The Memory Witch

by Wood, Heather Topham

It took me a long time to talk about the attack. I was afraid. I knew what the boys were capable of. Their threats of killing my parents and me closed up my throat and prevented the truth from slipping out. After weeks of meeting with therapists, I was finally able to whisper the names of the boys in the hushed atmosphere of her office.

  My mother promised that the nightmares would go away. We were selling our house and leaving for good. The boys would be far away and could never hurt me again. I would be able to go outside once again and not be afraid.

  Weeks past and my mother took me shopping in the city. She wanted me to buy anything and everything I would want for my new room. Gifts were her way of healing me and easing the pain of my ordeal. Yet, no matter how many gifts I received, nothing could erase the haunted look in my eyes.

  My mother’s smothering was a direct contrast to my father’s retreat. I had always been a daddy’s girl. Where my mother was strict, my father was lenient. My father would always come home and embrace me in a way that made me feel like I was the most precious thing in the entire world. Being without those hugs and seeing the anguish in his eyes every time he glanced at me after the attack kept the emotional wounds fresh.

  I still tried my hardest to worm my way back into my father’s heart. His distance made me guess that maybe I had done something wrong. I wondered if he was angry about me breaking the rule about going into the forest. I vowed to be the best little girl ever. His hugs and smiles would return and make me feel special once again.

  I had my mother buy him a present from me when we went shopping. It was an oversized box of chocolate covered cherries, his favorite dessert. As soon as we returned home, I rushed through the door to give them to him. I couldn’t wait to see the look on his face as he saw dug into them.

  I ran blindly from room to room calling his name. I heard my mother set down her keys and purse on the table behind me. After a fruitless search downstairs, I dashed up the stairs taking two at a time. The bathroom door was cracked open and the overhead light from inside the room cast a soft glow in the hallway.

  I shouldn’t have opened the door. I should’ve called to my mother or waited for the door to open. In my excitement, I thoughtlessly stormed into the bathroom and entered a waking nightmare.

  Blood. It was the first thing I saw. It was everywhere. The walls and floors were coated like someone had carelessly dumped out a can of red paint. The air was clogged with the iron scent of spilled blood.

  I took a step further into the room and my sneakers slid on the blood soaked tiles. As I gained my footing, my eyes finally found him. My father was no longer there. In his place was a crumpled mass of flesh that was sinking in a steadily growing pool of blood.

  Any healing that had taken place in my heart and mind dissipated in that moment. I was falling once again. Heading back to that abyss where I had existed while the boys had brutalized my flesh. This couldn’t be real. My father couldn’t be dead.

  I must have screamed. My mother rushed to my side. At the sight of my father’s body, her screams mimicked my own. She cradled me in her arms and we ran from the room. Her sobbing reassurances eased none of my pain. Once again, I wished for my own death. My childhood had been stolen away from me and there was no way back to it.

  ***

  I lashed out violently as hands shook me. I was still in the past and fighting against those who had wounded me beyond repair. My fist connected with flesh before I landed a kick on the figure in front of me. My eyes flew open and I saw Mason hunched over with his hands clutching his stomach. His pallor was pale as he watched me with alarm.

  “I’ve been trying to wake you up,” he gasped out. “You were screaming.”

  He reached out for me. I skittered away from him to the other side of the bed. I toed on my sandals that were set next to the bed.

  “Quinn, it’s me,” he said softly. His tone was the type used to coax mental patients into padded cells.

  “I need your truck,” I croaked out. “I have to see my mother.”

  “I’ll take you wherever you need to go,” he answered and took a hesitant step in my direction.

  I couldn’t meet his eyes. “No, I have to do this alone.”

  “You don’t have to tell me what you remembered, but from the look on your face, it’s safe to say it was much worse than you expected. It’s not smart for you to be driving when you’re this upset,” he advised.

