Unremembered (17 page)

‘Oh,’ I say, suddenly feeling as awkward as he looks. ‘Right. Sure. Go ahead.’

He slowly reaches towards me and I hold my breath. I don’t mean to. The air just kind of traps itself willingly inside my lungs. I feel his fingertips graze the back of my bare neck. His
touch causes my skin to prickle and heat up. He gently gathers my hair in one hand and sweeps it over my left shoulder, taking a moment to brush a few loose strands that didn’t make it.

The whole movement is so fluid – so practised – that it makes me 100 per cent certain he’s done this before. This is not the first time his hands have touched my hair. And I
find myself silently hoping that it won’t be the last.

‘OK,’ Zen says, clearing his throat. I jump and my eyes flutter open. I didn’t even realize they had closed. He’s back in front of me again.

‘So,’ I say, trying to mask my embarrassment. ‘It’s done?’

Zen takes a deep breath and sits himself down in an adjacent chair. ‘Yes. You should now be directly linked to the drive.’

I wait, wondering if something is supposed to be happening. I’m half expecting a bolt of lightning to strike my brain, but in reality, nothing changes. My mind is quiet. And the room has
fallen silent once again.

‘I don’t feel anything,’ I tell him.

He nods. ‘You won’t feel different. Think of this as an extension of your brain. An external storage container of sorts. But in order to access the information that’s in it,
the memories have to be triggered somehow.’

‘OK,’ I say dubiously. ‘And how do we do that?’

‘There are several ways to trigger dormant memories – key words, objects, images – but the easiest thing is for me to ask you questions.’

‘OK,’ I say again, feeling less and less confident that this will actually work.

He rubs his palms on his pants. ‘Let’s start with your house. Tell me about your living room.’

I frown. ‘How can I possibly do that? I don’t remember my house. I don’t remember anything about my life before—’

‘What colour is the couch?’ he interrupts.

‘Beige,’ I say without thinking.

My whole body freezes. Apart from my pounding heart. Which I can now hear in my ears.

What just happened?

‘And where is the front door?’ he continues.

This response comes as quickly as the last one. ‘On the opposite side of the room. Next to a tall brown lamp and a coat rack.’

I don’t know how I’m doing this. I don’t know why these answers are coming so easily. Or if they’re even the
right
answers.

I stare wide-eyed at Zen. ‘What is going on?’

He smiles encouragingly. ‘You’re remembering.’

‘I am?’

He nods. ‘Your brain is accessing the memory that’s stored on the drive.’

A rush of euphoria shoots through me, waking me up, energizing my senses. ‘Do it again!’ I order. ‘Ask me more questions!’

Zen laughs. ‘OK, OK. What else is in the room?’

I bite my lip in concentration and close my eyes but nothing is coming. ‘I . . . I . . .’

Zen steps in. ‘Sorry, you probably need something more specific. What is in the corner, to the right of the front door?’

A grin spreads wide across my lips. I know this. ‘It’s a plant!’

I doubt anyone in the history of the world has ever gotten this excited about a plant, but I don’t care. For me, this plant means everything. It’s a piece of me. A piece I thought I
had lost forever.

And then suddenly the room starts to take shape. What was a blank white canvas is now becoming a tapestry of colours and objects and furniture. One by one, items materialize out of thin air,
filling in empty gaps. A table. Another lamp. A chair. A bookshelf. A fireplace.

It’s so magnificent. And so real! I can remember it almost as clearly as I can remember my room at Heather and Scott’s house.

‘Is this really my house?’ I ask Zen.

‘Yep.’

I can hardly believe what I’m seeing – or remembering, rather. For the first time in what, for me, seems like forever, I start to feel an undeniable sense of ownership over
something.

My living room.

My beige couch.

My
house.

And everything I see feels comfortable. Safe. Right. It feels like
home.

The living room continues to populate with familiar adornments and trimmings. As though a pair of magic, invisible hands were skilfully decorating my memory. Brass candleholders appear atop the
mantel and are immediately filled with long tapered green candles. A richly coloured mosaic rug unfurls along the hardwood floor.

The walls, once plain white, are suddenly coated in creamy taupe paint as three dark wood picture frames take shape over the couch. Inside each one, a beautiful oil painting starts to emerge,
swiftly crafted by an unseen artist with a concealed brush.

