It was still night when I woke, or early, early morning, and storming outside, loud, and booming. Lightning streaked across the sky. The light was grey, the wind tore across the dunes, the sea grass whipped and bent in the gusts. It was spectacular to have that much weather outside and be safe and secure inside.

I squiggled over to Magnus, who was flat on his stomach, and snuggled against his back. I kissed his shoulder and stroked down his side. He didn't move. I rubbed up and down along his side, and then because he wouldn't wake up, coughed to see if I could jar him awake and pretend like I hadn't.

It was sort of lonely to be in his bed without him talking to me. And it had been a few hours, plus our wedding night.

I whispered, “Magnus? Magnus wake up?” He remained immobile. “Magnus?” I sat up and shook his shoulder, and finally, shoved him to his back, lifeless.

Blood rushed to my head and I went from sleep to full panic in a second. “Magnus, oh my god, Magnus?” I put my ear to his chest, his lungs. “Magnus?” Two fingers on his neck. I pressed and waited. There was a heartbeat, light, shallow breaths. “Magnus!?” Completely unresponsive.

I jumped from the bed, raced to the dresser, and dug through drawers for a pair of boxers and a T-shirt. “Magnus, Magnus wake up?” I yanked the clothes on. “Magnus, you're scaring me, get up, okay?”

I raced for the sliding door, yanked it open, and stepped on the porch. The security guard was in a chair at the other end, and I couldn't remember which one it was. “Hey, I need help, Magnus is...” His head lolled forward on his chest, “Hey! Hey! Help.” A lightning bolt streaked across the sky directly for the beach in front of the house, I pulled into the room, slammed the door shut, and raced for the living room. “Zach! Zach! Emma!” I climbed the stairs two at a time to the second floor and banged on the door of Zach and Emma's room.

There was no sound from inside, so I shoved the door open. They were both in bed, television flickering, volume completely down, not moving, not responding. “Oh no, oh no, oh no.” I raced down the hall past the nurse's room, she had gone to her own home to sleep. Lady Mairead's door was locked. I banged, to no avail.

I raced back down the stairs to our room and climbed on the bed. “Please wake up Magnus, please, wake up. You're scaring me.” I shook him and then rubbed the side of his face. “Magnus, everyone is asleep. No one will wake up. Magnus help me. I don't know what to do.” Should I call 911? What would they do, would they wake everyone up? Somehow? Could I google how to wake up a whole household of unnaturally sleeping people?

“Magnus? Please?” I massaged down his arms to his fingers and then his calves to his feet, not even an extra breath or a moan or anything like waking. What had happened? My eyes swept the room. The cake. There were two crumbs on the plate, the rest, eaten. The glasses of... I sniffed a glass. Champagne, were mostly finished.

I returned to the porch. The wind whipped my hair, grabbed at my clothes. I bent into the wind to make it to the security guard's position, finally remembering his name was Jim — something. “Jim! Jim!” He had a plate with a half-eaten slice of cake under his seat. He also had no roof over his head and rain was headed up the walkway. Jim was a lunk of a man, there was no way I was moving him, dragging him inside.

I spun taking in the deck. At the far end was a table with a standing umbrella. The wind gusted so hard it almost knocked me from my feet. I grabbed the umbrella, pulled it from the table, struggled keeping it from ripping free of my hands, and carried it racing to the security guard's chair. I shoved the umbrella stick into the slats between Jim's side and the chair and angled it toward the storm. Then I struggled mightily to open it against the wind. “Jim! Jim! Wake up you mother fucker, wake up!!” He was the worst freaking security guard in the world. What the hell was going on? The umbrella was open and it was not a good plan. What if the umbrella attracted lightning?

As if to scare me further, lightning raced across the sky and struck a bush in the dunes between my walkway and the neighbor's. Crap. But, there was nothing I could do. Jim was an easy two hundred and forty pounds of dead weight.

I needed someone to help.

