I want to ask him about it but I can’t. I try, but nothing comes out, so I just hold up the picture instead. He shakes his head and his face drops like his heart is breaking. “Sky, no,” he says, pleadingly.
“How?” My voice cracks and is barely audible. I look back down to the picture in my hands. “There’s a swing set. And a well. And…your cat. It got stuck in the well.” I dart my eyes up to his and the thoughts keep pouring out. “Holder, I know that living room. The living room is green and the kitchen had a countertop that was way too tall for us and…your mother. Your mother’s name is Beth.” I pause and try to take a breath, because the memories won’t stop. They won’t stop coming and I can’t breathe. “Holder…is Beth your mother’s name?”
Holder grimaces and runs his hands through his hair. “Sky…” he says. He can’t even look at me. His expression is torn and confused and he’s…he’s been lying to me. He’s holding something back and he’s scared to tell me.
He knows me. How the hell does he know me and why hasn’t he told me?
I suddenly feel sick. I rush past him and open the door across the hall, which happens to be a bathroom, thank God. I lock the door behind me and throw the framed picture on the counter, then fall straight to the floor.
The images and memories start inundating my mind like the floodgates have just been lifted. Memories of him, of her, of the three of us together. Memories of us playing, me eating dinner at their house, me and Les being inseparable. I loved her. I was so young and so small and I don’t even know how I knew them, but I loved them. Both of them. The memory is coupled by the grief of now knowing the Lesslie I knew and loved as a little girl is gone. I suddenly feel sad and depressed that she’s gone, but not for me. Not for Sky. I’m sad for the little girl I used to be and somehow her grief over the loss of Lesslie is emerging through me.
How have I not known? How did I not remember him the first time I saw him?
“Sky, open the door. Please.”
I fall back against the wall. It’s too much. The memories and the emotions and the grief…it’s too much to absorb all at once.
“Baby, please. We need to talk and I can’t do it from out here. Please, open the door.”
He knew. The first time he saw me at the grocery store, he knew. And when he saw my bracelet…he knew I got it from Lesslie. He saw me wearing it and he knew.
My grief and confusion soon turn to anger and I push myself up off the floor and walk swiftly to the bathroom door. I unlock it and swing it open. His hands are on either side of the doorframe and he’s looking directly at me, but I feel like I don’t even know who he is. I don’t know what’s real between us and what’s fake anymore. I don’t know what feelings of his are from his life with me or the life with that little girl I used to be.
I need to know. I need to know who she was. Who I was. I swallow my fear and release the question that I’m afraid I already know the answer to. “Who’s Hope?”
His hardened expression doesn’t change, so I ask him again, but louder this time.
“Who the hell is Hope?”
He keeps his eyes locked on mine and his hands placed firmly on the doorframe, but he can’t answer me. For some reason he doesn’t want me to know. He doesn’t want me to remember who I was. I take a deep breath and try to fight back the tears. I’m too scared to say it, because I don’t want to know the answer.
“Is it me?” I ask, my voice shaking and full of trepidation. “Holder…am I Hope?”
He lets out a quick breath at the same time he looks up at the ceiling, almost as if he’s struggling not to cry. He closes his eyes and lays his forehead against his arm, then takes a long, deep breath before looking back at me. “Yes.”
The air around me grows thick. Too thick to take in. I stand still, directly in front of him, unable to move. Everything grows quiet except for what’s inside my head. There are so many thoughts and questions and memories and they’re all trying to take over and I don’t know if I need to cry or scream or sleep or run.
I need to go outside. I feel like Holder and the bathroom and the whole damn house are closing in on me and I need to go outside so there’s room to get everything out of my head. I just want it all out.
I shove past him and he tries to grab my arm, but I yank it out of his grasp.
“Sky, wait,” he yells after me. I keep running until I reach the stairs and I descend them as fast as I can, taking two at a time. I can hear him following me, so I speed up and my foot lands further than I intend for it to. I lose my grip on the rail and fall forward, landing on the floor at the base of the stairs.
“Sky!” he yells. I try to pull myself up but he’s on his knees with his arms around me before I even have the chance. I push against him, wanting him to let go of me so I can just go outside. He doesn’t budge.
“Outside,” I say, breathless and weak. “I just need outside. Please, Holder.”
I can feel him struggling from within, not wanting to release me. He reluctantly pulls me away from his chest and looks down at me, searching my eyes. “Don’t run, Sky. Go outside, but please don’t leave. We need to talk.”