A Homecoming to Forget

by Emily Camp

  “I …” I blinked because I was not going to let myself cry. I would at least wait until I got home. I pulled my arms across my chest. “I don’t remember, okay? One day I had this … life … and then I wake up and everything’s different. My best friend is a stranger, a stranger is my best friend.”

  “Your crush is your boyfriend. That can’t be that bad, can it?” He reached for me, but I stepped back out of his grasp. His smile faded. “Sawyer.” He reached out again, but then dropped his hand. “You don’t know what happened. This isn’t me being jealous or possessive.”

  When did I say that?

  “He …” Trey rubbed the back of his neck. “What he did was messed up.”

  “What did he do?” I held my arms out.

  “Your dad said … I’m supposed to tell you too much.” His shoulders slumped.

  I turned toward the office. “I have a headache. I’m going home.”

  “I’ll be over after practice.” He leaned forward, then stopped. “Is it okay if I kiss you.”

  I tensed.

  “On the cheek?”

  “Okay.”

  Then he kissed me. He smelled like mint and spicy woods. It was familiar, even though I didn’t recall the scent, I knew I’d smelled it before. Of course, I smelled it before, this was my boyfriend of three years. That meant something, didn’t it?

  Chapter 6

  If looks could kill.

  Ambrosia stared daggers in my direction when Mr. Crumb announced the partners for our projects.

  Of all people to be paired with, I’d been given Trey Oliver as a partner. However, I couldn’t help but be scared I was going to get jumped after school by the way his ex-girlfriend stared at me.

  There was a commotion and shuffle as seats were exchanged to be closer to the partner to work with.

  I didn’t move. What was I going to say to him anyway? This was Trey, the boy I’d been crushing from afar for years now. Henry’s eyes locked with mine and he gave a half shrug as he stood from his seat, books cradled in his arms. I didn’t even hear who he was paired with because I was too distracted about my partner.

  Trey smiled at me, his braces glinting in the light then slid into the seat Henry just left behind. “So, I guess we’re partners.”

  “Yeah.” I tried not to smile too much to let on how excited I was about the pairing. I wanted to be cool.

  “Don’t worry, I won’t make you do all the work.” He gave me another grin. I could have melted.

  Chapter 7

  I sat plastered against the passenger’s door. Benji’s car was small. “You’re my brother?” This was the first conversation I’d had with him that I could recall.

  “Step.” He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. His hair was wavy, almost curly. He had a medium build, was a tad bigger than Trey.

  “Right.” I watched the trees and houses whiz by. At least this was familiar, except for the new diner and bakery on Front Street. I wondered if I’d ever been to either of those places. Mr. Herrington’s house at the end of our street had been painted and there was a fence around the yard that was not there before. I was amazed at how much a place could change in so little time.

  “Do you remember anything from that night?” He finally asked.

  I shook my head. “Nothing from the last three years.” Except the smell of my boyfriend.

  He pulled into our driveway, then turned off the key. Just as I reached for the door handle, he said. “You were upset.”

  “What?” I turned toward him. He stared straight ahead.

  “Before you left for the dance you were upset about something.”

  “What … how do you know?” I wondered what it was.

  He shrugged and finally turned toward me. “I’m just down the hall from you.”

  That wasn’t exactly an answer.

  “Did you ask me why?” I still wasn’t sure how close we were before this happened.

  “Figured it was Trey,” he said, “you two fight a lot.”

  We did? Why was this the first I was hearing this? And why did my ‘friends’ act like I was going crazy when I snapped at him at lunch if we normally fought?

  “Oh,” I climbed out of the vehicle and went inside.

  Benji was right behind me. His keys jingled when he sat them down. It made me jump. I wasn’t sure why I was so skittish. Maybe it had something to do with almost dying. I took the steps two at a time. The only thing I wanted was to sleep so I could let my mind rest.

  However, my brain had different plans for me. I tossed and turned between my soft sheets they were cool and crisp and still smelled like laundry detergent. My blinds were down, blocking the sun from coming in. I couldn’t have been in a better place to fall asleep, but my mind wanted answers that I did not have.

  Finally, I sat up and reached under my mattress. I knew it was a long shot but was happy when my hand brushed over my journal. When I pulled it out, it wasn’t the one I’d last had there so hopefully that meant I’d updated it. This one was sparkly, where the last one was just your normal black and white composition book.

  Sitting up, I pulled it into my lap, crossing me legs under me. Did I want to know what was inside? I wasn’t sure I did, but I knew I wasn’t getting any sleep until I had answers.

  The first page was dated six months ago. The first entry reminded me of the Burn Book in Mean Girls. It was about how much I couldn’t stand Ambrosia. I drew a fish with big lips and long lashes and captioned it ‘Fish lip girl.’ At least I had the same thought then as I did today. The second entry dated a few weeks after the first, was about Nadia how she was my best friend and we shared everything. I wished I could remember it. I talked about us going on an unplanned road trip and pretending we were French using what little French we knew from class. It made me sad to think how I didn’t know any of that now.