I raced back up the stairs to Zach's room. “Zach wake up. Wake up.” Emma's side of the bed had a plate on it, with a couple of cake crumbs. But Zach's was empty — maybe they shared, maybe he only had a bite — “Zach?” I stood over him and shook his shoulder, then I shook it harder. “Zach!”

He mumbled something.

“Zach!” I yelled into his ear. His eyes fluttered open but then closed again. “Zach I need your help, something is wrong with Emma and Magnus, please, help me.” His eyes fluttered open.

“Katie?” Then they closed again and he was back dead to the world.

“Did you eat cake? Zach?” His eyes opened briefly and he looked around then closed them again. I raced into their bathroom, grabbed a cup near their toothbrushes, and filled it with water from the sink.

I brought it to Zach, tried to rouse him to drink, and then in a panic just threw the whole thing in his face.

He spluttered. “Jeez Katie, what was—”

I was probably terrifying. My hair and eyes wild, the color drained from my face. “Something happened. I think something was in the cake. Oh my god, Zach, something is wrong with Magnus, he won't wake up, Emma won't wake up.”

He turned confused to Emma and shook her shoulder. “Emma, baby? You okay?” He sat up, groggily, rubbed his eyes, and looked around. Then back at Emma. “Baby, wake up?” He looked at me, his eyes unfocused and his mind still confused. “What happened?”

I burst into tears.

“Zach help me. I don't know what to do.”

He swung his legs off the bed with a groan then dropped his head into his hands. “Tell me again?”

“The cake. The cake, something was in — I need to go back downstairs, something might be really wrong, Magnus isn't — stay here and try to wake Emma.”

I raced to our room, dove onto the bed, and began shaking Magnus's shoulder again. “Magnus!” This time his breathing changed. He shifted. “Magnus!” I kept shaking and massaging and cajoling him to wake up. Pleading with him to please. Slowly, seeing more and more movement.

Zach appeared. Wobbly and dazed. “Did he wake yet? Emma is coming around.”

I was on my knees on the bed beside Magnus clutching his hand in mine pleading for him to please wake up. I said, “The security guard is asleep too—”

“Jim is fucking asleep, are you kidding me?”

I massaged and shook Magnus's shoulder, his eyes were fluttering.

I asked, “Have you checked on Lady Mairead?”

“She's not down here? What the fuck is going on?”

The sliding door opened and Jim, sopping wet, staggered in. “Is everyone okay? Something knocked me out hard, there's a storm, and an umbrella was stuck to my chair.”

Zach said, “Jim the whole house has been knocked out, Magnus is still, I'm going back to Emma.” Jim rushed behind him up the stairs.

Magnus's fingers wiggled in my hand. I knelt over him. “Magnus, please wake up, I need you to stop sleeping, because you're really scaring me.”

A few minutes later Jim returned. “How is he? Emma is awake, groggy but awake.”

“He's not waking, not yet.”

“I'm implementing a full Lights Out, and a search for Lady Mairead.”

I had a full edge of hysterical panic now. “I don't know what that is, what is it? I don't know how to—”

Jim said, “Just stay here, try to wake him.” He turned off the lights and left.

I sat on the bed, in the dark, hovering over my husband, whispering. “Please wake up Magnus, something happened and I don't know what to do, should I call 911? Please wake up.”

Zach came in, sort of stumbled to the bed, and sat on the edge. “Katie I'm sorry I'm not much help, I'm trying to get my wits about me. He'll wake up in a moment, if we have.”

“What was in that cake?”

“I don't know, I swear Katie, it wasn't me.”

“I didn't think you—”

The motorized shades buzzed closed, then the whole house powered down. Zack said, “I need to go back to Emma, so she's not scared.”

Zach's footsteps crept up the stairs and the security guard came into the room and stealthily checked the closets and under the bed.

I pressed my lips to the back of Magnus's hand. “Please. You're scaring me.”