THE TROUBLE WITH PAPER PLANES(66)

She was serious. She was deadly serious. This wasn’t a nightmare, this was real.

“Holy shit,” I murmured.

She leaned into me, burying herself in my arms, and despite the whirlwind in my head, I couldn’t help but think how right it felt, to be holding her like this. Even though she had a million secrets. Even though I hardly knew her. Even though I was ill-equipped to deal with any of this.

Amnesia.

It explained so much. Why she was so reluctant to talk about herself. Why she always steered the conversation back to me. Why she seemed to be holding back. She wasn’t deliberately trying to shut me out, she just didn’t know where the door was.

It made what was happening to us seem even more poignant. I was ready to believe in fate, destiny, serendipity – whatever name it went by. How else could anyone explain how our paths had crossed?

“I’m so sorry this is happening to you” I whispered into her hair.

I had a thousand questions for her, but one shone out above all the others.





LYING DOWN ON THE wooden jetty, Maia curled into my side, we stared up at the night sky. I was reminded of the Counting Crows song, about lying beneath a bowl of stars. They were so close, yet just out of reach. I was familiar with that feeling, of reaching for answers that seemed just beyond my fingertips. Apparently, Maia was familiar with that feeling, too.


It was easier to talk out there, in the semi-darkness. It was almost as if a cloak had been thrown over us, hiding us from the world, from reality. There’s something about sharing secrets under the light of the moon that makes everything seem less daunting. It suspends reality for a while. It gives you hope, and hope was something that you could never have enough of.

“How does it feel?” I asked, running my fingertips gently up her arm.

Her body shuddered and I pulled her closer.

“Sometimes I feel like I’m not really here, like this is all just a dream,” she whispered, her words lingering in the warm, heavy air. “I feel like I’m constantly waiting for something that never comes.”

I couldn’t help but draw comparisons. I knew that feeling. Ever since Em disappeared, I’d been waiting. Waiting for news, waiting for answers, waiting to resume my life.

I’d been biting my tongue until now, but I had to ask.

“I know this is insane,” I said, squeezing her hand, resting on my bare chest. “But maybe you’re here for a reason? Maybe you being here, in Raglan, isn’t an accident.”

She moved her hand, entwining her fingers with mine. I could feel her heart pounding against my ribs.

“You think I might be her. Emily,” she said, as I struggled to breathe evenly. “I thought so, too. As soon as I saw the photos on your wall, I wondered.”

I needed to see her face. I sat up, pulling her with me, grabbing both her hands in mine and holding them tight.

“Don’t you think it’s possible?” I asked, my heart about to burst straight out of my chest. “It could be possible, right?”

She looked like she really wanted to believe me, but I could also tell that she didn’t. Not quite, anyway.

“Anything’s possible,” she murmured.

“You don’t believe it, though.”

“I don’t know what to believe anymore. I may look like her, but I don’t know if I am her.”

I tried to think about this with my head, not my heart, but it was like separating two halves of myself. The half that wanted Emily back, and the half that wanted Maia to stay. The thing was, I had come to the realisation just days ago that I was willing to let Em go if it meant letting Maia in. But now that the opposite seemed possible, I was torn.

She let go of my hand and picked up a lock of her long, brown hair. “My hair is different.”

She was right. Maybe I was grasping at straws, but either way, I had to know.

“You said when you woke up in hospital, your head was shaved,” I said. “Maybe it grew back a different colour? I mean, you’d been through major trauma. I’ve heard of that kind of thing happening.”

She didn’t look convinced, but I wasn’t going to let that stop me. “Look, I know this is a long shot – all of this is. But you can’t deny the fact that you and I have a connection. And while you might not realise how unusual that is, I do. It’s never happened to me before. Maybe the reason we have this connection is because we already knew each other.”