I managed to drag my gaze away. “I’m going to…um, I’m going to run a few errands, so I’ll leave you here.”

I shook their hands, and managed to make suitable farewell comments, yet the whole time, the frog was calling louder. Time for you to go, I thought. For good.

I waited a second, watching their backs as they walked away. Then I walked to the door that said, “Sears Tower Observation Deck.”

Hours later, I climbed down one hundred and ten floors from the top of the Sears Tower, still shaking violently from the force of the wind and the thought that the frog might really be gone now. When I got outside, a dusky twilight had settled into the Loop. Most people were already on their way home, but a few stragglers walked the streets, a couple of lone cabs circled with roof lights blazing.

I hailed one of them and whispered my address. The experience on the roof had taken the power from my body. I was exhausted.

When I got home, I was relieved to see that Chris wasn’t there. I stripped away my clothes. I turned off all the lights and crawled in bed, pulling the covers over my head.

When I woke up early, the first rays of sun were pushing through the curtains I’d forgotten to close. I looked first at Chris, asleep with his dark lashes lying against his pale cheeks. I took a breath and rolled over.

And there was the frog.

I began to cry softly. I couldn’t get rid of it. Nothing would ever change.

“Y our mother was a voodoo priestess, right?” I asked Odette.

She glanced up from the proposal I’d given her, her almond-shaped eyes amused. “What kind of transition is that? I thought we were talking about my press release.”

I laughed. “Sorry.”

We were in the basement office of her restaurant, having one of our routine evening meetings. Well, they used to be routine until I became a VP. Now I’d had to make excuses to attend this meeting, instead of the account rep. When I’d waitressed in college, the main office there was a pitiful place with rotting walls and mice droppings. Odette’s office, in sharp contrast, was a vibrant space with brightly colored wall hangings, a wood desk painted yellow and a comfy blue visitor’s chair.

“It’s all right, Billy,” Odette said, in her slow southern voice. “You’ve been distracted all night. Tell me why you’re asking about my mother.” Odette was a heavyset, black woman with long braided hair. Sitting back, she drew her braids over her shoulder, the beads on the end clicking soothingly.

“You told me your mother was a voodoo priestess, isn’t that what you said?”

“I can’t possibly imagine why you’re asking me this, but yes, my mother is well known around New Orleans. Not that most people believe in that stuff, especially not up North.”

“I believe in it.”

“Since when?” Odette adjusted the collar of her chef’s whites and smiled patiently, as if she didn’t quite believe me.

“Since…well, since the last month. Since something happened to me.”

“What do you mean?”

“I changed overnight. My whole life did. And I think it was because of this therapist I went to. Or maybe because of this frog she gave me.” I stopped. How to put this into words? I didn’t want her to think I was crazy, like Dr. Hy did.

“You want to explain what you’re talking about?” Odette sounded concerned, but interested.

“Well…” I drifted off.

“Billy, I can handle anything. Hit me.”

And so I plowed on. I told her the whole story of Blinda and the frog and how I’d gotten everything I wished for overnight. I explained how all those things I wanted had brought about their own set of issues, which I hadn’t handled very well.

Odette nodded continuously. She muttered, “Uh-huh,” and “Okay,” and I kept talking. I told her about firing Alexa and how I wanted desperately for things to work with Chris but how he was killing me with food and conversation and constant sex. I told her how I missed my mom, how I even missed the obsessing and wondering I used to do about my absentee father. I told her about Evan flirting with me but left out the part about actually kissing him. It was the one part of my story I hadn’t been able to tell anyone so far. I was too ashamed.

“So I want to erase it,” I said, getting to the end of my story. “I don’t want people to love me or desire me because of some wish I made. I want to just go back to the day this all began so I can get my life right.”

“You want to get your life right?” Odette repeated.

“Yes, exactly,” I said, my voice getting a little louder, faster. “I’m realizing that I had been pretty passive about things. I knew Chris and I had problems, but I didn’t do much to remedy that. I wanted the vice presidency, but I didn’t do everything I could to make that happen. But I have a hunch that if I get rid of this frog, and all that went on this last month, I can start again and do it properly, you see? I thought I wanted my life to be easy-or at least easier-but what I realized was that I want to be responsible for what I achieve.”

“So it’s the journey that counts, not the destination. And all that New Age crap?”

I laughed. “Yes.”

“Okay, well you still haven’t told me what you want from my mother.” Odette shifted her weight, crossing her arms.

“Do you believe what I’m saying?”

Odette smiled kindly. “Of course. I’ve seen much stranger things than this.”

“Like what?” I asked, incredulous.

She shook her head. “Tell me why you asked about my mother.”

“I don’t know. I thought maybe she could help reverse this…this spell or whatever it is.”

“So that you can go back to the beginning and start over?”

“Do you think she can help me?”

Odette shook her head. “Sweetie, you don’t need voodoo.”

“But I do!” My voice was getting even louder. “I’m desperate. I need to do something.”

“So do it,” Odette said. “You don’t need voodoo for that.”

“I do if I want to go back to how things were.”

“No, no, Billy, don’t you get it?”

“What? What’s to get? I have to reverse all this. I think my best shot is just to get rid of the frog and get rid of what happened and then I can do something-”

“Billy,” Odette said, standing. She moved around the desk and put a hand on my shoulder. “Listen to me. You don’t need to go back. You just need to begin today. Start doing something. Now.”

I walked through Odette’s crowded restaurant in a daze. A long-haired guy sitting at the bar waved to me. I squinted and realized it was someone I’d known at Northwestern. Normally, I would have sat down and spent the next hour catching up. But now, I barely managed to raise my arm in a wave, before I kept moving, in a trance, through the restaurant and out into the mild night air.

The restaurant was on West Chicago, over two miles from my condo, but I didn’t want a cab whisking me home yet. I put one leaden foot in front of another and walked east, thinking that Odette was right. Exactly, one hundred percent right. She hadn’t said much, but her words about taking action now had made such sense. I’d thought that by getting rid of the frog, I had a chance to go back to the way things had been before. But I hadn’t stopped to think what that would mean. Chris would return to his usual incommunicative ways, Evan would still pat me on the back like a football player, I’d still be slaving in my cubicle (but happily creating), Alexa would still have her job (and still be annoying the hell out of me), my mom would still be miserably locking herself in her house in Barrington, and I’d still be pining for my father. No, I didn’t want that old life back. But I did want to take control of my life.

Before all this happened, I’d had all sorts of control, only I didn’t know it or I didn’t use it. I could have talked to Chris more about the obvious rip through our marriage, and I could have insisted that we get therapy, together. I could have told my mom she needed to back off a little; I could have encouraged her more to take a tennis class or join a book club. And at work, I could have done more than bitch about not being promoted.