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Celestial Souls, Book I: Christine
Chapter Twelve: Breaking Point

“Thank God you found it,” Ruth said the following day, looking more than relieved. “A little dirty but I can fix that.”

She had been more than eager to take it off my hands, and she didn’t stay for long after that. Why, I had no idea; the store was closed Sundays. But that left me to myself.

I had compiled notes on the book while thumbing through it. I couldn’t explain why besides the fact that I found it interesting to look at. They were written on lined paper and stuffed into a drawer on my desk. All I could say for sure was that the book was definitely divided into sections, each one marked with a title page. I was still a little unsure what the sections were, but there were seven of them. Not that it mattered; I probably wasn’t going to see the book again anyway.

Monday was like any other Monday (with the added bonus of people becoming excited for Christmas break the following week. I wasn’t excited yet; it was now December and there hadn’t even been a hint of snow. Seeing scraggly trees and hard, frosted ground wasn’t very cheerful, just depressing. At our locker, Shelby attacked me, looking excited.

“I wish you coulda been there!” she sighed. “It would’ve been great even if you went alone.”

I shrugged. “No fun going alone to a semi. D’you have pictures?”

“Duh! You don’t not take pictures.”

And she fished in her backpack, tugging out an envelope. I opened it – lots of pictures of Shelby outside the community centre, dressed in her vivid green cocktail dress (she was right; it was simple, but pretty). A few pictures had Shawn beside her, looking sort of uncomfortable in his shirt and tie. I smiled. They looked happy together.

“How was it?”

“Great!” she said, and from there until we parted ways for class, she rambled on about the dance, who was there and what they were wearing, all with a promise to tell me more during History.

Maybe because I was looking forward to it, but History came up ridiculously quickly; I had to have slept through Religion to explain how that class passed by quickly. While I was walking outside to the portable, wrapped up in a coat for extra warmth, I paused. Eric was there, standing by the portable, talking with Carly. Thank God. I’d been worried about his absence at the end of the previous week. Was he all right now? Had he smoothed things over?

I shivered – maybe it was the cold, or maybe it was the thought that occurred to me. What if he hadn’t smoothed things over? What if Mr. Dessler had simply suppressed his memories all over again? Oh God. One step forward, two steps back. Was that it? Was I fighting something that couldn’t be fought – was Serena actually right and I was the one being unhelpful...

I finally stepped into the warmth of the portable, everyone else sitting in their usual seats. This meant passing by Eric to get to mine, and right now he was deep in conversation with Carly. Quietly. I couldn’t hear what they were saying.

“Hey Eric,” I said as I passed by. I hoped he would respond. At least that would tell me he remembered me.

He glanced up quickly. Our eyes met, briefly.

“Hey Christine,” he said. That was it. I wasn’t entirely stupid; it was clear he was saying it merely to be polite. He didn’t want to talk with me. He wanted to talk with Carly.

But at least he remembered me, right?

Shelby was there, thank God for that. She was still on about the dance.

“...Shawn really can’t dance,” she noted mildly, “but that’s okay, you know? He’s got a sense of humour and that totally makes up for it...”

I grinned and nodded and tried to keep up. Shelby didn’t need to concern herself with my problems, my stupid, bizarre problems. I wished I could tell her. I wished I could tell someone, but there it was, rattling round my head. Besides, how would I phrase it? ‘I just found out Eric’s grandfather is the one kidnapping these girls?’ ‘This girl I know really wants me to help her take him down but won’t tell me why; you have any advice?’ Yeah, like that would go over well.

But how was I supposed to deal with it? I wanted to make things right; I wanted to figure out the hows and the whys of the whole thing. Who did I go to? Mr. Dessler? That could buy me a far worse suppression than before. Who knew what I would forget if that thing was turned on full-strength. Though I suppose if it was that strong, I wouldn’t remember having remembered, so it was a useless point.

But why was this going on? Why was why such a difficult question to answer? I wasn’t demanding much; I just wanted to know what I was getting into. They were comfortable enough talking about Erebe and divine-language and alien planets yet that was taboo? And yet they expected me to just smile and go along with it! Did they really think I was that stupid? I liked Eric, okay? I liked him, I thought of him as a friend, and I was really hurting that he was acting like that. There was something nice about admitting this, even if it was only to myself.

