. The cat laid her ears back and slinked away, disappearing to one of her hiding places where she would probably hunker down the rest of the day. Seeing the suitcase always troubled Queen.
       But long after Sharon had put the suitcase away, the cat still didn't emerge from her hideout.
       Not even when Sharon heated up frozen fish for dinner.
       The cat must be confused, as Sharon's bedtime was off-kilter, thanks to her jet lag. She made it up a little later that night, all the way through one show past the nightly news. Eight. She rattled kibble into Queen's dish, but still the cat did not appear. Nor to claim her pillow throne when Sharon fell unconscious into bed.
       She dreamed of sailing ships and wooden hulls that creaked against the crash of waves, and pounding rain, and salt spray in her eyes. "Noooooo," she moaned, or someone moaned.
       She snapped awake. Wide-awake. The clock face glowed 1:04.
       "Nooooo."
       It wasn't she who moaned. She reached past her head to Queen's pillow to pat the cat, but she touched pillow instead. Queen was still off sulking somewhere. A breeze caressed Sharon's face through the open window, bringing her a whiff of. . .fish.
       She should've taken the trash out before bed.
       She lay awake in bed, thinking this time she would fall back to sleep.
       Tap. . .tap. . .tap. . .
       Those darned teenagers were up to something.
       Sharon rose in the cold, wrapping her robe around her. She switched on her bedside light, thinking that a light would chase the teenagers away from her yard. Light flooded the room, drowning the room in light, the same way water washed over the decks, flooding the ship, drowning. . .
       Wait, where had that glimpse of a vision come from?
       Sharon rushed to the phone on her dresser. She would call someone. The police.
       Noooo.
       Her daughter, then. Deborah must be awake over there, across the ocean, by now. As Sharon dialed the number, her glance took in the empty space on the dresser where the hobnailed sole had been.
       Where had it gone?
       "Mom? Is everything okay?"
       "I'm just jet-lagged and wanted to hear your voice." Far better than listening to those tapping, clicking footsteps of the hobnailed sole coming from somewhere. The kitchen, she guessed. Where she'd left her journal. Of the crossing.
       "Good thing you called, Mom. I did a little research, and guess what I learned? Your great-grandmother? The one you named me after?"
       "Yes, honey. Deborah."
       "Well, guess what? She wasn't the first one in the family who tried to leave England. She had a, I don't know how many greats, a grandmother who wanted to leave for America, but the Revolutionary War got in her way."
       "Wars have a way of doing that," Sharon said.
       "Yes, I know, but she never made it. She tried to find passage for herself and her baby, asking around on the Thames, right there near where we were that day, but there was a terrible accident. She never made it out."
       But Sharon wondered if she had. Her hobnailed sole had finally come ashore. Home. It was good to be home.