For All Time

by Shanna Miles

  The question sounds muffled, like she’s standing behind a curtain. I shake my head. I’m thinking about the girl. I’m nervous and I feel stupid for being nervous about meeting someone I used to know, who used to know me. We are essentially strangers, but realizing she’s on the same floor fills me with… curiosity? Longing? How can you miss something you don’t even remember having?

  * * *

  I can’t look at her. Not that I’m physically incapable—there’s just something else holding me back. We decided to meet in the teen area of the children’s wing instead of in her room so my stilted conversation wouldn’t be the only entertainment. The game room at the hospital is pretty large, made to fit a whole horde of sick children, but there are just a few of us here. Bright colors swirl along the walls and meld into a yellow ceiling cut at an angle so there are more corners than there should be. I assume the design is supposed to keep our minds off the pain coursing through our bodies. There are large televisions affixed to two walls, one for watching and one for gaming. Since the younger kids keep an endless stream of fairy tales in queue, gaming is where the action is.

  I get there first, and when she arrives, I’m able to ask her mundane questions over my shoulder instead of trying and failing to keep her from staring at the bandages on my face. There’s a couch, yoga balls, and a love seat, all facing the gaming console with space for wheelchairs between. I’ve taken up residence in one of the love seats nearest to the window, but with a view of the hallway and exits. I get nervous when I can’t see the exits. Her nurse, a slim guy named Hassan, rolled her in and parked her almost directly behind me. I keep my voice light, using all the effort I have to keep it from shaking or breaking like a tween’s, but that’s how I feel: an awareness waking up inside my bones, vibrating and lighting my skin on fire… again.

  Her voice is like music.

  “My cousin Letitia said you came to say goodbye to me at the airport. I’m sorry. I know I don’t remember asking you to come, but you might not have gotten hurt if you didn’t, so I, uh… wanted to say that.”

  “It was my decision. Nobody knew what was going to happen. I’m sorry about your sister,” I say.

  “Thanks. I… don’t remember her.”

  “I don’t remember my mother. It’s awkward,” I add, and when she replies, I can sense the smile in her voice. At least we’ve got camaraderie born from a similar situation.

  “I know. I’ll say something and people think I’m being rude, or they’ll touch me in a familiar way and I’ll jump ’cause it’s a stranger stroking my arm. Then they’ll look at me like I’ve just spit in their coffee,” she says.

  “I stopped talking as much. My mother keeps staring at me like there is some stranger underneath the bandages who is impersonating her son,” I say sadly.

  There’s a pause. My heart skips a beat from the tension. “Have you seen what you looked like without them?” she asks.

  “I’ve seen pictures, but I don’t recognize that person,” I reply. He feels like a stranger whose life I inherited.

  One of my hands is completely untouched by burns, so I was able to use my thumbprint to log into my social accounts and get on my phone. I try to spend at least an hour a day scrolling through pictures of myself with friends, family, trying to jump-start something in my head. Some pictures are more private than the others. I saw her naked this morning. Not completely, but in parts, like a wicked puzzle in my photos folder. A thigh here, a belly shot there. More.

  I won’t mention the pictures. Maybe that other guy won’t ever come back, and I want her to like me for who I am now, not some memory, or out of obligation. Plus, who knows what I will look like once I’m unwrapped. I don’t want to get her hopes up. I don’t want to get my hopes up.

  “I don’t like dresses,” she says firmly, as if she’s just made a very important decision that needed to be announced.

  I’m not ready to turn around completely, but I can see her leg, a lean brown velvety limb, jutting out from her cast and covered in a gauzy purple flowered fabric. I like dresses, this dress, even if she doesn’t, so I don’t respond.

  “I think the girl I used to be liked them, but I don’t. There’s too much air breezing against my legs, not that it can be helped in this wheelchair.”

  I want to be that air. Wow! I have got to get myself together. I clear my throat and adjust myself in my seat, staring at the little dinosaur on the screen as it burps flames.

  “Is there another game on here?” I ask.