And what hurt me more was the idea that I’d try and hurt him just ‘cause his grandfather does something...well, illegal. I didn’t think – or wanted to think – that Serena would hurt him now that they knew the truth, but that was the thing, wasn’t it? I didn’t know what Serena wanted, or Ruth for that matter. I was getting angry just thinking about it – couldn’t they make up their minds? Either keep me ignorant or give me full disclosure. I should’ve said that to them on Saturday, but goddamn Ruth was good at brushing away stuff she didn’t want to talk about—

The bell rang. I jerked myself out of my mind, seeing pages of scrawled notes in front of me. Had it been that long?

“Hey Eric!” I said as I passed him on the way to the cafeteria. He had been standing at the pop machine, scrounging for a last quarter. The area was as quiet as that place usually got, there was no doubt he heard me. But he didn’t answer.

The day passed by in a daze; I was vaguely aware of Carly seeming very smug about something during Gym. But she was always smug about something or other and I didn’t want to know what this particular reason was. By the time the end of the day hit, I was practically inside my own head. I sat next to Thom on the bus; he looked pissed about this fact but I didn’t care.

“Can you move?” he said. “Emily’s over there; sit with her.”

“She’s saving that space for her boyfriend,” one of her friends said.

“Goddamn,” Thom muttered. “Then sit with her sister, okay? I don’t like sitting next to you on the bus.”

“Well suck it up,” I said. “Better yet, why don’t you sit with Claire?”

“No way,” he muttered, “She’s nuts ‘bout me.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

He grumbled and said nothing. I wanted to hit him for being a moody bastard, but I probably had no right to do that. I probably came off as moody too. I certainly felt it.

It was while we were walking home, kicking an empty pop can down the sidewalk – it clattered and scraped against the pavement, providing a nice white noise, did Thom speak again:

“Is there a reason you’ve turned into such a bitch lately?”

“What?”

He made an exaggerated expression; a clear sign he was pissed himself. “You heard me. You’ve been a real bitch, like, all of November. Is there a reason why, ‘cause I’m startin’ to get pissed off. Mum thinks you’re upset and then tries to get me to talk to her about shit I don’t wanna talk about.”

“I’m pissed off at stuff, okay?”

“No shit,” he said. “Is there a reason why?”

“I can’t tell you why. I can’t tell anyone why,” I said, scowling at the empty can on the ground. I have it an especially hard kick; it skidded across the pavement, far out of reach.

“How secret can it be?”

I laughed. It sounded bitter. “You have no idea.”

“No kidding,” he grumbled. “Can you stop being a bitch? You know, with the being pissed off at everyone?”

“Why the hell should you complain? We never talk.”

“You sulk round the house,” he grumbled, “It pisses me off lookin’ at you.”

“Then don’t look at me!”

“See, that’s what I mean about the being a bitch shit,” he said. “Before all this kidnapping shit went down you’dve ignored it, now you’re yelling at me.”

“You’re not exactly helping,” I grumbled.

It was still a little odd to come home to the house and have someone in it already; I had my key out to unlock it before Thom got there first and opened the door with ease. Right, Sylvia was still there. And Sylvia was just as observant as my mother, and ten times less tactful. Apparently Mama had ‘softened up’ since her marriage to Papa, according to Sylvia. What did she care?

As it was, Sylvia was doing laundry in the basement when we came home, and I took the opportunity to scurry off to my room. Normally I didn’t spend too much time there, but it felt nice now, to think uninterrupted. No worries about classes or other people, just myself. I flopped onto my bed, watching the ceiling fan rotate slowly above me. It wasn’t white like in Mr. Dessler’s little prison. It was a dark wood, and much bigger.

Hmph. I was still pissed about the whole situation. I didn’t work until the next evening though; should I confront them then? They seemed to be even worse than Mr. Dessler when it came to answering questions, and if he had memory-suppressing devices, what would they have? I didn’t want to even think about it. I didn’t even know how they worked. I sighed, watching the blades spin into a blur.

It was all so confusing, and the lack of a straight answer didn’t help in the slightest.

There were three sharp raps on the door. Lifting myself half-up off the soft bed, I saw Sylvia at the door (damn, I thought I’d shut it), holding a laundry basket. She did not look happy, and with her hair pulled back into a ponytail, she looked suspiciously like my mother.

Wordlessly she fished my clothes out of the basket, tossing them to me. They, naturally, landed in my lap, partially unfolded, and I had to refold them. Just as well. Sylvia folded clothes strangely.

Sylvia was also still at the door.

“Yeah?” I said to her. “Do you need something?”

“I wanted to know if you’d...like to talk,” she said.

“Not right now.”

