12. The Memory Shuffle

Present Time (a reprieve)

She was awake again, with no recollection of falling asleep. She felt feverish, slow and gritty all over. Decay in her head again. She could perceive the faint musk of decomposition coming through her bandages. Why do I smell that? I didn’t bleed. Then again, a lot of things that didn’t happen seem real now. Just like they did then.

She righted herself to continue reading her journal, which she had tucked away under her pillow. Something for the memory fairy. Will you bring me back my life, memory fairy? Was there ever any to speak of?

This time it wasn’t just the pain attacking her. There was a growing unwillingness in her, a judgmental inwards stare mocking her, fighting the will to persevere and find the truth in all of this uncertainty. She felt a mix of panic, loss, emptiness, anger, and something else she couldn’t place; something willing her on in spite of her better sense.

Pills.

She swallowed three tiny assorted pills in different colors. The acrid taste they left behind in her mouth as she swallowed them dry made her want to grimace, but instead she took a deep breath and swallowed again, this time feeling distinctly for the first time, that she had a sore throat and swollen sinuses. Of course…

She trudged through the journal entry for November 9, knitting her brows as much as the pain allowed until tears flowed freely once again. Her face was flushed; her skin felt close to blistering heat. She stopped reading and threw the notebook across the room. It hit the back of her open closet and fell out of sight behind her shoes and random misplaced items.

Don’t trust your dreams.

The events of November 9 (conclusion)

Reality’s cutting blade paralyzed her for a frozen second before she was able to move once again. It was dark out, and she was still sore, feeling even more tired than she had been when she went to sleep. Her mind felt like crumpled newspaper, reasoning about as simple as attempting to read said newspaper.

Recollection was a slow endeavor in her muddled state, but events started to fall in order sure enough. The first was the strongest impression: the ghastly face of the one called Soren, his horrid visage taking the place of Clay’s and coming for her as if ready to devour her very soul.

Coming for me… like the moon. Things were, in no uncertain terms, attacking me in this dream. Just like the ocean water in the one before, but this time it seemed more mean spirited, right from the start. What was the start? I was talking to Evelyn on the phone. Evelyn!

She had to talk to Evelyn, there was now an imperative call to action that made her spring up from her bed as if it was covered in hot coals. Then she remembered, it was still dark out, it was probably the middle of the night. A look at her alarm clock threw her for a loop.

8:37, it yawned greenly.

She palmed the top of the clock and brought it up to her eyes, staring at its face like it was a child trying to blame the dog for eating a whole chocolate cake off the counter. 8:38, the clock winked cheekily. Upon closer inspection, Leila noticed the crumbs on the offender’s maw: PM.

The case of the day that refused to die.

Leila deflated back onto her bed, sitting and letting the acquitted clock flop off her hand and settle next to her with a merry bounce. The thick unsteadiness of realization made itself a trap for her thoughts. Willing herself out of a dream seemed a far simpler task than making sense of what had happened.

I was aware during a freaking NAP?! I was so sure I was done with this day already, what else could there possibly be left to do? Was Evelyn even there, then? What about Clay and that Soren guy? They couldn’t have been in my dreams as… real people if it wasn’t even time for sleep yet. Could it be that they were sleeping too? What are the odds of four different people napping at the same time?

She could risk calling Evelyn, she decided, and started for the door when she realized how feeble she was. This must be how people feel when they try to walk after being in a coma for weeks.

Josh’s guitar was still in the den, leaning against the end of the couch. Leila fought back a tumescent pressure in her chest at the sight of it. She had no time to ride that train again right now, she needed to get answers from Evelyn.

“Leila, are you up?” Lola’s voice rang high and clear through the silent house.

“Yeah mom.” She attempted to go on with her plan to call her friend, although she could hear her mother’s footsteps approaching the den.

“Are you feeling okay? You wouldn’t get up to eat anything so I assumed you’d had something to eat at the outing. Was it a lot of walking all day?”

Lemme get a word in edgewise there, Lola, geez!

“Yeah well I guess the sun was really beating down hard or something. I didn’t even realize I was so tired.” Leila shrugged and hoped that would be the end of it, but knowing her mother she knew it was unlikely.

“Go to the kitchen and eat something, you can have some of the potatoes I made for dinner or heat up the fish from lunch.”

