The fond memories of our hide-and-seek game solidified into realization. Granny and I had our share of secrets too.
Travis concentrated on driving. I concentrated on him. My fingers ached to touch him. “Will you ever forgive me?”
It was a loaded question and unfair. He sobered, his face once again chiseled in stone. “What you do on your own time is your own business.”
“I didn’t do anything.” Much. I hope.
The radio pulsed in the background, a dull throb that mimicked the one in my head.
“Look, Gemini. I saw the video, and like I said, you are free to do whatever you want.”
Tell him the truth, Rae urged gently.
What is the truth?
You didn’t do anything.
Obviously I did. Just look online.
But it wasn’t you.
Videos don’t lie.
Tell him the truth, Gemi.
There is no truth.
“It wasn’t me.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” The look on his face twisted into something ugly and unfamiliar.
Unable to explain myself, I shrugged. Physically, it was me on the screen. I couldn’t hide from that. But was it me?
Of course it was. You can’t have it two ways.
“I don’t remember doing that.” I cringed even as the words left my lips, knowing they sounded weak and cheap.
“Convenient, that little memory thing of yours.”
Heat flared. “What does that mean?”
“It means, how long have you used that excuse on me?”
“What excuse?”
“Your wide-eyed confusion. ‘Oh, where am I? What’s the score?’ If you didn’t want to be with me, you just had to tell me. You didn’t have to hide behind your memory loss.”
My heart hammered in my chest, and it felt like Brutus would break free and rip Travis apart. “Is that what you think?”
“You’ve done it before. If it worked once, why not try again? You could conveniently forget about me when someone else came along. Someone you actually wanted to be with.”
“That’s not true.”
When Travis finally spoke, his sarcasm bit deep. “Oh right. The night your granny died you begged me to take you. ”
I shook my head. “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“You don’t remember? Did I just blend in with the other guys, Gem?” His pet name for me came out a caress. It hurt worse than his anger.
I huddled against the door and tried to bring my empty memories to life. I knew I’d lost time that night, but I had been grieving. Not cozying up with anyone. Not even Travis. It was just too much to contemplate. Especially when I’d just seen a video of myself online. We drove the rest of the way in silence. When I couldn’t stand being with him a second longer, the acrid smell of smoke filled the air. The truck turned onto the gravel road. The view outside the window was surreal. Flames licked a smoky plume as it rose above the tree tops.
Travis parked at the end of the driveway, and we walked halfway up. A fireman stopped us from coming too far and interfering with their job. Old Man Parson paced around in his dirty winter clothes and fur-lined hat. A cameraman stood by, snapping pictures for the local paper. My parents, too, stood on the perimeter, my dad chatting with a policeman. I wondered where they’d found them.
My head spun. I sat on the rusted swing beside the garage to keep from collapsing on the frozen ground. I watched the bizarre dance of water, ice and flame as they fought for control of the house. Firemen aimed streams of water into my bedroom through the busted window, flooding my sanctuary.
Thank God my books were packed away in the unattached garage.
One small favor turned my way.
My world unraveled through dragonfly eyes. I experienced the fire from a multitude of angles. Each one with a set of emotions. Some wept. Some keened. Some laughed. Others tensed with anger.
My parents moved away from the policemen. Travis approached. Sickness filled my stomach, threatening to overflow onto the ash covered snow.
My dad shrunk back. The fire tamed. Applause erupted and Mom wept.
A cold stillness followed.
Travis turned.
I traced every stride of his with my kaleidoscope eyes. A thousand steps, a thousand legs marched my way. The queasiness grew. I toppled out of the rubber seat and retched into the snow.
Travis lifted me back to the swing. I knew he was real from his hands—only one pair under my arms, one heat across my skin, even through the thickness of my down jacket. There was only one Travis now. He let me go and stepped away.
A police officer neared. His lips moved. I stared at him, unable to focus on anything but his nose. Freckled in the midst of his winter pale. His nose creased, and he reached for his phone.
Something deep inside nudged me.
I awakened, a lie on my tongue.
He nodded, relieved, and moved on.
We watched. My dad, Mom, Travis and I.
Someone pressed a mug of hot cocoa into my shaking hands. Mr. Parson.
We stomped to stay warm. We remained silent to conserve our fears.
A flash blinded me. And another. The forced blinks restored my vision of the smoky wall rising into the afternoon air.
The fire trucks left.
The police left.
The gawkers that had gathered faded away with the rumble of engines and the crunch of tires on snow.
Travis tugged my arm. “Gemi, you have to leave sometime.”
I nodded, but when I started to move, my feet carried me toward the house. Yellow tape blocked the entrances and surrounded the house. “Keep out,” it screamed.
I ignored the warning and pushed into the entry.
The kitchen was destroyed. Soot, water and smoke obscured the tile. An ice-crusted tomb encased the cupboards. Water lapped at my calves and soggy cereal boxes floated by. When I stepped into the hall and peered toward the back of the house, I saw sky and trees. Huge holes had been eaten out of the walls.
