Dare

by Glenna Sinclair

  “I asked you not to tell me?”

  I nodded. “You said you wanted to pretend that the day I met you was the beginning of everything. You said it wasn’t important to you to know whom I’d dated, whom I loved, whom I didn’t.”

  She rubbed her casted leg again. “So you didn’t.”

  “I didn’t. And then you moved out here; we got engaged; and we planned a wedding. It was going to be a beautiful affair here in Los Angeles. We rented out a beautiful garden downtown, had a priest, all the guests coming. Everything was set.”

  “And I called it off because of a snafu at the county office.”

  She made it sound so trivial. It hadn’t felt trivial at the time.

  “You wouldn’t let me explain. All you could hear was that I was married, and that convinced you that I’d been lying to you all along. I tried to convince you that I wouldn’t do that, that I wouldn’t have taken you down there if I had known you would find out that way, but you wouldn’t listen.”

  “I moved out?”

  “You rented a little house downtown, not far from where you were working on the mural for Margaret.”

  “Why didn’t I go back to Texas?”

  “I don’t know, really. I was hoping it was because it wasn’t really over between us. I wanted to believe that it was because you were upset, but you weren’t ready to end things between us completely.”

  “But you don’t know for sure.”

  “I don’t.”

  She adjusted her position in the chair, a low moan slipping from between her lips as she did. I wanted to insist she go back to her bedroom, take her pill, and relax a little. But I knew she didn’t want to be fussed over. Not now.

  “I want to see it,” she said after a few minutes.

  “What?”

  “The house I was renting. Maybe it’ll help me remember.”

  An image flashed through my mind, the high steps in front of the house covered in roses I’d bought and had delivered. Every day. For a week.

  “The steps are too steep. We’d never be able to get the wheelchair up there.” I sat forward and touched her knee lightly. “There’s plenty of time. The doctor said you shouldn’t push things, that it would come back naturally if it comes back at all.”

  She nodded. “I know. I just…I feel like something is missing, you know? I just want to get on with my life.”

  “Patience was never your strong point.”

  She smiled then, her eyes meeting mine for the first time since her father barged into the house.

  “Thank you,” she said, touching my hand. “I really appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”

  I shrugged. “I love you, Harley. And I’ve always believed that what happened three months ago was just a blip. We’re meant to be together.”

  Her smile widened briefly, but then pain shot through her expression. I’d had enough. I stood and swept her out of the wheelchair, carrying her to the small bedroom at the back of the house she’d been living in since coming home from the hospital. Her pills were on the bedside table. I fed one to her, then got the heating pad that seemed to be the only thing that could relieve the worst of the pain before the pill began working.

  She let me stretch out on the bed beside her; she even allowed me to cradle her head against my chest. As we lay there, I could almost believe that everything was going to be okay, that Harley was coming back to me. I held on to that hope with everything I had.

  Chapter 15

  Harley

  They removed my cast today. I wasn’t completely free of restraint because they replaced it with a removable boot to continue to support the section of the tibia that was broken the worst and continued to resist healing. My physical therapist said that I would be free of the boot in a few weeks if I kept working as hard as I’d been doing these last few weeks. I couldn’t wait to have my body back. This broken thing felt wrong, like it belonged to someone else. When I looked in the mirror, I didn’t know the woman looking back. My hair was growing, but it was still so short—like a little boy’s cut. But my collarbone was finally healed—though it still ached from time to time—and my ribs were good. If I could just get this leg to heal…

  I stood in front of the mirror in the bedroom that had been my primary space since leaving the hospital and stared at the summer dress I was wearing. It flowed nicely from my shoulders, the thin, white material making my pale skin look healthier than it really was. I don’t know what was more exciting: that I’d gotten myself dressed without having to call for Xander to fix my buttons or zipper, or that I was looking at myself in the mirror without the wheelchair I’d grown to hate.

  Independence was an amazing thing.

  There was still pain when I walked, but not nearly as much as there had been weeks ago when I first left the hospital. And it was clunky. But it wasn’t as if I was going to a ball anytime soon.

  I stepped out of the bedroom and slipped out a back door to the impressive porch that flowed from one end of the house to the other. I loved being outside. It probably came from growing up with a father who was a large animal vet. While my parents were caring for the horses and cows belonging to their clients, I was running around the ranches, dogs and horses some of my closest friends.

  I curled up in a chair in a sunbeam, enjoying the late afternoon heat on my face. My mom used to say I was a cat in another life because I’d always enjoyed bathing in sunlight. She might be right.

  My accident happened almost two months ago. Yet, I still had no memory of the last three years. There were little flashes here and there, but nothing concrete. My memories of the night Xander proposed were the closest I’d come to remembering anything substantial. And that had this fuzziness around the edges that suggested there was something still missing.

  I was beginning to worry that I would never remember.

