I was working in the loft when Amnesia arrived back at Loch Gen. The second the bell on the door chimed, I knew it was her, before I even swiveled around to look.
Brian was manning the front counter, and I watched from above as Am looked around for me. “Is Eddie here?” she asked.
Brian’s eyes swept over her, and a fuse of jealousy lit inside me. She was beautiful, and of course people (men, more specifically) were going to look, but I didn’t like it. I watched Brian smile at her, then point upward to where I was staring down.
Am swung around. When she found me, a smile lit up her features. “There you are.”
I leaned on the railing and smiled. “Here I am.”
“Brought you some dinner,” she said, holding up a plastic container.
“Get up here, woman,” I said, motioning with my head. I heard her rushing up the wooden steps, her feet echoing as she ran. When she made it to the top, I practically lifted her off the last one and swept her into my arms. Burying my face in her neck, I growled, “It’s been a long day. I missed you.”
“I missed you, too,” she said.
After a quick kiss, I snatched the container out of her hand and popped open the lid. “What did ya bring me?”
“Homemade alfredo,” she said proudly. Then she frowned. “Do you like alfredo?”
“If you made it, I like it,” I said, towing her along with me to the chair at my desk. The second I sat down, I pulled her into my lap. “I’m starving.”
She handed me a fork wrapped in a napkin, and I dug in. The sauce was creamy and rich and the wide noodles were cooked perfectly. Making a sound of appreciation, I shoved another bite into my mouth. “This is bomb,” I told her.
“Bomb,” she echoed.
“Really good. Best ever,” I explained.
Pride shone in her eyes. “Maggie helped, but I’m glad you like it.”
“Did you already eat?” I asked, scooping more into my mouth.
She nodded. “With Maggie.”
I propped my feet on the desk, leaning back in the chair. Amnesia’s legs hung over the side, but the rest of her cuddled into my chest. “Tell me about your day,” she said.
“It was boring,” I muttered.
“I just want to hear your voice.” She sighed, pressing a little closer.
Far be it from me to deny this woman anything. I told her about my day, about the stock and the boring spreadsheets, how someone spilled milk in the dairy aisle, and how Ms. Scarlet was allegedly almost crushed by rice.
She giggled when I talked, and the sound filled me up in a way no food ever could.
After I was finished eating, she stayed in my lap while I finished up some computer work. Then I showed her next week’s schedule with her name on it.
“Two hours ‘til close,” I said. “You sure you want to hang out that long?”
“Definitely.”
“Everything okay?” I murmured, stroking her hair.
“It’s been a weird day.”
“The memory threw you for a loop?”
Am nodded and sat up. “Yeah. And ever since, I’ve had this weird sense of… foreboding.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to make her feel better. I wasn’t sure anything could. I kissed her temple and asked, “Still want to stay at my place tonight?”
“Of course,” she retorted.
“Good! Come help me downstairs in the stock room so we can finish up and get out of here.”
I sent Brian home an hour before closing, and it took nearly the entire two hours to finish up the inventory in the back. Of course, some of that time was spent making out between stacks of boxes… but I wasn’t really counting.
At five ‘til nine, I turned the open sign to closed and locked up the store. Am and I left out the back entrance, where my truck was parked.
“You can see the moon’s reflection in the lake.” Her voice was hushed as she gazed down at the water.
“When I was in high school, my English teacher was a real romantic.” I scoffed. “She said something one time that made all the girls swoon and all the guys roll their eyes. But even so, I still think about it sometimes when the moon is low in the sky.”
Amnesia looked away from the water and the moon and up at me. “What did she say?”
“The sun sees your body, but the moon sees your soul.”
“That’s beautiful.” She contemplated the words. “Do you think it’s true?”
Thoughtfully, I nodded. “I think darkness is far more revealing than sunlight.”
The drive back home was quiet and short. I parked close to the house. The only light when the headlights went off was from the moon. She waited inside the cab for me to come around and lift her down. I knew she didn’t need the help, but it was just one more reason for me touch her.
As we walked along to the back door, Am caught my hand. “Let’s walk down by the shore.”
“Put your hands in your pockets so they don’t get cold,” I ordered, reversing direction toward the lake.
“You’re bossy,” she muttered even as she stuffed the hand I wasn’t holding into the pocket of her hoodie.
“Just looking out for my girl,” I said, lifting our joined hands and tucking them both into the pocket of my hoodie.
She smiled.
“Do you ever go out on the lake? You know, since that night?”
“I have a couple times. Mostly just to fish. It’s not my favorite place to be. It brings up a lot of, ah, memories. Guilt.”
“Yet you live on the water.” She pondered.
I shrugged. It was a paradox. “Yeah, as much as I dislike the lake, I’m drawn to it.”
Her voice was soft when she replied. “I can understand that.” After a moment, she spoke. “You blame yourself.”
“It’s hard not to. If I hadn’t insisted on doing that stupid dare, Sadie might still be here.”
“I might not be.”
I stopped walking, turning so we were facing each other. Down here, the water lapping at the shore was the loudest sound in the night. The breeze off the water was strong, and there was a slight bite to the air.
“I didn’t mean it that way.” I started. “I’m so glad you’re here, but that’s eleven years she’ll never get back. You’ll never get back.”
“Neither will you.”
A disgusted sound ripped from my throat. “I don’t matter.”
“You matter to me.” The words carried on the wind, somehow extending their life.
My heart lodged in my throat, making it hard to swallow.
We walked along some more, not quite close enough for the water to touch us, but enough that if a strong wave came in, it would.
