Being Henry David

11

“Here you go. I found a couple more.” Thomas brings over two more books and sets them on top of the stack he already gave me. Jesus. The guy is just way too into this research thing.

Sitting in the Thoreau room at the library, I flip through books on memory and memory loss, hopefully to get a handle on how this thing happened to me and, maybe, how to reverse it. I’m not sure the answer to that lies in these books, but Thomas is all about research, so whatever.

Amnesia can be caused by physical trauma like a crack on the head, the books say. Or, it can be a result of emotional trauma. Like if something really terrible happened, too traumatic to deal with, your brain blocks it out. It’s the brain protecting itself, a defense mechanism. Kind of cool and weird at the same time, when you think about it.

Basically all the books agree on one thing: the brain is a mystery. And what causes memory loss and what brings it back are things people don’t completely understand. Great. That’s no help at all.

What if I never get my memory back? I figure I have two choices: Create a life with no past, starting here and now. Or go to the Concord Police Department and turn myself in. They’d call the media and put me on the news, and eventually someone would see me and identify me. I’d be taken home to parents I don’t remember, a life that I apparently ran away from. If they want me back, that is. Then there’s the chance that I’m facing jail time. All of which make option number one sound like the best choice: creating my own life, on my own terms, something like what Thoreau did.

“Did those books help?” Thomas asks me, setting one more book on top of the pile, which threatens to topple over.

“Basically they say I might remember a little at a time, remember everything at once, or never remember another thing for the rest of my life.”

“Hmm,” says Thomas, scratching his bearded chin. “Well, that leaves things pretty much open, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” I say, leaning back with my feet straight out and my arms crossed over my chest, shutting down. “Sucks.”

“Listen, Hank, I have an idea. There’s this database for missing kids. We can bring it up on the computer and see if you’re on it.”

He signs me up for one of the library computers, and together we go online. And there it is, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. My heart jumps in my chest, just looking at those words. Missing. Exploited. Which am I?

“Any particular state you’d like to start with?” Thomas asks.

“How about New York,” I say. Makes sense. It’s where I woke up.

A few swipes on the keyboard, and he has opened up a page of missing kids from the state of New York. Over a hundred of them.

“Okay, Hank, go to it,” Thomas says. “I need to get back to work. Let me know if you find anything significant.”

“You’re brilliant,” I tell him.

“I know. Although, of course, if you don’t find yourself listed there, it’s just one more bit of evidence to prove my little theory.”

“That I’m the second coming of Thoreau,” I say dryly.

“Exactly.” He heads back toward his desk, then stops and says quickly, “If a man loses pace with his companions—”

“Perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured, or far away. Oh come on, Thomas. That was an easy one.”

Leaning over the computer screen with sweaty palms, I scan the pictures and read the listings. Date of birth. Age. Date the kid went missing. There are endangered runaways. Endangered missing. Family abduction. Non-family abduction. A John Doe with no picture is a possible homicide victim. This is a scary world to be visiting, even online, and somehow I’m a part of it. Creepy.

I’m confused when I see pictures of adults, with ages like forty-five or fifty-seven, until I realize they’ve been missing since they were kids. Somebody did age-progression computer imaging and some of the people look weirdly unnatural. I guess it’s not easy to take a picture of a four-year-old and try to figure out what he or she would look like at age fifty-seven. God, there are families who never give up, ever. Is my family one of those? Or were they glad when I disappeared? Nobody will miss you.

I check all the pictures of the missing children from New York, and I don’t find myself there. So I decide there’s nothing to do but start from the beginning with Alabama and go through every single state in the country, look at every single picture of every single missing kid, to see if I pop up.

Two hours later, my back is cramping up, I’ve only made it as far as Connecticut, and all the faces are starting to look the same. What a depressing task this is. All these kids with families who can’t find them. Or even worse, all the John Does and Jane Does who have been found, probably dead, and nobody even knows who they are, or were.

If I were to turn myself in to the police, is that what they’d call me? John Doe? A chill prickles down my spine.

That chill climbs up my neck and into the roots of my hair when I look at the last page of pictures from Connecticut. That’s when I see a face I know and almost fall right out of my chair. The kid’s hair is combed and cut shorter and the clothes are actually clean, but I still know him. I know the straight nose, the strong mouth and that stubborn tilt of his chin, like he’s daring someone to smash him in the jaw.

Jack.

John Alexander Zane, the listing says. Endangered runaway. His date of birth tells me he turned sixteen last week. He has been missing from Bridgeport, Connecticut, for about a month. So he and Nessa had only been on the streets for a month?

