“Where did she go, Eddie?” She pressed.
Well, that was an easy answer. “I don’t know.”
“Is this me?” Her voice was raw, scared.
I went to her, trying to pull her into my arms.
Her hands shot up defensively. “Stay back.”
I stopped walking. Pressure built up in my chest, making it hard to breathe. I glanced down at the photograph in her hand, at the past, and felt sorrow and confusion bubble up inside me. “Please, Am.” I tried again.
“Do you know me?” she whispered, relentless. “Is the girl in this picture me?”
“No,” I said, flat.
Her arms fell to her sides, utter disappointment written on her face. “I don’t believe you,” she rasped. “Why else would people whisper about us in the aisles of the store? What other explanation is there for the strange comments some people make or the way they look at me like they’ve seen a ghost?”
I stepped forward; she stepped back.
“The lake isn’t the only thing keeping secrets. This entire town is keeping a secret, and that secret is me!” she burst out. “Don’t lie to me!”
“Why is it so easy to suppose I’m lying to you?” I exclaimed.
“Why else…?” She paced away, then back, looked down at the photo and then back up. “Why else would you act like you’re obsessed with me?”
“Because I am obsessed with you!” I burst out. The second I heard my own voice, my own words, horror stole over me. My eyes rounded so wide my skin stretched taut over my face.
Reluctantly, I looked up at Amnesia. Her wide-eyed reaction was exactly what I was hoping not to see, but I knew full well it was the only one I would get.
Gentling my voice, I tried to backtrack. “That came out wrong.” The husky tone in my voice christened me a liar. “Actually,” I confessed, “no, it didn’t. It’s true. I am obsessed with you, Am. I have been since that night I found you floating in the lake.”
I knew it was unhealthy. Everyone looked at me with pity, with worry. Poor Eddie the victim who really wasn’t. I should have gotten over that night all those years ago. I should have learned to move on, but I couldn’t. I was haunted. Haunted by the lake. The memories… the what-ifs.
Everyone here in Lake Loch loved me, but I wasn’t an idiot. As much as I charmed them, when I walked away, sometimes they would whisper. Sometimes they would speculate.
He’s never been right since that night.
He’s a ticking time bomb.
Poor Forest and Claire. Their only son unbalanced.
He’s trying to assuage his guilt with her. He thinks he has a second chance.
“Why?” Amnesia whispered. The fact she backed away a few steps was something I didn’t miss. In fact, the newfound distance cut me like a knife. Not just the physical distance, but the mental barriers I felt her preparing to throw up.
I wouldn’t survive this twice.
Maybe the town had it right. Maybe I was unbalanced.
“I wouldn’t hurt you,” I told her, practically begging her to believe me. “I would hurt myself before I ever hurt you. I’d kill anyone who tried.”
Her breath rushed in. “Murder isn’t a joke.”
“I know that. I’m not joking. Given the choice between you and anyone else, I would choose you. Always.”
“You don’t even know me.” She was bewildered. I guess I understood that. But she didn’t know.
“Yes, I do.”
“Why, Eddie?” she cried, clutching the picture I wished she hadn’t found.
Why was I obsessed with her? Why did I claim to know her? Why had I been there since that night? Why, why, why?
Regret turned my voice into sandpaper. “I can’t tell you.”
“Can’t or won’t?” She was angry.
I couldn’t even blame her. I was angry, too. So angry it nearly drained me dry.
“Both.”
“Please, Eddie,” she pleaded, taking a step closer, holding the image out between us.
My entire body groaned as if it were trying to hold up the weight of the world. I felt my muscles straining, my resolve weakening.
How could I deny her anything? Especially when she had every right to know.
“Please tell me.”
I took a step forward, bringing us that much closer together. Am reached for my hand, and I surrendered it readily. She gave me a light shake, and the vibration traveled up my arm, tingling my heart.
Solemnly, my eyes searched hers. I felt this was a make-or-break moment for us. I wanted her so badly, so very badly.
“I can’t.” My head shook once.
Her fingers slipped away, her body floating backward. The picture in her grasp fell to the floor, crumpled from her grip. “Then I can’t trust you.”
“No, I guess you can’t.” I agreed, feeling as though my heart were literally being ripped from my chest.
“Good-bye, Eddie,” she whispered, turned, and walked out of the house without looking back.
I stood there for long moments, allowing the crushing weight of her rejection to splinter every part of me.
She was long gone. Silence wrapped around me, but I spoke anyway.
“Please, don’t go.”
My life was a beautiful lie. And beneath the beautiful lie lurked an ugly truth. I wanted to ignore it, to start over and let go of whatever brought me here.
People here knew more than they would say. I was in the dark, kept out of my own life.
The look on Eddie's face when I walked away was almost enough to make me stay.
Just like my plea was almost enough to make him talk.
Almost wasn't good enough. Not from him.
I wanted desperately to trust him. But I couldn’t, not when he all but admitted he was lying.
If I was going to use my blank memory as a clean slate to start over, it had to remain clean. Eddie’s lies were dirty. I felt dirty now. Dirty and filled with sorrow.
I wondered if the entire town knew what I didn't. Maggie? Dr. Beck? Even Dr. Kline? They all acted as if they were trying to help, but deceiving me wasn’t help.
The entire walk to Maggie’s was a blur, my thoughts too loud for me to really pay attention to anything. Her car wasn’t in the driveway when I walked up. Relief nearly made me sag. I wasn’t up to facing her right now, confronting her about what she might or might not know.
Using the key she gave me, I let myself in. The house was quiet when I walked through the living room. Wherever she was, she must have taken Elmo. In my room, I flopped across the bed belly first. I thought about burying my head in the pillow to cry, but tears didn’t come because I didn’t know what I would be crying about.
I shoved up away from the bed, rubbing my hands over my dry face. I really did feel dirty. My skin felt taut over my muscles, as if the tension in my body were making me tight. After rummaging around in the dresser for some clean clothes, I went across the hall to shower. Maybe the water would help wash away the worst of how I was feeling.
Just the sound of the falling spray soothed some of the tension away, making me eager to step beneath it. Where did I go from here? I wanted to stay in Lake Loch. Even though I didn’t technically have a home here, the place itself still felt like home. Was it because it was all I really knew or something else?