“At dinner?”

I snorted. “Not then either. We’ll all get indigestion.”

“You can’t just keep running away from this.”

“From what?”

“You know exactly what I mean. The moping. The temper. The hiding something big from your own mother.”

“If you’re trying to guilt-trip me, Sylvia, it ain’t gonna work,” I said.

She snorted now. “When you were a girl all I’d have to do was mention our mother and you’d fold like a deck of cards.”

“I’m not a girl anymore,” I said pointedly.

“And up until a month ago you’d still fold like a deck of cards,” Sylvia said, just as pointedly. Damn. She’d gotten me there. “Now I don’t need to tell you that neither of us are dense, because I know you know that. And I don’t need to tell you we’re concerned either, because you know that too. I should tell you that your sheer stubbornness is starting to piss – me – off,” she said, overly enunciating.

“You know what? The situation is pissing me off too,” I said. “I can’t even say why – no, Sylvia, it’s not ‘cause I don’t know why; I know ‘nough. It’s just that I’m not allowed to say...”

Oh, good God.

It had hit me. Just then. Weren’t those, if not the exact wording, pretty damn close the words Serena had said? ‘I’m legally obligated not to say’ holds a bit more weight than ‘I’m not allowed’, but the feeling was the same.

Suddenly, I felt the tiniest amount of sympathy. Likely she wouldn’t want it – she seemed stubborn that way – but I could, to some degree, place myself in her shoes. They weren’t comfortable shoes either.

Though Serena didn’t have the excuse of not knowing the whole story. She knew. Ruth and Theophanes knew. They just weren’t telling me for whatever stupid reason.

“And who,” Sylvia said calmly, “asked you not to say anything?”

“Certain people who you’ve never met,” I said. Sylvia’s eyes narrowed. I had seen that look before, and not from her.

“Do these ‘certain people’ have names?”

“Of course they do,” I said. I didn’t say anything else.

“And?” Sylvia said, making a ‘keep talking’ gesture. “What are they?”

“Serena,” I said. I could get away with that much, at least.

“Is that that ginger friend of yours?” she said, seeming to – if anything – get worse. As if the idea of a friend forcing me to keep secrets for her was a bad, bad, bad thing.

“No, that’s Shelby,” I said, spelling it out for added emphasis. “Serena’s someone else.”

“And how do you know her?”

“I met her one day. Night. She was at the hospital.”

“Doing what?”

I could see the wheels spinning in her head; in her head, this Serena was in a hospital for any number of unfortunate things – prostitution, being beat up by thugs, a robbery gone awry—

“Working,” I said. “She works there.”

I could see the wheels stop spinning. Sylvia looked as annoyed as I was feeling. She wasn’t my mother, she was my sister. Half-sister if you wanted to be technical. What I was doing was none of her business – it was none of Mama’s business, either. There was a limit to things, and at seventeen I had certainly reached that limit. She trusted me before the kidnapping with all sorts of things – but now I was wrong in the head, not to be trusted?

“But why do you care, anyway? We barely talk as it is; when was the last time we saw each other? About a year ago? And that was after two years of not seeing you. You’re off in Australia ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the time. You have no idea what’s going on here—”

“That’s enough!” she snapped, with all the tenderness of a pissed-off drill sergeant. “Are you trying to get me angry? Because I don’t know if my kids ever told you – it’s not good to be around me when I’m angry.”

“People say the same thing ‘bout Mama and I’m still here,” I said. She wanted me to be angry? Fine. I was angry now.

Sylvia’s jaw clenched shut so tightly I was surprised she didn’t chip a tooth. She hadn’t yet reached the ‘vein throbbing in her forehead’ stage, but give it a few more minutes and she would. She was younger than my mother; her body could handle the stress of it much better.

She was still very much in control of her voice. But she didn’t intimidate me. Mama, sure; she could be intimidating. Sylvia? Never. “I honestly thought you were smarter than that. Between Mama’s health problems and you generally being the good one, you should know better than to purposefully provoke me. It’s childish, and I thought that was beyond you.

“God forbid I be concerned that you’re wrapped up in something illegal, after all,” she said. “I’m just your sister who still tries to keep in touch however I can.”

“I’ll have you know that whatever it is, it’s not illegal,” I bluffed. She likely wouldn’t believe me, but even if I had exaggerated and told her Serena was the Canadian liaison for a Colombian drug cartel she wouldn’t have believed that either. Neither would I, for that matter. Sylvia and I got into a staring match; her eyes were dark. When I was a child I had been convinced that her normally medium-brown eyes turned dark, dark brown, even black, when she was mad – like some sort of natural mood ring. I was half-convinced now that her eyes were a few shades darker, and it was not a pretty sight.