  Xander was wonderful. He didn’t push me, but he was always ready with answers when I had questions. When I wanted time alone, he left me alone. When I wanted to hang out with him, he made himself available. I couldn’t imagine a man being any more considerate to a woman. And that confused the hell out of me.

  Why had I called off the wedding? So what if he was married before?

  I knew there had to be more to the story. However, I didn’t know how to figure out what that was.

  “Harley? There you are!”

  I turned and watched as Margaret Wallace walked around the side of the house toward me. She was wearing an expensive dress that was clearly not designed to be worn anywhere near nature, along with a pair of sunglasses that made her look vaguely like Jackie O. I wanted to laugh, as I watched her nearly trip over a low rose bush, but I bit it back. I didn’t know Margaret that well, but I knew her reputation. She was one of the hottest authorities on modern art in the country at the moment. At least, she was three years ago. And she owns the art gallery where every up-and-coming artist wants his or her stuff shown. I would have done just about anything, three years ago, to have my stuff shown in her gallery. So it was a little unreal for me to realize that I’d been working for her for months and that we’re actually friends of some sort.

  “I’ve been knocking on the door,” Margaret said, as she fell into a chair beside me. “I thought you’d gone out or something.”

  I patted my boot. “This is much easier, but I still can’t drive.”

  “I’m surprised Xander hasn’t hired a driver for you.”

  I smiled because he’d offered. However, I turned him down, not wanting to be a financial burden on him—even though it was pretty obvious he could afford it.

  “So, we’re opening the community center this weekend.”

  “The one where I was doing the mural?”

  “Yes. Construction is finally done. I was beginning to think we were never going to finish.”

  “Xander said the center is for low-income kids?”

  Margaret glanced at me, then smiled a little wryly. “I keep forgetting you’ve lost your memory. Yes, it is. I
started it almost a year ago when a friend of mine suggested that someone should do something about the kids running around the neighborhood with nothing to do. Xander found the space, and he donated the security system. Another friend ran several fundraisers to pay for the renovations, and you were providing the art.”

  “The mural wasn’t finished?”

  “No. But it’s close enough that only those with a good eye will be able to tell.”

  “I’d like to see it.”

  Margaret’s eyebrows rose. “Yes?”

  Before I could nod, she was out of her chair and grabbing my hand.

  “Let’s go!”

  She drove a Jaguar that was complicated to get inside with my new boot, but it was so much easier than it might have been with the thigh-high cast I’d had before. Margaret chatted as we drove across town, but I didn’t hear much of it. I was busy staring out the window, waiting for the landscape to prompt a memory or two. However, none of it looked even vaguely familiar.

  “Xander said I lived over here for a while.”

  Margaret gestured vaguely toward the west. “You had a tiny house over there for a couple of months.” She glanced at me. “He told you about the called-off wedding, then.”

  “He did.”

  “Did he tell you everything?” She slowed the car at a stop light and looked at me, her eyes searching my face for a long moment. “Did he tell you about—?”

  “The divorce that wasn’t on record? Yes.”

  “Then you know it was my fault.”

  I glanced at her. “What do you mean?”

  “Paperwork has never really been my thing, you know. I thought it got to where it should have gone, but…well, you know.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about.

  She eased the car forward, and we rounded a curve. The building on the left was instantly familiar to me, but I couldn’t tell anyone why. It just…well, it just was.

  It was a long, low building made of concrete blocks. It was painted a soft brown on the outside, but I think that was a new addition. I felt that it was once white with the sheen of dirt and debris all over it. The brown was definitely an improvement. There were signs naming it The Wilshire Community Center, with another that had Margaret’s smiling face on it, marking her as the organizer of the project.

  I was a little surprised to see my face adorning another of these signs. It was taken before the accident—obviously—my hair was long, almost to my waist, and I was smiling at the camera like one of those lawyers you see on the side of city buses. It was kind of creepy, looking at my own face and not really recognizing the woman who was staring back.

  “When was that taken?”

  Margaret pulled to a stop in the small parking lot besides the building. “I don’t know. You gave it to me a week or two before the accident. I never really had a chance to ask you about it.”

  We got out and headed inside. The main doors opened into a lobby that was furnished the way a teenager would furnish his own room, complete with mushroom chairs and video games. Past the reception desk, there was a hallway that opened into various classroom-type areas where kids could read their favorite books, watch television, get help with their homework, or work on art projects.

  “This room was your idea,” Margaret said, gesturing to the large room that was furnished only with easels and supply shelves. “You said the students didn’t get enough art instruction at school and would appreciate this sort of thing. We hired a young art teacher last week to oversee the project. She’s quite enthusiastic.”

  “That’s good.”

  Margaret just nodded, as she led the way further into the building. There were more rooms—a computer lab, a large library—all the things one might assume would be found inside a nice school. There was even a gym. Margaret pushed open double doors at the end of a long hallway, and we walked into a huge gym that had a full basketball court and room for full-sized bleachers. There were doors at the back of the room that led to locker rooms and a large storage room. I knew what the storage room looked like; I could even instruct someone on how to find the ladders and the painting supplies in there, even though I couldn’t remember a single day before this one in which I’d stepped into this room. It was so odd the way my head worked.