Leila came from the land of three meals a day. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were all family affairs, but the midday meal was the most formal. It was eaten after school and during work lunch breaks, which lasted anywhere from two to three hours depending on the job. Dinner was the most casual meal, usually something light enough to digest a few hours before bed.

She had been punched in the gut by the mention of food. She was flying light with nothing but breakfast in her stomach, which had long ago soured in the stress afforded by her classmates’ shenanigans. The struggle to hold out on calling Evelyn in favor of eating weighed on her, and she froze into position in front of her mother.

This is the kind of thing that makes a person look crazy. I mean, how exactly do you explain to your mom that you’re starving, you haven’t eaten in more than twelve hours, but you’re pressed for time to call your friend so you can figure out if she was in your dreams or not.

“Go eat.” The exact tone and volume in which Lola spoke moved Leila towards the kitchen like a remote controlled toy car. She’d always wondered how her mother achieved that ability, suspicious that it must be some sort of voice-activated thought-bypass chip implanted into her brain at birth. She’d entertained the idea enough to rake her fingernails through her hair feeling her scalp for surgical scars as a child.

Leila didn’t give dinner much thought, fish sounded more appetizing but she couldn’t be bothered to heat anything up. The potatoes looked tasty enough anyway, cooked the way she liked them; diced and fried with ham, onion, tomato and topped with melted cheese. She cut off a piece of the concoction with a spatula, the cheese already congealed although the pan was still warm. She poured herself some juice from the refrigerator and sat at the breakfast table to scarf down her meal alone. It wasn’t hard to make short work of what was on her plate, she was hungry enough to go through the entire pan if need be, but she just ate enough to calm the growl in her stomach and regain some of her sense and composure.

She placed her plate and glass in the sink and went back to the den. It was 8:50 now, still an acceptable time for a personal call, she told herself as she dialed. The call tone came through, and she held her breath as the tingle of expectation ran through her in inconspicuous waves. If this was going to be like her dream, it would be Mr. Soria who answered the call.

“Hello?” Evelyn said over the line, and Leila’s spirits sank. This was not off to a good start.

“Hey Ev, how are you holding up?”

“Oh, hi. I’m doing alright I guess. Just… really tired for some reason.” Evelyn sounded even groggier than Leila, which sparked another small hope in her.

“Yeah… hey, were you sleeping? You sound really fuzzy.” Leila palmed at her neck and felt a new painful blemish on her jaw. She closed her eyes and hope floundered.

“No, I was watching TV. Maybe I dozed off for a minute, I’m not sure. Hey…” She cut herself off although she’d started out with the conviction of someone who’d just remembered they’d left the stove on.

Leila waited a beat before asking, “What?”

“Well… no, I just wanted to tell you that Vin’s been walking around with his tail between his legs about not sticking up for us today. I mean I didn’t expect him to do shit for me, but I am mad that since you were also involved he didn’t even try to hold them off or at least distract them, you know? Whatever, he’s been sulking all day but I’m not talking to him.”

Every last word of Evelyn’s little discourse reeked of lies. Leila knew Evelyn did care about Vin not sticking up for her, but wouldn’t ever admit to it. The fact that Vin was, in fact, feeling remorseful about what he failed to do that morning made Leila feel hopeful all over again.

“Evelyn… did I talk to you earlier today? I just… had a dream during my nap and things are a little disperse.” She was rubbing her eyes with her free hand as she spoke, as if that would help make her thoughts stand in formation.

“No, we haven’t talked since school. What was this dream about?” Evelyn had regained some pep, no doubt from the interesting turn in the conversation.

“I heard the story of your sandwich… or at least some version of it.”

“What sandwich?” Evelyn inquired with such honest wonder that Leila felt something inside evaporate.

“What sandwich? The one you told me about this morning, the one you wanted to tell me about when Hannah walked in on us in the restroom? Oh my God Evelyn, I swear if you’re pulling another joke on me I’m not gonna talk to you for a week.” Leila wasn’t having any of Evelyn’s teasing, as her grating intonation indicated.

Evelyn took on a grave, solemn tone that made Leila’s blood stop in her veins, “Leila, I know I’m almost never serious about stuff, but I want to tell you right now, hand on the Bible… I have no idea what you’re talking about.”