Without warning, Riley popped up on her tippy toes and planted a kiss on his lips. Noah looked down at her mischievous expression as she spoke.
“I’ve got to go. I’ll be late to my class if I don’t hurry.”
Simultaneously, a male teacher appeared at the doorway of the classroom, looking at Noah. “Hey! No PDA! Get to class you two.” He seemed only slightly annoyed.
Riley winked at Noah as she departed. She seemed amused by the teacher’s reaction. Noah sighed and looked back at the teacher blocking his path towards his first class. The girl who had stopped in the hallway was now slipping into the classroom behind the teacher. Her expression was noticeably upset.
A thousand questions began filling his mind as he followed the guy into the room. Noah was the last person in, which left only one seat available in the middle of the room – right next to the girl. Did he know her? Why was she upset? Is it because of Riley’s kiss? Was she an ex-girlfriend?
He felt like he was walking on egg shells as he carefully sat down next to the pissed off magazine model. Noah felt extremely uneasy as the teacher began the lecture. He was in an unfamiliar classroom, in an unfamiliar school, surrounded by complete strangers. The only person who he felt like he actually knew was in separate classes all day, and he had already begun unintentionally pissing people off. He felt like a boat lost at sea without an anchor.
The girl next to him obviously knew him but having a conversation in the middle of class wasn’t possible, especially since she didn’t want to talk. As the lecture dragged on, he wondered if he could try to stop her in the hall and explain the situation. Granted, he knew that if Riley had barely believed his story, then it was unlikely this girl would accept that excuse, especially since she was angry. Noah imagined that Riley might not have believed his story if she had been upset prior to him telling her about his amnesia.
The teacher continued to monologue right up until the bell rang. Everyone began slowly getting out of their seats, but the girl rushed out of the room immediately before he could say anything. Noah just sat there stunned, realizing he had missed his chance. She was already long gone. He hoped they had more classes together, so he could attempt to make amends.
Gathering his stuff, a guy walked up to him. “Wow, did you do something to piss Madison off? I’ve never seen her angry. Like, never .”
Noah looked up at the guy, wondering who he was. He must be a friend. “Yeah, umm, I’m actually not sure.”
“Well, for not being sure, you surely must have done something.”
“Yeah, I guess.” He shrugged as they started walking out of the classroom together. Noah resisted the urge to introduce himself and ask the guy’s name. I already know him. I just can’t remember. It’ll be weird if I ask his name again.
As they reached the door, the guy started heading in the opposite direction. “Well, I’ll see you at lunch.”
Noah was glad to discover he would have someone to sit with at lunch, even if he didn’t know his name. “Right, see you.”
He realized he had forgotten to look at his agenda during the lecture, in order to figure out where his next class was. His thoughts had been too preoccupied with the girl. Opening it up now, he examined the arrows and highlighted path, again thankful someone had taken the time to mark this map for him. He found his next class easily, but waited to enter until the bell rang. He wanted to be the last person in the room, so he didn’t have to try to guess which seat was his.
The next few classes went by painfully slow. Every time he arrived at his next period, he hoped to see the girl, only to be disappointed when she wasn’t there. By lunchtime he had begun wondering if he had any more classes with her. He decided that if she wasn’t at lunch, then he might try to find out who she was by questioning the guy from first period.
Surprisingly, in every single class, Noah had people coming up to him saying ‘hi’ or striking up a conversation. It didn’t take him long before he realized that he had a lot of friends. Almost everyone seemed to know him. However, he attempted to avoid having in-depth conversations to prevent anyone from figuring out he had amnesia. Nevertheless, it was nice to know so many people knew and liked him.
When he finally got to lunch, his suspicion that he had a lot of friends was further confirmed when he found himself sitting at an entire table full of them. He now recognized many of these students from the first half of the day. Interestingly, they all seemed different, like they were all from different cliques. Yet they all seemed to have one friend in common – Noah. It was like he was the center to the spokes of a wheel.
Noah sat next the guy from his first class, hoping to try to question him about Madison, without seeming too weird. He discovered that the guy’s name was Alex by overhearing someone call his name. As soon as he sat down, Alex began questioning him instead .
“Dude! I heard you were all over the new girl this morning. No wonder Madison is pissed!”
A girl from across the table overheard Alex, and chimed in, “What ? Noah and Riley? When did that happen?”
Noah hadn’t thought to ask Riley how long they had been dating. He just assumed it had been awhile, like at least a few months. Had they kept it a secret until now? He realized that Madison must have become an ex-girlfriend recently .
Unsure of how to respond, Noah just shrugged.
In response to realizing the girl was eavesdropping, Alex moved closer to Noah to avoid being overheard. “I mean, Riley’s hot, but so is Madison. I thought you and Madison would make it official any day now.”
Wait. What?! Now Noah was really confused. And he had just begun thinking he was starting to figure things out. Was Madison not an ex-girlfriend? He had to know more. He needed to make sense of this situation.
“What do you mean by make it official?” He wondered.
Alex looked at him in disbelief. “Are you kidding me? You’ve been best friends forever, and you’re over at her house all the time. You two always claim to be ‘just friends,’ but everyone thinks you’re a lot more serious than ‘just friends.’”
