Undiscovered (Unremembered #1.5)(9)
“I’m no one,” I said as I stood up. I walked slowly toward the wall, preparing to climb it, preparing to spend the rest of my life with an empty hole in my chest.
And then she spoke again.
“Don’t go.”
I turned and sucked in a breath. The mere vision of her was haunting and soothing and melodic and torrential.
“It’s not safe out there,” she told me.
It’s not safe in here, I wanted to argue.
“I live out there,” I told her instead. “I can assure you it’s safe.”
She shook her head decisively. “It’s not safe out there.”
The blank repetition of her statement made me shiver.
I dug my fingernails into my palms. “Who told you that?”
But my voice was too forceful. My teeth too clenched. I regretted my frustration the instant I saw her recoil.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, taking a deep breath. “I’m just trying to understand what’s going on here.”
“I live here.”
I sighed. “Yes. You live here. But do you ever leave here?”
She nodded. “My father takes me outside the walls. But I have to go with him. Otherwise it’s not safe.”
I fought to keep control of my voice, my breathing. It wasn’t her that was aggravating me. It was whoever had been doing this to her. Whoever had been confiscating everything she knew, rummaging around in her brain for loose thoughts like one rummages around a messy drawer.
“Where does your father take you?” I asked.
“Today he took me to the beach.”
Ice formed in my veins. “The beach.”
Her face flashed nostalgic. “Yes. We went this morning.”
“It’s impossible.” I murmured it so softly, I didn’t think anyone could hear. But she did. She heard everything.
“Why is it impossible?”
“There are no beaches around here. We live in the middle of the desert.”
“You’re not correct,” she argued. “I went there. With my friends. We played in the ocean.”
My eyes closed. My heart slowed. My anger became very clear and focused.
That’s when I knew that I couldn’t walk away. That I would never be able to walk away.
Something bad was happening here. Worse than I’d imagined. Not only were they taking memories out, they were also clearly putting memories in.
And there was only one reason to do that.
The very reason the Memory Coders have a job in the first place.
To hide things.
“Why did you say you were here yesterday?” she asked, crashing into my thoughts.
“Because I was.”
She tilted her head, her recollection of the previous day obviously failing to match my account of it.
“I don’t remember that.”
I nodded. “That’s because someone made you unremember.”
This still didn’t compute. “Why?”
“I don’t know. I want to know. I will keep coming back here until I know.”
“Is that why you’re here now?”
A faint smile worked its way across my lips. “I’m here now because you asked me to come.” I dug out the tube from my pocket. “And because I wanted to bring you these.”
Her eyes zeroed in on the four dandelions contained inside, suspended in air, like a moment trapped in time. She took a step forward, then another. I kept my hand as steady as I could, but everything started to tremble as she came closer.
She reached out and took the tube from me, holding it up to eye level.
“What are they?”
“Dandelions,” I said, feeling an overwhelming sadness to be having this same conversation all over again.
“I’ve never seen them before.”
I almost had to laugh. I almost had to argue. But instead I just said, “I know.”
Through the clear glass of the tube, I saw her mouth curve into a beatific smile. “I think they’re beautiful.”
I waited for her to look at me, for her to lower the tube and for her eyes to meet mine. And then I repeated my answer. “I know.”
7: Protection
For the next few weeks, everything in my life faded into background noise. Like someone had painted a blurry halo around my life, and Seraphina was in the center. The only thing in focus.
I was determined to answer the questions that were crowding into my head on a daily basis, fighting for priority.
Who is she?
Why are they hiding her?
Why are they erasing her memories of me?
But each time I felt as though I was getting closer to an answer, a hundred more questions would pile on top of the others. I was drowning in my own inquisition. In my own need to know her and know about her.
Seraphina wasn’t any help. Her vocabulary and knowledge of the world were too limited. I quickly determined they were hand-selecting what she knew. What she remembered. What made sense to her.
And almost every time I went to see her, I had to start over.
I had to regain her trust.
I fell in love with her a little bit more each day. And yet, nearly every time I climbed over that wall, she didn’t know my name.
But I kept going. I kept introducing myself. I kept telling her the same stories over and over again. Teaching her the same words, answering the same questions, giving the same explanations.