Mine are the first pair of eyes his see when he opens them. They don't shift once. His brows pull together and he watches me curiously. Or maybe confusedly. His lips part and he inhales as if he might say something, but he doesn't.

She'd told me no, at first. Said she couldn't do it; she was too weak. I'd reminded her of the dreams she'd given me and how she'd showed me her own memories, suggested she combine the two. She'd said it's easier with me because of the strong bond we share. I'd reminded her of how "Stef" had invited Eli to the party. She'd insisted that that had taken a very concentrated amount of energy. I'd told her she'd best get to concentrating.

I have no idea what dreams of which memories she'd given him in the time alotted before he'd woken up. Or if she had even been successful at all.

Eli could potentially be laying eyes on me for the first time. Again.

"Oh, praise God." Relief shoots through Theresa as she sees that he's awake. She hurries to him, kneeling beside the bed and taking his face in her hands, and he is forced to tear his gaze from mine. "Oh, thank you, Jesus."

"Ma?" His voice is raspy from lack of use.

"Yes, baby; it's me; I'm here."

"What happened?"

"You fell and hit your head, sweetie," she tells him, and her voice is gentle and calming and I almost believe her. "Andrew called you an ambulance."

"Andrew?"

"Yes. Alyssa's Dad."

He looks upon me once more. He mouths the name — "Alyssa" — silently, trying it on for size. He doesn't seem convinced.

"Where's Dad?"

"He had to run home to pick up Kei and get us both a change of clothes. He should be back any minute now." On a cue I can only call Heaven-orchestrated, Theresa's phone vibrates in her pocket. She pulls it out and examines it. "This is him." She stands. "I'm gonna go get them. I'll call the nurse for you."

"Okay."

And then there were two.

I know I should be scared or anxious or some combination of the two, but I find comfort knowing that whatever happens — whether he knows me or not — is out of my control. I have done all that I can. I wait for him to speak first.

"I don't call you Alyssa," he says, unsure.

"No."

"I didn't think so. It didn't taste right." His tongue slides absentmindedly between his teeth to wet his bottom lip. "So, what do I call you, then?"

"Aspen."

"Aspen," he repeats. "Why do I call you Aspen?"

"Because it's my birth name," I tell him. And when that doesn't seem like explanation enough, I add, "You and my dad are the only two who call me by it."

He nods, but his brow is still furrowed. "Were you there? When I hit my head?"

"Yes."

"Where were we?"

I can tell he's reaching for pieces of the puzzle so he can form some kind of image in his mind to see if it feels familiar. So I tell him the truth. "We were at a friend's house. A friend of my mom's." And then I throw in a bit of Dad's story to promote continuity. "He had a graduation gift for me."

Eli scrunches his nose. "Graduation?"

"Yes. I graduated tonight."

He looks away from my face for the first time, down to the rest of me. My dress with the caked mud on the hem. My dirty bare feet. "I like your dress," he says.

I thank him.

"Are you my girlfriend?"

And there it is. Confirmation. He has no idea who I am. My stomach churns at the reveal. If he notices the further paling of my already-pale-enough skin, he doesn't let on about it. He simply awaits his answer.

"Depends on who you ask."

He chews on this for a moment. "Well, I'm asking you," he says.

I choose my words carefully. I don't want to repaint the past with any sort of selfish connotation attached to it. I want to leave it exactly as it was. "Well, I would say that we definitely care for each other, and we spend a lot of time together."

The corner of his mouth rises, just barely. But I notice. "And what would I say?"

"You would say I'm your girlfriend," I tell him without hesitation.

"Right on." The words resonate from somewhere deep within his throat. It makes me blush. I hope that the rush of blood to my cheeks has brought them back to their normal color once more. "We went to prom together."

My heart flutters. He remembers. "Yes," I breathe out, hopeful.

"And I took you to the reservation."

I nod eagerly, afraid if I speak that my voice will crack and give me away. His next revelation, however, renders me just a few decibals shy of speechless.

"Can I kiss you?"

"Wh— What?"

