Memento Nora

by Angie Smibert

  But I couldn’t do that to Micah. Not now.

  So I went to class. I avoided everyone, but one thought kept haunting me: would Micah forget me?

  28

  Bad Dreams and All

  Therapeutic Statement 42-03282028-11

  Subject: JAMES, NORA EMILY, 15

  Facility: HAMILTON DETENTION CENTER TFC-42

  Dinner that night was agony. Dad was in the glossiest mood I’d seen him in for ages. He talked incessantly about the big move, which was a week from Saturday. He went on about the stuff he’d found out about the new school, the golf course, the shops in the mall. And then he mentioned that the Slaytons were next on the list to get a house. He winked at me and said that maybe I could be ungrounded for a certain dance with a certain Tom Slayton.

  Mom hid behind her sunglasses. She barely ate; neither did I. All I could think about was Micah. There wasn’t anything I could do for him, but it was my fault. If he hadn’t come to see me, if I hadn’t agreed to do the comic, if I hadn’t said hi to him that day, if I hadn’t spit out the pill he would’ve been fine. I would have been fine.

  Now I thought I understood my mother. We both hoped that if we forgot things, everything would be fine. I thought again about going back to TFC. How else could I live in Dad’s world, in the gated castle he wanted to keep me in, knowing what I knew without going crazy?

  When I was getting ready for bed that night—dreading lying there, waiting for the dream to come—I found something under my pillow. It was the last issue of Memento, the one with the black vans, without words, the one Micah had brought over the night before.

  I looked at the frame where the van was coming out of the parking garage, the one next to Tiffany’s. I recognized that place—not the garage but the building beside it. It was 42 Randolph Street—where my dad works. Soft Target. The building and vehicles are unmarked to protect client interests, or at least that’s what he’d always said.

  Why would Dad’s company blow up parked cars? The whole thing was ridiculous. Terrorists blew up things. That’s why most people go to TFC. To forget our cares. To forget that the Coalition is out there stalking us. One little pill makes everything tolerable.

  Then I saw it. I didn’t want to see it, but there it was.

  TFC is Dad’s biggest client. And the worse things seem, the more attacks there are, the more money TFC and everyone else involved make.

  No, that’s insane. I shuddered. That can’t be the kind of security Dad provides.

  I tried to justify it in some way. Maybe Soft Target just blew up parked, empty, peopleless cars. It was the real terrorists who were still out there blowing up bookstores. Right?

  Maybe. Or maybe not.

  My head started to pound.

  I ripped up Memento and threw it in the trash. Forgetting my cares actually sounded pretty good just then.

  I had the dream again.

  This time the body arced out of the window of the top floor of the bookstore. I could see the dark suit, the red socks, the silver watch, and the book as they dived toward the concrete.

  I touched the book after it hit the ground. It didn’t explode. I turned over the body, fully expecting it to be Micah. Or my mother. It wasn’t.

  It was me.

  The silver watch was really a charm bracelet with a little silver purse on it. And the book didn’t say Memento Nora. It said Medieval Churches.

  I woke up in a cold sweat. I knew exactly what I needed to do.

  I picked the pieces of Memento out of the trash can and taped them back together. Then I sat down at my desk and inked in the captions and dialogue. The words flowed out of me like they had the first time I told my story to Micah. And when the words were all on the paper, I nodded off. And I didn’t dream.

  Someone tousled my hair.

  “Did you sleep at your desk?” Mom asked, concerned.

  “Uh, I forgot this was due today.” I tried my best to cover the drawings, but I thought she saw.

  “Is that what Micah wanted you to help finish?” she asked. “Your art history project?”

  I nodded. She didn’t try to look at the paper, only at me.

  Suddenly I wasn’t sure anymore. If I got caught, it meant the Big D and the Big Pill—as Micah called it. I’d forget about the past few weeks and go back to my glossy ways, oblivious. To everything.

  “Mom, why don’t we go away? The two of us,” I said, studying her face. “We could go to the beach, just like we did when I was younger.” I saw a flicker in her eyes, like she was considering it. Or had considered it. Maybe Dad wouldn’t find us this time—or even bother to look, especially if I threatened to expose him with this comic.

  I felt the paper under my hands. It was so thin. It wouldn’t intimidate my father.

  “Beach?” Mom asked, her face crinkled with amusement. “Honey, we’ve never been to the beach.” She laughed gently, dismissing the whole idea. “Breakfast is ready,” she added as she walked into the hallway.

  “Good morning, Siddy,” I heard my father say as he moved past her. Then I heard him dash down the stairs. “Early morning meeting,” he called right before the front door slammed shut.

  The black-and-white lines of Memento stared at me from my desk. The black van drives out of Soft Target. Van guy sticks something on car. It blows up.

  I had no appetite for breakfast.

  I pulled out my history book and wrote five words in block letters across the top of chapter eleven. Just in case. I dog-eared the page so I wouldn’t miss it later.

  Then I stuffed the last issue of Memento and my copy of Medieval Churches into my backpack and slung it over my shoulder.

