Unremembered (Unremembered #1)(19)

Mounted on the counter is the same kind of card-reading device that I saw at the supermarket yesterday. I point to it. ‘Why don’t you just use that?’ I ask, trying to be helpful.

But once again, I’ve said the wrong thing. Cody groans as he hands the man two bills. ‘Because my parents won’t get me a credit card. No matter how many times I ask. But thanks for reminding me.’

‘Credit card,’ I repeat, dissecting the words. ‘Credit: commendation or honour given for some action. Card: a rectangular piece of stiff paper.’

The man behind the glass gives me an odd look as he hands Cody our tickets. Cody flashes him a hurried smile. ‘She’s from –’ he grabs my arm and leads me away from the ticket counter as he mumbles – ‘somewhere else. You’re like a small child,’ he tells me sharply. ‘You really don’t know anything.’

The comment stings the back of my throat. I have to swallow before speaking. ‘I suppose I did at one point.’

Cody shakes his head. ‘A credit card is a plastic card that you use instead of cash. It keeps track of what you purchase and then, at the end of every month, you pay the total. I swear I feel like I’m in a bad sci-fi movie. Are you sure you’re not from outer space?’

‘I don’t think so.’

He laughs. ‘Well, it would certainly explain a lot. Wouldn’t it?’

‘How so?’

Cody rubs one of his bushy yellow eyebrows with his finger. ‘Never mind. Look, I’m going to use the bathroom. Wait here until I get back and don’t go anywhere, OK?’

I nod. ‘OK.’

He points to an orange plastic chair behind me. ‘Sit there.’

I do.

‘Don’t move.’

I watch him disappear behind a door marked MEN, and I peer around the room, counting the number of people (eleven) and the number of seats like the one I’m sitting in (forty-eight).

A young brown-haired woman in a blue dress approaches and asks me if I know when the bus to San Francisco stops here.

‘Five forty-five,’ I tell her.

She seems to be pleasantly surprised by my response. ‘Are you going there too?’

‘No. I’m going to Los Angeles. But I read the bus schedule.’

‘Do you live there?’ she asks.

‘Maybe,’ I say, and then upon seeing her confused expression and not wanting to attract any unnecessary attention to myself, I quickly add, ‘My family lives there.’

It’s only the second time I’ve lied. The first was when I told Heather that the boy in the supermarket parking lot merely recognized me from the news. I’m starting to understand the purpose of lying. It’s a protection mechanism.

‘How nice,’ the woman says. ‘Are you from Portugal or Brazil?’

I’m confused by the question, unsure of why she would assume these are the only two options. Do I look like I’m from Portugal? Or Brazil? And if so, why has no one else remarked on that before?

‘I don’t really understand,’ I begin. I want to ask her why she’s made this seemingly arbitrary assumption, hoping it might reveal some clue to my identity, but I’m not given the chance. I feel an urgent tug at my arm. Cody pulls me out of the seat and leads me to the other side of the station.

‘OK,’ he says, his voice serious. ‘First of all, don’t talk to random people in bus stations. It’s sketchy. Especially given your . . . well, celebrity status.’

‘She asked me about the bus to San Francisco.’

‘And secondly,’ he continues, ignoring me, ‘and probably more important, um, hello? You speak Portuguese?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘How could you not know? I heard you back there.’

‘Heard me what?’

‘Speaking Portuguese,’ he clarifies, sounding exasperated. ‘To that woman.’

I glance over his shoulder at the young woman in the blue dress. She’s taken the seat I just vacated. I think back to our conversation, suddenly hearing it differently in my memory.

‘Você sabe quando o ?nibus para S?o Francisco chega?’

‘Cinco e quarenta e cinco.’

‘I speak Portuguese?’ I repeat Cody’s question.

‘It would appear so.’

I reflect on what this means. Where I might have learned it. Perhaps I lived there once. Or perhaps I really am from Portugal or Brazil, just as the woman speculated. Is that why no one has come for me? Because they live in another country?

‘When I was little I had a nanny from Portugal,’ Cody says. ‘She used to watch Portuguese soaps all the time.’

‘Do you think that might be where I’m from?’ I ask.

Cody shrugs. ‘I guess it’s possible. But you don’t speak English with an accent so I don’t know.’

I don’t know either. I index this incident away in my mental file, adding it to the slow-growing list of clues I’ve collected. The only problem is, so far the clues don’t exactly fit together in any coherent way.

What does Portuguese have to do with the locket? Or with this tattoo on my wrist? Or with the boy who claims to know me?

‘I’m learning all sorts of interesting stuff about you,’ Cody says, that peculiar distortion suddenly back in his tone.