by Amity Hope
“Are you going to tell me what that was about?” Gabe finally demanded.
She nodded. “This,” she said as she held her grandfather’s cross between her fingers, “used to burn you. Just touching me while I was wearing it used to be awful for you. You once told me it was like holding on to live wires.” She hesitated. “It doesn’t feel like that anymore?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know what it feels like to hold on to live wires but I imagine it can’t feel good. When you were holding my hands, it felt…uh, it didn’t feel bad.”
“And when you were in the church? That first night?”
Gabe was staring off into the trees as he thought. Ava took the opportunity to take a good, long look at him. He had gained weight since he’d been staying with her. His face was filled out again. The pale skin was replaced with a sun kissed tan. His hair was windblown and incredibly appealing to her. She had to resist the urge to run her fingers through it. He seemed so much like his old self and yet, the one difference was the one that mattered the most to her. While he had slowly been getting to know her again, he still treated her like she was a bit of a stranger. He kept his distance and she didn’t want to violate what had somehow become their unspoken rule.
Actually, she did want to violate it. She just refused to let herself.
“It didn’t bother me at all. Actually, it had the opposite effect. The moment I walked in, I felt relieved,” he finally said as he met her gaze straight on. That was his first real memory and while it was tinged in fogginess, for the most part, he remembered. Or at least he thought he did. He remembered being confused, yet pulled there. Once inside, when he’d seen Ava a myriad of feelings coursed through him. But was the experience unpleasant? In any way? Other than when he had been terrified he’d scared her, no, it hadn’t.
“It was hard for you. Being in a church,” Ava told him. “Almost unbearable. Your blood was…”
Gabe could tell she didn’t want to finish the sentence. He didn’t blame her so he did it for her. “Tainted with demon blood.”
“You only have half demonic blood,” she said firmly.
Gabe scoffed.
“Don’t do that,” Ava softly commanded. “Because it was only half, it made all the difference. You didn’t let that half own you.”
He nodded but he looked away. He was becoming as attached to the lake as Ava was. It was calming. Hypnotic. Peaceful.
“I have an idea,” Ava said after a long, comfortable silence. Gabe turned his attention to her. “I know that first day we agreed we shouldn’t drive by your old house. Rafe’s house. But now, I’m thinking maybe we should. You’ve had a week,” she said. She was trying to keep her voice light.
“And I still remember nothing,” Gabe grumpily admitted. “I guess it’s worth a try.”
Minutes later they were on their way. Ava wondered if it was a stupid idea. Chances of running into Rafe coming or going were slim so she was willing to take the chance. If it meant Gabe got his memory back, it would be worth it. Besides, she knew that sooner or later Rafe was going to find out he had returned.
Since the evening she’d run into him she’d begun to close her curtains and blinds every night before the sun started to set. It offered little comfort but it was better than allowing him to steal glances at them while they were sleeping.
As she drove, Gabe looked agitated.
“We don’t have to do this,” Ava told him.
“We should,” he decided. “Maybe it’ll help. Maybe it won’t. But at least we’ll know. I just, I kind of just want to get it over with.”
He was silent the rest of the way and Ava just let him be.
“This is it, up here on the left,” she said as she pulled off the main road. “It’s the first house. You can’t see it all that well from here. I don’t dare go down the driveway, though.”
“No,” Gabe agreed, “you shouldn’t go down the driveway.”
He peered down the drive, catching only a glimpse of red brick. Just the sight of it sent a jolt of dread bolting through him. His skin prickled as a feeling of foreboding gnawed its way up his spine.
“Let’s go,” he said, his voice icier than he’d meant for it to be.
“Okay,” Ava agreed. She drove down to the next driveway before turning around. As they passed the house again, Gabe stiffened in his seat but couldn’t seem to pull his eyes from the tree line.
“Are you alright?” she asked when they’d covered the short distance back to the stop sign.
“Yes,” he said even if his tone disagreed.
She drove, silent for a while, trying to give him a moment.
“Did you…” she finally asked.
“No,” he snapped. “I didn’t remember anything.”
“Ohhhkay,” Ava carefully said as she turned her attention back to the road in an effort not to annoy him. Something had obviously triggered his bad attitude. No, not just something. It was the house. But if he didn’t want to talk about it, she didn’t want to push it.
Actually, she did want to push it. She just, yet again, wasn’t going to.
“I’m sorry,” he finally said. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. It’s just, there’s something about that place. It feels…off. Wrong.” He hesitated for so long Ava thought the matter was closed. “It feels evil. And I lived there?” he sounded disgusted at the thought.
Ava nodded. “You did. Not long. About half a year or so. Maybe not even that.” His face had clouded over. It was a look that Ava knew well by now. He was trying to remember.
And he couldn’t.
“What do you mean the house felt ‘off’?” she finally dared to ask.
“I don’t know how to explain it,” he said with a sigh. “That first night in the church, it felt peaceful. When we’re at your cabin, it feels comfortable. When you drove by there? It felt wrong in just about every way imaginable.”
“How are you feeling now?”
