The Hidden Memory of Objects

by Danielle Mages Amato

  “All right,” Johnson began, reaching for her briefcase. “I’ll just—”

  The doorbell rang again.

  “Megan,” my mother said coolly, “would you get that?”

  “But . . . ,” I spluttered, gesturing to Detective Johnson.

  Her voice was firm. “Megan, go.”

  I raced to the door and threw it open. Eric stood on our porch, wearing a red oven mitt on each hand. He held them up as if in surrender. “Hey! I thought if you had any trouble touching the Lincoln box, we could try these.” He waggled them.

  “The detective is here. Right now. Telling my mom some kind of news.”

  Eric’s eyes went wide. “Got it. Your room?” When I nodded, he took off the oven mitts and disappeared upstairs.

  I returned to the living room. Mom sat beside Detective Johnson, her eyes glassy and dull. She reached for my hand, which sent a jolt of fear racing through me. I sat on the arm of the couch. “What is it?” I demanded.

  “We’ve been in touch with the admissions office at UVa,” Detective Johnson said.

  “And?”

  “And it appears that Tyler withdrew his acceptance. Two weeks before he passed away.”

  I looked to Mom for confirmation, but she seemed dazed, staring straight ahead. “But . . . how is that possible?”

  Detective Johnson didn’t waver. “He was in contact with the admissions director via email, and he told her he was not planning to attend. He released his scholarship money, as well.”

  My mother took a piece of paper from the coffee table; it trembled as she handed it to me. Sure enough, it was a printout of an email from Tyler, saying that due to “unforeseen circumstances,” he had decided not to attend the University of Virginia in the fall.

  “What does this mean?” I asked, utterly confused. “Was he going somewhere else?”

  Detective Johnson shook her head. “We can’t find any evidence of that.”

  “But . . .” I stared blankly at the paper in my hand. A flush of heat spread up my neck, and I came shakily to my feet. “Are you saying he killed himself?”

  “It’s not conclusive,” Johnson continued, “but it does speak to his state of mind in the weeks preceding his death.”

  Mom finally lifted her head. Tears welled in her eyes. I wanted to comfort her. I wanted her to comfort me. But she stood abruptly and said, “This is complete nonsense. Detective, I’d like you to leave.”

  Neither of them tried to stop me as I ran off to my room.

  Eric was sitting cross-legged on the floor, and he looked at me in surprise as I slammed the door and tumbled onto the bed.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  I shook my head and buried my face in the pillow. I’d thought it couldn’t hurt worse than it already did. But if Tyler had really left us on purpose? Calculated the date and time? Made detailed plans? All while he’d been driving me to school every morning, telling me the same stupid jokes, making the daily unspoken promise that things would always be that way? I wasn’t sure I could bear it.

  Someone knocked on the door, and I stormed over and threw it open, already talking. “Mom, we have to—”

  Detective Johnson stood in the doorway. “It’s not Mom,” she said. “Not your mom, anyway. Can I . . .” She gestured toward my room.

  I stepped back and held the door open for her.

  As she came in, Eric looked back and forth between us. “I’ll be in the bathroom.” He left quickly and closed the door behind him.

  Detective Johnson headed straight for my worktable. “These are really good,” she said, reaching out a hand to touch the corner of one of my finished pieces. “I like the way the leaves look like lace in this one.”

  “Thanks.” I leaned against the wall and crossed my arms. “Mom let you come up here?”

  She smiled slightly. “I can be persuasive when I want to be.”

  I bet she could. I offered her the only chair.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know this is hard. But I think it’s better to let you know what’s going on.” She hesitated, examining me closely. “I think you want all the information you can get.”

  I kept my chin high, hoping the tears in my eyes didn’t show. “I do.”

  She nodded. “So I wanted to tell you . . . we’ve been getting a lot of calls. From journalists. About your brother. They’re sniffing around for a big story, trying to be the first one to break it, whatever it turns out to be. And they will. Even without the formal autopsy report. Someone will say something, and it will come out.”