  It was heartbreaking to look at him. He was utterly beautiful. The hardened look I had seen so often in those first months at the Chadwick House had been replaced by a gentleness that regarded me with a deep-seated affection. He was willing to do anything for me. He wanted to share my pain and make it better. Unfortunately, he couldn’t.

  I snatched his keys off of the nightstand and made a beeline for the door. Mason called out to me, but I was already opening the backdoor when I heard his heavy footsteps on the stairs.

  When I threw his truck in gear, I was afraid Mason would try to jump in front of the car to stop me. Instead, I saw him standing on the back steps, watching me pull away with despair clear on his face. I was hurting him. He had opened up to me and accepted what comfort I offered. Instead of leaning on him and sharing my pain, I was running away.

  My thoughts were nonsensical as I drove. Mason was most likely right by insisting I drive with someone. I felt half out of my mind. I couldn’t fully focus on the sickening revelations about my past. Instead, I was thinking about the other memories that I could now recall.

  I remembered the grandparents that I hadn’t seen since I was a child and how they used to sneak me candy bars before dinner when they visited. I thought about my best friend Bev that I met in preschool and how we left town without so much of a goodbye to her.

  Years and years worth of memories jumped around in my brain and begged to replace the painful ones. They fluttered in my mind and I tried to hold onto the happy feelings associated with each snapshot of my past. It helped block out the blood and the fear and the sorrow.

  The drive to my mother’s house was torturous. Luckily, Mason had a full tank since I left without my purse or phone. I had to keep to the speed limit or else I would find myself possibly hauled off to jail for driving without any identification. That would be an interesting conversation to have with a patrol officer. “Sorry sir, but I’m a witch who just recovered from amnesia. It turns out I was raped and witnessed my father’s suicide. It was all pretty traumatic, so I forgot to bring along my license. Think you could cut me a break?”

  I gripped the wheel harder until my knuckles turned white. I had so many questions for my mother. I was in no mood for her giving me the run around about the truth. I would resort to witchcraft if I needed. I was certain a spell could be done that would force her to spew out everything I had to know.

  My mother’s car was thankfully in the driveway when I pulled up at my house. I would’ve hated to storm into the hospital and cause a scene that the other nurses would be gossiping about for months. I slammed Mason’s car door and marched up to the door that I hadn’t seen in almost a year. I pushed it open and charged into the house.

  “Mom!” I yelled.

  My mother came running from the kitchen with her hand clutch to her heart. “Quinn, my god, you scared me half to death!”

  Her initial shock wore off and she moved towards me. I sidestepped her attempts at engulfing me in her comforting arms. After her questioning look, her features changed. A tired and resigned look regarded me as tears leapt to my eyes. I planned to come to my house and scream obscenities at her for the unfairness of my life. However, her familiar features called to me. It made me feel like I was eight years old again and wanted my mother to chase away all of the demons.

  “You know,” she said tonelessly.

  “Stella gave me a potion to return my memories,” I whispered.

  “Do you understand now why I went to her? Baby, you deserve more than that. You shouldn’t have those memories to haunt you,” she said earnestly.
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br />   “Mom…” My resolve crumbled and I launched myself in her arms. A salty trail of tears leaked down my face. The faucet had been turned on and I feared it would never turn off.

  She cooed, “I know, Quinn. It’s over now. The memories can’t hurt you.”

  Her smell was comforting. It was a strange combination of her perfume and the antibacterial gel she used during her work shifts. I allowed myself the luxury of sobbing into her shirt for several minutes, breathing in her scent.

  I broke away and looked at her with red and puffy eyes. “Mom, it was horrible…”

  “Honey, we survived. We moved on. I know it was only a spell, but Stella did help us learn how to be happy again. Although I remembered, I convinced myself that if you didn’t remember, I wouldn’t dwell on it.”

  “But not all of us survived,” I choked out, “Dad…”

  My mother snapped, “Your father was weak. What he did to us was selfish and cowardly. I hate to speak ill of the dead, but the moment he put that gun to his head, he stopped being my husband and your father.”