“It’s faded. I don’t really feel much of anything.”
She hesitated before asking her next question. “The only other place that I think might be important to you is the radio station over in Granville. You spent a lot of time there. I thought we could go there next. Not go inside,” she hurriedly threw out in explanation, “but maybe just drive by. Or do you think it’s a bad idea?”
“We can try it. It can’t be as bad as that house. And honestly, I’m getting pretty fed up with not knowing who I am,” he said, his voice harsh. It was the first time he’d admitted this to her.
Ava dared a glance at him. He was dragging his hands across his face. His body looked tense and his voice had been full of aggravation. To be honest, they had both thought it would only be a matter of time before his memories came back. The disappointment and frustration had begun to wear on them both.
“I really lived in that house?” he asked. Disbelief and disgust intermingled in his tone. His eyes were narrowed at Ava, waiting for her answer.
“You didn’t actually live in the house,” she said, hoping it would help. “You lived in the guest house around the back. Rafe lived in the house. And your father—”
“Don’t call him that,” Gabe ground out.
“Right, um, okay then,” Ava stammered, startled by his outburst. “When Azael was there I think he stayed in the main house, too. You did your best to keep your distance from both of them.”
Gabe had nothing to say to this and Ava didn’t dare to try to fill the silence. It seemed Gabe just needed time. Again. And she knew the best choice she could make was to give it to him. She was silent the rest of the drive.
“This is it,” Ava said as they finally reached the lot across the street from the station where Gabe had spent most of his days. She’d parked in the back of the lot, out of the way. She had never been there but she’d driven by enough times while she’d been in town to know where it was located.
He gazed at the stucco covered building. The call letters, in the form of a neon sign, adorned the side of
the building, next to the door. It was in the middle of a city block in Granville, tucked between a consignment store and a beauty shop. People were scurrying about on the sidewalk out front.
“I never went there with you,” Ava admitted. “But if you weren’t with me, or you weren’t at home, I think this is where you were. You got to be friends with some of the DJs.” She was carefully watching his face, futilely hoping for even the slightest flicker of recognition. His expression remained blank as he remained silent.
Ava’s frustration grew. Not at Gabe but for him. It was easy to feel sorry for herself, at her loss of him not knowing her, but she knew it was nothing compared to the loss he was facing.
His entire past was nothing but a question mark.
She jumped when his head snapped back.
“Who is that?” he asked. His tone was so hard it startled her.
Ava’s gaze flew over the cars that were parked in front of them and back to the building. A tall man with ineffably red hair had just pushed his way out of the door. He hesitated for a moment and Ava’s heart seemed to stop beating as she waited, sure he was going to swing his gaze their way.
Would it matter if he did?
She didn’t know.
When he kept moving down the block, toward a Chinese restaurant several shops down, she felt her muscles relax ever so slightly.
She turned to Gabe who was now curiously watching her.
“That,” Ava said, feeling the same sense of foreboding dread that Gabe had felt earlier, “would be your brother.”
“You said he wanted to speak with me. What do you think he wants?” Gabe asked her.
“I have no idea,” she honestly replied.
“I don’t think I want to find out,” he said with a grimace.
Chapter 9
If showing Gabe where he used to live and where he used to work was a bad idea, and Ava felt very much that it had been, she was sure that going to the old church would be an even worse idea. Or perhaps it was her own fear of the church that made her judgment on the matter a little hazy.
But the idea to go had been Gabe’s. And since he’d really asked so little of her, she couldn’t tell him no.
The abandoned building was in a rural area outside of Hunter Falls. It was down an old gravel road. There were very few houses on this road. Mostly, there were fields and other old, dilapidated, forgotten buildings. The church itself was surrounded by dense woods.
What had once been a gravel drive leading to the front of the church was now overgrown with weeds of all varieties. The lawn that had once been green and well kept was now brown and overgrown as well. The windows had been removed and boarded up. The roof sagged as if it were only hanging on by a few nails. The white paint had peeled revealing weathered, ugly gray, bare boards.
“This is the last place I can think of to take you,” Ava had admitted as she drove.
Gabe stole a look at her profile. She looked tense but resolute. He knew she didn’t like this idea, yet that hadn’t stopped him from insisting she take him.
“Ava,” he’d said quietly, “nothing has sparked my memory so far. I don’t think the church will either. That’s not why I wanted to come here. I just wanted to see it.”
She silently nodded.
He continued, sounding resigned. “I’m kind of thinking at this point, nothing is going to bring my memory back.”
She gave him a sympathetic smile as she looked at him. She wanted to say something reassuring but words of that sort evaded her. Instead, she just acknowledged their arrival. “This is it,” she said, as she pulled in a deep breath.
As they got out of the car, every cell in her body was begging her to leave. She was momentarily overcome with an almost paralyzing fear. What if, since this is where it all began, where Gabe was pulled away from her, what if it happened again? What if the floor just opened up and swallowed him?
“Aren’t you coming in?” Gabe asked as he turned around and noticed that her feet were stuck in place. He’d already made it halfway to the front door, pushing his way through the weeds, leaving a trampled path for Ava to follow.