  I lowered myself unsteadily onto the bed. She was right. This would be a huge story. Something Westside High would never stop talking about. My mom’s friends . . . she wouldn’t be able to escape this. We’d never get out from under what had happened to Tyler. It wouldn’t just define him, it would define all of us.

  She rested her hands on her knees. “So what I’m asking is this. Do you want me to tell you? If I hear when it’s going to hit? Do you want to know?”

  I looked into her calm, serious face. “Yeah,” I said. “I do.”

  “Okay.” She stood. “And one more thing.” She handed me a business card, her eyes knowing. “If there’s anything you’re not telling me. Anything at all.” She gestured to the card. “I hope you’ll reconsider. Help me get this right.”

  As Johnson left my room and walked down the stairs, Eric stuck his head in the bedroom door. “Is the coast clear?”

  I nodded and jumped to my feet. I had to get out of this house. Away from my mother, away from the detective, away from all of it.

  “Oh my god,” Eric said. “Your life is crazy.”

  “Just grab the oven mitts and help me with the damn box.”

  “A comment that illustrates my point.”

  I led Eric down the hall to Tyler’s room. The bag of personal effects was still sitting on Tyler’s bed, but the box was nowhere to be seen.

  “Are you sure you left it here?” Eric asked.

  “I didn’t touch it again after that night.” I emptied the bag again, going through the contents with growing anxiety. After looking under the bed and in the closet, I went to the door and stuck my head out. “Mom!” I yelled. “Mom, are you here?”

  She didn’t answer, but my dad came out of their bedroom wearing pajama pants and a white undershirt, rubbing at his face. “What’s happening? Are you hurt?”

  “Were you asleep?” I asked. “It’s like four o’clock. The police were just here. Didn’t Mom try to—”

  “Is that why you’re screaming?”

  “I left something in Tyler’s room, and I can’t find it,” I said. “A wooden box. Have you been in there lately?”

  “Is that all?” Dad let out a breath. His face was marked with sleep lines. “I haven’t seen any box. And I don’t think your mother has been in there in weeks. Seriously, Megan,” he said, walking back toward their room. “Don’t scare me like that again.”

  I turned to Eric. “It’s gone. The box is gone.”

  “Clearly we need a new plan.” Eric was pacing back and forth in Tyler’s room, plotting out our next move with a ballpoint pen and a spiral notebook.

  “We’re supposed to leave for Dr. Brightman’s office in ten minutes. With a box we don’t have. Exactly what kind of plan is going to help us here?” I sat on Tyler’s bed, my eyes still searching the room for the missing box. I’d asked my mother, and she had no idea what I was talking about either. “It’s like the box just disappeared.”

  I stood and started pacing the room. What were we supposed to do now? From the pile on Tyler’s bed, I scooped up the metal marbles I’d found in his room and in his locker. I fidgeted with them, rolling them back and forth in my hands.

  “Maybe,” Eric said, holding his pen in the air, “somebody else wanted that box.”

  “Do you mean someone stole it?”

  Eric shrugged. “It’s a possibility.”

  “Sure, forget all the electronics and my mom’s jewelr
y. Somebody broke into our house and thought, Hey, check out this cigar box.”

  “It was important,” Eric insisted. “You didn’t see anything when you touched the other objects in the bag.” He gestured to the things strewn across Tyler’s bed from my wild search. “You tore through them like they were nothing.” He stepped closer. “There’s got to be a reason that some things trigger your visions and not others. Maybe Tyler’s death left a trail of marked objects, somehow, and the box was important because it had something to do with what happened to him.”

  My thoughts raced. Eric’s theory that the box had been stolen was ridiculous; almost no way could it be true. Mom or Dad must have moved it, and they were so stressed out and distracted they’d forgotten. But Eric was right about one thing: the visions seemed to be triggered only by certain objects, and I had no control over what I saw and when.

  But could I control them? If I learned more about this ability, maybe I could see more, from more objects. Maybe I could really use the visions as a tool to help me figure out what had been going on with Tyler these last few months.

  I stopped my pacing and faced Eric. “We’re going to see Dr. Brightman. Box or no box, I think maybe he can help me.”