  The mural was behind us on the wall where the scoreboard hung high over the floor. Margaret grabbed my hand and turned me around so that I could see it. My first impression was that it was incredibly massive. My second was that it was far more technical than anything I was capable of doing. The lines were beautiful, the design intricate. I walked up to it and ran my fingers over a perfectly drawn palm tree, unable to believe my fingers had done this. But even as I touched it, I could almost feel the brush strokes it would have taken to do it, as though my body remembered it even if I didn’t.

  “It’s so much more than I’d imagined when I first suggested we have a mural put in,” Margaret said. “I interviewed dozens of artists and none of them seemed capable of creating the image I had in my head. And then Xander showed me your work, and I knew you would be perfect.”

  I was only partially listening. I was so fascinated by the work that there didn’t seem to be anything else in the room. My memories were still in college. In my mind, I was still learning my craft, not doing work like this. This was so far beyond me, yet…

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “It is. You’re a very talented artist, Harley.”

  Those words, coming from Margaret Wallace, were almost overwhelming. I glanced at her, a blush on my cheeks. Xander told me I know her, that we were all friends. But I still can’t wrap my mind around it.

  “Thank you,” I said softly.

  I stepped back and studied the mural. I could see what was missing, what needed to be drawn out a little more, what needed to be finished.

  “Would you let me finish it?”

  Her eyebrows rose. “Really? Do you think you’re up to that?”

  I nodded. “I’d like to give it a try.”

  Margaret suddenly burst into enthusiastic movement. She turned completely around before gesturing toward the back of the room. “All your supplies should still be in the storage room. I’m not exactly sure where you kept them all, but we could probably find them without too much trouble.”

  I was already halfway across the room. “I got it.”

  In just a few minutes, I was dressed in overalls and I had a paintbrush in my hand. I studied the mural for a few minutes, trying to get it all straight in my head. I could see where I’d been going with it, but my memories kept trying to get in the way, telling my confidence that I was going to fuck the whole thing up. But once I put brush to concrete, those doubts disappeared. I might not remember planning this out and painting it this far, but whatever it was inside of me that created these things remembered. And I was lost in that creative mode for the next few hours.

  It was the most normal I’d felt since all this began.

  Chapter 16

  Xander

  I couldn’t believe it. My Harley was back.

  I stood just inside the door of the gym and watched her as I’d done so many times in the past. She was humming just under her breath, some pop song that I vaguely remembered being popular years ago. Harley was an amazing artist, but she wasn’t much of a singer. But I didn’t care. This was the Harley I’d known, the Harley I fell in love with.

  When Margaret called and told me she was working on the mural again, I was livid. I couldn’t believe that Margaret would do this, that she would bring her here without talking to me first. But now…let’s just say I was a little less peeved than I was before.

  “This is familiar,” I said.

  Harley looked up and smiled widely. “Hey.”

  “Hey to you, too. What are you doing?”

  “Margaret came by the house to tell me about the opening here tomorrow night, and I thought seeing the building might help me remember something.”

&nbs
p; “Did it?”

  She bit her lower lip, a touch of sadness coming into her eyes. “Not really. I mean, I don’t specifically remember anything about this place or even this mural. But it’s like my hands remember creating this, like my creative side remembers it all.”

  “That’s got to be a good sign.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. But it’s been fun working on it. I didn’t realize my skill level had grown this much.”

  “You are incredibly talented, Harley. You were on the verge of signing a deal to show your stuff in a New York gallery the last time I talked to you.”

  “I was?”

  I wondered for a minute if that was something I should have told her. But I couldn’t see how it would hurt.

  “You said you were talking to Peter Collins at the Collins Gallery in Manhattan. In fact, I think you were supposed to fly out there a few days before or after the accident. You weren’t very clear on that part of it.”

  She concentrated on the mural for a minute. Then she stepped forward and applied her brush, losing complete track of our conversation. I was used to that. She could get lost for hours in her work. It was one of those things that was both a blessing and a curse. It kept her busy when I was out of town with work, but when I was around and wanted her to pay attention to me, sometimes it was quite the competition between me and the work.

  I sat in the middle of the recently waxed floor and watched her. I remembered the first time I watched her work like this, the day I picked her up for our first date. She’d gotten so involved in what she was doing that she’d let the time get away from her. The next time I watched her work like this was after the first time we made love.

  “I’m sorry, I’ve just got to get this image out of my head,” she said, as she scooted to the end of the bed and grabbed my shirt up off of the floor. When she didn’t come back right away, I followed her. I couldn’t find her in the small rooms off of the master bedroom, or the living room downstairs. But I saw the lights on in her little studio out in the backyard.