Never Never: Part Two (Never Never #2) (2 page)

My breathing is almost as erratic as the rain falling against the roof of my car. I bring my left hand up to the back of my neck and squeeze as I read the last paragraph. One I apparently just wrote a matter of ten minutes ago.

-Charlie got into a cab on Bourbon Street last night and no one has seen her since. She doesn’t know about this letter. Find her. The first thing you need to do is find her. Please.

The last few words of the letter are scrawled, barely legible, like I was running out of time when I wrote it. I set the letter down on the seat, contemplating everything I’ve just learned. The information is racing in my mind faster than my heart is beating in my chest. I can feel the onset of a panic attack coming, or maybe a breakdown. I grip the steering wheel with both hands and breathe in and out through my nose. I don’t know how I know that’s supposed to produce a calming effect. At first, it doesn’t seem to be working, but I sit like this for several minutes, thinking about everything I just learned.
Bourbon Street, Charlie, my brother, The Shrimp, the tarot reading, the tattoos, my penchant for photography.
Why does none of it seem familiar? This has to be a joke. This has to be referring to someone else. I can’t be Silas. If I were Silas, I would
feel
like I’m him. I wouldn’t feel this complete separation from the person I’m supposed to be.

I grab my phone again and open up the camera app. I lean forward and reach behind me, pulling my shirt forward and over my head. I hold the camera behind me and snap a picture of my back, then pull my shirt back into place and look at the phone.

Pearls.

A strand of black pearls is tattooed on my back, just like the letter said.

“Shit,” I whisper, staring down at the picture.

My stomach. I think I’m about to be…

I open up the car door just in time. The contents of whatever I had for breakfast are now on the ground at my feet. My clothes are being soaked as I stand here, waiting to get sick again. When I think the worst is over, I climb back into the car.

I look at the clock, and it reads 11:11 am.

I’m still not sure what to believe, but the more time that passes without recollection, the more I begin to entertain the idea that I may have just a little over forty-seven hours before this happens again.

I reach across the seat and open my glove box. I don’t know what I’m looking for, but sitting here doing nothing seems like a waste of time. I pull out the contents, tossing aside vehicle and insurance information. I find an envelope with our names written across it.
A duplicate of everything I just read.
I continue to flip through the papers until a folded piece of paper tucked at the very bottom of the glove box steals my attention. It has my name written across the top of it. I open it, first reading the signature at the bottom. It’s a letter from Charlie. I start back at the top of the page and begin reading.

Dear Silas,

This is not a love note. Okay? No matter how much you try to convince yourself that it is—it’s not. Because I’m not that type of girl. I hate those girls, always so lovesick and disgusting. Ew.

Anyway, this is the anti-love note. For instance, I do not love the way you brought me orange juice and medicine last week when I was sick. And what was with that card? You hope I feel better and you love me? Pfft.

And I definitely do not love the way you pretend that you can dance when you really look like a malfunctioning robot. It’s not adorable and it doesn’t make me laugh at all.

Oh, and when you kiss me and pull away to tell me I’m pretty? Don’t like that one damn bit. Why can’t you just be like other guys who ignore their girlfriends? It’s so unfair that I have to deal with this.

And speaking of how you do everything wrong, remember when I hurt my back during cheerleading practice? And you skipped David’s party to rub Biofreeze on my back and watched Pretty Woman with me? It was a clear sign of how needy and selfish you can really be. How dare you, Silas!

I will also no longer tolerate the things you say about me around our friends. When Abby made fun of my outfit that day and you told her that I could wear a plastic bag and make it look couture, it was way out of line. And it was even more out of line when you drove Janette to the eye doctor when she kept getting headaches. You need to get a grip. All of this caring and consideration is so unattractive.

So I am here to tell you that I absolutely do not love you more than any human on this planet. And that it’s not butterflies I feel every time you walk into a room, but sick, one-winged, drunken moths. Also, you’re very, very unattractive. I flinch every time I see your unblemished skin and think—Oh my god, that kid would be so much more attractive with some pimples and crooked teeth. Yeah, you’re gross, Silas.

