She hung up before I could ask her what the hell she was doing here, or have the chance to turn her down. She was lucky I had the kind of job that didn’t require a lot of conference room meetings and offered flexible hours so long as I got my work done. But she knew that already, which was why she wouldn’t give me a chance to say no for the hell of it. Given my lousy mood, she’d probably regret my company before we even got to wherever we were eating.
I groaned. …wherever we were eating.
Guess that meant I’d already decided to go. I scribbled a quick note, leaving the jacket I wore this morning behind. Passing Pamela’s area on my way out, I handed her the note explaining I was eating out today. She smiled and waved, all the while speaking firmly with whoever was on the phone, not skipping a single beat.
I stepped outside my building into balmy seventy degree weather. Out of habit, I scanned the pedestrians on the walkway and the cars that lingered on the side of the road, seeking anything unfamiliar. It was the city, so none of it ever looked familiar, but I always did it anyway. It was just a way of life now, always on the lookout for anything suspicious. My second scan caught Thea’s wave as she headed over, arm covered with a washed-out brown denim jacket that complimented her tiny frame and soft brown waves.
She reminded me so much of the way Megan used to be. When she was Claire. When she would dress in finer clothing, curl her long, brown hair and lightly paint her face with make-up. She and Thea used to share everything in high school, so I recognized the pair of hoop earrings she was wearing now.
“What are you doing here?” I tried not to sound accusatory, but that was just my crappy mood rearing its ugly head.
“I know, I know, okay? But I wanted to see you. I promise I backtracked several times and watched everything around me. I even went in one side of a mall and out the other and took a bus here.”
“Damn it, Thea,” I muttered anyway, roughly stroking my jaw, my eyes still set on our surroundings. She was careful about coming, but still, she shouldn’t be here. I wrapped my arm around her shoulders and pulled her into motion with me, getting lost in the hustle and bustle of lunchtime in Seattle.
She was the same height as her sister, my arm too comfortable with the position. My hand dragged down and planted itself between her shoulder blades before abandoning the contact altogether, finally drifting back to my side. I could see the similarities of the two sisters, both of them favoring their mother’s pale skin but getting brown eyes instead of her hazel. Both had the same chestnut colored hair, but Thea’s skin was slightly paler and her brown eyes more tan than dark brown. She followed me into a Vietnamese restaurant and we quickly ordered our drinks and Pho soups.
Slightly disgruntled, I asked, “Seriously, Thea, what are you doing here? We agreed. No physical contact. Phone calls and emails only.”
“I know,” she replied, whipping her napkin before dragging it across her lap. “But it seems I need to step in and mediate and I can’t freaking do that over the phone within your lovely five minute time limit.”
“It’s for her protection. Don’t you get that?”
“Yeah, I get it, Nick,” she snapped bitterly, though she kept it hushed. “Doesn’t mean I have to like not seeing the sister I just got back! Who’s to say all this hiding and me changing cities and mom and dad selling their house is going to change anything? We’re stronger together.”
“We’re also more obvious together. It’s better this way.”
She huffed loudly. “Says the guy who actually gets to be with Claire!”
I sat there silently, watching her face fall the moment she caught her error, sighing and closing her eyes. “She hasn’t been Claire for a long time, Thea. Look at all the memoires she’s gotten back these past few months. You know as well as I do that Megan isn’t Claire. That light, carefree girl with stars shining brightly in her eyes who we both loved has been hardened. Yeah, she’s got the memories and knows who she’s supposed to be, but there’s a shell around her thickening so damn fast I can hardly keep it chipped back. That damn doctor of hers… I don’t know what they do in those sessions because she won’t tell me, but Megan’s changing right before my eyes and not for the better.”
“What do you mean?” she asked weakly, a look on her face so aggrieved you’d think I’d just told her that her puppy needed to be put down.
