August Unknown

by Pamela Fryer

  They passed the Mirthful Mermaid. Geoffrey stopped at the first red light leading into town and he swiveled toward her in the seat.

  “The night we came down to dinner at the Mirthful Mermaid, I got scared when I saw the marina.” She glanced out the passenger window and looked at it, now at a different angle as they were level with it. The same jolt of uncertain fear hit the pit of her stomach. “Like the person who...might be there.”

  “The person who what, August?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t want to say ‘the person who’s after me,’ or ‘the person who’s trying to hurt me,’ because I’m not sure either is true. It’s just this feeling I have.”

  The light turned green and he drove on.

  “Right now your instincts are all you have. You need to trust them.”

  She reached across herself with her right hand and placed it on his forearm. “I knew you would understand.” She smiled at him when he glanced over. “Thank you.”

  He swallowed, as though her touch made him uncomfortable. August worried she’d crossed a line she shouldn’t have. She drew her hand away and adjusted herself more comfortably in the plush leather seat.

  “You don’t have to thank me, August. I told you I would help you as much as you needed.”

  “No, I mean, thank you for being so nice to me.”

  He glanced over and returned her smile, a touch of pink in his cheeks. She wanted to kick herself. She had made him uncomfortable.

  “I enjoy helping you. You’re nice to be around.”

  The rest of the short ride was spent in silence. Geoffrey dropped her at the hospital’s main doors, and then left to find his brother-in-law.

  Though Dr. Lohman’s office was plush, with comfy leather furniture and artistically textured paint in warm rust and beige, still the room had a sterile, laboratory-like feel.

  “Hello, August. How’s your arm today?” The doctor pulled two delicate china cups from a cabinet and made herbal tea from the hot water spigot of a watercooler.

  Dr. Lohman was a pleasant enough woman who wore fashionable street clothes, but she was still a virtual stranger. August had to force herself to remember the doctor was trying to help, but something about seeing a psychiatrist seemed ridiculous. She felt guilty, knowing she was only pretending to believe the visit would help.

  August read her observations from the notebook and relayed the incidents since the last time she’d seen her. “Geoffrey is having his brother-in-law, Sheriff Mike, check on the burger joints that look like a 1950s sock hop right now.”

  Dr. Lohman scribbled something in her notes. “You’re the first amnesia case I’ve had,” she said when she looked up. “Right now, I’d like to focus on the fear you’re experiencing.”

  “Do you think it’s real?”

  “If you’re feeling it, it’s very real,” she answered.

  The uncomfortable tension in August’s shoulders eased. It felt good to have another supporter in her corner, at the very least. Her guilt increased for having doubted the woman’s profession.

  “Most cases of amnesia aren’t caused by the actual injury to the head, but by a trauma that the patient can’t bear to remember.”

  “Like if my husband tried to hurt me.”

  The doctor nodded, though noncommittally. “It’s possible. Do you think you were married?”

  “I don’t know. I do have the tan line.” She looked down at her finger. Geoffrey’s handsome face flashed across her mind’s eye. In her heart, she hoped she wasn’t married, that she had just moved her peridot ring from one hand to the other. The fingers on her left hand were still too swollen to test the theory.

  “It’s possible you’ve confused one type of memory for another: for instance, the memory of a movie you’d seen, or a story someone else told you.”

  “So you don’t think it was really me with the other kids?”

  “No, I’m not saying that,” Dr. Lohman answered carefully. “It’s promising that you remember your own reflection in the mirror. I’m just saying you shouldn’t struggle too hard for things, let them come naturally. Amnesia is almost never a permanent condition.”

  By the time the hour wound down, August was feeling less confident about the fading dream.

  Dr. Lohman scheduled her for another visit in two days, and August smiled and took the reminder card while secretly not sure if she would keep the appointment. At the very least, she owed Geoffrey to explore any means necessary, and the doctor did seem genuine about wanting to help.

  Even if I am just one gigantic Guinea pig to her.