  Corey, a bald boy with cracked lips and a filthy sense of humor, switches to another screen. He can’t be more than fifteen, but acts like he’s thirty. “I know your bag, Torch. You want a first-person shooter. I can tell.”

  I am so desperate to do something with my hands, distract myself in some small way, I forget to tell him not to call me Torch. “Uh, sure. I would like a first-person… shooter. Um, what exactly is it?”

  “It’s really self-explanatory. Apocalypse Moon. You see something, you shoot it.”

  A minute later the entire room is filled with the sound of gunshots; animated gore splashes against the screen, and it does the trick. I can’t say that I like what I’m doing, but it is immersive, and then I remember that this is supposed to be a light chat, a chance to meet an old friend and make a new one. I grit my teeth and turn to face her.

  “I’m sorry. This probably isn’t the kind of thing you want to see right now, after what happened.”

  Her head tilts a bit as she considers me, and her mouth lifts into a slight smile. She looks exactly like the girl in the photos, but she’s got this unexpected strength, a sharpness like the key lime pie they served for dessert last night. The girl in the pictures seemed softer, sweeter. Neither one better than the other, just different.

  “I got next.”

  42 TAMAR

  EXPLOSIONS ERUPT IN QUICK SUCCESSION. Maybe I should be a little unnerved by them, but I gotta say, now that gaming has become part of my daily routine, it’s kind of comforting. I like that I’m able to complete something that doesn’t require memory or the use of my healing body. I only need my thumbs here. Physical therapy leaves me in tears, and the doctors don’t know yet if I’ll regain full use of both my legs. There’s still a lot of swelling, but in the game none of that matters. The rumble and cacophony of noise soothes me from the silence.

  “Did guys in suits come and ask you about the accident?” I ask Fayard. Turns out Ms. Daniels was right. It didn’t take more than a day for Fay and me to fall into a comfortable rhythm, friends. It would be hard to explain how or why I feel so at ease with him—I just do.

  He’s furiously punching buttons, his focus completely on the TV monitor. He’s wearing shorts today and a BENEDICT COLLEGE TIGERS T-shirt that he ironed so fastidiously the crease is plainly visible down the sides. His head is still bandaged, but I can see the hollow of his collarbone, the outline of his calf muscles in his good leg, the taper of his fingers…

  “Hmm?” he finally replies.

  “Oh, I said, have guys in suits come and talked to you?”

  “How did you know?” Fayard turns quickly in my direction and does a swift survey of the room, probably to make sure we’re alone. He avoids looking me in the eye. Maybe it’s the bandages that make him insecure; maybe it’s just me. I don’t judge him for it. I like that his face is obscured. He looks like I feel: hidden behind a mask.

  “They’ve been coming to see me, too. This last time they let slip that they think the bombing was some assassination attempt. One of the president’s senior cabinet members was supposed to fly out that day, but he missed the flight because of a car accident.”

  “Really? They told my mother it was a terrorist attack. Really scared her. They never asked me anything directly; Mamá wouldn’t let them past my bedroom door.”

  “I don’t like it. It feels as if they’re trying to pry information from us. Like we have some connection to all of it. You don’t remember anything, right?”

&nbs
p; Digital explosions rock our corner of the game room and light up the screen with scattered debris. Fayard shakes his head.

  “They give me a bad feeling,” he says. “But as long as we’re in the hospital we’ll be fine. There are cameras, people. Once we’re released, though, who knows what will happen. I’ve been watching the news. You would think that an attempted assassination or terrorist threat that hasn’t been solved yet would still be relevant, but there is almost nothing about it. It’s like it never happened.”

  His voice switches in and out of this weird accent. He’ll start a sentence and then catch himself, like he’s pretending to be someone he’s not or he’s remembering who he’s supposed to be in bits and pieces. I know the feeling.

  “You sound almost happy,” I say.

  “I am happy. I’m alive. You’re alive. That’s enough to make me happy.”

  I can feel the heat bloom across my cheeks. And now I feel stupid.

  “Is there anything wrong?” he asks, fingers jamming the controller as fast as a hummingbird’s wing.

  “No,” I say, a little too loudly.