The eavesdropping girl still overheard Alex, chiming in again. “Maybe they’re friends with benefits .” The girl obviously thought she was hilarious as she giggled at her own comment .
Noah wondered what kind of relationship he and Madison truly had. At least now he knew for a fact that Riley’s kiss was what had triggered her anger. Even if they had only been friends, it was obvious from her reaction that she at least thought they were more than friends. He really hoped they hadn’t been friends with benefits, because the idea that he had started two-timing her with Riley made him sick to his stomach. Was he that kind of a person?
Riley was definitely super attractive, but if he had already been something serious with Madison then he couldn’t imagine dating Riley. Was the Noah who he couldn’t remember a jackass?
Just as he was considering how he might find out more information about the situation, a group of three girls walked up to the table and randomly started taunting him. “Hey Noah, I heard you really pissed off Madison. You’re both such losers.”
For a second, he was completely astonished that they had taken the time to come over and tease him about what was apparently the big gossip of the school. Unsure of how to respond to their unexpected bullying, he just raised his eyebrows and looked back towards the table, as if to say ‘wow.’ He could hear them scoffing at his lack of reaction. They continued to try to jab at him more, but when he didn’t react or show any emotion they scoffed again, walking away with a lingering, “Such a loser.” It was clear that they had wanted to get a rise out of him, but they quickly became bored when they weren’t able to .
Noah was beginning to understand an interesting facet of his life as a high school student. It was obvious that he had a lot of friends, yet he didn’t appear to be ‘popular’ in the way it was usually used. He was popular in the sense that everyone seemed to know who he was, and most people seemed to like him, yet because he wasn’t a foot
ball player (they all seemed to sit together) he wasn’t in the snob group.
From what he could tell, Madison was in the same boat. With her looks, he couldn’t imagine a world where she wasn’t the most popular girl in school – everyone else seemed average in comparison – yet here she was being called a loser by a group of snobs. Maybe they held a grudge against her, because she had turned down their offer of friendship. Which likely indicated Madison actually had her own personality, along with some character and healthy self-esteem to go with it. She didn’t need the approval of snobs to feel like she fit in.
While Noah was contemplating this revelation, Alex went back to his questioning. “So what are you going to do about Madison?”
Suddenly remembering the schedule in his agenda, Noah recalled that whoever had written it had placed stars next to his first and fifth classes. Had Madison done that? Were those the classes they had together? Confident that this was most logical explanation, Noah tentatively responded. “I was hoping to talk to her during fifth period to try to figure this all out.”
“Good luck with that,” the eavesdropper commented. “Apparently, she left school right after first period. ”
Oh no! Noah groaned inside. He had completely missed his chance. How was he going to talk with her now?
Alex was quick with his next question, ignoring the girl. “So are you going to stick with the new girl?”
Already frustrated, he wondered why Alex kept calling Riley the new girl. Certainly after a few months people would put a name with the face. Irritated, he decided to ask. “Why do you keep calling her the new girl? She has a name.”
Alex seemed embarrassed. “Oh, well, I mean she only just transferred a couple of days ago. I didn’t even know her name until Emma mentioned it a minute ago.” He was referring to the eavesdropper.
Wait. What?! Now Noah was super confused. Did students even transfer at the end of the semester? He had assumed that he and Riley had been dating for at least a month, minimum. She had seemed so comfortable with him, as if they had a ton of history together. Had he asked her out only a few days ago? That would make yesterday only their first or second date.
Can two people really become so comfortable with each other in only a couple of days? Maybe they had some serious chemistry. Maybe the fact that they were so comfortable with each other was why Noah had abandoned the Madison-ship for Riley.
Noah began chastising himself. Dammit Noah, what mess have you gotten yourself into? Of all the times to lose his memory, it had to be right when he had made an extremely complicated decision that probably required a great deal of finesse to resolve without causing significant conflict. And now he had a pissed off Madison, who was either secretly his girlfriend or at least wanted to be, and he had no memories to provide him with any clue of how to deal with the situation.
More to himself than anyone else, Noah responded. “Jeez, I really need to talk to her.”
Alex heard him. “Why don’t you just walk over to her house after school like you normally do?”
For a few seconds, Noah was annoyed by the fact that he didn’t know where she lived, and he couldn’t ask anyone because everyone was aware that he should know where she lives. But then his mind pulled him back to a detail in Alex’s statement, Why don’t you just walk over…
Walk over? Noah thought. She lived within walking distance? Did she live in the same subdivision as him? That would make sense why he supposedly frequented her house so often. Remembering back to last night, he recalled that he had felt extremely nostalgic walking back to his house – had the nostalgia come from the many trips he had bad back and forth from Madison’s house? Noah wondered if he should just leave school now and try to find her house by walking around the subdivision.
No, I can’t do that. I can’t afford to draw more attention to myself right now. Plus, she might not have gone home. Noah sunk in his seat as he realized he would have to wait until school was over – another three hours of torture. Having to wait at all was bad enough, but since he only had memories from last night and today, three hours felt like an especially long time.
