“It’s been a weird day.”
“The memory threw you for a loop?”
Am nodded and sat up. “Yeah. And ever since, I’ve had this weird sense of… foreboding.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to make her feel better. I wasn’t sure anything could. I kissed her temple and asked, “Still want to stay at my place tonight?”
“Of course,” she retorted.
“Good! Come help me downstairs in the stock room so we can finish up and get out of here.”
I sent Brian home an hour before closing, and it took nearly the entire two hours to finish up the inventory in the back. Of course, some of that time was spent making out between stacks of boxes… but I wasn’t really counting.
At five ‘til nine, I turned the open sign to closed and locked up the store. Am and I left out the back entrance, where my truck was parked.
“You can see the moon’s reflection in the lake.” Her voice was hushed as she gazed down at the water.
“When I was in high school, my English teacher was a real romantic.” I scoffed. “She said something one time that made all the girls swoon and all the guys roll their eyes. But even so, I still think about it sometimes when the moon is low in the sky.”
Amnesia looked away from the water and the moon and up at me. “What did she say?”
“The sun sees your body, but the moon sees your soul.”
“That’s beautiful.” She contemplated the words. “Do you think it’s true?”
Thoughtfully, I nodded. “I think darkness is far more revealing than sunlight.”
The drive back home was quiet and short. I parked close to the house. The only light when the headlights went off was from the moon. She waited inside the cab for me to come around and lift her down. I knew she didn’t need the help, but it was just one more reason for me touch her.
As we walked along to the back door, Am caught my hand. “Let’s walk down by the shore.”
“Put your hands in your pockets so they don’t get cold,” I ordered, reversing direction toward the lake.
“You’re bossy,” she muttered even as she stuffed the hand I wasn’t holding into the pocket of her hoodie.
“Just looking out for my girl,” I said, lifting our joined hands and tucking them both into the pocket of my hoodie.
She smiled.
“Do you ever go out on the lake? You know, since that night?”
“I have a couple times. Mostly just to fish. It’s not my favorite place to be. It brings up a lot of, ah, memories. Guilt.”
“Yet you live on the water.” She pondered.
I shrugged. It was a paradox. “Yeah, as much as I dislike the lake, I’m drawn to it.”
Her voice was soft when she replied. “I can understand that.” After a moment, she spoke. “You blame yourself.”
“It’s hard not to. If I hadn’t insisted on doing that stupid dare, Sadie might still be here.”
“I might not be.”
I stopped walking, turning so we were facing each other. Down here, the water lapping at the shore was the loudest sound in the night. The breeze off the water was strong, and there was a slight bite to the air.
“I didn’t mean it that way.” I started. “I’m so glad you’re here, but that’s eleven years she’ll never get back. You’ll never get back.”
“Neither will you.”
A disgusted sound ripped from my throat. “I don’t matter.”
“You matter to me.” The words carried on the wind, somehow extending their life.
My heart lodged in my throat, making it hard to swallow.
We walked along some more, not quite close enough for the water to touch us, but enough that if a strong wave came in, it would.
“Tell me what you remembered today.” I cajoled, knowing it was hard for her but also sensing she wanted to talk.
“I’m the one that made my hair look the way it did before, all uneven and messed up.”
That surprised me. It was probably the last thing I expected. “You cut your hair?”
“With scissors,” she admitted. “I did it as some sort of revenge or something. He liked my hair… said it was his, and one day I snapped, started hacking it up to spite him.”
I swallowed, the lump in my throat only growing thicker. “Maybe that was the only thing you had in the moment to feel in control.” I reasoned.
“He broke my arm in punishment.” Her voice was flat, almost disconnected.
I stumbled. “He what?”
She stopped beside me, turned, and all the hair blew into her face, concealing it. It was dark out here, but the shadows in her eyes weren’t because of the night. “I can still feel the way his boot pinned my fingers to the floor. He stomped on it,” she murmured, her voice far away. As she spoke, her hand wrapped around her arm, near her elbow, as if the pain were still there. “I heard the bone snap.”
The string of dark curse words I let loose were ripped away with the violence of a sudden wind. “Jesus,” I muttered, pulling her into my chest. “I’m so fucking sorry, Am.”
“It’s not your fault, Eddie.”
I would forever feel it was.
“Did you remember anything else?” I asked, my words coming out harsh.
“No. That was enough.”
Wrapping an arm around her, we started walking again. She tucked her hand back into my pocket, though she could have used her own. Tenderness swelled inside me; it matched the anger I was consumed with knowing someone had once treated her that way.
If I knew who it was, I’d destroy him. “Did you see a face in the memory, Am? Something that would help you recognize who did this to you.”
“No,” she answered, forlorn. “Even if I did, I probably wouldn’t recognize them.”
Still. A face was better than nothing. We could do police sketches, look at criminal profiles… something. Hell, anything to make this bastard pay.
We walked along a few moments more. Amnesia gazed out across the ever-fluent water and the shimmering reflection of the moon.
“Did they search Rumor Island after Sadie disappeared?” Even though she was right here in my arms, her voice seemed far away.
“They searched everywhere,” I told her. “Including the island. More than once.”
“What was out there?”
“Nothing. Just Widow West alone on the island in her old house. The police interviewed her a few times, wanting to know if she saw or heard anything that night. The island was looked at closely because that’s where we’d been going when the boat flipped.”
Amnesia glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. “She didn’t see anything?”
“No. They searched the entire island. It’s pretty wooded with old trees and bushes. There’s a small beach on the back side. That’s where the dock is and where she keeps her boat.”