“I can see pushing you does no damn good,” she half-sighed, half-growled. “We don’t know what’s going on, but you know we’re only trying to help. It would be – nice – if you would open up.”

“I wish I could,” I said. I sounded like Serena. Sylvia uttered that same growled sigh and left me to flop back onto my bed, watching the spinning fan blades.

It didn’t stop there. Mama got home around half-past five, as was usual for her. She then went to her room to change, also usual. What was unusual was that, rather than going and helping Sylvia with dinner, she decided to drop in on me. I was trying to do History homework (What were the primary differentiations between Rome and Greece? Your answer must be at least five paragraphs long. I hated essay questions) but found it difficult. History reminded me too much of Eric. It was stupid. He wasn’t even talking to me anyway; he’d decided Carly was good company and if he was still on about that stupid, stupid—

“You busy?”

I jumped a little. Where had that come from? “Yeah. Doin’ homework.”

“Oh,” she said. “D’you have a minute?”

I glanced down at my sheet. Five paragraph essays were the easy kind – but easy or not, they were still essays, and I had a feeling I knew what she was going to talk about and if I wasn’t able to concentrate before I certainly wouldn’t after...

“Yeah, I guess,” I half-mumbled. She took the opportunity to step inside further, seating herself on the edge of my bed. This allowed us to be closer to eye level, or as close as we could get.

“Sylvia says”—

“I don’t care what Sylvia says.”

“You damn well should; she’s your sister.”

“That doesn’t mean anything. She’s never here—”

“—but she damn well tries to keep in touch and you know it. What’s the matter with you? You’ve been all upset these past few days and I can’t figure out why.”

“It’s nothing—”

“You’re not fooling anyone Chris, least of all me. It’s not ‘nothing’ if you’re moping about and snapping at everyone. Now what is it?”

I dimly wondered what would happen if I did say anything. Serena would yell, of course; possibly Ruth as well. But I’d been yelled at by Serena before. And I’d stood down Ruth being mad before, too. And if she found out about Mr. Dessler? Well, Mama was a generally law-abiding person; she couldn’t do anything about it, really, besides inform the police, and I had a feeling Mr. Dessler had plans just in case that happened.

That was assuming she even believed me. Likely she wouldn’t; likely she’d tell me that I didn’t have to make up fairy tales and just tell her what was really going on. And that somehow would be even worse.

“A situation. A very complicated situation.”

“How complicated is ‘complicated’?”

“Very,” I assured her, “Even I don’t know all of it.”

“And what do you know?”

I paused. I wouldn’t have been mad if Serena had decided to at least give me a why before asking my help, but she hadn’t, and I was rather mad...

I told her. As much as I could, from the initial kidnapping and how my captor (for I didn’t tell her who he was) informed me about the Nisekem and dead royals and the phasers and the memory-altering device. I told her about how I’d stumbled about the city, not knowing where I was until I came across the store. I told her about gradually regaining my memory, in chunks here and there, and the book and Ruth and Theophanes realising what had happened and everything they’d told me—

Mama looked confused, to put it mildly. Bewildered would probably be a better word; she was sitting there, blinking as if she hoped to wake up from a disturbing dream. There was a long silence between us, while Sylvia bustled about the kitchen. I waited. Hopefully she would tell me her reaction rather than just sit there in a daze.

Finally, she spoke.

“I...” she broke off, shaking her head like that would finally make her wake up. “I think...maybe...you should see someone about this.”

I shouldn’t have been surprised. After all, hadn’t I thought it really stupid when I first heard it? But I couldn’t help but feel insulted: she had repeatedly asked for answers and I had given them to her. I crossed my arms. “I’m not insane.”

“Did I say that?” she said, her usual briskness coming back. “No, you’re not insane; you’re just stressed out. Everyone gets that way. Sometimes talking to someone can help.”

“Like who?”

“Like the police, for a start,” she said, “I’m sure they’d like to know more about where you were.”

“I’m sure they would.”

“Dinner!” Sylvia called to the back of the house. Mama stood, and I followed. Dinner would be nice. Hopefully feeling my taste buds being seared would be a nice distraction from everyone thinking I was crazy.

When I slept that night, I had strange dreams. Dreams of temples and sacrifices and light. Lots of light.

