I’m walking toward the window to take a peek outside when there’s a knock at the hotel door. We both freeze and look in that direction.
“Who is it?” Silas yells at the door.
“It’s me!” A voice replies.
Silas motions for me to go stand on the other side of the room, away from the door. I don’t.
I’ve only known myself for a few minutes, but I can tell I’m stubborn.
Silas unlatches the deadbolt and pulls the door open just a little. A scruffy brown head bobs around the door.
“Hey,” the boy says. “I’m back. 11:30 sharp, just like you said.”
He has his hands stuffed in his pockets and his face is red like he’s been running. I look from him to Silas, and back to him. They look alike.
“You know each other?” I ask.
The younger, lookalike version of Silas nods his head. “We’re brothers.” He says this loudly while pointing first to Silas and then himself. “I am your brother,” he says again, looking at Silas.
“So you said,” Silas says with a slight grin on his face. He glances at me, then back at Landon. “Mind if I take a look at your ID?”
The boy rolls his eyes but pulls a wallet out of his back pocket.
“I like that cool, rolling your eyes thing you have going on,” Silas says as he opens the boy’s wallet.
“What’s your name?” I ask him.
He tilts his head, narrowing his eyes at me. “I’m Landon,” he tells me, as if I should know this. “The better-looking Nash brother.”
I smile weakly as Silas looks over Landon’s ID. He’s a good kid. You can tell by his eyes.
“So,” I say, looking at Silas. “You don’t know who you are, either? And we’re trying to figure this all out together? And every forty-eight hours we forget again?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Sounds about right.”
This feels like a dream. Not reality.
And then it hits me. I’m dreaming. I burst into laughter, just as Landon hands me a sack. I think my laughter caught him by surprise.
“What’s this?” I ask, opening the sack.
“You asked me to bring you a change of clothes.”
I look down at the gown I’m wearing, and then at the clothes. “Why am I wearing this?”
He shrugs. “That’s what you were wearing last night when Silas found you.”
Silas pushes open the bathroom door for me. The clothes have tags on them, so I pull them off and begin to change. A cute black top with long sleeves and jeans that fit like they were made for me. Who gets new clothes in their dreams?
“I love this dream!” I yell through the bathroom door.
When I’m finished changing, I swing open the door and clap my hands together. “All right, boys. Let’s go. Where to?”
I make a quick check of the hotel room as Charlie and Landon file out. I grab the empty trash sack out of the small can under the desk and shove all of our notes into it. When I’m certain I have everything, I follow Charlie and Landon outside.
Charlie is still smiling when we reach the car. She honestly thinks this is a dream, and I don’t have the heart to tell her it isn’t. It’s not a dream. It’s actually a nightmare and we’ve been living it for more than a week now.
Landon climbs inside the car, but Charlie waits for me by the back door. “You want to ride in the front with your brother?” she asks, forming air quotes with her fingers.
I shake my head and reach around her to open the door. “No, you can ride in the front.” She begins to turn when I grab her arm. I lean down to her ear and whisper. “You aren’t dreaming, Charlie. This is real. Something is happening to us and you need to take it seriously so we can figure it out, okay?”
When I pull back, her eyes are wide. The smile is gone from her face and she doesn’t nod. She just gets in the car and closes the door.
I claim my spot in the back seat and pull my phone out of my pocket. There’s a reminder set on it, so I open it.
Go to the police station first. Get the backpack and read every note and journal entry you can…as fast as you can.
I close out the reminder, knowing I’ll get about five more reminders in the next two hours. I know this…because I remember setting every single one of them last night.
I remember writing all the notes in this small hotel trash bag that I have clutched tightly in my hand.
I remember grabbing hold of Charlie’s face right before the clock struck 11:00a.m.
I remember whispering never never to her, right before I kissed her.
And I remember ten seconds after our lips touched…she pulled back and had no idea who I was. She had no memory of the last forty-eight hours.
Yet…I remembered every single minute of the last two days.
I just couldn’t tell her the truth. I didn’t want to scare her, and making her believe I was in the same situation as her seemed to be the more comforting option.
I don’t know why I didn’t forget this time, or why she did. I should be relieved that whatever the hell has been going on with us seems to be over for me, but I’m not relieved at all. I’m disappointed. I would rather have lost my memory again with her than to have her be alone in this. At least when we were in it together, we knew it was something we could work out together.
What seemed to be a pattern has now been broken, and I feel like this just makes it even more difficult to figure out. Why was I spared this time? Why was she not? Why do I feel like I can’t be honest with her? Have I always shouldered this much guilt?