Not in love.

Not at all.

Never Never.

Charlie.

I stare at the way she signed off and read those words through a few more times.

Not in love.

Not at all.

Never Never.

Charlie

I flip the note over, hoping to see a date. There’s nothing to indicate when it was written. If this girl wrote me letters like this, then how could everything I just read in my notes about the current state of our relationship even be true? I’m obviously in love with her. Or at least I
was
in love with her.

What happened to us?

What happened to
her
?

I fold the letter up and put it back where I found it. The first place I go is to the address listed on the paper for Charlie’s house. If I don’t find her there, maybe I can get more information from her mother, or from anything I can find that we might have overlooked before.

The garage door is shut when I pull into her driveway. I can’t tell if anyone is home. The place is grungy. Someone’s trashcan sits sideways next to the curb, trash spilling out onto the street. A cat is pawing at the bag. When I step out of the car, the cat dashes down the street. I look around as I make my way to the front door. No one is around, the neighbor’s windows and doors are all shut tight. I knock several times, but no one answers.

I look around one last time before I turn the knob.
Unlocked
. I quietly push the door open.

In the letters we wrote to ourselves, we mention Charlie’s attic a few times, so that’s the first place I search for.
Charlie’s attic.
I’m meeting the attic before I meet the girl. One of the doors is open in the hallway. I walk in and find the bedroom empty. Two beds—this must be where Charlie and her sister sleep.

I walk to the closet and look up at the ceiling, finding the entrance to the attic. I push clothes aside, and a smell fills my nose. Her smell? Floral. It smells familiar, but that’s crazy, right? If I can’t remember her, I can’t possibly remember her smell. I use the closet shelves as stairs and make my way up.

The only light inside the attic comes from the window on the other side of the room. It’s enough to illuminate where I’m going, but not by much, so I pull out my phone and open the flashlight app.

I pause and stare down at the open app on my phone.
How did I know that was there?
I wish there were rhyme or reason to why we remember some things and not others. I try to find a common link in the memories but come up completely empty.

I have to hunch over because the ceiling is too low for me to stand upright. I continue across the attic, toward a makeshift sitting area on the far side of the room. There’s a pile of blankets lined with pillows.

She actually sleeps up here?

I shudder trying to imagine anyone willingly spending time in a place this isolated. She must be a loner.

I have to bend over more to avoid hitting my head on the rafters. When I reach the area she’s made up for herself, I look around. There are stacks of books beside the pillows. Some of the books she uses as tables, topped with picture frames.

Dozens of books. I wonder if she’s read them all, or if she just needs them for comfort. Maybe she uses them as an escape from her real life. From the looks of this place, I don’t blame her.

I bend down and pick one up. The cover is dark, of a house and a girl, merging together as one. It’s creepy. I can’t imagine sitting up here alone, reading books like this in the dark.

I set the book down where I found it, and my attention falls on a cedar chest pushed up against the wall. It looks heavy and old, like maybe it’s something that’s been passed down in her family. I walk over to it and open the lid. Inside, there are several books, all with blank covers. I pick up the top one and open it.

January 7
th
-July 15
th
, 2011.

I flip through the pages and see that it’s a journal. In the box beneath this one, there are at least five more.

She must love to write.

I look around, lifting pillows and blankets, searching for something to put the journals in. If I want to find this girl, I need to know where she frequents. Places she might be, people she might know. Journals are the perfect way to find out that information.

I find an empty, worn backpack on the floor a few feet away, so I grab it and stuff all the journals inside. I begin pushing things aside, shaking out books, looking around for anything and everything that might help me. I find several letters in various places, a few stacks of pictures, random sticky notes. I take everything I can fit into the backpack and make my way back to the attic opening. I know there are also a few things in the bedroom at my own house, so I’ll go there next and sort through it all as fast as I can.