“I mean she’s closed herself off to me. She’s there but not really.” We sat there in silence as the waitress delivered our soups, neither one of us moving to try them just yet. I didn’t know about Thea, but I sure as hell didn’t have much of an appetite these days. She sure looked skinnier than she used to be. The only reason I forced a dinner down my throat every night was because I was sure Megan wasn’t eating a whole lot either and I didn’t dare let her skip a meal I could witness for myself.
“I don’t know what to do anymore,” I admitted dejectedly. “I can’t tell her not to worry about the future or let go of the past. And I know she worries. She’s always lost in thought and I’m scared to death to ask her what’s going on in there because it’s probably some traumatic memory that’s still haunting her.”
We were so distant now. Even though just six weeks ago she asked me to touch her more than ever, every single attempt made her jump or cringe even more. If anything, she’d been withdrawing, slowly drifting farther away from me.
I blamed Dr. Vitriz. Something was going on in those sessions. Something that made Megan retreat within herself, forcing smiles my way to prove she was getting better, when in fact, I feared the exact opposite to be true. I mention it once to Megan, and only once. Because the temper that flared out of her wasn’t worth a second performance. She was defensive and I still hadn’t figured out why.
“She’s scared,” Thea said simply, blowing a spoonful of broth, sipping it between her pale red lips. “Of all the things she’s unearthing inside her head. I don’t like what that doctor’s doing any more than you do. What few times I’ve been able to talk to her she’s mentioned how that doc’s been trying to dredge up everything she’s managed to forget. And I’m not talking about the sugar-coated memories she had with us before.”
“She’s actually telling you about her sessions?” I asked, a twinge of jealousy stirring my stomach. I still hadn’t touched my soup, my right hand continually stirring it with my spoon, chopsticks idly held in my left.
“A little. Like I said, I hardly get anything in five minutes and only if she’s in a sharing mood. That’s why I came here.” She laid her spoon down to break open her chopsticks. “I know you think it’s important to keep her hidden away, and believe me, I agree with you. But sometimes a girl needs her sister. I’m not the one who’s living with her, watching her every move. Maybe she’ll open up to me if I can get her alone for a while.”
I let my spoon rest on the table. The thought of eating just made me sick now. I always felt tired these days, drained. Megan didn’t fare any better. We were like shadows shifting through the house. Our corporeal bodies were there, but spiritually, hell if I knew where we were. We were slowly drifting apart and I just didn’t know what to do about it.
I sighed and rubbed my left temple. Her life absolutely sucked these days. At least in Myrtle Creek she was somewhat happy. She had a good group of people to interact with daily who cared for her. “You know, sometimes I feel like she would’ve been better off lost without us.”
Thea silently gasped, her lower jaw left hanging, her accusing eyes narrowing. “Better off?” she quietly snapped, slamming her spoon back down on the table. “No, Nick. She’s not better off without her family. We’re the only people in the world who truly love her. Of course she should be with us.”
“But at what cost, Thea?” I discreetly snapped back, leaning over the table to minimize eavesdropping ears. “She may’ve been alone but she made herself a new life. She was safe! And look what happened the moment we yanked her back into our lives. She was forced to talk to the damn cops and it got her taken again by that f**king ra**st! Really? She had to go through all that a second time just so we could have her back? There’s no way you think that’s a fair trade.”
Thea had looked ready to argue with a vengeance until that last bit. Now, she sat back in her chair, looking solemn.
“How the hell can we be so selfish to keep her here?” I asked.
“So what are you saying?” she asked with the smallest of voices. “You wanna let her go hide in the world all by herself again?”
“No, of course not,” I answered glumly. “God, I’m the most selfish one of all because there’s no way I could give her up now.” I sighed long and hard. “But she’s not happy. She’s given up everything. Her life, her family…just because some jackass has a sick obsession with her.”