  “Are you sure? You seem distracted. You never let a troll get by you, and three just slipped past your sniper site.”

  “Oh, sorry. Um, can we stop?”

  His fingers pause over the controller.

  “Sure. There’s a few other games here.” Fayard stops the play and switches to the main screen to scroll through our options.

  “I don’t want to play a game anymore. I want to talk,” I say.

  My stomach flutters, but the antinausea meds I’m on pretty much guarantee I’m not going to throw up.

  “We were together, right? Like more than just friends,” I start.

  Fayard takes in a deep breath. I can tell from how his chest rises before he hobbles over to brighten the lights.

  “Yes, definitely more than friends,” he adds. His back is turned. “Do… do you feel anything when you look at me, when we’re together?” I ask. He still hasn’t turned around to face me.

  “I don’t have any memories of us, but…” He pauses to adjust the light switch.

  Everything becomes bright, and it feels like the floor falls out from beneath me as embarrassment crackles hot and fierce in my chest. “But?” I prod.

  “But I have these dreams. Immersive, more vivid than these games, dreams where I live whole lifetimes… with you,” he says softly.

  I swallow hard.

  “We’re in different places, but I’m the same person, or I feel like the same person. It’s hard to explain,” he says in a rush.

  “Okay,” I say slowly, trying to keep my voice even, which is difficult because my throat is as dry as the desert I walked through in one of my own dreams with him.

  “Last night I was—I mean, we were on a train. I worked there and I ran a numbers game. It’s like gambling. I made money and got into some trouble. I was running, or at least trying to. My leg,” he says, and taps his cast. His eyes have a far-off look as he explains, like he’s back there. I must make a face, because he laughs.

  “Yeah, in every life my leg gets broken or severed or something. But you’re always there. We meet and I fall for you and…”

  I break eye contact. I can’t risk him seeing an understanding in my gaze. If he looks deep enough, maybe he’ll see the life I lived last night in Mali. I know, because I woke up in a cold sweat and asked the night nurse if she’d ever heard of Mansa Musa. It was just my luck that she’d minored in ancient African studies, because she talked to me for nearly an hour about how he was the richest man on Earth and how famed his pilgrimage to Mecca was. I didn’t breathe a word to her about how I watched myself live as a slave, how I fell in love with a soldier wearing Fayard’s face. If I close my eyes, I can still taste the dates he fed to me.

  He puts the controllers away and gingerly grips my wrist. I stop breathing when he lifts his hand to pull away. I turn my palm up and take the plunge, lacing my fingers in his.

  “Are you okay?” he asks.

  “I’m fine,” I lie.

  “No. I’m scaring you. It’s weird, I know. I told my neurologist, but he suggested I talk to a therapist specializing in head trauma.”

  Warmth floods through my body, and I ease my hand back so I can fiddle with a button on my dress.

  “I see a therapist.”

  “Do you think I’m crazy?” he asks, worry lacing his voice.

  “I didn’t say that. We’re in the same boat. Trying to figure things out with bits and pieces of a broken picture.”

  “Right,” he says. He sounds disappointed. I feel guilty about not corroborating his story, but I need more information. I need to get this new life in order. My mind is playing tricks on me, just like his is playing tricks on him. We don’t need to get caught up in some shared delusion.

  I take a deep breath. “But those are dreams. What about now? What do you feel when you’re with me… here?”

  “I feel something. Not physically. Well, not entirely physically, but like I’m supposed to remember you. Everyone else seems like a stranger, but not you. I can drop my guard when I’m around you, but I can’t make sense of why that is. Why do I feel so comfortable if I can’t even remember us being together before the accident?”

  He meets my gaze for the first time all morning, and my heart catches. That simmering energy between us that makes me want to touch him suddenly boils over. He keeps his eyes on me for just a moment longer before he turns and presses a fist to his chest, rubbing it in small circles.

  “Are you okay? Should I call for the nurse?” I ask.

  “No, no. It’s just… you make me nervous. No, that’s not what I mean. Sometimes I think English isn’t my first language, but I can’t remember what that language was.” He sighs. “I try to find the words to explain what it’s like when we’re together, but I can’t. Does that happen to you too?”