  August headed to her physical therapy appointment on the second floor, hoping it would pass quickly, eager to see Geoffrey again. The exercises she could do with her arm were minimal due to the bend in the cast, so the therapist set her on a lifecycle.

  By the time she returned to the waiting area in front of the hospital, her mind was the clearest it had been since the night of the accident.

  Geoffrey pulled up in a black BMW sedan and reached over to push the door open for her. “You’re looking rejuvenated.”

  “I’m feeling it,” she said, sliding in next to him. “Though no clearer on the memories. This is your car?”

  “Yep.” He helped her draw the seatbelt before pulling out of the hospital’s circular driveway. “Just got it back from the shop.”

  “Did I dent the bumper?”

  He glanced over with alarm in his eyes.

  August laughed. “I’m kidding. No, really, did I?”

  “No, thank God. I wouldn’t have kept it if you had.” He clenched his jaw. “How did the appointments go?”

  “The physical therapy was good. What did Mike have to say?”

  “He’s checking on the burger joints.” He glanced over. “Dr. Lohman wasn’t good?”

  August sighed. Was she that easy to read? “I feel like a lab rat. Every time I ask her a question, she answers it with one for me.”

  Geoffrey pulled the car into the Mirthful Mermaid’s parking lot. He turned off the engine and faced her.

  “We talked awhile and did some more tests with numbers and names, but nothing much came of it.” She sighed. “It’s frustrating. It’s like my memory has been wiped clean. I can’t believe I don’t even know my own name.”

  “Maybe it was really awful, like Grizelda, or Prunella.”

  She laughed. “Would I be less attractive if it was?”

  He shook his head and his expression grew somber. Those deep brown eyes were as soft as velvet. “I don’t think there’s anything that could make you less attractive.”

  She blushed and turned her gaze out the front. So she hadn’t imagined the tiny hints that he was growing attracted to her. That was okay, because she was growing attracted to him, too, and was sure she’d slipped tiny hints as well.

  But what if I have a husband, she wanted to ask. What if I’m running away? What if I did something really awful in my past, so horrible I can’t even face it in my own memory?

  “You don’t have to go back if you don’t want to,” he told her. After her last thought, his innocent words took on a deeper connotation.

  But August knew he was talking about the therapist. She shrugged. If she didn’t continue the sessions, it would almost be like quitting. “I’ll try one more, how about that?”

  “Deal.” He offered his hand. August reached around with her right hand and accepted his shake.

  He held her hand tenderly, and in his gentle grip August could feel the magnitude of his caring. Their relationship had changed. They’d gone from being two people who had been in an accident, to friends whose lives had been forever changed by the events. She would never forget him, she was sure of that.

  “Hungry?”

  She smiled. “Starved. I rode eight miles on the lifecycle.”

  The Mirthful Mermaid was crowded with lunch-hour patrons. Millie saw them and motioned to them to come to the bar. She popped open two bottles of beer and served them to
two men in fishery uniforms, and then poured two glasses of water for Geoffrey and August and slipped a slice of lemon in each.

  “Jenny’s popping early. I’m on bar duty. Pull up a stool.” She smiled and gave August a wink. August could see where the rest of the family, all the way down to Jocelyn, got their friendly eyes. “You must really like my chowder.”

  “Actually, that looks delicious,” she said as one of the waiters served a crab salad sandwich on toasted sourdough slices to one of the patrons next to her. “And we already established I like crab.”

  “Two crab sandwiches, coming up.” After Millie moved off, August swiveled her stool toward Geoffrey.

  “I told Dr. Lohman about all the feelings I’ve been having, and I want to tell you, too.”

  Geoffrey set down his water glass and gave her his full attention. That was one of the things she loved about him. He really listened when she talked.

  “I didn’t tell you this before, but I had some incidents of fear. Maybe, technically, they were panic attacks. I’m not sure, because I’ve never had one before.” She shrugged. “Or I don’t remember if I did.”