Thea pushed her soup towards the middle. Guess that meant two of us weren’t eating today. “We’re all pretty miserable right now. You think I really wanted to give up my job and move to Chicago?” She shook her head when she added, “No. Mom and Dad are living off cash in a damn trailer park instead of my childhood home. I’m living with an annoying roommate just so all the bills can be in her name, and I can’t even see my own sister. But I’ll take it if it means I know where she is and that she’s safe with you, no matter how much it sucks.”
“So what do you want? You want to see her, stay with us a night? What?”
“I’d like to come stay over this weekend.”
Today was Wednesday. Curiously, I asked, “You came all this way and you don’t want to see her tonight?”
“I’d love to see her tonight, but I can’t. I know I ambushed you for lunch…” She said it mockingly because we’d accomplished nothing but losing our appetites. “…but truthfully, I asked my booking girl to fly me through Sea-Tac so I could have a six hour layover on my way to L.A.”
“Chicago to Seattle to L.A.? That’s one messed up flight path.”
“Tell me about it. But I figured you’d just say no or brush me off over the phone.”
I crossed my arms and leaned back in the chair. “Wanted to give me the guilt trip front and center, huh?”
She flashed a quick smile and fluttered her eyelids dramatically, her hand reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ear. “Did it work?” she asked blushingly.
“Thea, you don’t have to guilt trip me. I already live there. And I’m not going to tell her family they can’t see her. We just have to be extremely careful about it. Just make sure you don’t have a tail doing it. Where are you going to be on Friday?”
“I’m in L.A. the rest of the week.”
“Good. Come straight from there instead of going home. And if you can make a million circles in LAX’s terminals, even better.”
“Yeah, I understand. I’ll zig and zag the whole way here. I don’t want anyone following me anymore than you do.”
Dinner was routine like any other night, where I cooked, we sat mostly quiet as we ate, and then she cleaned behind us. She just stared at her meal in a daze, pushing around the peas with her fork and burying them beneath the mashed potatoes instead of eating them. I wasn’t doing much better, so I could hardly ask her to eat more. When I came out from my shower, I wasn’t surprised to find her sitting in the living room reading a paperback. Libraries required proof of residency, and since we funneled money into an account for one of her father’s friends to pay all the bills that were in his name, we didn’t technically live here. So she either had to buy her books or grab one at some leave-one-take-one pile she found at the grocery store. She still loved to read – at least that was one thing that hadn’t changed since her Claire days.
She smiled softly as I settled in beside her, leaving a few inches to act as a buffer, with the throw I had her take from her old room draped across her legs. My arm rested on the cushion behind her head, but again, I knew she didn’t really want to be touched. “I saw Thea today.”
Her eyes widened as her head tipped. “Why didn’t you tell me yet? Is she alright?”
“She’s fine. She’s just mad over how we’re all spread apart and keeping to ourselves. I think she just needed to vent.” I couldn’t help it. My fingers found their way to her hair, and they gently combed through the strands of her ponytail. Megan didn’t seem to mind, so I kept going. “She wants to come see you.”
Her head fell back onto the cushion, trapping my hand beneath. “I’m awful, aren’t I? It doesn’t hurt me that much to be separated from them. I stare at that photo album every night, and I can almost remember every memory tied to those pictures now. But there’s still something missing. Like a link between the memories and the feelings that would make me feel more emotionally attached to them. I know they’re my family and that I love them. And yes, there are moments when I wouldn’t mind being with them, but it doesn’t bother me that I don’t see them that much. How come I’m not upset that you’re the only one from my old life that I get to see every day?”
She turned to me with saddened, confused eyes. “Is there something wrong with me?”
It killed me to see her look so wounded. I slowly reached out and took her hand, rubbing my thumb along the top of it. The pages of her book flipped out of place, so she closed it completely. “No. You had your memory wiped followed by something traumatic. No one has the right to tell you how to deal with that. It’s something you have to figure out on your own. And if you need space from your family, fine. If you need space from me, fine. I’ll give it to you. They’ll give it to you. There’s nothing wrong with your behavior if that’s how you need to go about healing yourself.”