The stairs called to me, and I tentatively stepped forward. Would they hold me? I didn’t care. Travis followed behind, and I wondered vaguely if he planned to catch me should I fall, or stand by and watch me plummet through the staircase into the basement.
I reached the landing without incident and continued up. Boot tracks in the soot led to the top of the stairs. More sky, more trees, more holes. The hall ended, the back half of the upstairs was missing, and I saw the den with the computer desk crippled under the heat of the fire. The space where the fake tree stood was nothing but ash. I would never know if Mom decorated it in time for Christmas.
To my left, the door had been hacked open by an axe. The drenched blue and red striped curtains hung limply across the window. The train set connected the rocking chair and the bed in a woven path across the wooden floor. The yellow paint peeked through where gloved hands smeared the ash away. I picked the dream catcher up off the floor and tucked it in my pocket.
Blackness closed in.
I fought against it, willing myself to stay present. The sweet strains of classical music tugged me forward, along the train tracks and into my past. I blinked, once, twice, clearing my head. I struggled out of Trav’s arms, peered into the blackened bones and the hollowness of it all. Memories emerged from the ruins. Little snippets of a boy and a girl. Blonde and small, running down the hall. Slamming doors during games of hide and seek. Laughter filled the air.
Jimmy.
My world wavered. I said the name out loud, forcing his ghost to turn. He smiled. Two missing teeth and dimples. Sunshine in the winter light.
“Gemi.” Trav’s voice cut through the image and the haze crept forward. I jammed my thumbs into my temples, pushing against the blackness that promised to deliver another hole in my memories.
Laughter sounded from behind me. I turned and looked into my own eyes. A child of six. A smile matching mine, but with twin gaps.
She ran past
me, into the room, and slammed the door. I forced it open in my mind and followed her into the yellow room as it was before the fire, before the loss of my childhood. Jimmy sat on the floor, his gray-green eyes flashing mischievously. The child me sat in the rocking chair. A ball of orange yarn wound up through my knitting needles. A spray of knit feathers rested on my lap.
Somewhere below the dream room a door opened, squeaking on dry hinges.
My muscles contracted, freezing me to the spot.
Angry shouts and loud banging. Flesh on flesh. “I know what you did, woman. I know all about it.”
Smiles fell to the floor.
I choked back a sob and the yellow room slammed shut, closing me off from the secret just outside my grasp.
Chapter 27
Luna called to me from the edge of the burnt-out floor. The sun had fallen behind the smoke and clouds. The yard light shone through the missing roof, casting shadows into the bowels of the house.
There would be an investigation. Einstein said it first, and I knew he was right. It was the reason Luna wanted to jump through the gaping wound in the hall. She blamed me for the fire and wanted to end it all before we were found guilty and charged with arson.
As much as I wanted to fight with her, a small part of me thought she might be right. I could have started that fire. Granny’s car looked as if it had recently driven over the snow-packed roads, and I certainly wasn’t in the best frame of mind last night.
Yet, there were more important things to deal with right now than Luna’s fear.
Einstein called out, urging me toward the garage.
I pulled Luna away from the ledge and followed Travis down the steps to the front lawn. The carpet roll mocked me—another fire from another time—and I wondered if maybe Mom started the blaze to escape from her prison. Or if my dad started it to escape from his.
Somehow I convinced Travis to load up my boxes and books. He didn’t offer to take me to his house and minutes after unloading my stuff in the garage, Travis turned his truck back toward Prairie Flats. In two weeks, I’d lost everything and was truly alone. Still, the tears wouldn’t come. I was done losing time, and despite my exhaustion, I knew my dad and Mom would show up here eventually. And once they arrived at a clean, fully functioning home, I couldn’t imagine them leaving again.
2:36 pm
I carried my treasure boxes to my bedroom and stored them in the hidey-hole in my headboard. Next, I went through the basement, looking for boxes that held something other than what their labels boasted. My cursory search showed up nothing unusual, and my disappointment started to wear on me. Granny had planned for everything—right down to spare toothbrushes and emergency quilts—yet she had left me nothing in regards to the big secret.
It wasn’t like her. Convinced I was missing something, I wound my way to her room. Each box in her closet yielded a pair of shoes or a half dozen scarves. Granny apparently didn’t make treasure boxes of her own.
4:07 pm
The urge to keep searching nagged at me. With a mug of chai tea in hand, I walked through every room in Granny’s house, discarding items as impractical hiding places or those that had already been searched. My eyes landed on the cedar chest. I pulled the linens from it and stroked the silken lining—feeling for what, I didn’t know—found the hard edge of glue and tugged. The fabric ripped away from the shell, and I peeled back the silk to reveal scattered papers an inch thick across the bottom.
With trembling hands, I gathered the pages and carried them to my room like an offering. The first paper was a soft brown with faint red lines making parallel paths across the paper. I unfolded it, unaware that I held my breath until it released in surprise.
Letters scrawled across the page.
Forever.
Underneath that single word was a drawing of a stick boy with spiky blonde hair. His hand reached to that of a stick-drawn girl. Their fingers clasped together like a spider with too many legs.
In a heart above the girl someone had written “always” in a strong steady hand.