  I shake my head. “Not really, but I do feel out of place.” And out of time, but I don’t add that. Instead I change the subject. “I’m supposed to love carrots, but I finally tasted carrots a few days ago and I hate them.”

  “When they told me what the chili dogs were really made of, I almost vomited,” he says. He looks like he’s about to gag just thinking about it.

  “I inhaled them. They were delicious. What are they made of?” I ask, a bit scared of what he’s going to tell me.

  He shakes his head and laughs with his mouth wide open. “You do not want to know.”

  “No, I do. I want to know. I want to know everything, even though I can’t wrap my head around the simplest things. Food should at least be simple.”

  “You guys need Google.”

  We both turn our heads toward the voice. It’s the boy with the oxygen mask. I’m ashamed I still don’t know his name, and I’ve seen him too many times in the game room to ask.

  “Who’s Google?” we both ask in unison.

  He wheezes, and his voice comes out as thin as a paper gown. “It’s a what, not a who. Has anyone put you guys in front of a computer yet?”

  Another kid in a wheelchair, but with two working arms, wheedles in on the conversation. “They keep the brain-damaged kids away from them. Something about agitation.”

  Mask boy rolls his eyes dramatically. “Follow me.”

  We trail him down the hall into his room. It’s larger than mine and empty. Auntie O hasn’t left my side, so she’s become a fixture in my tiny space, sitting quietly under a soft lamp I’m sure she brought from home. The sickly-sweet scent of fresh but soon-to-be-rotten ranunculus fills the air, and the hospital-issue blankets have been supplemented by hand-sewn wax-print quilts that smell faintly of nag champa incense.

  His room is barren, with only the scent of antiseptic and the glare of the afternoon sun as its complements. My breath sounds too loud in here. In the corner there’s a glowing screen, smaller than a television, but larger than the phones I’ve seen people carry.

  “All right, so, uh… what’s
your name? I’ve been calling you Bomb Boy in my head, but my mom would say that isn’t polite.”

  “Fayard. Her name is Tamar, not Bomb Girl,” Fayard says before I have a chance to defend myself. “And what should we call you?”

  “P-Nasty.”

  “Excuse me? You want us to call you P-what?” I say in disbelief.

  “P-Nasty,” he says to me with a straight face, and then turns to Fay. “Oh, she wasn’t Bomb Girl. It was Hot Angry Chick.”

  “I’m not angry; I’m just opinionated,” I mumble, more concerned about this Google business than my hurt feelings.

  “So, you open up the browser and type in anything you want to know more about. You sit here,” he says to Fayard. “Before you tell me how girls can do it too, he’s got two working hands with all the functioning fingers,” P-Nasty says to me.

  I’m about to tell him where to go, but he’s right about this one. My thumbs are fine, but I don’t think I’ll be able to type. My competitive side suffers though. Ever since he mentioned girls being less aggressive during game play, I’ve been extra attentive to my kills in the WatchKiller Dogs game we play with the Busan team online every other night. I’ve surpassed his kills by nearly two to one, and I’ve only been playing for a short time. I turn my attention to Fayard, whose fingers seem to fly across the keys like he’s in some kind of trance.

  “How do you know what keys to press?” I ask, and he just shakes his head.

  “I bet it’s sense memory. I’m pretty sure you’ve played video games before, too. You wouldn’t be half as good if you were just picking it up.” He turns to Fay. “You want to look up the accident? Probably the best place to start,” P-Nasty replies.

  Fayard starts typing and a flood of conspiracy theories associated with the event pop up on a few newspaper websites and forums, this mini-journal online conversation lounge where you can only write a few sentences, and this video forum where people have posted clips of the explosion. We should be dead. The blast radiated in all directions, and what was once a beautiful feat of architecture is now just rubble. A tiny red X superimposed over a cloud of ash points to where Fay and I were found, almost as soon as rescue efforts commenced. Fay plays a short clip from a local news station. A man in a shirt and tie stands outside the airport gates.