The Elizas: A Novel(56)

“Nothing happened to me, exactly,” I say. “Except that I had a panic attack and lost consciousness. And then the police came, and they drove me home.” You know. Totally normal day.

“How intriguing that the assailant deleted the file,” Desmond muses. “It has to be someone who knows something, right? Someone who doesn’t want you to figure out who Leonidas was speaking with.”

I nod—this is what I’ve deduced, too.

Desmond places his hands on his hips. “You know, you can subpoena phone records. We should explain this to the police.”

I make a face. “On what grounds? It’s not like I have much proof besides eavesdropping on Leonidas’s conversation.”

“Hmm.” Desmond looks chagrined. “We should try and get proof.”

I nod, though I have no idea how we could do this. “I’m pretty sure a number I know was on that call list. I’ve tried all weekend to remember, but I can’t.” I sigh. “Even better, I wish I could just remember who I was talking to that night in Palm Springs. And maybe even who pushed me into the pool.”

Desmond paces the room, then suddenly snaps his fingers. “I have an idea.”

I suck in my stomach. There’s something propositional about his voice. “What?”

“I’ve been reading up on how to unlock memories. Sometimes, the key is to go back to the scene of where you lost them. They can return just by smelling the same smells or hearing the same sounds. We should go back to the Tranquility.”

“What, today?”

“I have the day off.” His gaze goes to my bruise again. “Unless you’re feeling too infirm.”

I run my tongue over my teeth, and all at once they feel smooth and clean. It’s not like I have anything else to do today besides panic. The Tranquility looms in my mind like a book I don’t want to open because I’m not sure I want to know how it ends, but maybe Desmond is right. Maybe everything will slot into place if we go.

“Okay,” I say. At the very least, it would be an opportunity to retrieve my car from the resort’s garage. I’d thought my family was going to chariot it back for me, but as far as I know, it’s still there.

Once again in the Batmobile, Desmond plays a favorite song from a CD complication in his disc player: something heavy with mandolins. I play one next: Sleater-Kinney. I watch his expression, suddenly curious of what he thinks. “Interesting,” he says, and finds another song on his CD. A lute, some mewling. I keep my expression neutral, but I notice him watching me in the same way I was watching him. I burst out laughing.

NPR, sports radio, Spanish for a few minutes, even though neither of us really knows the language. We follow an old VW Beetle, a pink stretch limo with Happy Chicks painted on the side, a bright blue bus of old people. Desmond waves to the old people, and many of them wave back. Toward the back of the bus, a younger, shadowed face appears, and I flinch. I’m looking at an image of myself.

“Are you all right?” Desmond asks, because I must have made some sort of noise.

The bus lags a little behind us. The angle of the sunlight changes, and the face in the window is gone. There is sweat spilling down my neck into my underwear. I chew viciously on a fingernail. “I just thought I saw something. Someone.”

“Who?”

I press my hand hard against my knee. Me, I want to say, but I know that’s impossible. Out loud: “I don’t know. But it was someone who looked like they knew me, maybe.”

By the time we pull up to the Tranquility’s sweeping front drive, I am feeling sweaty and starving and maybe like this isn’t a very good idea. I still don’t really know Desmond. Who’s to say he isn’t dangerous? Should I have alerted Bill and my mother? They’d seemed so offended that I’d disappeared to Palm Springs the last time without telling them.

We stop the car, and a valet immediately appears to relieve us.

“Good afternoon,” Desmond says dramatically, using a fake, Dracula accent. He tosses the valet his keys, and I notice he has a wimpy throw. I bet he was picked last for teams in junior high gym.

“Sweet ride,” the valet says, handing us a ticket. “You two staying with us?”

Desmond glances at me with one eyebrow raised. “Shall we? Perhaps a suite par deux?”

My smile wobbles, but I’m still feeling so out of it, so I snap, “Of course not. And I think your French is wrong.”

He walks inside, and I reluctantly follow. Desmond tries to take my arm and I let him for a few seconds before dropping it. Halfway across the floor, the smell of tequila wafts into my nose, and I swoon. All at once, pieces of memories that I don’t know what to do with rush my brain. I see myself, younger, sitting on a barstool, laughing at someone. Me and a person, lounging on a couch together. Leonidas?

Desmond touches my arm. “Is it happening?” he asks, excitedly. “Are you remembering?”

“I don’t know,” I murmur, taking a deep breath to try to steady my legs.

We walk past an indoor desert garden of waterfalls, cacti, and terra-cotta sculptures. The atrium is fragrant with floral succulents. A potpourri of people in southwestern garb probably purchased in the gift shop lounge on big chairs in front of a floor-to-ceiling window that overlooks a desert vista.

“This is truly an oasis,” Desmond says, tenting his fingers. “I used to come here as a child with my father. It’s why I bring my team down here—I always feel so centered in this place. You, too?”