He isn't even phased by my negative reaction. He is a man seeking answers, nothing more, nothint less. "I mean, do we kiss. Like, is that something we do?"

I clear my throat before I give my answer. "Yes."

"Sweet," he says, the little smirk back and tugging harder on his mouth now than the last time. "Do we do it often?"

"Uh... We, uh... We kiss a good, healthy amount, I guess."

"Nice. Noice," he nods. "Nice." I get the feeling he's mentally patting himself on the back, giving himself a high-five. "Have we ever kissed in the — up in the — the, uh..."

"The treehouse?" I ask. This time his cheeks flush. "Yeah."

"Oh... And do the—"

"Do the guys know about it?" I offer up. I feel myself grin, just a small one. "They do."

"That's, uh..." he wets his lips again. "Can you read my mind, or something?"

A lump lodges itself in my throat. Is he playfully mocking me? Or is he simply oblivious to how he does so?

"I can't remember what it feels like."

"What what feels like?" I ask cautiously. What me reading your mind feels like?

"Kissing you."

I exhale harshly. The lesser of two evils. "Oh." And I realize that I could potentially offer up an answer to both of the potential questions, a pair of jagged puzzle pieces. "You can kiss me. If you want."

His eyes go wide, and he stares at me for a too-long moment before catching himself. "Uh, I've been out for a while." He points to something behind me. "Could you bring me Ma's purse?"

I reach behind me for it and go to the bed. I sit down on it carefully and set the bag in his lap. He opens it and rummages around for something until he finds what he's looking for. He pulls out a tin can of cinnamon-flavored breath mints. He pops one into his mouth and then holds the can out to me, an offering. "Want one?"

I shake my head. I'm not one for cinnamon. I don't care for the aftertaste. He puts the can back in the bag and drops the bag to the floor. He chews and swallows. "Um," he says, and I can tell that he's nervous by the way he averts his eyes from mine. "I don't know what to say next," he says with a chuckle. Words have never been Eli's weak point.

I give him a small smile and a nod of encouragement. He leans forward a tiny bit and then stops. "I'm sorry. I've never done this before. I mean, I know I have — kissed you, I mean — but I can't remember it. So it's kinda like my first time all over again."

"I promise I'll go easy on you," I joke, and it's probably the most flirty thing I've ever said in my life and I'd like to say have no idea where it came from. But I do. Eli has always been the confident one of the two of us, one step ahead, always one step ahead. But right now I'm standing on the platform and it's my turn to help him rise to me. It's a dizzying feeling, but dizzying in a good way, and I find myself wanting more of it. "Come 'ere," I whisper like an actress in a movie.

His adam's apple rises and falls quickly and he starts leaning in again, more sure of himself this time, although his eyes are still nervous as they sweep from mine down to my lips. I put my hands on his shoulders and guide him to me.

We kiss.

There is nothing.

Not even white.

I kiss him back fervently, desperately, searching for something, anything. I try all the usual tricks — running my fingers through his hair, my nails skimming his scalp, grazing my teeth across his lower lip. His heart is pounding and his pulse races beneath my fingertips. He grabs at my shoulders and the tops of my arms and kisses me open-mouthed. His breath is hot and heavy and cinnamon and I realize I should probably not be exciting him like this if he has a concussion. But I get nothing from my advances.

I can't feel his aura.

He parts from me and touches his forehead to mine. "Wow," he sighs. "I totally get why we do that a good, healthy amount, now. I swear to you, I felt that kiss all the way in my toes." I can hear the smile in his voice even with my eyes still closed. "Thanks for not going easy on me."

The door clicks open and we jump away from one another, startled. But it's not either of his parents.

"Aspen Quinn," the nurse, Ruthie, clicks her tongue at me. "Did Dr. Jackie discharge you?"

"No, nurse," I say sheepishly, keeping my head down. I feel Eli's white, hot stare boring into the side of my head.

"Well, I should think you'd get back to your room so that he can do so, hmm?"

Eli takes my hand and lifts it, inspecting the plastic band around my wrist, just now noticing it for the first time. His eyes are wild when I meet them with my own.