  “I was the one to find him,” I cried. “Oh god, the blood…”

  “He was a monster for doing that to us. He knew we would come home and find him,” she seethed. Her voice was earnest. “Quinn, I only wanted to protect you. I’m sorry for lying, but I didn’t know how to tell you that your father took his own life. It would lead to so many more questions…” She swallowed visibly and then stated, “Questions I didn’t know how to answer.”

  “I remember the boys and what happened in the basement…but I can’t remember going to court or testifying to the police about it. Are they in jail?”

  “Quinn, why don’t we sit? I’ll make you dinner and then we can talk. It’s been months since I’ve seen your beautiful face,” she said soothingly. She grabbed my hand and pulled me into the kitchen. I sank down into one of the chairs at the table as she busied herself at the sink. I had noticed the way she wasn’t meeting my eyes.

  “Mom, I’m not hungry,” I insisted as she gathered ingredients from the refrigerator. “It’s too late for you to protect me, I already know what the boys did to me. I need to know that they at least paid for what they did.”

  My mother’s heart was in her eyes when she turned back to me. “Honey, you have to understand. It took us weeks to coax the names out of you. When you finally gave them to us, your father and I decided to not make the situation any worse for you.”

  My blood turned cold. “What are you talking about? What did you do?”

  Her green eyes turned distant as she relived the past. “Benjamin Lerner was the mayor’s son. I knew the family well because his grandmother lived in our development. Her house was the one that the boys took you to,” she said in a choked whisper. “Cameron and Daniel Bernard were sons of the town councilman. We talked about what a nightmare it would turn out to be if we accused them of attacking you.”

  “Raping me,” I corrected her harshly. I demanded, “So what? Because of who their fathers were you let them get away with beating and raping a child.”

  “Quinn, it’s hard to understand, but they were children themselves…”

  I cut her off with a bitter laugh. “They were hardly children. How old were they?”

  “Fourteen and fifteen,” she mumbled.

  “I would imagine that by fourteen and fifteen it should be common knowledge that pedophilia would be wrong,” I said dryly. My features contorted into a mask of disgust as I regarded her. “So that’s the whole story then? My father kills himself because the thought of his little girl as spoiled goods and couldn’t bear it to look me in the face. Then, we run off like I had done something wrong. Meanwhile, those sick freaks went unpunished and possibly adding more victims to their rap sheets.”

  My mother was openly crying now. Her reserve was shattered and she kneeled before me. Her sobs begged me to forgive her. But I couldn’t. The hurt was too fresh and raw. Instead of prosecuting those bastards and getting me therapy, she had us run. We disappeared to a new place and she filled my head with falsified memories.

  I stood up. “I have to go.”

  “But Quinn, you just got here. You can’t leave until I make you understand the motivations behind my actions. Baby, I was only trying to protect you,” she pleaded.

  “Mom, no matter what your intentions were the fact is that you created this fantasy life for me instead of helping me deal with reality. You may have made the memories go away, but the feelings never did,” I said. I drew in a sharp breath before continuing, “Do you realize that I’ve always been afraid of sex? All this time, I thought something was wrong with me. I prayed to be normal and not feel horror and shame every time a boy tried to do more than kiss me. If I had dealt with the rape, then maybe I would’ve learned how to get over those feelings.”

  “You’re right, Quinn. I made mistakes as a mother. I’m not perfect, but my love for you has been the driving force behind every decision,” she said with conviction. “Stay the night, Quinn. I’ll call Stella, I’m sure she’ll understand. We can get into our pajamas and eat popcorn in front of the TV.”

  “I’m going back to Stella’s,” I said resolutely. “She respected me enough to let me know the truth about my past.”

  I vaulted past her form on the floor and made my way to the front door. She was close at my heels. “Quinn…please,” she begged.

  “I can forgive you for a lot of things, but…” I said softly, “letting those pigs get away with what they did is unforgivable.”

