With a lump in my throat I shoved the flyers to one side and turned the cookie tin upside down, frowning when I noticed a box the shape and size of a deck of cards among the debris. It was wrapped in shiny red paper with golden swirls, rattled when I shook it, and as I turned it over, I spotted a tiny folded note attached to the top with tape. I took it off, and opened it, recognizing Jack’s neat penmanship.
Dear Lily,
Stay tonight & every night after.
I love you.
Jack x
I tore into the paper and ripped open the box, but instead of the ring in the brochure it was a house key, one I instinctively knew was for his apartment. Jack had planned on asking me to move in, maybe even propose, and I’d have said yes to all of it if he hadn’t disappeared. If I hadn’t found out he was a liar. As the future we’d had together crumbled between my fingers, I pressed the box and brochure to my chest, trying not to scream. Scream for Jack to come home. For him to tell me the truth, and, most of all, for this nightmare to be over.
11
MAYA
I barely slept all night, and early Sunday morning, at what Ash and I had long ago baptized stupid o’clock, meaning the sun had scarcely graced the bottom of the skies, I gave up and got out of bed. Once I’d made sure Ash was in his room, and everything that had happened the night before wasn’t a dream or my overactive imagination, I paced the kitchen for a while before going for a run to clear my mind.
Exercise wasn’t something I’d done much of since Ash had left. I hadn’t had the desire or energy, preferring to stay home and work on my driftwood art in the garage. It wasn’t just for the badly needed extra cash my pieces brought in, but also the feeling of satisfaction the work gave me, and the illusion I was doing more with my life than simply letting it pass me by. Barbara, who ran a store in town called Drift and who was charged with selling my pieces, often said she thought I could have a much broader reach if I set up online. Maybe I would now that Ash was back. But first I needed to figure out what was going on with him.
While the rain had stopped, the gray, low-hanging clouds appeared to be in no hurry to make way for the sun, and the crisp air was cooler than I’d anticipated. I went to the back of the yard to the path at the top of the cliffs and turned left, upping the pace, my legs already protesting from the lack of care and attention. I slowed down, deciding on a walk so my lungs wouldn’t collapse, and found a steady rhythm, my feet barely making a sound as they hit the earthy path.
Forcing myself to push some of what I’d seen online the night before from my mind, I focused on what I’d found out about Ash’s potential condition, and the mental notes I’d made. Complete memory loss could have multiple causes, including Alzheimer’s (far too young?), a stroke (no other symptoms?), drugs or alcohol withdrawal (he’d always been antidrugs and drank responsibly), mental health issues (genetic predisposition?), and what Fiona had mentioned, amnesia, which seemed the most feasible but opened up a plethora of possibilities.
Anterograde amnesia was the inability to form new memories, but Ash had mentioned falling asleep in both the trailer and the old house he’d broken into, and when he’d woken up, he’d recalled being at the beach. Transient global amnesia meant forgetting pretty much everything, so it was a contender. However, retrograde amnesia was also the inability to recall past events, and could be caused by a head injury, which Ash had definitely suffered judging by the gash I’d seen last night. I’d read through site after site until the pages blurred and I’d gone cross-eyed. In my mind, if he had amnesia, I ruled out anterograde because the part of his brain that made new memories seemed to be working, but what did I know other than reading up on Dr. Google?
Walking a little faster, I stumbled and tripped when the tip of my shoe caught on a root because I was too busy thinking about what would happen if Ash had one of the other types of amnesia, I got home and he no longer recognized me. Or if he’d had a stroke after all, a precursor to a bigger, more damaging and potentially fatal one. Getting outside was supposed to help my focus. Instead it was turning my brain to mush, making it a soupy mess of terrifying questions, with not nearly enough answers.
When the first raindrop smacked me on the forehead, I cursed myself for coming out in the first place. Ash had been sound asleep, but what if he woke up while I was gone, and ran off again? I was freaking out now, cutting through the forest before bursting out onto the main road, running full throttle, my lungs burning. It took me another few minutes to get back to the house, and well before I ran up the driveway, I saw Keenan’s bright red Subaru WRX parked askew.