“Man, you look bummed,” Alex commented.
Emma chimed in again, “You should have thought about this before you started getting all handsy with Riley.”
Alex gave Emma a look, “Not helping Emma.”
“I’m just saying.” She shrugged and looked away.
Noah didn’t respond. He didn’t have the energy. He didn’t know what to think. Dammit, why did I have to lose my memory at a time like this?
“Maybe you should eat something.” Alex suggested. He seemed to be trying to get Noah’s mind off the situation.
He slowly shook his head in response. “I’m not hungry.” All the anxiety and drama had seemed to steal away any appetite he might have had.
Alex made a few more attempts to try to distract Noah, but he just wasn’t in the mood. After a few minutes, he and everyone else at the table seemed to silently agree to give him his space. He sat there in silence, staring at the wall, not even trying to listen to the conversations at the table. When the bell rang, Alex patted him on the shoulder. “Good luck man. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Noah realized that lunch must have been the last time he saw Alex during the day. He nodded in response, got up, and headed to his locker.
The rest of the day was, in fact, torture – and he knew from last night what real torture felt like. He felt numb. Every second ticked by slowly as if it was taunting him. Over and over again, he considered just leaving school early and trying to find her, but he knew he couldn’t afford to draw attention to himself. He didn’t want his parent’s asking questions when they found out he had skipped school. Plus, Riley would probably have questions too if he wasn’t in his last class. He wanted to avoid as many questions as possible while he tried to figure this whole mess out.
Noah arrived at his last class hoping that Riley’s presence might break him away from his melancholy. As usual, he intentionally attempted to be the last person in the room, so he didn’t have to guess which seat was his. He had expected to see Riley come to class, but when the bell rang he realized she must already be in the room. As soon as he entered the doorway, he began scanning his classmates, but Riley was nowhere to be seen. There were two empty seats this time. From earlier in the day, he had noticed that most of the teachers had students sitting alphabetically, so he had an idea of which one was his. He sat down, double checking that she really wasn’t there.
The woman at the front of the class scanned the room for attendance, noticing that someone was missing. “Riley?” She called. Then when it was obvious Riley wasn’t in the room, she spoke more generally to the class. “Has anyone seen Riley?”
A girl raised her hand to reply. “Mrs. Stanford, she wasn’t in my third period either. I think she went home sick.”
Riley was sick? She seemed fine this morning. Had he given her a cold ? Noah did a quick internal check and noted that he felt fine himself, other than stressed. But he did feel hot – he had felt hot all day. Was he running a fever?
Noah felt his head and then felt stupid. He had no idea how to tell if he was running a fever. His head felt fine to the touch, but that was probably normal for people with a high temperature. He contemplated asking the teacher to go to the nurse’s office, claiming he didn’t feel well. However, there were too many ways that could backfire on him. What if they called his parents? What if she had someone escort him to the nurse’s office? Either way, it would draw too much attention to himself. As much as he hated to, he needed to just wait until class was over, so he would be free to investigate the Madison situation. Noah was concerned about Riley too, but there wasn’t anything he could do about a cold. On the other hand, Madison felt like a ticking time bomb – he needed to find her and figure out what was going on.
When the last bell rang, Noah filed out of the room with everyone else and headed to his car. Once there, he climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled
out his phone. He had hoped that maybe Riley would call him after school, since she knew he couldn’t unlock his phone, but there were no messages or missed calls. He stuck the phone back in his pocket and started the car.
On the way to school that morning, he had only partially paid attention to the roads, but nevertheless he seemed to know how to get home almost on autopilot. He realized it must be because he had driven the roads to and from school enough times to have it ingrained in his mind. Pulling into his driveway, he pulled out his phone again to see if maybe he had missed a call from Riley. There was still nothing.
Well, Riley will be okay. I need to find Madison. He got out of the car and headed straight for the sidewalk. He was hoping the feeling of nostalgia would lead him to Madison’s house. Noah turned in the direction from where he come last night, and started walking in that direction.
Sure enough, within a few seconds he started feeling nostalgic again. Then abruptly, he had a flashback.
Madison was laughing. Her adorable face lit up with a devilish grin. Her brown hair was pulled into a high ponytail. It was her birthday – she was reading something he had written in a card for her. She grabbed a small wrapped box in her lap – her present from him. She began tearing off the wrapping paper. He couldn’t see what it was, but she could. Her face gasped in surprise. She hadn’t been expecting it. Madison looked up at Noah, her chocolate brown eyes sparklingly. She threw herself at him, wrapping him in a tight embrace. Noah could feel her breath on his ear as she thanked him in a whispered. “I love it.”
Stunned, Noah blinked. He had stopped dead in his tracks on the sidewalk. The memory was so powerful that it felt like it had really happened just now. He reached his hand up to his ear, which was tingling from the sensation of Madison’s whisper. His heart swelled at the memory as strong emotions filled his chest .
He knew from Madison’s reaction earlier that she had at least wanted to be more than friends; however, now he knew that he had felt the same way. Had he hidden his feelings from her, thinking that telling her would destroy their friendship? Was there a reason he had thought she didn’t feel the same?
The Keras Genome Page 4