The Ground Beneath Our Pyjamas

“I used to think there was no such thing as too much light. But then I stepped into a place so bright it could bleach your soul—and found my sons waiting in the glare.”

As I stumbled through the shimmering Portal, the harsh, unforgiving brightness of Clivilius slammed into me like a physical blow.

It was blinding, relentless — not just light, but presence, bearing down on me as though the very landscape demanded something from those who dared to enter. Gone were the comforting, familiar surroundings of our home, the soft clutter of the kitchen, the gentle shadows of the study. In their place stood a barren, exposed expanse — vast and unyielding, stretching out in every direction like the surface of some forgotten world.

The ground beneath my feet was covered in layers of ochre dust. The air itself felt wrong — not just hot, but charged, dry and crackling with a strange current that set my nerves twitching. Each breath felt sharp in my lungs, as if I were inhaling light rather than air.

I squinted against the glare, my eyes watering as they struggled to adjust to the intensity. It was like stepping into a furnace — not just in heat, but in weight. The atmosphere pressed against my skin, heavy and oppressive, making it hard to draw breath. Sweat prickled at the nape of my neck, and panic fluttered briefly in my chest.

And then, through the haze of discomfort and disorientation, I heard a voice — familiar, unmistakable — calling out to us.

“Dad! Mum!”

It was Paul, his voice a curious mix of relief and apprehension as he jogged towards us.

My heart lurched at the sound. The sight of him — solid, real, here — cut through the alienness of the place like a shaft of mercy. Even in these strange and unsettling circumstances, seeing him felt like balm to my frayed nerves. A lifeline.

A reminder that not everything had changed.

Suddenly, Jerome followed closely behind us, his presence adding to the surreal nature of the moment.

He looked just as dazed as I felt — barefoot, blinking against the blazing light, his frame half-shadowed by the swirl of the portal behind us. We must’ve looked ridiculous: a whole family transported across some veil of reality, clad in our pyjamas like sleepwalkers dropped into a dream we hadn’t agreed to.

Here we were, standing in the middle of an unfamiliar world, the ground endlessly dusty beneath our feet, the sky an endless sheet of azure, and yet the cotton flannel of Jerome’s bottoms flapped softly in the wind. The absurdity of it all hit me square in the chest. If I hadn’t felt so raw, I might’ve laughed.

As Paul enveloped us in tight hugs, I clung to him fiercely, pressing my face into the side of his neck.

I breathed in the scent of him — sweat, dust, something unfamiliar and metallic beneath it all — and reassured myself that he was real. He’s here. He’s alive. That this wasn’t just some mad, heat-induced hallucination. My fingers gripped the back of his shirt as though letting go might shatter whatever miracle had delivered him to us.

Noah took a moment to adjust his dressing gown — tugging the belt tight, smoothing the collar — a small, fussy gesture that spoke volumes about his discomfort and unease.

I felt a flicker of irritation at his priorities, at his inability to just be in the moment, to embrace our sons without worrying about appearances. Even here, in a place beyond reason, he still couldn’t let go of dignity.

But the joy of having this apparently lost boy in my arms again quickly overwhelmed any negative feelings.

It rushed through me with such intensity that I had to bite down on a sob. A love so full, so immediate, it left no room for pride or irritation. Just a swelling gratitude — raw and blinding — that brought tears to my eyes, blurring the barren world around us. My throat tightened with the force of it.

They were here. My sons were here.

And then, almost without thinking, I found myself saying the first thing that popped into my head.

“Claire’s been looking for you,” I quipped, my voice laced with my characteristic dry humour.

It came out before I could stop it — part barb, part reflex. Ridiculous, of course. Out of place. But that was the point. It was my way of cushioning the intensity, of stepping sideways from the full weight of the moment before it crushed me.

I knew it was absurd, dragging Claire into all this — Claire with her constant texts and her sanctimonious tone — but it was like muscle memory. A kind of emotional self-defence, honed over years of managing family tensions with equal parts sarcasm and endurance.

And from the look of surprise and amusement on Paul’s face, I could tell he understood. He saw me, the real me, behind the nonsense. That he recognised the familiar rhythm of our family dynamics, the dry jabs and eye-rolls we used to navigate the far messier truths beneath.

Even here — in the middle of nowhere, or everywhere, or whatever this place was — we were still us.

The irony wasn’t lost on me either. Here I was, standing in the middle of God-knows-where, wearing my favourite Jesus-adorned pyjamas, cracking jokes about Claire.

The very picture of maternal dignity.