“Oh, hell, no,” I wheezed, leaping up the porch steps, and as my fingers touched the door handle, I could already hear the shouting.
“...because you sure as shit should crawl back underneath it,” Keenan yelled. Ash must have said something in reply because Keenan raised his voice again. “Should I take that as a confession, you goddamn piece of—”
I rushed through the door and into the kitchen, where Ash was dressed in jeans and an old sweater, his hair sticking out at different angles. He stood behind the kitchen table as a red-faced Keenan, who held his car keys tightly in his fist, moved in on him.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I roared, and both of them spun around.
“I want answers,” Keenan said, turning back to Ash. “And you’re going to give—”
“I told you already, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Ash reached for the back of a chair, looking like he might collapse, his eyes darting from Keenan to me and back again.
“Get out.” I walked over and grabbed Keenan’s arm, but he shook me off. “I said get out. Leave. Now. I mean it. You don’t get to come here and mess with my brother.”
“Stepbrother. And I’ll do whatever the hell I want, Maya.”
“Not in my house. Why can’t you understand he’s lost his memory? Besides, Ash is—”
“Innocent?” He led out a pseudo-laugh. “Yeah, yeah. He had nothing to do with Celine or Kate, blah, blah, blah. It’s a load of horseshit. You know it, I know it, and—” he pointed to Ash “—so does he.”
I narrowed my eyes, took a step closer. “For the last time, the police cleared him. They never found anything implicating him in any way. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Because he’s inno—”
“Them finding nothing means fuck all,” Keenan said. “I sure as hell don’t believe Kate slipped. And Celine—”
“Who are Kate and Celine?” Ash said.
Keenan whipped his head around, taking a step in Ash’s direction, his balled fists moving up to his chest, locked and loaded. “You don’t get to say their names, asshole.”
“Enough.” I pushed Keenan toward the door, an almost impossible feat given our size difference. “Get out and don’t come back. Stay away or I’ll have a restraining order slapped on your sorry ass.”
Keenan’s jaw made tiny sinewy movements, and I was about to order him out of the house once more when he glared at the both of us and marched to the front door. I followed, slamming it shut and locking it behind him, and moments later heard the tires of his prized possession spinning on the gravel as he sped off down the road. When I walked back into the kitchen, Ash had slumped down at the table. I went to him and put my hands on his shoulders.
“You shouldn’t have let him in,” I said.
“He kept banging on the door, I figured I could calm him down.” Ash looked up at me. “Who was he talking about? Celine, and...Kate? What happened to them? Where are they?”
“Listen, Ash, I really think we should go to the doctor—”
He smacked his palm on the table, bellowed, “I’m not a child. Tell me. Now.”
I took a step back, blinked hard and tried to keep my face neutral as the harshness of his voice rang in my ears. My hopes he’d left his temper somewhere in Maryland along with his memory faded a little. I’d hated how angry he
’d become in the run-up to his abrupt departure from Newdale. I didn’t want that Ash back, but the one from before, the one who was always gentle and kind, the one who always made me feel I was at home.
“It’s all right, I’ll tell you,” I said, slowly pulling out a chair, observing Ash for the smallest of reactions, wondering if any of it might act as a trigger, as my research had indicated things could, and trying to plan how I’d handle the situation if it did. “Celine lived in a house farther up the street. The first on the right, the run-down one with the red shutters. Keenan lives there alone now.”
Ash raised his eyebrows. “That dickhead’s our neighbor?”
“Technically, yeah. But he’s almost a mile away.” I didn’t want to continue, but could tell Ash wouldn’t let this go, and I couldn’t blame him. He had no recollection of Celine or Kate, and Keenan had rattled him twice. If I didn’t give Ash something, he’d try to get information elsewhere and, depending on the source, it would do more harm than good.
“Celine’s a year younger than you,” I continued. “Keenan’s her older brother, and Fiona, the redhead—”
“I remember. I tried to steal her phone.”