  Dr. Brightman’s office was in a brick row house on Capitol Hill. Like its neighbors, the house had a little square of green lawn in front, surrounded by a low wrought-iron fence. The sidewalk bustled with pedestrians: moms with fancy strollers, couples making their way toward Eastern Market, older folks walking their dogs.

  A short flight of steps led to a bright-blue door. Eric bounded up the stairs first, and we crowded together on the small stoop. I pressed the bell, and moments later, Dr. Brightman himself answered the door. He was dressed more casually today, in dark jeans and a black sweater. Far from ordinary, though, the sweater had a tall, slouchy collar and bright silver zippers that slashed across each sleeve. He wore gloves but no sunglasses, and his eyes were sharp.

  “Miss Brown. And . . . friend. Please come in.”

  He gestured us through the door and into a room that was nothing like I’d expected. The historical building had been completely gutted and renovated with an eye toward ultramodern design. A glossy black monolith of a desk stood in one corner of the main room; in front of it, two dark leather couches formed a sitting area. All the tables and decorative touches were made of metal and smoky glass. The walls had been papered in an understated stripe, and thick gray carpet covered every inch of the floor. A staircase led up to . . . where? Living quarters? Rooms filled with the historical artifacts and polished antiques I’d expected?

  Eric eyed the room’s only personal-looking object, a set of car keys hanging on a hook by the front door, with a goofy plastic key chain in the shape of Abraham Lincoln’s head.

  “Have a seat,” Dr. Brightman said. We did. The furniture was less comfortable than it looked. He sat on the couch opposite us. “So you have a box to show me?”

  I shared a look with Eric. “I ran into a little trouble with the box.”

  “Trouble?”

  Eric jumped in. “It was stolen.”

  I gave him a warning glare. “We don’t know for sure that it was stolen.”

  “But it’s a possibility,” he said.

  I took a deep breath before plunging forward with my prepared speech. “I’m pretty sure the box belonged to Senator Gary Herndon, and my brother took it before he died.” Even as I said the word, it choked me a bit. “My brother, that is. Died. Not Senator Herndon.” I steadied my voice. “And I want to figure out what happened to him.”

  Interest sparked in Dr. Brightman’s eyes. “The Herndon family has been collecting Lincoln artifacts for generations. The senator’s own father spent years—and hundreds of thousands of dollars—assembling one of the nation’s best private collections.” He leaned toward me. “But if you don’t have the box, why did you come?”

  “Because of what I saw when I touched that piece of fabric at the exhibit.” I looked him in the eye. “Because of what you saw. I thought you might still be able to help me.” I hesitated. “I’ve seen things like that before. Visions, or whatever you want to call them. And when I touched the box, I . . .” My hand went involuntarily to my head as the memory of how it felt pulsed through me.

  “It was painful?” he asked.

  “That’s putting it lightly.”

  “Was the box the only object that you’ve . . . had that reaction to?”

  I thought of the baseball cap we’d found, and how long it had taken me to recover after touching it. “Not quite.”

  Dr. Brightman nodded. A slight smile began to play at the corners of his mouth. He was silent for a long time before he spoke.

  “Every object has a history.” He picked up a clear glass bowl from a side table. It was spun through with black threads, like ink spilled in water. He weighed it in his hand. “Someone made it. Someone packaged it, shipped it, sold it. Maybe someone used it for years, every day, before you ever owned it. Maybe not.” He put the bowl back down. “Most of the time, that history is invisible to us. Or we don’t care. But sometimes, history gives the most ordinary objects special meaning. They become not just eyeglasses, but Benjamin Franklin’s eyeglasses. Thomas Jefferson’s fountain pen. The flag that covered Abraham Lincoln’s coffin. They connect us to people and moments from the past, and we hunger for that connection.” He shrugged. “Of course, an object doesn’t have to be worthy of a museum to have a history. And some histories are more painful than others.” He stood. “Do you want to try an experiment?”

  “What kind of experiment?” Eric asked. I nudged him with my elbow, and he made an apologetic face.