  I heard her call my name as I returned to Mason’s truck. I tuned out the side of my conscience that urged me to return to her. Part of me longed to offer my forgiveness and bury myself in her warm embrace. However, a new side of my personality had emerged after the amnesia was lifted—a colder and unsentimental Quinn that was not so keen to forgive the sins of the past.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  It was late afternoon by the time I returned to Stella’s estate. As I neared the driveway, a lump formed in my throat. A single ambulance was parked out front. To the side of the vehicle, Mason was speaking to a pair of EMTs while waving his hands for emphasis. Three pairs of eyes watched me as I parked the car and leapt out towards them.

  “What happened?” I gasped.

  Mason turned to the EMTs and whispered something that did not reach my ears. They nodded and climbed into the ambulance. I stood transfixed as the ambulance drove past me and away from the estate. I didn’t realize I was trembling until Mason put a hand on my elbow to steady me.

  “Stella?” I asked in hushed tones.

  “Yes, I found her a couple of hours ago. She must have died during the night. She did look peaceful at least,” he said wistfully.

  “Mason, I’m so sorry,” I cried.

  Our embrace was desperate. I laced my hands behind his neck and pulled him close to me. His hands wrapped around my waist and my body was pressed against his. We were both in so much pain and had been through so much already. I wanted to temporarily relinquish my pain and focus on comforting him.

  “It’s my fault,” I admitted softly. “She wanted to do the offering on the spell and I let her. I had no idea she would give up her life for it.”

  Mason took my hand in his. His thumb brushed over the delicate skin of my palm and replied, “Quinn, we don’t know if that’s what happened here. Aunt Stella was in her seventies and she was sick the past week. She most likely died of natural causes.”

  Even though he was in pain, Mason was still trying to ease my guilt. His aunt was difficult, but she was the only family he had left. “I’m sorry for everything. I shouldn’t have run off with your truck like that this morning. I should’ve been here when you found Stella.”

  “Quinn, don’t worry about it. I’m just glad you’re back here and you’re okay,” he insisted. He kissed my forehead before asking, “Do you want to talk about it?”

  I laughed mirthlessly. “What did I do to deserve you?” I asked rhetorically. “You just los
t your aunt and you’re still worried about me.”

  “Quinn, nothing you will tell me is ever going to change how I feel about you,” he promised.

  Mason knew I was deflecting and was calling me on my bullshit. I stepped out of his arms and stood stiffly next to him. “I was…raped when I was eight.” The words left a sour taste in my mouth. My stomach roiled with nausea as I continued speaking. “Three teenagers took me into a basement and held me down as they each took a turn.

  “I tried to fight and scream, but they were stronger and shoved a sock in my mouth. They hit me and threatened to kill me. Over and over again, I kept wishing for them to stop and just let me die. The pain and the humiliation…” I choked out. Mason moved to hug me, but I stepped back. “My father couldn’t deal with it and that’s why he killed himself. I was the one to find him…”

  “Quinn, I had no idea...” Mason murmured. “I can’t even imagine what kind of fucked up dirtbags would ever do that to a child.”

  “My mother didn’t go to authorities or tell their parents or do anything,” I said anguished. “We moved away and the boys were never punished. I’m not going to let them get away with it.”

  “Quinn, I’m not sure if anything can be done now. It was ten years ago and even if evidence was collected then, I’m not sure if they would be able to be prosecuted. Maybe it would be better for you to leave it alone,” he suggested.

  “Yes, it was ten years ago for them, but for me it feels like it just happened hours ago. I still feel their filthy skin on mine. I can still smell their rank breath. They will pay for what they did to me,” I swore. Mason cringed at my words. His affection for me made it difficult to hear what had been done to me.

  “What do you plan to do?” he asked hesitantly.

  “I’m a witch now. I’ll track each one of them down and make them pay,” I said resolutely.

  “Quinn, that’s not the life Stella wanted for you. That’s not why she taught you her spells,” he said horrified.

  “You expect me to just let this go? It sickens me to think about them happy and healthy while I’m a complete mess,” I retorted.