Red opaque curtains glide across the window, blocking out the daylight until, finally, the lamp in the corner illuminates, casting a warm soothing glow on everything, and adding a satisfying
finishing touch to the full picture.

But even though the living room seems to be complete, I am hungry for more. I have a burning desire to explore the rest of the house. To push the limits of my newly returned memory.

I notice the beginnings of a narrow hallway leading out of the room and I’m immediately pulled towards it. I squeeze my eyes shut tight and focus hard on the path of the hardwood floor,
forcing my mind to walk down it until I see . . .

Nothing.

The world simply stops there. And as hard as I try, as deeply as I concentrate, I can’t see beyond it. It’s as though the hallway just dissolves into nothing. The floor ceases to
exist, the walls disappear, and I’m surrounded once again by that exasperating empty white space that’s been haunting me since they pulled me from the ocean.

I squirm in my seat and let out a small whimper. ‘I can’t . . .’ I try to explain, frustration mounting. ‘I can’t see anything else.’ I open my eyes and look
desperately at Zen. ‘I can’t remember what’s outside of that room! Why can’t I remember?’

Zen puts a reassuring hand on my arm, but this time his touch does nothing to calm me. ‘Because you only have access to what’s on the hard drive. And unfortunately I wasn’t
able to get any memories of other rooms in the house. Which means you won’t be able to see anything past the living room.’

I toss my hands in the air and launch to my feet so forcefully the little blue chair I was sitting on goes flying backwards. ‘So that’s it?’ I cry. ‘That’s all I
get? A quick glimpse of a stupid living room? What good can that possibly do me?!’

I expect Zen to reach out and try to comfort me again, but he doesn’t. In fact, all he does is smile. As though he’s thoroughly entertained by my aggravation.

‘What?’ I demand, my teeth clenching.

He shakes his head. ‘Nothing. Sorry. It’s just . . .’ His voice trails off.

‘It’s just what?’

‘It’s nice to see you back.’

My forehead crumples. ‘Back?’

‘Yeah, you know, the old Seraphina. The feisty, spirited one I fell in love with. I saw a flash of her just then and it . . .’ His smile quickly fades, replaced by a much more sombre
expression. ‘Well, for a while there I was afraid she might be gone forever.’

My rage suddenly subsides and I cast my eyes downward, coming up with nothing more interesting to respond with than ‘Oh’.

‘But don’t worry,’ Zen assures me, tapping the steel cube. ‘That’s not the only memory on here. I promise there’s more to see.’ He stands up and
retrieves the upturned chair from the other side of the room where it landed. ‘Sit back down. Relax. I’m going to show you my favourite memory of all.’

Reluctantly I lower myself back into the chair. ‘And what memory would that be?’ I ask, trying to sound as lighthearted as possible in hopes of counteracting my earlier outburst.

The crooked smile is back. The one that makes me feel like it’s the only thing in the world worth remembering. He holds my gaze tightly as he says, ‘The day I met you.’

‘Close your eyes,’ Zen instructs me. ‘Go back to the living
room and tell me what you see.’

I do as I’m told, allowing my mind to be transported back to the only room I have. I focus hard until I see everything reappear in front of me. The beige couch. The coffee table. The lamp.
But this time, there’s something new in the picture.

‘A book,’ I tell him eagerly. ‘I see a book. And a hand. It’s . . .’ The realization comes fast. ‘It’s mine! It’s my hand. I’m holding the
book. I just finished reading it.’

‘Good,’ Zen encourages. ‘That’s right. You were in the living room reading.’

I can see the book clearly in front of me now.
A Wrinkle in Time,
by Madeleine L’Engle. The cover is ragged and peeling away. As though it’s been read a hundred times. And
underneath it, I can make out my legs, curled up on the couch, swathed in a pair of dark grey cotton pants. They look surprisingly similar to the ones I was wearing when the rescue boat found me.
The ones still folded up in a drawer at the Carlsons’ house.

‘Now try to let the memory guide you. It may be somewhat stilted at first but it will get easier and start to flow more fluidly the longer you do it. And I’ll be here to prompt you
if you get stuck. What else do you remember about that day?’

