The 6:30 flight out of Atlanta touched down two minutes early in Jasmine's hometown. As the plane taxied to its terminal, she switched on her cellphone, eager to hear any new messages. A smiled leapt across her face as she heard the voices of those she loved the most. Her husband had gotten their four year old son to talk to her voicemail and she could hear their ten year old in the background making rude noises. Business had taken her away from home for six months this time and she physically ached to be in her family's presence.
Sighing, she listened to the rest of her messages as the plane stopped and everyone around her stood to collect her belongings. In the jostle, she thought she heard the message wrong, so she played it again. But no, it was the same message. She felt hot, she could feel a flush rise to her cheeks and she stared at nothing. She played the message yet again and gripped the arm of her chair. All the cabin lights went out and there was a disconcerted murmur amoungst her fellow passengers.
Taking several minutes to calm herself, she finally got up and exited the plane. The stewardess glared at her but said nothing. Inside the terminal, Jasmine dialed the numbers very deliberately and immediately a familiar voice picked up on the other end.
"Jasmine! You got my call?" the woman's voice said.
"Yes, Dr. Cioffi, I did. Will you please tell me what the fuck you are talking about?" Jasmine demanded in an eerily calm voice.
"Well," the doctor's voice wavered slightly, "its just as I've said. I think you need to come into the office to hear it for yourself. I would've never believed it either. But I think you need to get here as soon as possible so we can start pressing charges."
"I'll be there first thing in the morning, my family is here to pick me up," Jasmine hung up the phone and made her way to the baggage claim. She could see her brood already assembled and waiting for her. Her husband John was waving excitedly with one hand and holding flowers in the other. Their ten year old, Jackson, was holding up his younger brother, Leroy, and screaming out to her. She put on her best smile and closed the distance to her family. Her boys hugged her and Leroy gave her kisses. When she rose, John wrapped his arms around and kissed her with all his might. As they pulled back, his smile faded and he asked,
"Darling? What's wrong?"
Jasmine mustered a smile quickly and explained, "Oh, I'm just tired from the flight." She looked down at her sons and smiled and told them all to stop fussing, how she couldn't wait to get home.

Later that night, she ate dinner with her husband and sons and after, her sister and brother-in-law came by for a couple cocktails. After a while, Jasmine stared her sister down and spoke to her in a tone only detectable by close siblings.
"Daisy, will you please take the boys tonight? I really need some quiet time with John."
Her sister looked perplexed, knowing full well what that tone meant but unable to understand why it had been conjured. Already the room seemed to grow darker.
"Yes, of course," Daisy replied, half a heartbeat later.

With the boys gone to her sister and brother-in-law's house, Jasmine sat her husband down on the couch and crossed the room to pour herself another drink. She did not offer him one.
"Why did you send the boys away? Why did you speak to your sister in such a weird tone?" he asked immediately, apparantly husbands could also hear such a tone. John was always one to cut to the heart of the matter, it endeared him to her, because in some ways it made them similar.
"I got a phonecall from the school physician this morning," she said, being very careful not to look at her husband.
"Oh yes?" she could hear him shift on the couch, "About what? Why didn't she call me as well? Why didn't you tell me sooner?" he demanded.
"Can you think of any reason why she would not John?"
She heard him begin to stand and she laid her eyes upon him. He froze and sank back into the couch.
"Can you think of no reason why she would not, John?" her voice began to rise.
His face became pained. It was obvious he was trying to move and could not. He began to sweat with effort.
"What are you talking about? What's happening?" he stammered.
The air around them became dense and all light dimmed. The bulbs retained their same incandescence, but there seemed to be a filter over his eyes. The room became hot and nothing stirred, nothing except Jasmine. She loomed over him, drink in one hand, air distorting around her like asphault on a hot summer day.

"Why would a school physician call one parent and not the other John? Why the fuck would that happen?" she was screaming now and the glass in her hand shattered. The air arouund him and in his lungs began to constrict. He could not breathe, hs eyes began to water. A soft squeek broke his lips.
Then, she turned, and the feeling abruptly stopped. He could breathe again, he could move again. He collapsed on the ground and sobbed.
"What's going on? What do you think is going on?" he yelled, his voice broken and hysterical. She turned her eyes upon him again and again he was frozen and suffocating.
"Did you hurt our son, John? Did you.." her faltered, unable to find the words. Hot, thick air moved like a dark hand and seized him by the brain stem. She followed it over to her husband and knelt on the floor in front of him. With both hands on either temple she opened her mind and poured it into his.
Her terror and hatred poured into his skull like a tidalwave, she ripped and tore at his memories, violently searching for any scrap of evidence to confirm the news that now hung in front of his minds eye like some gruesome poster. He could hear the phone message in her memory and nearly gagged. He looked pleadingly at his wife as she dove in and out his synapses.
"Please," he thought, "I did not do this."
Then all was still. Tears poured down John's cheeks as he slowly became aware of his corporeal self. His blurry eyes finally focused on his wife's face. It was twisted in fear and concern. She was holding his hands and he slumped against her. He felt like an old man, he felt like he could feel his life slipping away, he felt utterly raped and devoid of everything.
"I'm so sorry," she finally managed, "I just thought,.. I heard... if it had in any way been true,.. I'm so sorry."
He felt a different kind of air gently tending to his internal hurts. He had felt such airs before; their wedding night, the birth of their sons. On those occasions, he had written it off as something imagined in his elation. But now he turned to his wife, sobbing and wan, and said,
"What the hell did you do to me? What the hell are you?!"
"Hush darling, I'll make it all better. I have been neglecting to tell you about a lot things."