  Dr. Brightman went to his desk and opened a drawer. He took out a small card and returned to the couch, laying it down on the glass table. It was a photograph of a young woman in profile, the paper curled at the corners and yellowed with age. She wasn’t particularly pretty, but she looked stylish. You know, for the 1800s.

  “So, how to describe this. . . .” Dr. Brightman thought a moment. “Have you ever heard of slow glass?”

  I shook my head.

  “Purely science fiction, of course. But a fascinating idea.” He ran a finger over the surface of the coffee table. “When light enters glass, it bends. It slows down, bounces around, before coming back out. But what if we could slow down the light even more, so it became trapped for years? When it finally emerged, you would essentially be seeing the past.” He tapped the photograph with one gloved finger. “Imagine artifacts the same way. As though there were memories bent and bouncing inside them, waiting to be seen again. Some memories are brighter than others. Some burn like staring at the sun.”

  I lowered my hands and rested my fingers on the photograph.

  Nothing happened.

  Memories like lights, I thought. I squeezed my eyes shut. Lights did glimmer behind my eyelids, but they might have been nothing more than an illusion.

  “You need to keep your eyes open,” Dr. Brightman told me. “Look at the object, but look beyond what you see.”

  I tried to look beyond the photograph, but I had no idea what I was doing. And still, nothing happened. Until Dr. Brightman’s bare hand closed over mine.

  A light rushed toward me, and the world around me shifted. Instead of Dr. Brightman’s impeccable office, I found myself in a green-and-gold restaurant, lit by hanging lamps and brightened by the clink of silverware on china. Dr. Brightman stood beside me, his hand still on mine. The woman from the photograph sat at the table in front of us, her cheeks flushed pink and a spark of mischief in her blue eyes that the camera hadn’t captured. Across from her sat a young man with a shock of dark tousled hair and a mustache that grew down toward his chin. He had one arm hooked over the back of his chair. His eyes were locked on the young woman, and a wolfish grin split his face.

  She tossed her head, and her long curls bounced against one shoulder. “I won’t wait for my father’s approval to marry. If I let him make my decisions, then no
thing in my life will belong to me. Not even my mistakes.” She beamed at the young man. “Or my joys. I count you among the latter, of course.”

  He smiled indulgently, pulled out a pocket watch, and checked the time. Then his face altered, as though a mask had dropped down over his features—or as though one had been pulled away. He stood, suddenly stiff and rigid.

  The young woman laughed up at him. “Johnnie,” she said warningly, “don’t tell me you’re leaving so soon. I might have been at six or seven other engagements this morning.”

  The man’s expression did not soften. With some ceremony, he reached down and took the woman’s hand, lifting it to his mouth and kissing it. “‘Nymph, in thy orisons be all my sins remembered.’” As he turned to leave, I saw him reach into his pocket and pull out a card. The photograph. He gripped it in his hand as he walked away from the table.

  The woman called after him, surprise and confusion coloring her face. “Hamlet? That’s your exit line? At least give me some Romeo and Juliet.” Despite her irritation, he disappeared through the door, swallowed up by the light.

  Dr. Brightman shifted beside me, pulling the photograph from between our linked hands. The world went dark.

  When I could see again, we were back on the couch in Dr. Brightman’s office. He had a slight smile on his face. “You found it.”

  Eric rested a hand on my arm. “What did you find?”

  “A memory.” I raised my hand to the back of my head, where a dull ache had started to grow. “That man . . . it was John Wilkes Booth, wasn’t it?”

  Dr. Brightman nodded. “Very good. The assassin, on the morning of his famous crime.”

  I shuddered. “And who was she?” I nodded toward the picture.

  “Booth’s fiancée. Lucy Lambert Hale.”

  “Her father didn’t want them together?”

  Dr. Brightman picked up the photograph in his still-gloved right hand and carried it back to his desk. “Like Clara Harris’s father, John Parker Hale was a powerful senator. In fact, he’d been named ambassador to Spain. Some historians believe Hale requested the assignment just to end his daughter’s engagement to an actor, of all things.”