It was so absurd, so utterly incongruous with the gravity of our circumstances, that I almost wanted to laugh. Almost. But laughter would have cracked something open, and I wasn’t ready for that yet.

Instead, I felt my usual grumpiness settling over me like a protective cloak, shielding me from the barrage of questions and emotions that threatened to overwhelm.

It was a familiar feeling — prickly, yes, but grounding. A weathered old armour that kept the chaos at bay, if only just.

Thankfully, Luke chose that moment to make his appearance.

He emerged from the giant wall of swirling colours through which we had all passed. There was something almost theatrical in the timing — as though he'd sensed that we were teetering on the edge of emotional saturation and decided, quite pragmatically, to shift the focus.

“Where’s Charles?” he asked, his voice sharp and direct.

No hesitation. No preamble.

“Seminary!” Noah, Jerome, and I responded in unison, the word tripping off our tongues with the ease of long practice.

The echo of it lingered in the air a moment longer than it should have — oddly bright against the strange stillness of the landscape. It was such a small, mundane detail, but it settled something inside me. A strange kind of balm.

For that brief moment, it grounded us — reminded me that not everything had slipped through my fingers. Some things, at least, remained unchanged. Rituals. Routines. The call-and-response of shared life.

Paul chuckled softly at our response, the sound light and familiar.

I turned slightly toward him, catching the warmth in his expression, and felt a rush of affection that caught me off guard. For all his strangeness of late, for all the worry and confusion that had wrapped around him like fog, he still had that spark. That gift for finding humour — and with it, comfort — even in the most bizarre of circumstances.

But then I turned to Luke, my earlier irritation and confusion coalescing into a white-hot burst of anger.

“Luke!” I screeched, my voice high and accusing. “What have you done!?”

The words tore from me before I could think, raw and ragged, carried on a wave of disbelief that had been building from the moment I stepped into this impossible place. The heat, the light, the madness of it all — and now this? My son, standing there like he hadn’t just torn our world out from under us?

He had the audacity to shrug, his expression nonchalant, maddeningly calm. As if he hadn’t just upended our entire lives. As if he hadn’t dragged us away from everything we knew and loved with no warning, no choice.

“I did what was necessary,” he said simply, as if that explained everything.

Necessary? The word rang unpleasantly in my ears. My breath caught, fury threatening to spill over into something primal. I wanted to shake him — to grab him by the shoulders and make him see. To scream every name he’d ever been called by, every memory he was desecrating by acting like this was just another one of his whims.

But before I could even form the beginnings of a response, Paul jumped in, cutting the air with a sharp dose of sarcasm.

“You didn't think it was necessary to let them change out of their pyjamas first?” he asked, gesturing broadly to our ridiculous attire.

I glanced down at myself, the absurdity of the moment crashing in all at once. Jesus-printed pyjamas, dust-covered slippers, bed hair frizzing at the temples — we looked like cult escapees or mad pilgrims in a child’s storybook. What had felt mildly amusing earlier now burned with humiliation. It wasn’t just silly. It was a reminder — a glaring, physical sign — of how utterly unprepared we were for whatever this was.

But Luke just shrugged again, his answer as dismissive as his demeanour.

“It didn’t really cross my mind, to be honest.”

The sheer indifference of it struck a nerve so deep I could hardly see straight. I felt my blood pressure rising, a hot flush creeping up my neck, my hands instinctively clenching into fists at my sides.

How could he be so cavalier? So unconcerned about the impact his actions had on our family? How could he just stand there — calm, aloof, almost smug — acting like this was all perfectly normal?

He looked like a prophet. He acted like a child.

And I, his mother, had never felt so furious.

But before I could give voice to my frustration, Noah spoke up, his expression bewildered, his tone hesitant.

“And where’s the New Jerusalem?” he asked, his eyes scanning the barren landscape around us, as if searching for some sign of divine intervention.

I turned to look at him, startled by the gentleness of his question — and by its sincerity. His brow was furrowed, his gaze sweeping the dust-swept horizon with an almost childlike hope. As if he truly expected to see golden spires rising from the cracked earth. As if something holy might be just a few steps away.

I saw Paul shoot Luke a look of pure incredulity, his eyebrows raised so high they almost disappeared into his hairline. His mouth twitched with barely concealed disbelief.

I could practically hear the unspoken what the heck? that passed between them. It didn’t need saying — it was written across Paul’s entire face. The surrealness of it all, the impossibility, had finally reached a tipping point. We were suspended in a moment that felt more like bad theatre than prophecy, and none of us knew what act we were in.

But Luke, unfazed as ever, just continued on as if everything was perfectly normal.

