CHAPTER 8

I knew where Armand lived. Everyone knew where Officer Sanders lived.

I stood at the doorstep, my finger hovering over the doorbell. I had taken the rest of the day off from Ollie’s today. It was a small town—a car would be convenient, but you didn’t truly need that to walk from Ollie’s to the Sanders’ residence.

My hand fell from the bell. I knocked on the door instead.

Five knockings later, the door opened.

“We’ve got a bell, you know,” Armand said.

“Will you let me in?”

“Depends. Are you here to rob us?”

I just looked at him.

“You really can’t take a joke, can you?” He shook his head. “You’ve got to earn a sense of humor these days, Cadwell. Let’s take a walk, shall we?”

I didn’t move. “Is Duane home?”

“He’s not.”

“Then I guess you will do, too.”

“What? Is this some kind of sex drive emergency attack? Should I be flattered that I’m your second choice?”

“Shut up, Mandy Boy. You know why I’m here. You know.”

He sighed and closed the door behind him. “Let’s take a walk, shall we?”

We walked down the steps. The weather today was quite good. Breezy, but not too hot or too cool. The Sanders residence was located at a very nice neighborhood—not too showy, but definitely cozy and beautiful. There were a lot of trees alongside the streets. The houses around varied from simple suburban houses with white picket fences to four-story villas with green gardens and spacious garages.

A few kids were showing off their gadgets while walking to the same direction. Some elder people were jogging. A guy near us was walking his dog—I didn’t know what type, but it’s so big that my first instinct was to balk at it.

Until the dog sniffed suddenly in our way and began barking loud.

The man tried to sooth the dog, but it took a turn to another direction—away from us, even though he kept tugging on its leash. Eventually the man gave up and tried to catch up with the dog instead when it went free on a run.

“Dogs never liked us,” Armand said.

“You, you mean. I’ve got no problems with home pets.”

“Don’t be discriminate. But you know, whatever helps you sleep better at night.”

I snorted, stuffing my hands inside my pockets.

“Ah,” Armand sighed in content. “Nice weather. After all the storms, you’d never guess this town actually has nice sunshine and white cloud and light blue sky.”

“It’s very—” I cut myself of with a glare before I finished agreeing with him. “I’m not here to talk about the weather.”

“That’s true. How’s your Physics project going on? Need my help? Ah, what about Chem, partner?”

It was amazing how he could make the word ‘partner’ sound like a dirty word. “No small talk, either.”

“So now you’re a big talker. I see. The three-worded sentences were just a phase, huh?”

“Stop it! I want to know how much you know.”

He stopped walking.

“What I know,” he said, “depends on what you already know.”

“I know that you and Duane know who I was. My name was Eiko. I’m a Japanese descent. I know that you need to tell me everything or I’m going to go insane.”

“On the contrary,” Armand replied, “if you know everything, you’re going to go insane. Why do you think we’ve given you time to remember anything? And when you didn’t, we finally decided to give you a bit of a push. And that’s still going on. You need to remember everything by yourself.”

“Don’t tell me the psychological crap—my mind is strong enough to—”

“It’s not about your mind, Elena. It’s about you.” He started walking again, turning left to the other block. A tree branch hung low in front of his path. He ducked and continued walking. “Don’t you feel a distinction between your present self and who you were before? Do you think if I tell you now that you like eating rabbits before, you’re going to like eating rabbits now? No. You’ve got to remember how you liked eating rabbits in order to like it again.”

I shot him a look, scrambling to match his pace. “That’s just a gross analogy. Rabbits are so cute and furry.”

“It’s not an analogy.”

I decided to ignore what that might even mean. “Give me at least a clue. You’ve been in the same school with me since when—forever?”

“Actually, I was considered an outsider. I’d just moved to your school a few weeks before you went there yourself. We needed to monitor you.”

“Monitor me? Who were you to me? My brother?”

“Brother?” He snorted. “Do you see any resemblance between the two of us? I didn’t even know you before. I’m just helping Duane. He is the one who really knew you before.”

“And he was my…?”

“Hmm…How do you girls usually say it again? Boyfriend sounds too childish, soulmate sounds too cheesy. Lover sounds too X-rated for now, but I have no doubt you two were as active as bunnies for all those years you were together. But you get the idea.”

I let out a strangled laugh. “What do you mean? I woke up in the woods naked when I was fifteen. That means I was at least fourteen when you said he and I…”

Armand’s gaze held no joke. “I thought you’d know by now. Don’t you believe in reincarnation?”