Neither Sylvia nor my mother were awake as Thom and I got ready for school, and neither of them were awake when we left, locking the door behind us. Thom was dead silent on the way to school, which was more than a little irritating. Even small talk would have been nice, anything to get away from the sound of the wind whistling through the trees. But he was silent, probably still thinking that I was being a bitch, and probably didn’t want to provoke me. Idiot.

He only looked half-asleep, and I wondered how he could be. It was December, the wind was cold. I felt it sting against my cheeks, and it was a relief when I stumbled onto the crowded, noisy bus – at least that was warmer than outside.

Posters for the turkey dinner and talent show on the last day of classes were being put up as I stepped inside, bright orange and pink and yellow, all designed to catch our attention. It worked. People were crowding around them even as they were being put up. This would mean that the halls would be just a little bit emptier, so I took the advantage.

Shelby was just arriving there as I got there, opening the door with a creak.

“Hey Shelby,” I said, pulling my hands deep into the sleeve of my sweater. It kept them warm, at least.

“Hey Chris,” she said. “Damn cold outside. I’m bringing my coat to History.”

“No kidding. You’re usually here a little earlier than this.”

“Oh, I got a ride from Shawn today. He left later than the bus did.”

“Cool,” I said, shoving my backpack into the locket. “Must’ve been nice.”

“Not really, his car’s a piece of junk,” she said with a grin.

“It’s better than the bus,” I said. “Roomier, too.”

“Yeah, at least I didn’t have to freeze my ass off waiting outside...”

O’Reilly was already in the classroom when I stepped in, her blonde hair done up in a long braid which looked rather unflattering. This was unusual, as she usually waited until the bell practically rang to step into the room and lock the door behind her. But she was wearing a thick, high-necked turtleneck, so maybe she was as cold as everyone else was. Whatever the reason, the classroom was still fairly empty at this point, and she was taking the time to flip through a large book, her face pulled into a very displeased expression.

She was muttering to herself, and I froze, halfway between her and my desk. Was that sing-song language she was muttering? Straining to hear over everyone else talking, I tried to listen more carefully.

“...doesn’t make any sense,” I caught for certain, “Can’t teach that until after...”

I relaxed, heading back to my spot before anyone else noticed. She wasn’t speaking sing-song, she was just muttering to herself. Was I becoming paranoid now? I hoped not. It was bad enough my mental to-do list included confronting Ruth about this whole thing, possibly Serena if she was there; I didn’t want to pry too much into O’Reilly’s life as well. I didn’t really want to pry much into her life at all; she always struck me as the lonely, embittered middle-aged spinster-type, the kind who you shouldn’t upset because it wouldn’t be pretty. I wasn’t alone in this thought either.

And O’Reilly herself didn’t help a bit either. Marching over to the door and locking it with a click as the bell rang, she then marched right back to her desk and stood, perfectly straight, and glared at us from beneath her glasses. I felt myself slouching down into my seat, trying to avoid catching her eyes. Obviously she was in a mood, and it was never a good idea to attract her attention when she was like that. It almost always resulted in pop quizzes or something like that.

“Good morning,” she said, not sounding like hers was a good morning at all, “Before we begin, a prayer for that poor girl gone missing. From what I’ve heard, apparently the situation has escalated to the point where the Sūreté of Quebec have become involved.”

She was rewarded with blank stares.

“They’re the Quebec equivalent to the Ontario Provincial Police,” she said; there were more blank stares. “The girl was from Quebec,” she said, in such a way that suggested she had more to say. Probably along the lines of ‘you morons’, as I couldn’t see her saying anything stronger than that.

We mumbled through an ‘Our Father’ was all the blandness and boredom of any school prayer. And when we were done, she continued to glare at us as if we’d done something horribly wrong.

“I’m in the middle of marking your essays and I must say, generally speaking, I expected much more from you than this. You cannot say my lectures are vague, and your textbook isn’t either, and you have access to the notes I put online...”

She droned on and on and I found myself starting to tune her out as usual. Normally this would be a good thing, in the sense that it made the class seem to go that much faster – but today it was a bad thing. My mind wandered. I thought about various things – my mother, Ruth, Serena, Eric – all of them had different views, and all of those views were – awful. Horrible, whatever you wanted to call it. Serena especially; she was still angering me. Still! And I just wanted the answer to why? What that really so hard? She didn’t seriously expect me to help her without knowing why I was doing it, did she? How arrogant. As if I would have just said ‘oh sure, when do I start?’

