by Dani Irons
The one thing that tells me I should go is my guilt, which is implanted in knot form in my gut. Wasn’t the gut the one part of your body you’re supposed to listen to?
Maybe going to the meeting will make me feel better about everything. Get closure or whatever. I’ll do this last thing, make it up to everyone and then leave. But another thought occurs to me. “What would signing that contract mean for me?” I ask. “I mean, will I have to stick around and work with the Scouts or with Cora and Dion?”
“No. Wyatt explained it to me. The site can be kept up remotely, from anywhere. And he says he would do that for you.”
“Why would he do that? Do all that work and give me all the credit?”
“I think he was trying to help patch things up with you and your parents. Maybe he thought that if the Cub Scouts gave Christakos Creatives business and he made sure you had something to do with it, things would work about between you guys.”
But then I’d gone and done something to make sure they would still be mad at me. I should go to the meeting. To explain to them it was all Wyatt and I could return the money to my parents. I don’t know what I’ll do after that, being homeless and all, but that’s my fault and I’ll figure it out. “When’s this meeting again?”
“Seven in the morning tomorrow. It’s at the Elks Lodge. Do you know where that is? I could look it up on my phone for you.” She pulls out her phone and begins typing stuff in.
“No thanks.” I turn and walk away from her. I know she’s trying to make up for lying to me, but I’m still too mad to care.
Chapter Forty-Two
Junior Year at UCLA, June
The Morning of the Accident
James and Megan broke up. I knew this because when they saw each other outside of the student center, they barely looked at each other. Maybe they were only having a fight, but I’d followed them all day and they never once met up. So tonight was my chance. The night I’d finally get James back.
I would get the girls together after I finished packing everything into my Corolla and text James on Mia’s phone to come out with us. He needed to bring me my phone anyway because I’d accidentally left it over at his house last night during an impromptu Friday hookup, and that way I’d have an excuse to see him.
I would sleep with him, tell him I still loved him, and convince him we should be together. It was a good plan. I stuffed my last pair of shoes into my car and climbed in.
Chapter Forty-Three
Now
I step out of the car and head into the front entrance of the Elks Lodge, my eyes straight in front of me. I vaguely notice older people mingling around the breakfast bar, helping themselves to biscuits and gravy and sausage or Bloody Marys and crisp slices of bacon. My stomach (not my gut) wants me to stop and join them, but I head straight for what looks like a convention room where the back of Cora’s head is visible through a window.
I pass by groups of young Scouts and they act like I don’t even exist. Some chat about badges and merits and selling peanuts. Others, video games and wilderness trips.
After letting myself into the room and sitting down in the only available chair, my heart begins trying to tunnel its way through my chest. I avoid the ache along with eye contact with everyone in the room—apart from the two old men in the Scouts uniforms who must be the ones in charge.
“Oh, hullo,” one of the men says to me. He’s at least sixty with gray hair and knee-high socks that I can see underneath the table. The combination of the two make me want to laugh and cry at the same time. “You must be Olivia Christakos, the techie.” He reaches out a hand.
When I grab it, some of my nervousness falls away. This man is not a part of my family drama and suddenly I love him and want him to be my grandpa. I guess I’m feeling lonely because that isn’t an appropriate emotion a person should have for a stranger dressed like he is, right?
“Yep!” I bark, too loud for the room. I clear my throat and try again. “That’s me. Super techie. Computer genius. Web guru.” I tug on a chunk of my hair until it hurts, wishing nervousness couldn’t completely take over a mouth and voice box. I know that I was supposed to come in here and explain that Wyatt was the one to do it all, but I can’t get the words out of my mouth. Part of me thinks Cora is going to start shit with me in front of everyone and part of me thinks Wyatt will say something to upset me. I feel like I could either yell until I passed out or cry until I died of dehydration.
The other old Scout speaks. “Nice to have you. We were going over some of the details with your parents here. We didn’t get very far, so we could probably start over now that you’re here.” He flips a page and gets ready to show me the beginning of the contract. The print is small and I can feel sweat starting to drip and then pour into my butt crack, filling up my panties.
“Actually, uh...” my voice cracks, but I force the words out. “Wyatt was the one who did all the website stuff, it was just my idea. But he did all the, uh, code or whatever. I have no idea how to do any of that. Plus, I have somewhere super important to be, uh. That’s why I was late? So I should get out of everyone’s hair.”
I want to curl up into a ball and disappear. Next to me, in my peripheral vision, I can see Wyatt’s wild curly hair and tall frame. His breathing has gone ragged.
The old men Scouts exchange a look and do this mental deliberating thing I can see happening behind their eyes. “Mr. Rosen said you designed the website. That’s what we are interested in. The design.”
I should look to Wyatt for confirmation of this—a normal person would—but I just can’t. The one holding the contract flips to the last page and points. “Sign right there and we’ll let you go.” He hands me a pen. “We’re glad you could stop by. It means a lot.”