My breath sped up. “I go to church with the Cadwells every Sunday.”

“And even the Church at least believes in incarnation.”

“I don’t understand.”

“But you do. You just don’t want to see it. Like I told you, just because I’m telling you, it doesn’t mean you’ll decide to believe me. Knowing is different from remembering.” Armand leaned forward, gazing at me. “Don’t you have dreams? Usually memories come in dreams.”

Holding his gaze settled a heavy weight on my chest. I looked away. “But they don’t even make sense. I—”

“Sometimes, Elena, things are just right before your eyes, but your mind refuses to let your eyes open. You have to remember at least what you are before we can tell you who you were.”

What if Armand hadn’t been kidding? What if everything he said was really true? It wasn’t the first time that kind of suggestion passed in my head. Past lives. Reincarnation. I didn’t really consider myself a believer, but just knowing that there could be a life after death was sometimes disconcerting. And yet I was a living proof of it. I should have died. But here I was, living again, just without the memories.

“Hey, what are you thinking about? Duane’s abs?”

I jumped a little, then sighed when I saw Ingrid’s amused expression.

Then I remembered what she was asking me.

“No!” I cleared my throat. “I mean, no, I was thinking about something else.”

“Well, whatever you were thinking about, you’d better check them out.”

I tilted my head. “Check what out?” I turned to look at where Ingrid’s gaze was fixed on. Coach had made some of the guys run extra laps before the girls started. The gym shirt fitted them just right, and when they ran, their shirt rode up a little and exposed either well-defined muscles or pale bellies. Guys contrasted like that at our school. There was no in-between. The hot ones were hot. The rest was just not.

I just caught the sight of Duane and prepared to ogle when the Coach whistled.

Signal for us girls. I shot through.

And I felt free.

I love running.

Although I was bound to the tracks, if I squint up at the sunlight enough I could imagine myself in the dreams. Running on the autumn daylight, my feet touching the soft green grass, a wide smile, laughter… If I could just close my eye while I ran, I could feel a soft rain pouring down on my skin, cooling my flushed skin, my lips, his lips, a kiss shared in the rain—

I stumbled and fell to the ground in heap with someone who had just run into me. My knees skidded to a halt with the impact, but not before it tore my skin and scratched my head.

“I’m sorry!” a voice said. “But you were in my track, so—”

I winced when I pried my eyes open. When my eyes had adjusted to the glaring sun, I looked at the guy who had just spoken and groaned loudly. He was the last person I’d like to deal with face-to-face right now. If no one was going to give me answers, then they shouldn’t keep shoving the questions right under my nose.

I tried to get up, my knees stung too much that I kept falling down helplessly.

“I’m not—I’m sorry! Here, let me help you up.”

I slapped his hand away. “I can get up myself,” I snapped, just as we heard the sound of Coach’s whistle.

“Cadwell! Go to the nurse’s office—hey, you there, Sanders, take her!”

Duane gave a pointed look at me. I glared at him.

Biting my lip, I propped myself up with my hands and managed to stand on both of my feet, even though my torn, bloody knees stung like son of a—

“Can you walk or do you want me to carry you?”

Walking seemed like a very painful idea, but I wouldn’t degrade my pride for someone like him. So I sent one last vicious glare at him over my shoulder and started to drag my feet in slow, painful strides.

I heard a sigh behind me. “Great,” he muttered. “By that speed, we’re going to get there in a week.”

I ignored him, and tried to walk faster without tumbling down. In my periphery, I saw Armand looking at us while he talked to the Coach. And then, with a last glance at us, he went away from the field.

By the time we reached the nurse’s office, my knees didn’t sting as badly anymore. In fact, after the nurse cleaned my blood, the wound didn’t look so bad—just like some shallow scratches.

The nurse frowned as she cleaned the blood on my temple. “How did the blood get there?” she asked. “Your head is unscratched.”

I was pretty sure it was scratched just now. “Um, I touched my knees and touched my head?”

“And how did you get so much blood on you for those scratches on your knees?”

“Um, hemophilia, maybe?”

The nurse put her hands on her hips. “Why do you seem so reluctant in answering everything? Why do you answer all my questions in questions?”

“Um, because he’s here?”

The nurse sighed and gave Duane a dismissive glance. “Well, your injuries are all tended now. The bell rings in fifteen minutes. You can go straight home.”

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