  He leaned closer, concern filling his eyes. “Panic attacks? August, when?”

  “I told you about the sensation I had when we first drove past the marina. It also happened here, the other night. I got short of breath when I saw this scary man looking at me. He seemed so...purposeful. But now I realize I was probably triggered by the terror I felt when I saw the docks.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” He touched her hand where her cast ended, gently curling his fingers around hers. She opened her grasp to receive his, and squeezed.

  “I realized right away I’d imagined it, and I thought you would think it was ridiculous. Dr. Lohman said it was possible I had the panic attack because everything is so unfamiliar to me.”

  Geoffrey frowned. “Did she dismiss your fears?”

  Now August felt guilty. She shouldn’t have voiced her reservations about the doctor. “Not exactly. She thinks something bad happened to me, and my amnesia isn’t so much from my head injury, but from a terrible incident I won’t let myself remember. When I told her you were looking into the sock-hops, she said it was a good idea if I go to them.”

  His eyebrows rose. “And to the marina?”

  She nodded. “What do you think?”

  He took a deep breath, and August sensed he didn’t want to answer. “Not to be like Dr. Lohman, but what do you think?”

  “I’m not ready.” She traced the wet spot on the bar left from her glass into a flower shape with her fingertip. “Not yet.”

  “Then I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

  Gran Millie sashayed toward them with two plates in her hand. “Here you go, Millie’s famous baked crab sandwiches and a side of our equally if not more famous coleslaw. Sweetheart, yours is cut into four pieces to make it easier on you.”

  “Thank you, Millie.”

  “That’s Gran Millie to you, missy.”

  August blushed and cast a secret smile at Geoffrey. His wonderful family had made her feel so at home she wanted to cry. Even Derek didn’t seem so bad anymore.

  Millie served them tall glasses of iced tea with lemon, and brought a side of delicious three-bean salad in a tangy Italian dressing.

  “Sorry I can’t gab more,” she said, rushing to pop open four bottles of beer. “I’m shorthanded without Jenny behind the bar.”

  “I’ll send Derek down. He needs something to occupy his time.”

  His grandmother stopped and gave him what August suspected was the tried and true don’t-even-think-about-it eye.

  “No you won’t. He’s clumsy enough as it is. And the last thing I want to do is put a mouse to work in the cheese factory, if you get my drift.” She hurried away to serve the beers.

  “She has a point,” Geoffrey said over a sigh. “I guess we’re stuck with him.”

  August dug into her sandwich, wondering if he was ever going to divulge the history between them.

  * * *

  She paused outside the brick building. Her stomach turned as those last six months at University of the Pacific came rushing back. She’d tried to put it out of her mind. That part of her life was over, and she would never sink that low again.

  But even as she drove into this rat-hole part of town, it all came back like a relapse of some hideous disease.

  When her dad got laid off and the money for college stopped, she’d tried to get work as an exotic dancer. The seedy manager of the place snorted, looked her up and down, and told her to come back after she “got new titties.” The response had been the same at the three other “gentleman’s clubs” that were within driving distance. No way was she getting breast augmentation, even if she could afford it. How would she explain it back home?

  The only way she could stay in school was to go to work as an escort. And the only way she could stomach being an escort was to get high. Vince was the man who could always make that possible.

  At least no one back home would know. The taint of those wretched experiences was on the inside.

  And now it was all in the past. She was off that shit and would never go back on it. She could hardly believe she was standing outside Vince’s run-down building again, even if all she sought was information.

  She stepped over a sleeping drunk on the stairs, thinking he looked vaguely familiar, and started up the three flights to Vince’s top-floor loft. She rapped the knocker on his door. One, two, pause, and a third time. The secret knock seemed ridiculous now that she was sober.

  He opened the door. After a moment’s surprise, he gave her a smarmy smile. “Thought I’d never see you again.”

  “Likewise.” She pushed inside. “Not a social visit, Vinnie. Don’t get your shorts in a bind.”