One picture beneath his is the female version of Jack. It’s Nessa, smiling in what looks like a high school portrait. I hadn’t realized how much they look alike. Vanessa Lee Zane. She’s barely fifteen.

For a second, I want to call the number listed and report that I’ve seen them, so at least one of these desperate families can know what happened to their kids. Maybe there’s an aunt or somebody who would take them in, get them away from Magpie and off the streets. But then I remember the look on Jack’s face when he said he’d never go back home. Something bad happened with their dad, and I can’t be the one to potentially send them back to it.

Thomas pops in to check on me. “Anything yet?” I decide not to tell him about Jack and Nessa, figuring it would do nobody any good.

I shrug. “Not yet. My neck is starting to cramp up from all this computer stuff.”

“So close it down for now and come help me,” Thomas says. “We’ve got a bunch of shelving to do over in fiction. I could slip you a few bucks if you’ll help me out. Sound good?”

I grin at him. “Money always sounds good.”

The Battle of the Bands is only one week away, but Hailey is able to pull together a couple musicians to play with us. The drummer is this laid-back stocky guy named Sam who plays in the school jazz band, and the bass player is a friend of hers from English lit class, named Ryan. Ryan, a short, thin guy with glasses, has never played with a band before, but she says he’s taking lessons and is ready to play. So we all show up together to rehearse for the first time Monday afternoon on the high school stage. Hailey introduces me to everybody as a new transfer student. I wonder how long I’ll be able to get away with that.

Secrecy, as it turns out, is a big part of the Battle of the Bands event at Thoreau High. The windows on the auditorium doors are covered with black paper so nobody can peek in from the hallway, and only one band at a time rehearses with the stage crew to keep everything a surprise until performance night.

Bands are allowed to play one to three songs. Of course we choose just one, “Blackbird,” hoping we can even pull that off. Sam, Ryan, Hailey, and I set up our gear on the stage and take a few moments to tune up.

“Okay, let’s try it like this,” I suggest. “It’ll start with Hailey and me, guitar and voice, for the first part of the song, nice and easy like a ballad. But as we go into it a second time, you guys join in and we totally rock it out through the end. Want to give it a shot?”

We start the song just like Hailey and I had been practicing in the white room. Guitar and voice, the two of us together. Hailey starts out strong, with that gorgeous voice of hers. But then, she starts to waver. She stops singing, swallows hard. “Can we start over?” she asks me.

“Of course.”

“Need something, Hailey?” Ms. Coleman asks from the auditorium seats. “I brought a few candy bars along just in case.”

Hailey looks embarrassed but shakes her head. “No, I’m fine,” she says. “Just nerves.”

I begin the intro again, cutting her a meaningful look. You can do this, Hailey.

Even though her voice is tentative, she makes it through the song the first time through, and the rest of the band comes crashing in. It’s total chaos. We sound like crap.

“Whoa. Hold on, hold on,” I say, waving my arms to stop them. “You came in too soon. And Ryan, you have that progression wrong. I don’t know what that last note was, but it wasn’t right.”

Ryan’s face turns bright red, but he nods. “You’re right,” he says. “Sorry, just a little nervous. I’ll get it.” I take a deep breath and remind myself this was our first time through. Not a total disaster, not yet. Relax.“Let’s start from where you guys come in, okay?” I count it off, and we sail into the next verse. Sam gets it immediately, adding just the right touches on snare and cymbal. Ryan screws up again, but at least we finish the verse.

“I’ll get it,” Ryan insists.

We take it from the top again, and this time, Hailey sounds stronger. We limp through the part with Ryan, then do it again. And again.

“Okay, it’s almost time for the next group to come in.” Ms. Coleman comes up and joins us on the stage. “That’s… really coming along.” Which is probably the nicest thing she can think of to say. “So let’s talk staging and some really basic special effects. What did you have in mind?”

I shrug. All my focus was just on the music, but clearly Hailey has been thinking about the rest. She and Ms. Coleman sit on the edge of the stage, and Ms. Coleman makes notes on a yellow legal pad.

“Sounds great, Sam,” I tell the drummer. “Ryan, well, dude, you’re getting there.”

Ryan’s face burns as he puts his bass in its case. “I’ll work on it at home. I’ll get it,” he says again.

“I know you will,” I say, hoping like hell.

“One more thing,” Ms. Coleman says. “What’s the name of your band?”

The four of us look at each other. We hadn’t given that detail any thought at all.

“Can we get back to you on that?” Hailey asks.

“All right, just let me know as soon as possible so we can put it in the program,” says Ms. Coleman. “Good work today. Be here at seven on Saturday, ready to play.”