  I turned the page and on that one I talked about Trey and I went into great detail about fooling around. My face flushed. I did what? How could I ever look him in the eye again? Before I could finish reading it, I turned the page. There was an entry on how unfair my curfew was and that it was all Janice’s fault. That she hated me because she hated my mom. Then I discovered a couple pages had been ripped out. That was odd, because I always revered my journals as something sacred and I never ever, ever pulled pages out. I would sometimes scribble over things or white them out, but I never ripped a page from it.

  I continued to read on, searching for any clue about what happened with Henry. There were pages and pages of me professing how in love I was with Trey and then complaining about him on the next. I seemed melodramatic.

  Then I paused at a page, it was stuck to another one, not too badly though, it only took a little tugging. I was nearly in tears when I saw it. HAN in big, shaded-in bubble letters and a heart around it. I ran my fingers across it. Henry Andrew Nash. Wait? Why was there a heart around it? From the passage three days before, Trey and I were applying to the same colleges then we were going to get married as soon as we graduated.

  Then a few more pages were missing. More drama with Trey, more Ambrosia hate, more my step mom is evil, then about three quarters of the way through it was blank. I don’t know why I kept turning empty page after empty page, but I did and when some red writing jumped out at me I stopped.

  It was written in big, scratchy letters. You won’t find what you’re looking for here.

  I looked around my room as if the person who wrote it was still here. Then I threw the journal across my bed, my heart pounding in my throat.

  I stood and paced my room as I chewed on my thumbnail. Who would have been in my room to write that and was it written before or after my disappearance/reappearance? So many questions. The only people I knew about being in here were my dad, Trey and Janice. My mind immediately went to Trey. We fought a lot according to the journal and my stepbrother. However, if it was him, why did he leave all the pages about our fights? Unless … he did that on purpose?

  There was a noise outs
ide my bedroom door that made me jump. I crept to the door and put my ear on it. My heart thudded in my chest. Was it the person who wrote the note in my journal? Perhaps Janice up here to finish the job? I slowly creaked my door open and screamed when a cat meowed and jumped off the shelf across the hall.

  Benji’s door swung open, his eyes wide. “There you are, Mr. Whiskers.” He picked the black cat up in his arms. The cat purred as he glared at me with his creepy yellow eyes.

  “Are you okay?” It took me a moment to realize he was talking to me and not the cat.

  “I didn’t know we had a pet.”

  “He came with me. I’ve had him forever, hence the Mr. Whiskers.”

  I nodded, because who but a small child names their cat Mr. Whiskers?

  “Sorry he scared you.” He petted the cat, whose eyes were narrowed and nose pointed to the ceiling.

  “It’s okay,” I said.

  Benji turned to walk away.

  “Benji.”

  “Yeah?” He turned back around, Mr. Whiskers wriggling out of his arms, no longer content.

  I pointed to the pink journal on my comforter. “I just … I saw something disturbing.”

  He stared at me, his brow furrowed for a second. “Did you remember?”

  “No.”

  His eyes flicked from me to the journal on my bed. I should tell him. I needed to tell somebody.

  “If I show you, promise you won’t look at anything else.” I lifted the journal off the bed. I didn’t need him seeing how much I hated his mom, or worse, the details of my sex life.

  “Okay?” He stepped cautiously in my room.

  I sat down on the mattress, he beside me, leaving enough space between us that didn’t make me uncomfortable. I turned the journal open to the page with the writing and handed it to him.

  He blinked at it for a second before saying, “Who wrote this?”

  “I don’t know.” I took the book back before he could break his promise about not reading the rest of it. “Did … has Trey been here lately?”

  He furrowed his brow again, then his eyes widened. “I think so. He was in here when you were missing, after the cops.”

  “He could have done this?”

  “Yeah.” Benji curled his hands into fists and leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees. He looked at our reflection in the mirror. “I never liked that guy.”

  What Benji said may have had me convinced except for the part that Trey didn’t tear out the pages that made him look bad. Janice could have though. Even though I whined about her in my journal it was nothing more than a teenager complaining about not getting her way, it wasn’t anything incriminating. What if those torn out pages talked about how I was scared of Janice or how she said things to me when my dad wasn’t around? Then I thought about someone else.

  Like Trey and Janice, though I wrote some horrible things about her, too.

  Ambrosia. The way she looked at me at lunch, that icy stare that made me chill. Was it my suppressed memories trying to get through to me?

  “Are you hungry?” Benji watched as I closed the journal.

  I hadn’t eaten much at lunch because of the drama. “Actually, I am.”

  “I’m going to order something.” He hitched his thumb over his shoulder. “Salad?”

  I put my hand to my stomach. “I was kind of hoping for a burger.”

  He straightened his shoulders and raised his eyebrows. “Really?”

  “I don’t eat burgers anymore, do I?”

  He held his hands in the air. “If you want a burger, I’m not going to eat mine in front of you. You’re getting a burger.”

  He stood and started toward the door.

  “Benji?” I said before he was gone.

  He stopped and turned. “Yeah?”

  “We were close? Because I always wanted a big brother.”

  He smiled at that. “You told me that same thing the day our parents got married.”

  Then he left without really answering my question.