"I got in a car wreck," I tell him softly.

"What?!"

Next I tell him a lie, a lie to cover my father's tracks, and I forfeit the game with a mismatched puzzle piece. "I left to get help after you fell. Obviously, I didn't make it very far."

"You left me? Unconscious?"

"My dad was there."

"Alright, Miss Quinn. Back to your room before you get the both of us in trouble."

I try to convey to Eli through a look how sorry I am and how badly I wish it wasn't true and how deeply I care for him and I try to will him to remember, please, please remember.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," I promise as I rise from the bed.

"He'll be here," says the nurse.

🦎

          I am discharged later that night, and Eli the next morning. He sleeps the majority of the day Saturday. On Sunday, I do not ask permission to go and see him because I'm afraid I might be told no. I knock on the Whitneys' front door and Kei gives me a big hug and lets me in. And there he is, wedged between towers of pillows atop the sofa, a game controller in his hands and a loud, violent noise coming from the TV.

"A.G.!" He drops the controller when he sees me, and his character crashes into something and goes up in flames.

I hadn't asked him to continue calling me Alyssa. He does this of his own accord. "Hey." I slide in next to him on the sofa, tossing some pillows onto the floor at my feet. Eli kisses my cheek, and it makes me feel guilty although I can't decide what for.

"Wanna play?" he asks, reaching for the controller and extending it to me.

I eye the foreign object like Eli's offering me a snake. "I don't really, uh. No, thanks."

He puts the controller in my hands regardless and goes to the TV stand, opening a cabinet and retrieving another one identical to the one I now hold. He turns it on and restarts the game, this time making it dual-screen and multi-player.

"The doctor said I had a concussion," he says as soon as the game has begun. My character is a male dressed in post-apocalyptic armor and weilding a large rifle. I pilot him through the streets of an abandoned, run-down city. "Said I might have some trouble with short-term memory for a little while."

I think he's just making conversation, but then he says something more that leads me to believe otherwise. "The weird thing is... they couldn't find a point of contact. No bruise, no lump, no lesion. It's almost as if I was... wearing some sort of helmet."

I stiffen, breath caught in my throat, and my character stills onscreen. Eli continues to play the game, ensuring that the noise that covers up his words continues. "I remembered some more stuff," he says, and there is nothing cautious about his words when I can guarantee that there should be. "You were in witness protection."

I swallow and nod briefly. Even if I wasn't, I'd lived eleven years believing I was. And this is what I'd originally told him.

"You were hiding from the man who killed your mom."

"Yes," I whisper.

"That's whose house we were at that night, isn't it? He tried to hurt me? And he tried to take you."

I say nothing, for there is no point. He has remembered it, therefore, he knows it's true.

"Where is he?"

"Don't know," I say beneath the sounds of the zombie apocalypse happening on the other side of the flatscreen. "He got away."

Eli maneuvers his character to where mine stands, hopelessly still, and wards off the flesh-hungry creatures that are swiftly catching on to our scent. "That's what I thought."

"Is that... Is that all you remember?"

"For now. Are you moving again?"

"I'm done with running."

"Good," he says, and he sets his controller down in his lap, effectively ending both of our characters' lives to the crowd of enlivened undead. One of his hands covers mine. "I want you to stay," he says, his voice low, and I feel that thing again, the thing I'd felt in the hospital before I'd kissed him. The confidence.

"D'ya wanna go to the treehouse?"

He flushes and looks down at our hands, then back up at my face, then over his shoulder to ensure no one had heard, then over to the staircase, then back to me. "Lemme go put on some pants."

He leaves and scurries up the stairs to his bedroom, and I laugh when I realize he's been clad only in his boxers this whole time.

🦎

          I don't get another visit from my mother, but I know she's still around because every day Eli excitedly recalls to me new things he's remembered. It's just small memories, at first. The color of the dress I'd worn to the prom, my mom's name, the time I'd won two games in a row of Texas Hold 'Em that very first game night, how I'd pinned him up against the wall of the girls bathroom when he'd nominated me for prom court. Eventually, he recalls deeper emotions — how he'd felt when he'd found out I'd kissed Sam at Ty's party (which had been worse than he'd originally let on), how nervous he'd been right before he'd kissed me for the first time and how relieved he'd felt when I'd kissed back, how his heart had nearly dropped out of his chest when I'd dropped out of the tree at the reservation.