“We will,” Hailey says. She turns to the rest of us. “Can you all practice at my house Wednesday afternoon? Like three o’clock?” Everybody says yes.

Her cheeks are pink and she looks excited, but there’s this wild thing lurking behind her green eyes and I know she’s also terrified that this year will be a replay of what happened last time. I want to tell her to relax, it’s going to be great, that she’s going to be amazing.

But I never get the chance, because just then the back door of the auditorium crashes shut like a gunshot. This time, thank God, I don’t collapse onto the floor. But then I see who came in, letting the door slam like he did it on purpose: Cameron. And he looks pissed.

“Uh-oh,” I hear Hailey breathe beside me.

“Cameron, you know the rules,” says Ms. Coleman. “You’re supposed to wait in the hall until someone from the crew comes to get you.”

Cameron’s eyes are locked onto Hailey’s, but he responds to Ms. Coleman. “I’m sorry. Guess I forgot.”

“That’s okay, I think these folks are done.” She shoots Hailey a questioning glance, and Hailey nods. “You can bring your group in now, Cameron.”

“Cameron has a group?” I whisper to Hailey.

“Yep,” she says, biting her lip. “It used to be my group.”

While Sam, Ryan, and I gather our gear together, Cameron pulls Hailey over to the side of the stage and I try to eavesdrop. They talk in hushed tones so it’s hard to hear, until the voices rise in argument. Coiling a cable, I draw closer to listen.

“Why the hell should you care? You have another lead singer now,” Hailey says.

“That’s only because you said you wouldn’t do it,” Cameron argues, yanking his cap off, as if his anger makes it too tight on his head. Their voices lower again and I can’t hear the rest.

“Hank.”

Someone calls my name from the auditorium doorway. Sophie the janitor stands in the hallway, waving me over with a blue rag in her hand. What does she want? Am I in trouble? Did she or the dread-lock janitor decide to turn me in? Pushing aside my nervousness, I hop off the stage to join her.

“Hey, Sophie,” I say, all casual. “What’s up?”

Sophie’s kind brown eyes scan my face like she’s trying to absorb that part of me that reminds her of her son.

“Did your friends ever find you?” she asks. Her gray-black hair is wild today, full of static electricity. Like if I touch it, I might get a shock.

“What friends?”

“They came into the school asking after some new kid, and from their description, I knew immediately it was you.” She wipes her hands on the blue cloth and stuffs it into the back pocket of her overalls.

Ice-cold fear trumps the nervousness in my gut.

“What did these people look like, Sophie?” I fight an urge to shake her.

“They were two young men, like you,” she says. “But of course, most people look young to me these days.” Her smile creates a web of wrinkles around her eyes, but my face is frozen and I can’t smile back.

Could she mean Magpie? Was it naïve of me to think Magpie would just give up and let me go? After all, we know too much about each other. I know he’s into drug dealing and taking advantage of street kids, and he knows what I did to Simon in that alley. But it’s not possible that he tracked me all the way to Concord. Is it?

“Are you doing okay, Hank?” Sophie looks like she wants to check me again for signs of a fever. “Ever since you left the school, I’ve been worried about you.”

“Oh, sure,” I say, forcing a smile. “I’m fine, really.” She’s a sweet lady, but I just want to be done talking to her. In fact, I want to bolt out of this room. “Thanks for letting me know about my, uh, friends.”

The auditorium door slams shut again, jarring me to the bone, and there’s a flurry of voices as the rest of Cameron’s band files into the room, pulling Cameron away from Hailey to set up. The lead singer is this skinny girl dressed all in black with straight blond hair, dyed pink at the tips. She gives Hailey a superior smirk, like she’s proud that she’s taken Hailey’s place in the band. Whatever. There’s no way she’s as good.

Ms. Coleman shoos us out of the auditorium so Cameron’s band can set up. Out in the hallway, we say good-bye to Sam and Ryan and they take off, leaving Hailey and me alone together. Her cheeks are red after her exchange with Cameron, and her green eyes flash.

“Let’s get out of here,” I suggest. “You want to go downtown?”

“Yes. Need ice cream, stat,” she says and manages a tight smile. “By the way, what did the janitor want? I saw her talking to you.”

“Nothing. She just kind of likes me, I guess.”

“Of course she does.” Hailey reaches over, so easy, and takes my hand. Hers is warm and soft and fits perfectly into mine. “She’s a sweet lady, but a little crazy,” she says with a shrug. “That’s what people say anyway.”

“Yeah.” But I know she’s not that crazy. Still, it’s not possible that somebody really did come looking for me, not here in Concord, Massachusetts. Is it?

Don’t think about it.