“Right, well, she’s Keenan’s twin. Their mom left a few years back, after their dad died. I don’t think they’ve seen her since. Fiona runs the Harbor Inn motel in town, and Keenan works at the mill. He—”
“I don’t care about them. What does their sister have to do with anything? Why is Keenan so pissed off at me?”
I tried to determine how much of Pandora’s box I should open. Celine had always been the bona fide Sunshine Girl everybody loved, and both my mom and Brad were delighted when she and Ash grew close. Ash was sixteen back then, and despite the fact I’d grown up in the year since Mom and I had moved in with Brad and Ash, I knew he still saw me as the little kid with the nerdy math shirt and boring Mary Janes.
“You’re spending a lot of time with Celine,” Mom said one night as we sat at the family dinner table. She handed Ash the mashed potatoes before exchanging a glance with Brad, a bemused smile playing on her lips. In return, Brad made wide eyes at her, signaling he wanted her to stop talking, which, of course, she didn’t. “Tell me, are you two—”
“Friends,” Ash replied, dumping another spoonful of mash on his plate, which was already piled high with roast beef, carrots and Yorkshire puddings, a Sunday dinner both Ash and Brad had taken great delight in introducing us to. I couldn’t believe how much Ash could get away with eating, or how much he’d grown in height and muscle over the past year. In comparison to the guys in his grade, he looked like he’d finished high school, especially since he’d taken up carpentry. The other boys were pubescent, and acted as if they were little kids, but not Ash. He had the body of a man, like the ones on TV or in magazines.
Earlier in the afternoon I’d stood at the kitchen window, peeling potatoes, and watching him cut the grass without his shirt on, beads of sweat gathering across his back and flat stomach. The sight made my belly flutter, a strange sensation I’d never felt before, as if I’d swallowed a hundred fireflies. Mom had to ask me to pass the milk three times before I heard her, and then I handed her the juice.
“Friends?” Mom raised her eyebrows at him. “Are you sure that’s all it is?”
“Ophelia,” Brad said. “Leave the lad alone. A man needs his secrets.”
“Ash doesn’t keep secrets from me.” I hadn’t meant to say it out loud, hadn’t meant for it to sound so childish, either, and when Mom laughed, my scowl deepened.
“Oh, little Bee,” she said. “I bet Ash doesn’t tell you everything he gets up to.”
“Of course I do.” Ash winked at me, but I couldn’t say for sure it was the truth.
Mom changed the subject and patted my head as if I were five, not—at last—a teenager. How I’d longed to call myself that, a teenager, only to learn the word held no superpowers at all. When I looked in the mirror, I still saw an awkward thing staring back at me. Shaggy black hair and an angular face with huge eyes, which might have been fine if I’d lived in an anime comic book. I wondered if it was what everybody else saw when they looked at me, including Ash.
“Hang out with me this afternoon?” I’d said to him three weekends ago, as we’d sat on the porch eating ham sandwiches and drinking Mom’s delicious homemade lemonade. “I want to get some more wood at the beach and make necklaces and bracelets.”
“Maybe tomorrow,” Ash replied, which sounded much the way Mom talked to me when she’d already decided I wouldn’t get what I’d asked for.
“Why not today?” I sounded whiny, but I couldn’t help it. We hardly spent any time together anymore, and I missed him.
He lowered his voice and leaned in, his whisper tickling my ear. “Can you keep a secret?” After I’d given him my most sincere nod, and crossed my heart, he’d continued. “Celine’s having some trouble. She needs someone to talk to.”
“What kind of trouble?” I whispered back, leaning in, and throwing a glance over my shoulder to demonstrate my utmost levels of discretion.
“I can’t tell you. I promised, and it’s important to keep your promises. Always.”
I’d insisted I wouldn’t share with anyone, I was excellent at keeping secrets, but he’d still refused to elaborate, maintained it wasn’t his place to tell, he couldn’t betray her. I didn’t like him excluding me from parts of his life, and stomped up to my bedroom, ignoring Mom’s pleas to be quiet because she had another headache.