  Chapter 8

  I listened to the shower run in my bathroom as I lay in the middle of my bed, staring at the ceiling. When Trey told me he was showering here, in my room, I know I blushed. Even if this had happened hundreds of times before, a naked boy in my room was new to me.

  I tried to distract myself with my phone, but I hadn’t been able to get into any of my social media accounts. I’d been locked out by too many bad log-in attempts. Then was given my security question to answer. Who was your childhood best friend? I held my breath and typed in HAN. I was prompted to create a new password. I looked at my bathroom door. If I would have done this before it would have been something to do with Trey? Maybe his name and jersey number? I typed, Ijustwant2remember.

  I was in. I let out a breath and scrolled through my newsfeed. It was full of selfies that didn’t even look like me, but that wasn’t surprising. Who had selfies that looked like them? I still couldn’t get used to the bright blonde. I’d decided I was going back to my original color as soon as possible.

  There were a couple of memes too, but nothing strange about my posts at all. I looked into my direct messages and there was nothing at all. Which I found weird. Why would I have deleted every message I’d sent or received. Why hadn’t I received any since I went missing?

  The bathroom door opened, the steam from the shower pillowed in my room. Trey wore blue athletic shorts that were low on his hips and no shirt. I felt my face flush and looked back at my screen. He crawled into bed beside me as if we were married. His damp hair on my pillow.

  “What ya doing?” he put his arm around my stomach. His bare skin touched mine. I think I quit breathing.

  “Um.” I wondered if he could hear just how hard my heart was beating. “Looking for clues.”

  He laughed, and it went to my belly. I remembered how infatuated I was with that laugh, though now it was a little deeper. “Think social media holds all the answers?”

  “I was hoping.” I fidgeted so we weren’t touching except for his arm around me. I tried not to think about what was written in my journal. “It’s weird there are no DMs.”

  “Everyone knows you can’t remember, maybe they’re giving you space.”

  Or maybe somebody was in my account and deleted them all.

  “But there isn’t even anything from before I went missing? Did I always delete my messages?”

  “I don’t know. I doubt it, you were always messaging somebody.”

  “Who?”

  “Nadia, Ambrosia.” He shrugged. “I don’t know, didn’t ask.”

  I stared at my screen again. We didn’t have the type of relationship where we told each other everything. He wiggled closer to me even though I’d tried to create distance. He pressed his lips against my neck.

  Ooooh. That felt … not bad. But I still couldn’t decide if I was safe with him or not. Right here like this, I knew he wouldn’t hurt me. Benji was down the hall and my dad down stairs. Which was another thing I couldn’t figure out, why my dad let my boyfriend sleep in my room with me. Before, he wouldn’t even let Henry in my room with the door shut and I wasn’t even into him like that.

  “Hey, can I ask you something?” I leaned away.

  “Yeah.” His voice was husky as he pushed hair off my shoulder.

  “Benji. He told me that you and I … we fight a lot.”

  At the mention of Benji Trey’s jaw tensed then loosened. Then he let out a laugh that really wasn’t a laugh at all. “He did, did he?”

  I nodded.

  “Of course, he would.”

  “Is it true?” I held the covers to my chest as if I wasn’t wearing a t-shirt.

  Trey leaned up on his elbows and shook his head. “We’ve been together for almost three years. We see each other all the time. Everyone argues when they’re around each other a lot.”

  “Why are we together so much? It’s not like we’re married.”

  Trey sighed scooted up until he was leaning against my white head
board. I concentrated on his eyes so I wouldn’t look at his bare chest or abs, reminding me that he was half naked in my bed. “I don’t want to push you, okay?”

  “Okay?”

  “It’s just your dad told me it was better to let you remember on your own and I’m trying to do that. I want you to remember everything, but I want you to remember on your own. Not because of what I said.”

  “It’s important.” My voice was barely a whisper. “Because I don’t know if I can trust you.”

  Trey cursed, startling me. “You never told me exactly why,” He ran his hand over his damp hair. It stuck straight up. “But you always acted like you were scared to be alone here. Like you thought this place was haunted or something.”

  “Benji wasn’t here?”

  “Yeah, about Benji.” He paused and looked down at the bright comforter covering us. “You two weren’t that close.”

  Thinking back, Benji never did answer that question when I asked him about it. But today we’d gotten along well, and it seemed like we were close like siblings before this happened. I stared at Trey, not knowing what I was looking for or how I was going to respond, when I finally said, “Why are you lying?”

  “You think I’m lying?” He slapped his palm in the middle of his chest.

  I kicked my legs until I was upright against the wall. If I’d been on the outside of the mattress, I’d have been completely out of the bed by now.

  His face, chest, and forehead were pink. His eyes narrowed.

  “Please leave.” My hands and voice shook.

  “Wait, are you scared of me?” Then he cursed again, under his breath.

  “What if I said I remembered?”

  “Do you?” he reached for me, but I plastered myself to the wall.

  “No, but I … don’t even know you.”

  Trey rubbed his forehead as if he had a headache. “You’ve only lost three years. We’ve known each other since second grade.” His voice was clipped and his jaw jerked.