  On my way downstairs I checked myself in the hall mirror. I hadn’t done my hair or my makeup, and I was wearing the same clothes I had on yesterday. The old me would’ve never gone out like this. The new me, though, liked what she saw in the mirror, bad dreams and all.

  29

  The Final Piece

  Therapeutic Statement 42-03282028-11

  Subject: JAMES, NORA EMILY, 15

  Facility: HAMILTON DETENTION CENTER TFC-42

  I borrowed some money from Mom’s purse and took the bus to Winter’s house. She wasn’t there. Mr. Yamada was sitting in the gazebo in her garden, staring at the new sculpture on the table. It was a partially constructed metal mask held in place with wires and scaffolding. Through the eyes and behind the unfinished, or maybe torn away, part of the face you could see dozens of gears. Wheels upon wheels working together. They were connected to this big red cog, almost the size of the face sitting next to it, with a wrench dangling from the nut. It was massive. And cool. And kind of creepy. Very Winter.

  “The cops picked her up,” he said without looking at me.

  My stomach felt as if it had dropped through the floor. “They got Micah, too,” I whispered. “It’s all my fault.”

  “No, I shouldn’t have trusted Bell.”

  “I’ll probably be next,” I said. “But that’s okay.”

  Mr. Yamada looked at me, and I held up the final Memento. He smiled. It was the first time I’d seen him do that.

  “Cops don’t appreciate art,” he said as he clicked a button on the remote control in his hand. The gears on the sculpture started to turn, and he lifted a flap at the base, revealing a slot.

  I fed the original into the slot, and the gears started turning. The monkey wrench spun around slowly as the last ever issue of Memento printed out from the base of the big red cog.

  It was the perfect final piece for Winter’s garden.

  30

  But He’s My Creep

  Therapeutic Statement 42-03282028-11

  Subject: JAMES, NORA EMILY, 15

  Facility: HAMILTON DETENTION CENTER TFC-42

  “Homeland High,” Mr. Yamada told the cabbie as we settled into the backseat.

  I’d told him he didn’t need to come with me.

  “I need to see my lawyer about Winter,” he explained. “I’ll drop you off on t
he way.”

  Neither of us wanted to talk.

  An ad for the Nomura Pink Ice flickered across both of our windows. A girl a lot like me held the mobile to her ear and said, “You can never be too pink or too thin.”

  I felt sick, but I hugged my backpack tight. Inside, two hundred fresh copies of Memento waited to be released.

  The cab let me out right in front of school. Mr. Yamada looked so alone sitting there in the backseat. I hitched up my backpack (and my courage) to walk up the front steps. We’d done it before. I could do this alone, I told myself. I just needed to get past the rent-a-cops and make it to the bathrooms.

  When I stepped inside, I was so busy psyching myself up that I didn’t see Officer Bell standing to the side of the bag search area.

  “Miss James,” he said. “I need to talk to you.”

  The rent-a-cops looked up from their magazines. Bell opened the staff door to the garage and motioned me toward his waiting police car.

  I hadn’t acted fast enough. Micah and Winter must have already made their statements. I wanted to run, but my legs wouldn’t move. I felt as if I were standing in a bucket of Jell-O with a two-ton weight on my back. A rent-a-cop touched something at his desk, and the front doors clicked shut, locking behind me. Trapped, I willed myself to move toward Officer Bell.

  He held open the back door of his squad car for me. Somehow I got in. He flicked a couple of switches on his dashboard as he slid into the driver’s seat. The windows blackened. The other switch must have been the sound damper. I couldn’t hear a word he was saying into his mobile, but he was obviously arguing with someone. Then he threw the mobile on the seat and turned on the lights. We sped away from Homeland Inc. Senior High No. 17.

  My only regret was that Memento was still in my backpack. My friends would never know about the vans or the car bombings. Neither would I.

  As Bell’s big gray car hurtled me toward the Big D, I imagined the old me waking to find she’d hit the jackpot. A glossy life behind the gates. A new house. A seemingly happy family. The right friends. Her own car. And a date to the prom with Tom Slayton.

  I felt sorry for her, especially when she’d read what I’d written across the top of the chapter on the Renaissance in her history book.

  YOUR FATHER BEATS YOUR MOTHER.

  I hoped that was enough to keep Mom (and the old Nora) safe. Would I believe me? I don’t know. Maybe I can leave some things out of my statement before I get the Big Pill, some things for the old me to hang on to.

  Winter and Micah must have omitted a lot in their statements or else Bell would have been arrested, too. Well, not if he’d been working undercover and narced on the whole Memory Loss Support Group. Mr. Yamada was right. We shouldn’t have trusted him.

  Bell slowed the car and parked.

  “Did you turn in the whole MLSG?” I blurted out as he opened the car door. “They trusted you.”

  Officer Bell pointed toward a building. That’s when I noticed where we were. It wasn’t a police station. It was the same alley, the same back door to the same church where we’d met the MLSG. Southside Methodist Church.