“It’s just over the hill,” he said, his words hanging in the air like a challenge, a dare to question his version of reality.

He pointed — calmly, confidently — towards a distant rise in the land, as though we were on a school field trip rather than wandering through a dusty, foreign wasteland in nightclothes. The absurdity of it was unbearable.

Paul threw his hands up in a gesture of defeat, his expression a mix of exasperation and resignation.

I could see it in his posture — the way his shoulders sagged slightly, the way his eyes flicked skyward as though appealing to some higher power for patience. He was as confused and frustrated as I was, as lost in this surreal conversation as the rest of us.

And still, the hill waited.

And then Luke dropped another bombshell, his voice casual, almost bored.

“Paul will take you there,” he announced, as if it were a foregone conclusion, as if he had the right to dictate our every move.

I barely had time to process the words before Paul reacted.

“What!?” Paul's protest was immediate and visceral, his voice rising in pitch and volume.

I could sense his reluctance instantly — the tension in his jaw, the way he stepped slightly back from us, instinctively trying to create distance between himself and the absurdity he was now being saddled with. His body spoke louder than words: not like this. He wasn’t ready. None of us were.

He wanted to shield us — I could see it. That familiar, quiet sense of duty that had always clung to Paul like a second skin. He was trying to protect us from something. From whatever lay ahead. From whatever he’d already seen.

But Luke just furrowed his brow, his expression a mirror of Paul's own frustration.

“I don’t know why you’re getting so worked up. I told you I would bring them here,” he shot back, his tone implying that their previous discussions somehow justified his unilateral decision-making.

Their discussions. I bristled at the implication. What had they agreed on, these two sons of mine? What else had been planned behind my back?

Paul tried to argue, lifting the laptop he had brought as if it were a piece of damning evidence, the device looking oddly fragile in this dry, sun-bleached world.

“Yeah, but I thought—”

But Luke cut him off, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

“Oh, plans changed,” he said, as if it were no big deal, as if our lives and futures were just minor details to be adjusted on a whim. “Dad wanted to go to the New Jerusalem instead.”

I felt a surge of anger rise up in me — hot, sharp, protective.

At his tone. At his arrogance. At the way he tossed Noah’s name into the conversation like it was a trump card. As though invoking faith absolved him of accountability.

I stared at Luke, seething, my thoughts racing.

How dare he? How dare he use our beliefs against us — twisting scripture and hope, playing on Noah’s longing for spiritual meaning like it was a tool to bend our wills?

He was pulling the strings, and we were dancing.

And I was done dancing.

But before I could voice my outrage, Jerome spoke up.

“What is she doing?” he asked, pointing towards a figure in the distance.

The question jolted me out of my fury, and I turned instinctively, squinting against the hard light. The air shimmered slightly at the horizon, blurring edges, but there — yes — I could see her.

It was a woman, middle-aged and dressed in practical, outdoorsy clothing: cargo trousers, a wide-brimmed hat, sleeves rolled up past the elbows. And she was pushing — of all things — a shopping trolley.

The metal frame rattled along the dusty earth, filled to overflowing with plants and gardening supplies: terracotta pots, plastic jugs, tangled green shoots poking out from bags of soil. A small watering can was wedged beneath a tangle of hessian sacks.

At first, I was as confused as Jerome, my mind struggling to make sense of the absurd sight before us.

What on earth was a woman doing pushing a shopping trolley through the middle of a desert wasteland? Where had she come from? What was she doing?

It was so far beyond the realm of normal — so utterly incongruous with everything I knew — that I couldn’t help but stare. My mouth fell open, and I didn’t bother to close it.

Luke, on the other hand, seemed entirely unfazed — as if this scene, this woman with her trolley of potting mix, were the most natural thing in the world.

“Hey, Karen!” he shouted, his voice carrying across the distance, his tone brimming with a familiarity and warmth that set my teeth on edge.

The woman — Karen — stopped and turned, her face shaded by the brim of her hat, though even from this distance her body language was unmistakable. Frustration radiated off her in waves. She planted one hand on her hip and glared in our direction.

“I'm busy, Luke,” she shouted back, her voice sharp and clipped, laced with an undercurrent of exasperation.

I couldn’t help but glance sideways at him, incredulous. Who was this woman, and how did Luke know her well enough to be summoning her like a teenager calling his mate from across a car park?

But Luke, undeterred, just kept pushing.

“It'll only take a few minutes!” he called, his tone cajoling, almost pleading.

I watched as Karen hesitated, then let out an exaggerated sigh — the kind I knew all too well. Her shoulders slumped in resignation, and she left her trolley where it stood, beginning the long, trudging walk towards us.