“Tell me what you remembered today.” I cajoled, knowing it was hard for her but also sensing she wanted to talk.
“I’m the one that made my hair look the way it did before, all uneven and messed up.”
That surprised me. It was probably the last thing I expected. “You cut your hair?”
“With scissors,” she admitted. “I did it as some sort of revenge or something. He liked my hair… said it was his, and one day I snapped, started hacking it up to spite him.”
I swallowed, the lump in my throat only growing thicker. “Maybe that was the only thing you had in the moment to feel in control.” I reasoned.
“He broke my arm in punishment.” Her voice was flat, almost disconnected.
I stumbled. “He what?”
She stopped beside me, turned, and all the hair blew into her face, concealing it. It was dark out here, but the shadows in her eyes weren’t because of the night. “I can still feel the way his boot pinned my fingers to the floor. He stomped on it,” she murmured, her voice far away. As she spoke, her hand wrapped around her arm, near her elbow, as if the pain were still there. “I heard the bone snap.”
The string of dark curse words I let loose were ripped away with the violence of a sudden wind. “Jesus,” I muttered, pulling her into my chest. “I’m so fucking sorry, Am.”
“It’s not your fault, Eddie.”
I would forever feel it was.
“Did you remember anything else?” I asked, my words coming out harsh.
“No. That was enough.”
Wrapping an arm around her, we started walking again. She tucked her hand back into my pocket, though she could have used her own. Tenderness swelled inside me; it matched the anger I was consumed with knowing someone had once treated her that way.
If I knew who it was, I’d destroy him. “Did you see a face in the memory, Am? Something that would help you recognize who did this to you.”
“No,” she answered, forlorn. “Even if I did, I probably wouldn’t recognize them.”
Still. A face was better than nothing. We could do police sketches, look at criminal profiles… something. Hell, anything to make this bastard pay.
We walked along a few moments more. Amnesia gazed out across the ever-fluent water and the shimmering reflection of the moon.
“Did they search Rumor Island after Sadie disappeared?” Even though she was right here in my arms, her voice seemed far away.
“They searched everywhere,” I told her. “Including the island. More than once.”
“What was out there?”
“Nothing. Just Widow West alone on the island in her old house. The police interviewed her a few times, wanting to know if she saw or heard anything that night. The island was looked at closely because that’s where we’d been going when the boat flipped.”
Amnesia glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. “She didn’t see anything?”
“No. They searched the entire island. It’s pretty wooded with old trees and bushes. There’s a small beach on the back side. That’s where the dock is and where she keeps her boat.”
“And the house?” She pressed.
“They searched that, too. There was nothing.” I’d been angry in the weeks following Sadie’s disappearance. Angry with the police for not being able to find her, angry with myself for losing her, even angry with my friends who issued the dare. Everyone in town looked at me with pity and accusation. Even though I was in a shit ton of trouble, I searched with everyone. I searched until I was so tired I nearly fell over, until my feet had blisters the size of silver dollars. “I kept searching, even after the investigation was called off. I was obsessed. I couldn’t understand how a person just vanished like that.”
“I’m sure you did everything humanly possible,” Am said softly, pulling her hand out of my pocket and reaching for mine.
It wasn’t enough. “One night I fell asleep on the lakeshore. When my parents found me, I was half in the water, half out. My mom was so upset. I still remember the look on her face.” A ghost of a smile tugged my lips. It wasn’t funny, not at all, but the way her eyes nearly popped out of her head when she demanded I stop searching was something I could look back on eleven years later and find a little humor in.
“She was worried about you.”
I nodded, clearing my throat. This wasn’t about me. What happened wasn’t about me. Gesturing with my chin, I stared out at the looming shape of Rumor Island. “So why all the questions?”
“There was something about her today. When she spoke to me, all the hairs on my body stood on end.”
“She normally doesn’t talk to anyone,” I said, thoughtful. “She just gets what she needs, tolerates me, and leaves.”
“I didn’t like her,” Amnesia said, fully committed to her aversion.
I turned my back on the water, facing her. “She scared you.”
Amnesia still stared out at the lake, in the direction of the island. Slowly, she nodded. “Yeah, I guess she did.”
I made a mental note to keep Mrs. West away from Am the next time she came in the store. This was the first time I’d seen her react this way to anyone in town. Usually she had a smile for everyone.
It made the already eerie quality of the island even more so.
“C’mon. it’s cold,” I murmured, tucking her into my side and steering her toward the house. We walked quietly along. Every few moments, the water would come so close it would splash my shoes.
“Amnesia?” I said, still thinking about what she said.
“Yeah?”
“Do you think the widow had something to do with what happened to Sadie?” What the fuck kind of universe would it be if that were true? That the truth to the town’s biggest mystery was actually here right in front of us all this time.
She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “No. The few memories I’ve had, it’s always been a man. There’s never been a woman with him.” She glanced up at me with a rueful look on her face. “Maybe she’s just not a likable person. Maybe that’s why she lives alone.”
“Well, you’re pretty likable.”
“I am?”
“Mm-hmm.” I agreed. “In fact, I’d go as far as to say you’re insanely lovable.”
“Insanely?” She gasped. “Why, that’s the sweetest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
I smiled wide.
Giggling, Am peeked up at me. “You’re pretty insanely lovable yourself.”
I arched a brow as we walked up the steps to the door. “Did you just proposition me?”
“Depends. Did it work?”
Scoffing, I asked, “What do you think?”
The sound of her laughter echoed behind us, drifting out toward the moon. “Good thing we have all night.”
Amen to that.