I have proof to back up some of his newfound memories — a photo of us by the front door at my house, dressed to the nines and posing, hands carefully placed on each other in careful places; the portrait of the us-adorned tree that he'd painted for me; the book he'd given me as a graduation present.

A good portion of our time together comes back to him (or, I suspect, is being given back to him while he sleeps), but there is one tiny detail that he never mentions. And I wonder if Mom means to force us to have the same difficult conversation we'd once had all over again, or if she simply hasn't had the energy to produce that particular memory yet. So I don't say anything; I just continue to wait.

Dad gets a job, his first real job in years. Now that I know we weren't really in the WPP, I have no idea how he's been making money for the majority of my life, but the thought of asking makes me feel sick. He wears slacks and a tie to the office every day, and he seems to really like it. I can tell from his aura that he feels really fulfilled for the first time in a long time.

But I don't.

Dad and I don't talk about what happened. This doesn't come as a surprise, though, seeing as how we didn't talk much when Mom died. Dad and I aren't really talkers. I always thought that that had been a trait I'd inherited from him, but now I guess it'd been developmental, not genetic — nurture and not nature. Maybe if I talked about it it would help my nerves settle into my skin, my skin settle into my bones. But of the only other two people I could talk about it with, one of them hasn't shown herself and the other is missing a rather large piece of the puzzle.

So, Dad settles into work, Eli settles into his memories, Theresa settles into the idea of me being a permanent fixture around her house, and Nebraska settles into summer.

But I don't.

I've never been a compulsive person, but it just feels like the cycle is incomplete. Because this is how it's always gone — we move to a new place, something bad happens, and we leave; wash, rinse, repeat. But this time something bad has happened and instead of leaving, we shoved it into the background and, instead, we settled.

I'm restless. I stay awake most nights just staring at the ceiling and making friends with the shadows on the walls. I try to read, but I find I can't concentrate on the words — I read a whole page without retaining any of it and have to start at the beginning again. I know if I woke Eli he'd serve as a welcomed distraction, but I won't peel him from his sleep because I wouldn't want him to peel me from mine. I tell myself that Eli is much more selfless than I — I type up many text messages but backspace them without ever pressing send.

It'd be easy to settle here. I could enroll at York Community and get a job at the Starbucks by the interstate. Eli and I could potentially spend the entire summer together, lazy and carefree, doing all the things I always wanted to do but never could. We could go to the city, see movies, visit museums, go to amusement parks, find a music or arts festival. We could make a fort out of sheets in my living room and stay up late binge-watching Netflix and drinking coffee. We could go to the skate park with Dex and visit the Spanish church where Jules's dad preaches at. We could loiter at the outlet mall with Reggie and play baseball in the park with Sam. We could paint a new picture, assemble a new puzzle. I could get to know myself again.

It would be easy to settle here. It would be easy. It would.

It would.

__________

Okay, guys. Jig's up. This.......... has been the second-to-last chapter. Chapter 30............. will be the end of the road. I'm not sure how I feel about this yet, but I know it's producing a sad aura.

Good news, though: I am planning a sequel! The sequel does not have a title or cover art, yet, because obviously I can't design cover art without a title. Honestly, not much about the sequel has been mapped out yet. It's currently just, like... a vague idea. And that makes me dark blue because I don't wanna stay away from you guys for that long while I figure out what I'm even doing.

While I will say that Chapter 30 will pose a few new questions — (or just one big one, really) — it will not answer any old ones. So this is your last chance to bring any major unanswered questions to my attention. I believe I've answered everything... but there's a possibility that there's something I may have overlooked. So, if there's something you're still confused about, please let me know.

I think that's everything, for now. This edit comes courtesy of LilianaAra, duh. Remember to wear your seatbelts and call your mom and tell her you love her.