When I reach the opening, I drop the backpack through the attic hole first. It hits the ground with a loud thud and I flinch, knowing I should be quieter. I begin to descend the shelves one by one, trying to imagine Charlie making the journey up and down these makeshift stairs every night. Her life must be pretty bad if she escapes to the attic by choice. When I make it to the bottom, I grab the backpack and stand up straight. I pull it over my shoulder and start toward the door.

I freeze.

I’m not sure what to do, because the officer who tapped on my window earlier is now staring straight at me.

Is being inside my girlfriend’s house illegal?

A woman appears in the doorway behind the officer. Her eyes are frantic and they’re lined with mascara—like she just woke up. Her hair is wild, and even from several feet away, the scent of alcohol finds its way across the room.

“I told you he was up there!” she yells, pointing at me. “I warned him just this morning to stay off my property, and he’s back again!”

This morning?

Great.
Wish I had informed myself of that fact in the letter.

“Silas,” the officer says. “You mind coming outside with me?”

I nod and proceed cautiously toward them. It doesn’t seem like I’ve done anything wrong, since he’s only asking me to speak with him. If I did anything wrong, he would have immediately read me my rights.

“He knows he’s not supposed to be here, Grant!” the woman yells, walking backward down the hall, toward the living room. “He knows this, but he keeps coming back! He’s just trying to get a rise out of me!”

This woman hates me. A lot. And not knowing why makes it hard not to just apologize for whatever the hell I did to her.

“Laura,” he says. “I’ll have a talk with Silas outside, but you need to calm down and move aside so that I can do that.”

She steps to the side and glares at me as we pass her. “You get away with everything, just like your daddy,” she says. I look away from her so she won’t see the confusion on my face, and I follow Officer Grant outside, clutching the backpack over my shoulder.

Luckily the rain has let up. We keep walking until we’re standing next to my car. He turns to face me, and I have no idea if I’ll be able to answer the questions he’s about to throw at me, but hopefully they aren’t too specific.

“Why are you not at school, Silas?”

I purse my lips together and think about the answer to that. “I, um…” I look over his shoulder at a passing car. “I’m looking for Charlie.”

I don’t know if I should have said that. Surely if the cops weren’t supposed to know she was missing, I would have clarified that in the letter. But the letter only stated that I needed to do whatever I could to find her, and reporting her missing seems like it would be the first step.

“What do you mean you’re looking for her? Why isn’t she at school?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. She hasn’t called, her sister hasn’t heard from her, she didn’t show up for school today.” I throw a hand behind me in the direction of the house. “Her own mother is obviously too drunk to notice she’s missing, so I thought I’d try to find her myself.”

He tilts his head, more out of curiosity than concern. “Who was the last person to see her? And when?”

I swallow as I shift uncomfortably on my feet, trying to recall what was written about last night in the letter. “Me. Last night. We got into an argument and she refused to ride home with me.”

Officer Grant motions for someone behind me to come toward us. I turn around, and Charlie’s mother is standing in the open doorway. She crosses the threshold and makes her way out to the yard.

“Laura, do you know where your daughter is?”

She rolls her eyes. “She’s at school where she’s supposed to be.”

“She is not,” I interject.

Officer Grant keeps his eyes trained on Laura. “Did Charlie come home last night?”

Laura glances at me and then looks back at the officer. “Of course she did,” she says. Her voice tapers off at the end like she’s not sure.

“She’s lying,” I blurt out.

Officer Grant holds up a hand to hush me, still directing his questions at Laura. “What time did she come home?”

I can see the confusion wash over Laura’s face. She shrugs. “I grounded her for skipping school this week. So she was up in her attic, I guess.”

I roll my eyes. “She wasn’t even home!” I say, raising my voice. “This woman was obviously too drunk to know if her own daughter was even inside the house!”

She closes the distance between us and begins pounding her fists against my arms and chest. “Get off my property, you son of a bitch!” she screams.