And Mama – well, Mama was a tricky case, I tried to reason with myself. She was just going through the initial denial that I had – but instead of believing it from experience, or because I was locked in the basement of a man who did sincerely believe it, she had no such options, so of course she would reject it. It was natural, perfectly natural. But it still stung.

The bell rang. I jerked myself out of my haze and went to make the mad dash to my locker.

It was, if possible, even colder outside than in the morning, and even though I wrapped my thick camouflage-print jacket closer around myself, pressing my binder to my chest, I still didn’t feel any warmer. Even with the sun shining.

Eric and Carly were already there, and the only reason I noticed was because they had a tendency to sit near the door – probably so they could get out quicker when class was done. At least I assumed that was her excuse. Carly was smirking and looking superior about something. I didn’t really care what. What mattered more was Shelby, looking very concerned as I approached.

“Hey,” I said, tossing my binder on the desk and sliding into the seat, “You okay? You look upset.”

She looked shocked now, although she tried to hide it.

“Did you hear?” she said, weakly, looking for all the world that she wished someone, anyone else had to be the one to break the news rather than her.

“Hear what?”

She made a face as she said it; it looked rather like she’d been forced to swallow a lemon. “Carly...just happened to mention – very loudly, too – just before you came in, that she and Eric were...dating. Like...officially. For real.”

“So what were they before?”

“If the rumours are true, friends...with benefits,” Shelby admitted, still looking sour. “I don’t really believe it myself,” she added, rather hastily.

“Oh,” I said. Shelby looked even more sympathetic. I tried to focus on something else: “What rumours?”

“Oh, that’s right, you don’t pay as close attention to them as I do...” she mumbled, “They started a little after the Halloween dance, but I didn’t want to say anything. You seemed like you had a chance, and you really seemed to like him. Then, just after the semi last week...well, I guess those rumours aren’t rumours anymore.”

“Oh,” I said again. I still tried to think of other things, as there were things I didn’t want to think about. What would his grandparents think? From what I could tell they didn’t like her very much; was he doing it to purposefully irritate them? ...would this give Carly immunity to being kidnapped? I wanted to think ‘no’, as hadn’t Eric said they’d warmed up to me? And I had still been taken, although that was because Carmen had been scratching at the walls; did this Julie girl scratch at the walls too?

“I’m so sorry,” Shelby said. “You’ve got work tonight, but tomorrow you come over to my place after school. We can have brownies and ice cream and whatever you want.”

She was saying this with the air of someone comforting a friend after a break-up. I was being stupid now. We hadn’t been dating; we were just friends. Not friends with benefits, and I wouldn’t want it that way. No stability.

“No, that’s okay,” I said. “Really.”

“I insist,” she said, her words being partly drowned out by the bell ringing and Rourke stepping inside, wrapped up in a coat as well.

The class went by in a whirl of names and dates and events. Even when we were given time to work on the assigned questions did it seem to pass by quickly.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Shelby growled. I thought she was talking about the questions, glancing down at them to see what was the problem. They didn’t look difficult at all; they were just the same things we’d read about in the book—

“Hey Christine,” Eric said quietly. Oh. That was it.

I glanced up slowly. He was standing by the desk, the sleeves of his shirt-and-sweater combo rolled up, the chain of his tag wrapped around his index finger. Carly was not with him.

“Hey Eric,” I said warily.

“What d’you want?” Shelby snapped, using the tone of voice normally reserved exclusively for Carly.

Automatically, his finger twisted itself around the chain a second time, tightening the grip on the first loop; his finger was white where the chain dug in, and his fingertip was slowly turning a purplish shade.

“I need to talk to you at lunch,” he said, sounding just as wary. “Alone?”

Crap. “Yeah, sure,” I heard myself say. “Meet you by the vending machines?”

“Yeah. Maybe around quarter-to noon.”

“Yeah, okay. See you there?”

“Yeah.”

Shelby was giving him a glare that would have made the most stonehearted person squirm. He ignored it as he left, taking back his usual spot.

“Calm down would you?” I said to Shelby. “He didn’t do anything to you.”

“He hurt you,” she said simply.

“And why would I be hurt? We were never dating,” I said, turning back to my work. Shelby had nothing more to say about the matter – or maybe she decided to simply keep quiet, but we finished the rest of the period in silence. And even as we headed outside, the cold wind stinging my face again, we were still silent.