  “Hey, no problem. Whatever you want, you know I’m always here.” He snickered. “Though I wouldn’t turn one down for old time’s sake?”

  Thankfully she had her back to him, and he couldn’t see her grimace. She gagged at the memory of the many times she’d exchanged a blow job for a hit. Even though he spent most every day in this rat hole, he didn’t bathe much.

  She glanced at the messy coffee table. The assortment of glass paraphernalia made her mouth go dry. Too-familiar longing rolled through her, ending as prickling chills across her flesh. She swallowed her uncertainty through a dry throat. This was the point when recovering alcoholics called their sponsors.

  She turned away. She didn’t need a sponsor, or anyone else. She was strong. This was behind her.

  “I only need information. You owe me a favor. When Carly and I got busted, I told her I’d kill her if she ratted you out.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  She faced him. She’d never noticed, or never cared, what a crap hole this loft was. When she was in college, living in a dorm room with three other girls she despised, having a loft this size all to herself was her greatest fantasy.

  Geez, did he ever clean? A dust bunny the size of a kitten sat on the floor in the corner by an old pizza box. Empty aluminum cans lay scattered about. Overfilled ashtrays made her want to gag.

  “All I require is your time. I need information.”

  He eyed her, working a piece of candy in his mouth. “What sort of information?”

  “Nothing you can’t handle. I’m looking for a missing person.”

  “Why don’t you try the police?”

  She scowled. “Why do you think?”

  He crossed the room and sat in front of his computer. The setup looked like an alien beast, with its tangle of wires stretching out behind it like monstrous veins. “Give me a lead.”

  She sat beside him on an old office stool. “Her name is Emily Atkinson. She went missing September ninth. Fell overboard near Hutchison’s Island.”

  “So I’m looking for bodies washed up.” His fingers tapped across the keyboard with surprising speed. “You’ll want me to check the coroner’s records for any unidentified wome
n?”

  “Will there be pictures?”

  He tapped away. “Depends on where she is.”

  “I want you to look all the way down to Southern California.”

  He made a face. “That long in the water, won’t be pretty.” He leaned back in the office chair and swiveled back and forth as the computer ran its search.

  She waited as irritation crawled up her spine. This loft, and its dark memories, made her itchy.

  A fat orange cat walked into the room and plopped down on the floor. Did Vinnie ever get confused between it and all the dust clods?

  The computer beeped and Vinnie righted his chair to face the screen. “All right, um, eight drownings in the past two weeks.” His mouse clicked. “Five bodies so far recovered.”

  “That many?” She tried to sound concerned instead of perturbed. “That’s terrible. Any of them have pictures?”

  He shook his head, pushing the hard candy left and right across his mouth. “None. Can’t say I’m disappointed. The sight of a stiff always makes me want to hurl.”

  “I need any incident on the ninth or tenth concerning a twenty-five-year-old blond woman. I’m looking for Jane Does.”

  The cat rose and ambled over to sniff her pant leg. Usually she hated cats, but reached down and scratched his head to be congenial.

  “Jane Does, huh.” Vinnie’s fingers clacked away. Ghostly flashes of blue and orange moved over his face as the screen changed. “Hmmm. Also got a traffic fatality in Crescent City involving a pedestrian still unidentified, approximately thirty years of age.”

  She rose and peered over his shoulder. “No picture?”

  “Nada. Hmmm, this one’s interesting. Splatto.”

  “The short version, please.”

  “This one jumped off Yaquina Bay Bridge. Again, no photo available.” He rolled his eyes. “Thank God.”

  A jumper? Emily? Unlikely. “Probably not her. Give me the location anyway.”

  He wrote it down and continued. “Here’s another unknown, blond woman is still missing after a boat sank off the coast of Agate. No picture or names released at request of the family.”

  At first she thought it would be the report on Emily, but then as “Agate” registered, her heart leaped. Could Emily have been picked up by someone? She chewed her lip to keep from smiling. That would be poetic justice; Emily rescued, only to get swamped.