I bite my lip and concentrate, attempting to verbalize everything I see and feel. ‘I was getting hungry,’ I recount. ‘I was going to eat lunch. But then I heard something. A
scratching sound. It was coming from outside.’

I watch the scene as it plays out in brief, somewhat hazy fragments. I see it through my own eyes. As though it’s happening to me right now.

Standing up. Walking to the front door. Reaching out my hand.

But I’m crippled by a sudden bout of fear and I quickly withdraw it.

‘I was scared,’ I tell Zen. ‘Something scared me.’

‘Yes,’ Zen replies. ‘Do you remember what you were afraid of?’

‘The outside,’ I say with startling certainty. ‘I was afraid to go outside.’

‘Why?’ Zen prompts.

‘Because someone told me not to.’

Who?
I immediately wonder. I clench my eyes shut and press my fingers against my temples, trying to find the person’s face. Trying to hear the warning. But I just can’t. The
memory is not there.

‘I’m not supposed to go outside when no one is home,’ I tell Zen. But I barely recognize my own voice. It sounds flat and lifeless. My words come out like a monotone chant.
‘Something bad will happen if I do. But I don’t know what.’

‘It’s OK,’ Zen says hastily. ‘Keep going.’

I inhale deeply and slide back in.

My hand extends again. My finger presses against a glowing blue scanner. The door beeps and I push it open.

‘I didn’t listen,’ I recall. ‘I went outside anyway.’

Zen laughs. ‘You were never very good at following rules. Much to the disappointment of the people who made them.’

I think about the Carlsons. How I convinced Cody to sneak out of the house before they woke up. How I disappeared into the night without telling them I was leaving. I find myself comforted by
the knowledge that apparently some parts of me were never really lost.

‘What did you see when you went outside?’ Zen asks, his question inspiring a whole new picture to appear before me.

A white wraparound porch, a small, well-manicured lawn with freshly cut grass and flowers. The air is hot and dry.

‘My front yard,’ I reply.

‘And past that?’

I struggle to remember what was past the yard. But I can’t see much.

A tall concrete wall rising ten feet into the air blocks my view. There’s a narrow walkway that leads from the base of the porch steps and across the lawn but it stops at a thick steel
gate that’s been set into the wall.

‘I don’t know,’ I reply, flustered. ‘There’s a giant wall. It circles the whole house. I can’t see anything over it.’

‘It’s all right,’ Zen assures me, resting his hand atop mine.

‘What is the wall for?’ I ask.

But to my surprise, it’s me who responds. Or some variation of me. Once again, I hear my voice drop into an unnerving, inflectionless drone as I callously repeat something I don’t
recall learning. ‘It’s for my own protection.’

A debilitating chill runs up my arm. Zen strokes my fingers. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ he says. ‘Focus on what happened next.’

I nod, forcing myself back into the scene.

My eyes scan the length of the wall, searching for the source of the strange noise I heard from inside the house. I notice something move off to the side.

‘I saw something,’ I tell Zen.

‘What did you see?’

My gaze whips to the right and lands on a pair of hands that are gripping the top of the wall. I hear a grunt as someone struggles to pull himself up. A head appears a moment later. I
can’t make out the features of his face but I can see that he’s young. My age. Maybe slightly older.

‘A boy,’ I reply, my excitement growing. ‘He was climbing the wall.’

He swings one leg carefully over the top, followed by the other. Then he sits perched on the ledge, staring down. Gauging the distance to the ground. After a moment, he pushes himself off,
free-falling for a second, before landing in a crouched position on the other side.

My
side.

He stands and dusts himself off. I can see his face now. He has thick, dark eyebrows that are pinched together to form a crease above the bridge of his nose. His eyes are a rich brown. His
hair is almost black. It sweeps across his forehead, a few strands tickling the tips of his eyelashes. He shakes his head to brush them away as a single drop of sweat falls from his
forehead.

‘It was you,’ I say quietly, opening my eyes and gazing into the same oval-shaped face.

Zen grins. ‘It was me.’

‘You climbed the wall?’

He shrugs. ‘What can I say? I was curious. You put a giant concrete wall in front of a guy, he’s gonna try to find out what’s on the other side.’