It was only as I tossed my trash into the can, the Styrofoam squeaking as it rubbed up against the rim, did she say anything substantial: “Good luck. You come back and tell me what he says?”

“Yeah, sure,” I said. I would probably have to lie my way out of that one.

Eric was where we agreed to meet, compulsively fiddling with that chain. He had, by the looks of his collar, also fiddled about with that as well. Or maybe Carly had; who knew? He didn’t glance up as I approached. Reaching up, I tapped him lightly on the shoulder, or as close to it as I could get. I didn’t want to startle him – he jumped. Oops.

“Sorry,” I said. “Didn’t mean to.”

“S’okay,” he said. “Can we head somewhere a little more...private?”

‘Private’ turned out to be a hallway in one of the side corridors, in a small room between the actual hallway and the outside. The area was deserted. Eric leaned up against the far wall; I stood where I was, near the middle. I could hear the chain gently clinking about as he twisted it, and that was the only sound I heard.

“So...what did you need to talk ‘bout?” I finally said, after what felt like an eternity of silence.

“The whole...kidnapping...thing.”

I could feel my heart sink. This wasn’t going to end well, was it?

“What about it?”

There was another long pause. Far away, in the main part of the school, I could hear people walking around, talking. They probably were talking about much happier things than I was.

“About Pop. My grandfather,” he added, as if I didn’t know who he was talking about. “What you said last week.”

“What happened?”

“I called him during lunch, and he tried to say I was just upset still over the whole thing and to not worry about it,” he said, “and even then I thought ‘she’s still upset, she doesn’t know what she’s saying’. But when I got home he seemed really tense ‘bout something. We had a bit of an argument. I faked sick on Thursday. We didn’t talk much about it but he was pretty upset about something. After dinner Pop wanted me to help with his computer – it’d locked up or something and he thought I might know how to fix it. So I was down there, trying to get it to unfreeze, when I heard a – scratching – at the back wall.”

“And?”

“And I remembered what you’d said and it was like, how could I have forgotten something like that? That big, you know? Came crashing back in a minute.”

“Trust me,” I said, “I know.”

“And Pop says ‘what’s th’matter with you, boy?’ like he doesn’t know what’s going on. And I say ‘holy shit. There’s someone in the back there.’ And Pop, Pop just pretends like I don’t know what I’m talking ‘bout, and I said it again, I said you said the same thing, and he just looks at me funny. ‘She remembers?’ he said. And I said ‘yeah, ‘parently she does.’ And he looked all upset.”

“And then...?”

“And then we argued some more. And it all came out,” he said, his face looking stern, distant. His jaw seemed to have locked up. He was no longer fiddling with the chain, his finger frozen in position with the chain looped around it.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I didn’t really know what else I could say. “I know – okay, I dunno how much it hurts. But I’m sorry. I was tired of seeing you beat yourself up over something I know you didn’t do and wanted to help.”

“But knowing my grandpa did it makes it okay?”

“No,” I said. “It doesn’t.”

“Damn right it doesn’t,” he said, his voice dropping into a growl. I stepped back, instinctively.

“What did you want me to do? Leave you to beat yourself up?”

“I’d rather – I’d rather have had that than this!” he said, his voice echoing in the small room. “I – I love him, okay? He’s the closest thing to a father I’ve ever had and now I find out he’s the bastard doing all this? Do you have any idea what that feels like?”

“No—”

“No, that’s right, you don’t,” he said. He wasn’t moving from his spot by the wall, frozen as if he’d been turned to stone. “You don’t understand at all.”

“I just wanted to help.”

“You said that already,” he said. “I get that. But I’dve been much happier not knowing. Pop said the same thing.”

“You’re not angry he messed ‘round with your memories? You’re not mad that he’s the reason you beat yourself up over nothing?”

“How can I be?”

“He might be your grandfather but that doesn’t excuse him,” I said, my voice going a touch shriller. “When I figured it out I was shocked that he’d even do that to his own family.”

“Yeah, I’m mad,” he said, “I’m very mad! At him, at myself...”

“At me?”

There was a long silence. “Yes. A little bit. I wished you hadn’t told me.”

“Too damn bad,” I said, feeling my own temper flare up now, “I wanted to help. I wanted to protect you from him, from him preying on your own ignorance – from the people looking for him. D’you have any idea how goddamned persistent they are? They say ‘oh, you know him – help me find him so I can bring him to justice’ or shit like that. And every single time they’ve asked I’ve said no. I don’t know why I said no, I don’t know why I’m so opposed when my mind’s telling me I should be going to the police – but I do.”