Every step she took seemed to echo with reluctance. I could feel the weight of her irritation from here, like heat rolling off the ground.

And somehow, the strangeness of it all just kept deepening.

As she approached, Luke made the introductions, his hand gesturing towards us with a flourish that seemed almost mocking in its grandiosity.

“Karen, meet my parents, Noah and Greta. And this is my younger brother, Jerome.”

The way he said it — like a ringmaster presenting the main act at a poorly attended circus — grated on me. There was something too casual, too rehearsed in his tone, as though this moment had played out in his head many times already and we were merely hitting our marks.

I don’t know what came over me in that moment, what possessed me to step forward and envelop this strange, prickly woman in a warm hug.

Maybe it was the surreal nature of the situation — the aching absurdity of standing pyjama-clad in a foreign world, surrounded by dust and prophecy. Or maybe it was the desperate need for some kind of human connection, something tangible to anchor myself to amidst all this madness.

Or perhaps it was just my natural instinct towards sociability — the deeply ingrained habits of a lifetime spent as a mother and a hostess. Smile. Offer tea. Welcome the stranger.

So I stepped forward, arms opening almost before my brain had caught up, and embraced Karen.

“Lovely to meet you, Karen,” I said, my voice warm and effusive, the words emerging from somewhere automatic.

Even as I said them, they felt oddly hollow — thin and brittle in my mouth, as if borrowed from a script I no longer believed in. But I smiled anyway.

Karen, for her part, remained stiff and unyielding in my arms, her discomfort with the physical contact radiating from every pore.

Her back didn’t soften. Her arms stayed glued to her sides.

“Likewise,” she mumbled, her tone polite but distant.

And just like that, I released her — stepping back with a strange mix of embarrassment and annoyance prickling beneath my skin. I didn’t know what I’d expected — warmth, perhaps, or some spark of camaraderie in this strange place — but whatever I’d hoped for wasn’t there.

Not yet, anyway.

I noticed Paul suppressing a smirk, his eyes dancing with barely contained amusement at the awkward scene unfolding before him.

He knew — better than anyone — how much I thrived on social interaction, how much I craved the warmth and connection of human relationships. Hosting, chatting, tending — they were second nature to me. And he knew, too, how little patience I had for those who didn’t share my enthusiasm, who couldn’t or wouldn’t reciprocate my overtures of friendship.

Karen, stiff as a fencepost and twice as thorny, had already tested my patience — and Paul knew it. His amusement was familiar, infuriating, and strangely comforting.

But even as I registered his smirk, I couldn’t help but feel a pang of sympathy for Noah.

He was fidgeting uncomfortably in his dressing gown, the tie slipping slightly, his cheeks tinged with an unmistakable flush of embarrassment. His hands kept smoothing imaginary creases, fingers twitching with the need to fix something — his collar, the situation, himself.

I knew how much he valued appearances — how deeply he believed in presenting a polished, respectable image to the world, especially to strangers. It was more than vanity; it was dignity. Control. Identity. And I knew, too, how much it must have cost him to be seen like this: vulnerable, dishevelled, utterly out of place.

Luke, surprisingly, seemed to sense Noah’s discomfort.

“I suppose I’d better get you some clothes to change into,” he remarked, his tone casual, almost offhand.

As if we’d merely popped round unexpectedly. As if this were all perfectly normal.

The absurdity of it all lingered — sharp and surreal — but I tucked it away for now, filing it beside the heat, the dust, the trolley woman, and the many unanswered questions waiting just beyond the horizon.

Jerome spoke up again, his voice small and hesitant, almost lost in the vastness of the landscape around us.

“Can’t we just go home?” he asked, his eyes flickering towards the shimmering gateway that had brought us to this strange and terrifying place.

The words pierced me. Clean through.

I felt my heart clench at the sound of his voice — the naked longing, the desperation woven into each syllable. My sweet, steady Jerome, who rarely asked for anything, now standing in the middle of this impossible world, voicing the only question that truly mattered.

I wanted nothing more than to gather him in my arms, to pull him close and shield him from all of it — the brightness, the strangeness, the sheer unknowability of what came next. I wanted to promise him that everything would be all right, that we would find a way back to the life we knew.

Back to the rhythm of school drop-offs and Sunday dinners. Back to Millie. Back to safety.

But even as the words began to form on my tongue, I knew they would be a lie.

A soft, well-meaning lie — but a lie all the same. And what good would it do to offer false comfort here, in a place where nothing made sense anymore?