  Inside were the same macaroni paintings, the same burned coffee smells, and the same folding chairs as before. The chairman, Ms. Curtis, and two other members waited for us in the little kitchen. The librarian, to my surprise, rushed to meet us. The others stayed put, sipping their coffee and watching us over the white brims of their Styrofoam cups. Ms. Curtis hugged me lightly, pulling away after a few seconds as if she was embarrassed by her feelings.

  “Does that answer your question?” Officer Bell asked. “I’m sorry we couldn’t get Winter and Micah in time,” he added quietly. The worn Formica breakfast bar stood between us and the coffee klatch in the kitchen. Under the counter, Ms. Curtis gently took his hand.

  “Then why haven’t you or Ms. Curtis been picked up?” I asked. “Or them? Or Mr. Yamada? He thinks you turned in Winter.” I wondered if he’d seen Bell grab me through the plate glass doors of the school. Or if he was already on the way to his lawyer’s.

  “Katie and I were ready to make a run for it as soon as we heard Micah was gone,” Bell said, staring at some random fleck in the countertop. “But then a friend at the detention center told me that someone ordered the kids held without statement.” He looked up at me, anger in his eyes. “They’re kids. It should be a simple erase and release job. I tried to call Koji, but he wouldn’t answer.”

  I had a cold feeling in the pit of my stomach. And I was suddenly conscious of the cool silver bracelet dangling on my wrist. “My father?” I asked.

  Bell nodded. “He doesn’t want them to implicate you.”

  Or screw his career. Mom had changed hers because it was hurting his.

  “But how can he stop them from talking?” I asked. “Don’t the police run Detention?” Did Dad have that much power?

  “Soft Target runs the Hamilton Detention Center for Homeland Inc.,” Bell replied.

  “Which is owned by TFC,” Ms. Curtis added.

  “Oh,” I whispered. My dad ran the Big D. And his people blew up shit. For the company that would help you forget about it with one little white pill. TFC was the one with so much power. I took a deep breath and tried to absorb it all. It didn’t work. I couldn’t quite wrap my head around Dad making his living—our living—this way. And he was the one holding Micah and Winter. Another thought popped into my head. “If Micah hasn’t talked yet, why did Winter get picked up?”

  “He made a call to her before he was detained,” Bell said. “About a printer.”

  “Damn.” It’s a monitored network. Micah had said it himself. And he’d forgotten it when it counted the most. That was probably my fault, too.

  “Their detention also protects us,” the chairman said. He put down his coffee cup and walked around the counter to where Bell, Ms. Curtis, and I were standing. The others continued to sip their coffees and watch us warily. “If they don’t talk, no one will know about us—which is why you cannot hand out any more of those comics. You cannot risk going to Detention, young lady,” Mr. Carver said, putting his hand on my shoulder. “For our sakes and your own.”

  Officer Bell snorted, but I felt an odd sense of relief flooding through me. The backpack felt lighter. Maybe I had no business endangering these people. Maybe I should ditch Memento, leave it to the adults, and get on with my life.

  “It’s a pity about your friends, though.” The chairman closed his hand on my bag.

  A pity? I drew back. I could see Bell staring at the floor, not wanting to look at me. Then I got it. If Micah and Winter were being held without the possibility of them telling their stories—which was the only way to erase their memories—then they could be in Detention indefinitely. And all because of me.

  My dad didn’t want TFC to know that his little princess was involved—and that he’d been unable to stop it. That would ruin everything for him. No big contracts. No house in the compound. No money.

  So my friends could sit in the Big D not telling anybody anything for years. Just like Winter’s parents. Maybe that’s why they’re still there. Somebody didn’t want them to talk, either. I backed away from the chairman, clutching my backpack.

  “You—we—can’t leave Winter and Micah in Detention forever,” I said. The chairman’s face told me he could. Maybe. His eyes darted to the other members in the kitchen. They looked to Ms. Curtis, who gripped Bell’s hand tightly. I turned to him. “If I tell my story, would the authorities have to hear Micah’s and Winter’s? You said it should be a simple erase and release case, right?”

  Bell didn’t answer for a moment. I could see him turning the possibilities over in his head. “You know you’d have to get caught red-handed, right?” he said slowly. “Otherwise your father could continue to protect you.” He paused again. “Your father wouldn’t hold you in Detention forever, would he?”

  My dad might be a lot of things—ambitious, controlling, cruel even—but deep down I know he loves me. I think
he even loves Mom, in his own awful way.

  However, it would certainly be embarrassing for him if his biggest client found out that his daughter wrote (and distributed) Memento—and he covered it up by keeping two other kids on ice. Okay, Dad is definitely a creep, but he’s my creep. I had to gamble that he loves his princess enough not to tuck her away forever behind bars just to cover his own ass.

  And the story was important enough to take the risk. Kids needed to know TFC was blowing up shit to keep us scared. Scared enough to forget but not too frightened to stop spending money. I thought of Winter’s crab sculpture, scrambling along, weighed down by its shopping bag shell, unable to break free.