I start to shake my head, but the man pushes a pen into my hand. Chloe said Wyatt would do all the work. If I get any compensation for it, I’ll just make sure he gets it. But right now, I need to get out of here. I’m starting to shake and sweat. I sign it without comment and the other Cub Scout leader guy hands me a photocopy of the contract. “We’ll send you a copy after everyone signs, for your records.”
I stand, shake hands and I’m nearly out of there. Home free. I step on Wyatt’s foot and turn to apologize, but his pained expression—I don’t think for a second this is the result of my stepping on him—makes me turn away again. I cannot look at him. I stumble but recover, and when a young Cub Scout opens the door to the meeting room, I’m at eye level with him. He’s holding a tray full of ice water in glasses covered in condensation, his neckerchief askew. He looks just like...
Part Two:
Finding Olivia
Chapter One
He looks just like that little Cub Scout outside of Pink Dollars that night I was hit. His damn neckerchief was askew, his shirt torn. How he’d asked Chloe and me for money when we were waiting to get into the club. I’d broken my heel and was leaning against the wall, waiting for the glue to dry.
Then we’d gone in and Ava and Mia were being total bitches and Wyatt was there and he looked nice. I missed him because he used to be around a lot. And then one day he wasn’t. I’d flashed him my bra and told him not to tell anyone about my third nipple.
My hand flies to my mouth. “Oh, my God,” I whisper between my fingers, and the rest of the room is so silent that I can hear someone’s breathing. I’m flooded with emotion. Pissed and sad and hurt and so confused.
Someone comes up from behind me and tries to take my elbow, but I stumble out of the room and nearly fall to the floor. “I’m fine!” I shout as someone else tries to help me up. My vision has gone blurry and black in spots. It’s like trying to watch a movie but there’s too much glare and something in your eye. You only get some of the picture.
I pushed that little boy out of the way. The headlights headed straight for me and th
at car hit me because I pushed this little boy out of the way. I remember. First it hit my ribs and sent me flying. I landed on my collarbone on something hard—a fire hydrant, maybe—then bounced off and landed on my arm and, finally, my head. I blacked out. And now I’m in this building.
My dad runs over. “Kitten?” I haven’t seen him in months, but right now he is the most amazing sight. I wrap my arms around him.
“Where am I?” I whisper into his neck, feeling my body shiver. Is it cold in here?
His eyes narrow. “You’re at the Elks Lodge. Are you okay? What happened?”
“I—I don’t know. I don’t remember...what am I doing here?”
“You signed a contract with the Cub Scouts?”
I try to think through the cotton someone’s put into my brain. “Why would I do that? That doesn’t make sense. Wasn’t I hit by a truck or something?”
Realizing I’m on my knees with Dad bent at a horrible angle to try to console me, I stand. I analyze my body. My arm is in a cast and my fingertips find a thick scar on my collarbone. I look to Dad for an explanation. Mom runs up behind him, looking pissed off. I don’t mind. At least she’s something familiar in this unfamiliar place.
“Olivia?” A guy asks to my left. Wyatt. “Are you okay?” He’s dressed in the Cub Scout uniform that I haven’t seen him wear since middle school and he looks ridiculous. Mom’s face shifts suddenly. “Is she all right? Honey, are you all right?”
“I think so...just...dazed. How did I get here? I’m not, like...dead?”
“We’ve got to get her to the hospital right now,” Dad says, and I’m about to protest when he lifts me over his shoulder, fireman-carry style.
“I can walk, Dad. I’m fine.”
He doesn’t set me down until it’s time for me to climb into the back of the car.
“Is it all right if I come?” Wyatt asks, jogging after us.
“Why would you come?” I say, buckling myself. I make a gesture to my mom like, see, I can buckle myself, I don’t need a hospital, when Wyatt slides in next to me.
Everyone ignores me. Mom turns around in the passenger seat while Dad starts the car and buckles himself. To Wyatt she says, “Do you think your mom would mind watching Natalie for a few more hours? I’d hate to impose, but—”
“No, no, it’s really fine. I’ll let her know.” He pulls out a phone from his back pocket and texts something.
Everyone is on a half-second fast-forward.
“I’m fine! I just got dizzy.”
Dad talks at me through the rearview mirror, sneaking peaks at me when he can. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
“Getting hit by the fucking truck. But it looks like I’m fine.”
Wyatt’s fingers still on his phone and his head pops up. “You don’t remember anything after the accident?”
Fear buds inside me, but it comes out of my mouth bitchy. “Should I?” I snap.
His mouth opens and closes and it makes him look like a fish. He licks his lips furiously.
“You still do that when you get nervous? What do you have to be nervous about?”
Mom’s looking at me now, tears in her eyes. “Honey,” her voice is soft but frustrated. “You were in a coma for a few days following the accident. Then...you woke up.”
“I woke up?” I can’t wrap my head around what they’re telling me.
“Do you remember the accident?” Dad asks.
“Yes, every bit until I hit my head.”
“Do you remember wandering out into the street?” Mom asks.
“I didn’t wander out. Is that what Chloe told you? There was a boy!”