Karen, sensing the growing awkwardness, took the opportunity to extricate herself from my embrace — such as it had been.

“Well,” she said, her tone brisk and businesslike. “I guess that’s my cue to keep moving. These garden supplies won’t move themselves.”

She gestured broadly towards the dozens of trolleys scattered across the desolate landscape — their metal frames catching the light, surreal against the barren earth and burning sky. There was something defiant in the way she stood there, sunhat angled like a shield, as if daring the absurdity of her task to challenge her.

Then, without another word, she turned and strode away. Her steps were purposeful, clipped, each one an act of dismissal — of us, of our questions, of the emotional mess we were stewing in.

And as she walked off into the harsh light, Jerome’s question lingered in the stillness she left behind — a plaintive plea suspended in the heat between us.

None of us had the courage to answer it.

“It’s not quite that simple,” Paul said at last, his voice gentle, almost apologetic.

He draped an arm around Jerome’s shoulders, pulling him close in a gesture that was part comfort, part quiet reassurance — a shield, however temporary, against the surreal dilemma unfolding around us.

“How about I explain it on our way to camp?” he suggested, his tone light, almost casual, as if he were proposing a leisurely stroll down a familiar path rather than leading us deeper into this unknown place.

I glanced at him — my eldest — taking in the steadiness in his face, the careful way he was trying to soothe, to soften the edges of something he clearly didn’t fully understand himself. It was classic Paul: trying to shoulder the weight for the rest of us. Trying to give shape to something shapeless.

“Great idea, Paul,” Luke agreed, his enthusiasm grating on my already frayed nerves.

Paul motioned for us to follow, his steps quick and purposeful as he set off across the barren landscape — as though he were leading a group tour instead of dragging his family into the heart of a mystery none of us had consented to.

He paused for a moment, turning back to address Luke.

“Oh, and Luke,” he said, his voice firm, almost stern. “Bring their clothes to camp, would you? Don’t leave them at the Drop Zone this time.”

There was an edge to his tone, a subtle rebuke beneath the surface — not cruel, but clear. Paul had always been the peacemaker, the one who noticed what others overlooked. And in that moment, his simple request felt like an act of quiet defiance — a reassertion of care in the midst of all this thoughtless haste.

I felt a flicker of gratitude towards him — a rush of affection for his consideration, for his attention to the small, human details that made such a difference in our comfort and well-being.

Even here, even now, he still looked out for us.

Luke, to his credit, seemed to take Paul’s request seriously. He nodded, his expression solemn, almost contrite.

“Of course,” he said, his voice soft, almost reverent.

And then, with a final glance towards the Portal — as though checking for something only he could see — he stepped through, his form shimmering and dissolving into the swirling vortex of light and colour.

Just like that, he was gone again.

“Let’s go,” Paul urged, his voice gentle but insistent.

He began guiding us away from the Portal, away from the temptation to turn back, to flee towards the safety and familiarity of the life we had known. His hand rested lightly on Jerome’s shoulder, and I followed without thinking, my feet dragging through the grit, my mind still tangled in everything we had just left behind — and everything we were walking into.

The harsh, unforgiving landscape stretched out before us, an endless expanse of dust and rock and blistering light. There were no trees, no buildings, no shade — only the dry, dust-covered skin of the earth stretching underfoot and a sun that beat down without mercy.

Its rays seared my exposed skin, prickling my arms and face, making my eyes water until I could hardly keep them open. My throat ached with thirst, already dry and scratchy, the taste of heat and grit clinging to every breath.

The dust was relentless — clinging to everything, coating my pyjamas in a fine, chalky film. It worked its way into my nose and mouth, caking along my gums, stinging my eyes. I could feel it settling into the creases of my skin, into the fine lines and wrinkles that marked the years I’d spent tending, worrying, giving — the years that now felt so far from here.

It was a tangible reminder of how far we were from home — from the lush green lawns, the hedged verges, the quiet cul-de-sacs of Craigmore. From our house and the illusion of control it had once offered me.

Questions raced through my mind, one crashing into the next, their edges sharp and chaotic.

What had possessed Luke to bring us here? What delusions — or worse, manipulations — had he used to convince Noah to abandon everything we had built, everything we had worked so hard to hold together? And what would become of us now — stranded in this strange, hostile place, cut off from everything and everyone we had ever known?

A surge of anger flared in my chest, hot and sudden, burning brighter than the sun.

Luke.

My son — my child — had done this. Had torn us away from our home, our community, our very lives with no warning, no explanation, no choice. Just a vision, a calling, a swirling light and a string of cryptic instructions.

How dare he?