Repeat(2)

I shake my head.

“Call Doctor Patel’s office if you have any problems, okay?”

“Yes.”

“Keep in touch, kid. Let me know how things go.”

“Okay.”

Mike disappears.

“Did you want to bring the flowers?” asks my sister.

I shake my head. This is it. Time to go. Frances just stands by the door, waiting.

My first memory is of waking up in this hospital, but really, I was born late at night on an inner-city street. A couple found me unconscious and bleeding on the sidewalk. No identification. Handbag and wallet missing. And the weapon, a blood-splattered empty bottle of scotch, lay abandoned nearby. Walter, half of the pair who found me, gets teary every time he describes that night. But Jack, his partner, did two tours in ’Nam and has seen far worse. They’re the first ones who brought me flowers. Not that I got many. My friends are few.

Previous me had, apparently, gone out to dinner alone. Her last meal consisted of cheese and spinach ravioli in a pumpkin sauce with a bottle of Peroni. (Detective Chen said it’s a yeasty Italian beer that goes well with pasta. It sounds nice. I might try it sometime.) From there, security cameras have her withdrawing a hundred and fifty dollars before walking off into the night. There were no cameras on the quiet side street where she’d parked the car. No one around apart from the attacker.

That’s how Clementine Johns died.

Out in the hallway, there’s a mix of patients, visitors, and medical staff. Same as always for midmorning. I wipe my sweaty palms on the sides of my pants. It’s nice to be wearing actual clothes. Black sandals, blue jeans, and a white T-shirt. Nothing too exciting; nothing that would make me stand out. I want to blend in, watch and learn. Because if we’re the sum of our experiences, then I’m nothing and no one.

Frances watches me out of the corner of her eye, but doesn’t say anything. Something she does a lot. I’d say her silence makes me paranoid, but I’m already paranoid.

“Sure you’re all right?” she asks while we wait for the elevator.

“Yes.”

The elevator arrives and we step inside. When it starts to move, my nervous stomach swoops and drops. Through the crowded lobby we go, then out into the sunshine. Blue summer sky, a couple of green trees, and lots of gray concrete. Nearby traffic, people, and lots of movement. A light breeze ruffles my hair.

The lights on a nearby white sedan flash once and Frances opens the trunk for me to deposit my small suitcase. Anxiety turns into excitement, and I can’t keep the smile off my face. I’ve seen them on TV, but I’ve never actually been in a car since that night.




Now . . .




“Amnesia,” he mutters for about the hundredth time. Usually, ‘fuck’, ‘shit’, or some blasphemy follows that statement. This time, however, there’s nothing. Maybe he’s finally getting used to the idea.

I sit on the opposite side of the booth, inspecting the cocktail menu. It’s as gross and sticky as the table.

“Can I get you guys something else?” asks the waiter with a practiced smile.

“I’ll have a pi?a colada.”

“You hate coconut,” Ed Larsen informs me, slumped back in his seat.

“Oh.”

“Try a margarita.”

“What he said,” I tell the waiter, who presumably thinks we have some kinky dom-sub thing going on.

Ed orders another lite beer, watching me the entire time. I don’t know if his blatant examination is better or worse than my sister’s furtive looks. He’d suggested going back to his place to talk. I declined. I don’t know the guy, and it didn’t feel safe. So instead we came here. The bar is dark and mostly empty, given it’s the middle of the afternoon, but at least it’s public.

“How old are you?” I ask.

In response, he pulls his wallet out of his back pocket and passes me his driver’s license.

“Thank you.” Information is good. More definites. “You’re seven years older than me.”

“Yeah.”

“How serious were we? Did we stay together for long?”

He licks his lips, turns away. “Don’t you have someone else you can ask about all this? Your sister?”

I just look at him.

He frowns, but then sighs. “We saw each other for about half a year before moving in together. That lasted eight months.”

“Pretty serious.”

“If you say so.” His face isn’t happy. But I need to know.

“Did I cheat on you?”

Now the frown comes with a glare.

Despite his don’t-fuck-with-me vibes, it’s hard not to smile. The man is blessed in the DNA department. He’s so pretty. Masculine pretty. I’m not used to being attracted to people, and he’s giving me a heart-beating-harder, tingles-in-the-pants kind of sensation, which is a lot new and a little overwhelming. Makes me want to giggle and flip my hair at him like some vapid idiot.

But I don’t. “It’s just that I’m getting some distinct vibes that somehow I’m the bad guy in all this.”

“No, you didn’t cheat on me,” he growls. “And I didn’t cheat on you either, no matter what you might have thought.”

My brows jump. “Huh. So that’s why we broke up?”