“What boy, sweetheart?” Mom says, more patiently than I thought she was capable of.
“That Cub Scout.” I point toward the Elks Lodge, receding in the distance. “Well, not that one. But another one, in L.A. He fell into the street on his bike and his lace got stuck in the wheel. He couldn’t get out of the street so I ran over to him, pulled his lace out and then...whammo!” I laugh a little, but I don’t know why. Maybe I do need a hospital. I could be in shock or something.
Mom’s jaw becomes unhinged. “You saved a little boy?”
“That’s what I said, didn’t I?”
Wyatt slips his phone back into his pocket and reaches for my hand. I pull away and give him a weird look.
When he takes his hands back he asks, “So you don’t remember waking up and seeing us in the hospital?”
“I—” I was going to say I didn’t wake up in a hospital, that I’m right here, but now I’m starting to think there’s a chunk missing from my memory. My arm is in a cast and my ribs have a dull ache to them. “I guess not.”
Wyatt’s face is so stricken, it’s like I told him I am going to initiate him into my new vampire gang or something.
“You don’t remember the last few weeks,” he presses. “You don’t remember...me?”
I shake my head, study his features as they harden.
The rest of the ride to the hospital is quiet. We all sit in silence and stare out the windows. Except me. I stare at Wyatt wondering what his clenched fists and tight jaw mean.
Chapter Two
We go to the emergency room and the staff does a bunch of tests and then they call my doctors in L.A. After several hours of sitting around waiting, the emergency room doctor tells me everything is fine. My memory has just—inexplicably—returned.
My doctor—a tall, slight woman with mousy brown hair—is surprised that I remember everything from before my accident given my amnesiac history. She asks me a buttload of questions about growing up at home and family and friends. But then she asks me why I was staying at a hotel.
“I haven’t been,” I say. I’m sure I would remember doing something like that.
“Your parents told me that you ran away and have been staying in a hotel with money you took from their business.”
My eyebrows shoot up to my hairline. “I wouldn’t take money from them,” I say, because lying is what I do. I know I took ten thousand a couple of months ago—although I have no idea how much time has passed since I woke up in the hospital—but I have no memory of staying in a hotel. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
The doctor asks me a few more questions, trying to figure out where my memory lag is. I tell her the last thing I remember is being at the club, helping that kid get out of the street. The next thing I remember is being in the Elks club, being very confused.
When the doctor leaves, I don’t look anyone in the eyes. Mom already knows I took that cash and that I was the one to open the credit card accounts in their names. I still haven’t admitted to it, but I know she knows and I can’t bear to see her disapproving expression.
But of course she has something to say. “You don’t remember anything about staying with us the last few weeks?”
I shake my head.
“Nothing at all?” Dad adds.
“No. Sorry if I...did anything. I don’t remember.” I wish I had thought to say my lack of memory went further back, to when I stole their socials and petty cash. But it’s too late for that now.
“So you don’t remember you and...me in the last few weeks?” Wyatt’s standing very close to me. His face is blank, his expression heavy.
“What do you mean, ‘you and me’?” My voice is harsh. I still have no idea why he’s here. He hasn’t hung out with my family in years. I barely see him anymore.
“We were...”
“Dating,” Dad supplies.
I laugh, but it comes out cruel, and since Wyatt’s right next to me, I try to rein the bitchiness in. “Um, no. I’m sort of seeing someone else. Kind of.”
“James?” Dad asks. He’s standing next to the doctor, hands stuck into his pockets.
&nb
sp; “Yes, Dad. James. Like you don’t know this already.” Even though we haven’t technically been together for years now, I’m definitely closer to dating James than I ever would be to Wyatt.
“Where was he when you woke up in the hospital? Where has he been this entire time while you were recuperating?” Dad’s voice isn’t angry, he doesn’t get angry often, but it’s close. Maybe closer to frustrated.
“I wouldn’t know, would I?” My voice is filled with annoyance. I know who I am, dammit. I’m not some idiot.
“He hasn’t been around at all,” Wyatt says with a sigh.
My snark is in full force. How the hell would an old childhood pseudo friend know anything about James’s and my relationship? “It’s none of your damn business,” I say. “And maybe he doesn’t know what happened to m—”
“He does,” Mom adds just as the doctor lets herself into my room. Mom directs the conversation to her. “Is this even normal? I didn’t know that if her memory came back, the time she spent trying to get it back would disappear. I mean, where the hell did it go?”
The doctor shrugs and that puts me on alert. Doctors shouldn’t shrug. They should have answers. “The brain does what it wants,” she says. “There is very little we can do about memory. Some studies suggest—”
“Studies?” Dad says. “We don’t want studies. We want to know what’s happening with our daughter! Will her memory go away completely one day? Will she forget who she is again?”
Seriously, the doctor says, “Anything is possible, honestly. She could wake up tomorrow and not remember the entire last year of her life. But I’m hoping that this will be the last time her memory shifts or disappears. I’ve never seen a case like Olivia’s.”
“Hoping?” Mom asks like it’s a dirty word. “Is that really all you can do?”