His face had gone a shade whiter. “Who’s looking for him?”

“People. People he might know. I dunno how much he’s told you. But they’re looking for him like nothing else.”

Eric swore. “He didn’t say that. He just said pretend as if nothing was wrong. And I said ‘how can I pretend?’ – all he said was ‘you don’t give yourself ‘nough credit’.”

“And you’re okay with this?”

“No, I’m not okay!” Eric exploded, “How can I be? My own father—grandfather – is the man behind all this, he’s telling me to act like nothing’s wrong – I want to hate him. I want to hate him so badly for doing all the stuff he taught me was wrong. I want to hate him for hurting you, for hurting all those other girls, messing with their minds – messing with my head – but I can’t. This is the man who’s raised me since I was five and who’s pretty much the only family I have left.”

He paused, to try and recompose himself, his finger looping itself around the chain again and again until the chain was pulled taut, unable to be twisted any longer. His finger was turning purple again.

“I can’t hate him,” he repeated, “I want to. But I can’t. And I just wanted to say to you – I know, now. He knows that you know, and the situation is so messed up – I don’t think we should talk to each other. Your help wasn’t very helpful.”

A dam burst. “Goddamn it, I’m trying! Do you have any idea how badly I want to talk to someone – anyone? I dunno what he’s told you, I dunno if it’s different from what he told me, but there’s so much going on that I can’t tell anyone about and I hoped if your memory came back we’d have something in common – it wouldn’t be so bad with someone else there that had to cope, it wasn’t just me lost in the middle of something I can’t even begin to understand—”

“You thought wrong!” he snapped. “I don’t want to deal with this, I don’t want to cope, and I don’t want to get involved any further than I already am. I’m – I’m sorry you’re going through a lot of shit, guess what? I am too! It’s not just about you and your problems – I’ve got them too! It’d have been nice if you’d thought of that just a little bit before you decided to try and help—”

“You were gonna find out eventually! They’re hounding me, trying to get me to introduce your grandfather to them – I dunno why; they already know where you live – and I’ve said no, but one day they’re gonna get tired of me saying no and just find you on their own and tell you. Would it be better coming from them? Would it?”

“Yeah!” he said. “It would’ve! At least that way I – I dunno, at least that way would’ve been less painful! I can disbelieve something if a total stranger tells me; if someone I know, someone I li—respected told me, it’s much harder to shake off!”

“Well I’m sorry,” I snapped. “I thought it would have been kinder to hear it from someone you knew rather than total strangers.”

“I can think for myself,” he said, “and I think you’re messing ‘round in things that aren’t any of your business. I just wanted to let you know that. I think, whatever friendship we had – we should just shelve it. It’s bad enough dealing with our own problems, we don’t need to get involved in each others too. I’m not as mad as I seem, it’s just a whole lot of shit to deal with.”

“I know it is! But you’re being ridiculous!”

“You’ve said that before,” he said, struggling to remain calm, “Nice to know you think I’m ridiculous.”

“You are, a little bit. You’re too hard on yourself.”

“And you need to realise you can’t fix everything no matter how hard you want to. You’re just making it worse. I don’t think there’s anything else I can say to you. Now, if you’ll excuse me,” he said, finally moving for the door; I stood, numb, in my spot, “I promised Carly I’d meet her somewhere. Please – don’t start crying. It won’t help.”

As he left, the sounds of the outside coming back briefly as the door opened, I stood there, rooted into position. Is that what he thought? After everything I’d tried to do for him, after everything I tried to protect him from even though I shouldn’t have, after everything I...I...

I felt my legs moving, walking through the halls in a daze, the world blurring into an incomprehensible mess of colours.

No, I thought. This had to be some sort of childish revenge. I couldn’t – I didn’t like him – this had nothing to do with that, this had everything to do with his grandfather being a manipulative son of a bitch. He was upset. I was upset, and it was bad enough I had to deal with my mother and Sylvia and Serena and Ruth and—

The washroom smelled clean. Antiseptic. It must’ve been cleaned recently. It was a large one, and I felt myself walking down the tiled floor to a stall at the end, the beige door open slightly. I slipped in, feeling the warm tears sliding down my cheeks already – goddamn it, why did I cry so easily? That was the reason no one really gave a damn what I thought; I was just the stupid little weak-willed girl—

Not really knowing why, or caring, I slid the little metal lock shut, sat myself down on the edge of the toilet, and began to cry.