Ash saw Celine more and more often, hanging out with her after school, sometimes at her house, or at ours as they worked on math and biology because she was, quote, “smart, and a grade level ahead.” His voice had gone soft when he’d made that comment, and I’d winced as it pinched my heart like a crab’s claws.
“Are you okay, Bee?” Ash had asked, bringing me back to the Sunday dinner table. I’d nodded but picked at the rest of my food in silence, not saying another word, even when Ash asked again if something was wrong. Once Brad’s homemade sticky toffee pudding had been devoured, the dishes cleared, and Mom had told us we were free to leave, I turned to Ash, my cold shoulder already thawing.
“Want to shoot some hoops?” I said.
“Not now. Maybe when I get back.”
My scowl returned. Ash hadn’t said anything about going out. Usually we spent Sunday evenings watching a movie or playing basketball or baseball outside. “Where are you going?”
“Out for a little while. I’ll see you later.” He gave me one of his big smiles and turned to Brad, who’d already collapsed on the sofa and buried his nose in the newspaper. “Dad, can I take the car?”
Brad lowered his paper, glancing at Ash over the top of it. “Rules?”
Ash grinned and counted on his fingers. “Drive safely. Don’t drink. Call if I do.”
“You got it, kid. Keys are in my jacket pocket. Have fun.”
I watched Ash leave, uncertainty mixing with curiosity and anger, an unpleasant concoction bubbling away inside me as I heard him drive away. “Tell Mom I went outside,” I said to Brad, adding a hasty please so he wouldn’t call me back to correct me on my manners.
“Be home by seven thirty,” he said through a yawn.
I ran to the garage to get my bicycle, a green-and-yellow racer Ash had helped me repair. We’d spent ages on it together, fixing the gears, getting new tires Ash had paid for out of the money he’d made doing carpentry. He’d even saved up and bought me a new seat because I’d complained the old one hurt my butt.
A mile later I got to Celine’s house. Brad’s car stood in the driveway and I hit the brakes on my bike, making sure I stayed hidden behind the leafy trees. Ash leaned with his back against the driver’s door, his thumbs hooked into the front pockets of his jeans. Celine stood about a foot away from him. Unlike Keenan and Fiona, who’d inherited their father’s Irish looks, Celine had taken aft
er her Italian mother—or her mom’s lover, if the rumors were to be believed. Whatever her parentage, she had long dark hair, which shone in the sunlight, a mix of dark brown and mahogany, and she’d showcased the tan skin on her arms with a fitted pink T-shirt. She had the perfect round breasts I wanted, hips I’d have killed for and a tiny waist accentuating the curve of her bottom, which was framed in a pair of black shorts. No wonder Ash wanted to spend time with Celine. Everyone in school did.
I tried to hear snippets of their conversation but was too far away. As I watched, Celine shook her head before covering her face with her hands. Ash put his arms around her, pulling her against his chest, the way he did with me when I had a nightmare. I knew how Celine felt in those arms, as if nothing in the world could ever hurt her again. A powerful shot of envy like nothing I’d ever experienced before traveled from the top of my head and down to my toes. That was the moment I realized I hated her for taking Ash away from me. The more time he spent with her, the less he had for me.
I watched, waiting for their embrace to end, willing it to be over. They were only friends. He’d said so. But Ash put his index finger under Celine’s chin, gently tilting her head toward his. I gasped when their lips touched, stood frozen to the spot when her arms went around his neck, and his hands traveled underneath the back of her shirt. My head spun, turning my vision blurry as Celine took Ash’s hand and led him inside the house. I wasn’t a stupid little kid. I knew exactly what they were doing. There were no other cars in the driveway, which meant her parents weren’t home—no surprise there, apparently they’d left Celine, Keenan and Fiona alone for weekends ever since the latter two turned double digits—but it didn’t seem as if the twins were home, either. I couldn’t stand the thought of Celine and Ash being together, doing that. If he fell in love with her, he’d never hang out with me again.
You Will Remember Me Page 9