She bit her lip, trying to squelch her emotions before saying, “I’m not sure that I can go in there.”
He tilted his head to the side and offered her an empathetic look.
“I don’t think you should go in there either,” she hurriedly added on. “What if something happens to you? I couldn’t go through that again.”
He pulled his eyes from Ava and took in the ramshackle church once more. When he looked at her again, he looked determined. “Ava, I have to do this.”
She nodded as she pushed her feet to move. She was grateful it was the middle of the day. A bright, beautiful sunny day. Bad things weren’t supposed to happen on days like today. If it were night, or even cloudy and gray, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to go through with it.
Gabe patiently waited until she caught up with him.
He tentatively held his hand out to her. She took it without hesitation.
“Is that better?” he asked.
“Yes,” she whispered. Now that he had offered it to her, she had no intention of letting go. If the unthinkable happened and he was pulled away again, she was going to do her damndest to hold on and be pulled away with him.
As if he knew what she was thinking, he gave her hand a reassuring squeeze and tacked on a weak smile.
Together, they pushed the rest of the way through the waist high mess of grass and brambles. When they reached the door, it was open, as Ava knew it would be. Azael had opened it to let himself in that night. When Ava had returned days later, looking for traces of Gabe, it had stood ajar. She had pulled it shut that day, but the lock had been broken.
Not that there was any point to locking it anyway. She couldn’t imagine anyone but them visiting and it wasn’t as if there was a single thing left inside for anyone to take.
The hinges didn’t creak as Gabe pulled the door open. Instead, they made a grating, grinding sound of protest. The inside of the church was dim because of the windows being boarded up. With one hand, Gabe pushed the door open all of the way, allowing the sunshine to pour in. Ava never let go of his other hand.
He led the way inside. An open arch acted as entrance into the sanctuary. At one time, double doors swung from it but they, like the pews, windows and anything else of possible value had been pulled out.
Gabe led the way through the arch, their feet scuffing their way through the dust.
“This is it?” he asked as he moved further inside. His voice echoed through the emptiness, bounced off the high ceiling.
“This is it,” Ava said in a shaky voice.
They were standing in the middle of the floor. It was the area that had crumbled but when she’d returned days later, it was inexplicably undamaged.
Gabe craned his head, taking in every inch of the space. The ceiling. The corners. The altar.
He finally glanced back at her again. She stood with her teeth clenched, her eyes glassy and huge.
“You’re shaking,” he finally noted.
She bit her lip and managed a nod.
Without another word, he pulled her into him. His arms went around her and she managed to tamp down a sob as she found comfort burying herself into his chest.
“It’s okay,” he whispered into her hair. “Don’t you feel it?”
“Feel what?” she asked, worriedly. He had told her that being in the church had not bothered him. Was it just because his mind was such a mess that first night? Had he not realized it?
“It’s peaceful here,” he finally said. “There’s a sense of rightness about it.”
“Peaceful?!” Ava grated out, taking a step backward and feeling a sudden sense of loss when Gabe’s arms fell away. “You died here!”
“Did I?” Gabe asked with raised eyebrows. “Because here I am.”
Ava stared at him for several long moments. “You’re right. You didn’t die. Not really.” She remembered the c
onversation with Grier; she had reminded Ava that no one ever really died. “But you are different.”
Gabe’s face hardened almost imperceptibly. “Well, obviously.”
“I didn’t mean it like that. It’s more than just your lack of memory. What I meant was that before, you couldn’t be in a church. Now you can. Your scars, the ones on your back, are gone.”
“But I have a new one,” he reminded her.
“Yes,” she agreed, “you do.”
“So just how different am I?” he asked her. “I mean, other than my scars being different. And now I can be in a church.”
“And you can touch me,” Ava reminded him. “I mean you can touch me when I’m wearing this.” Her hands flew to her neck and he nodded. “You used to be able to feel other people’s emotions but you’ve already told me you can’t do that anymore.”
“I can’t,” he said somewhat defensively, as if worried she didn’t believe him.
“It’s almost like you’re human,” Ava said with a small, forced laugh. He couldn’t be human.
Could he?
Her heart took off racing at the thought. If he was human? What would that mean for them? At the end, that last day, he had told her they didn’t have a future together because they were too different. And yet, he had promised to love her forever.
“Do you think?” Gabe asked, dipping into her thoughts.
“Think what?” she had to ask, having gotten too sidetracked by her memories.
“That I’m human?” he wondered with eyebrows raised.
“Maybe,” she cautiously said but then an unwanted memory settled into her head. “Except the day Molly and Julia were over, when you cut yourself with the razor…you healed almost right away.” She thought that over. “But sometimes, razor cuts seem a lot worse than they are. Maybe you really didn’t heal as quickly as I thought. Maybe they just weren’t bad to begin with.”
He shrugged. “I know a way we can find out.” His hand dove into his pocket. When he withdrew it, sparks seemed to fly from the violet and cerulean stones. Ava shrieked as she stumbled backwards, landing hard on her backside on the dusty floor.