“Forever and Always.” That was Granny’s phrase.
It was Jimmy’s. Rae whispered so softly I had trouble hearing her.
Angel did too, You mean Gemi?
“No,” I whispered. “Jimmy.”
I traced my finger across the picture, letting it linger on the boy. “My brother.”
The answer belonged to me, as did the truth behind it. Jimmy was my brother.
Nothing in my life indicated this was true. There were no pictures of two little blonde kids. In fact, pictures of me had been virtually non-existent beyond my school photos, church directories and the snapshots Granny gave me after a weekend at her house. For my thirteenth birthday, I got a digital camera I used on scenery, not people—with the exception of Travis. I didn’t like the contrived emotions people forced onto their faces while posing for the camera. I assumed my parents felt the same way. We just weren’t picture people.
We were collectors.
I collected books—stories of hope. Mom collected treasures, ugly things she found beauty in and hoped to rehabilitate. My dad bought hobbies—sports equipment for sports he never played. His yearly binges filled the spaces where Mom’s treasures didn’t reach. Together they had collected a lifetime of things and found no pleasure in any of it.
Apparently, we also collected secrets. Like long-lost brothers.
Yearning for more, I opened a construction paper card. The crayon boy stood behind a birthday cake with eight candles.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JIMMY!
I MISS YOU.
FOREVER AND ALWAYS, GEMI.
I sifted through more cards that never reached the birthday boy. Cards I had no recollection of making. Nor did I remember sliding them into the lining of the trunk and sealing it shut with glue. That knowledge unhinged me and satisfied me at the same time. My memory lapses were not new. Yet there was also a purpose for them. On some level, they helped me cope with Jimmy’s disappearance from my life.
5:58 pm
I gathered the papers from the cedar chest and hid them in my headboard next to my treasure boxes and messenger bag. I pulled out the notebook journal from the past few days and reread the things I had known but forgotten, adding new notes for the future when I’d need to learn them again.
I had a brother named Jimmy.
He started the pet phrase, forever and always, a tradition Granny and I kept long after he was gone.
But where did he go?
And what about Abi, Trav’s niece? Did they disappear at the same time, together?
Eleven years ago would have made me six, about the same age as the memory-me in the yellow room.
The ghost-me that held a ball of yarn and a turkey hat.
The spider webs connecting us: the people I knew but had forgotten.
I scratched my new question on the next line: How was it possible to forget someone I’d known my whole life?
Clarence would know. I put a star by his name and continued reading.
Clarence and Granny were friends, then and now, but not my parents.
We were back to the beginning, to a time when my dad smiled holding a baby Jimmy. Right before I was born. I was the secret. Not Jimmy.
But that didn’t make sense. None of it did.
The clock chimed—7:15—pulling me away from my task. The clock. The church. The directory. Panic rippled through my body as a memory solidified. The picture of my parents holding Jimmy.
Mr. and Mrs. Dan Baker, and Jimmy.
Jimmy. The nickname for James.
* * *
Luna made her way to the medicine cabinet where the night time cough syrup beckoned. She chugged one capful of the thick liquid, then refilled the measuring lid a second time. She read the label—it was too much—and tipped it back anyways, letting the bite of medicine slide down her throat. Next she grabbed a bottle of ibuprofen and took a handful to ease the ache in her head. She felt almost giddy as she chased the painkillers
with three day’s worth of depression meds.
Satisfied, she curled up on the couch and waited for sleep.
As the edges of her world wavered, Luna called James. “It’s finally done.”
* * *
My body felt like it had been steamrolled. I couldn’t find the source of the noise that woke me, nor could I focus on my world. When I tried to stand, my legs gave out from under me. I fell to the side and smacked my chin on something hard. I blinked, but there seemed to be no difference in the light.
Hands shook me and my stomach rebelled. Oh Lord, what happened?
“Gemini?” A slap on the face. Another. Neither hurt. Something rattled, and I wondered if I’d been bitten by a snake. It was a painful way to die, I’d heard.
A finger jammed down my throat, and my head slammed against something solid. My neck rested on an unforgiving ring. I gagged, but didn’t puke.
Another slap.
“What did you take?”
My tongue felt thick and dry in my mouth. I tried to answer, but the words got stuck.
More rattling. Wallpaper came into focus. The thermostat clock above the toilet flashed 8:11 pm.
“How many did you take?”
My head lolled to the side. I held up my fingers. Three, no five. I shrugged and hunched back over the toilet, cradling the cool porcelain in my arms. I closed my eyes again and saw Luna curled up in the corner of the yellow room. Rae held Luna’s head and stroked her hair. She whispered words I couldn’t hear.
Just let her go.
Rae turned on Fell. You know we can’t. We don’t know what would happen to the rest of us.
It’s called integration, Rae, and you know it. It’s the only way to stay healthy.
Rae’s face clouded. It’s the only way for you to remain in control. I won’t let her die.
I focused on Luna, her lifeless form wrapped in Rae’s arms. Another set of arms hugged me from behind. Orange ginger. Mom. “Call an ambulance.”
Whispering Minds Page 15
