"When you're laying there on that floor and they're counting, for nine seconds, all you can think is how free you are. But then you know, you gotta get up, and you gotta fight some more, cause if you don't, they're gonna kill you."
Dalton West is lost. Not in a physical sense, much deeper than that. From the time he'd awakened on the side of the road in an old pickup truck six months back, until today, was all he could remember. Even the name he carries is borrowed from a sticker on the back of that truck.
A fading polaroid image of a young boy, with a big, antique teddy bear that he somehow knows is him, and a small, silver medallion on a string around his wrist, are the only clues he has to who he might be, and what happened to make him forget everything else. Everything except an urge that keeps telling him someone's life depends on him remembering.
When he meets Leeanne, a small town girl, with even bigger problems, he'll put his search on hold to make sure she gets more than nine seconds of freedom.
PART FIVE
The apartment above the hardware store had been outfitted sometime way before I was born. I liked it. The old furniture and worn linoleum had a lived in, honest feel. It felt like home.
There were tall windows along the front wall. Pulling back the curtains flooded the room with natural light. It was old, but like the workshop below, meticulously well kept.
“For being so dated, it’s very well kept,” I said. Fred was showing me the space.
“It was Bedman’s place. But, he died downstairs, at his workbench, if you’re worried about that,” Fred said.
He kept looking at me as if I’d change my mind, or disappear.
“No, it’s great,” I said.
I was relieved to find that mattress had been recently updated to a memory foam version, and the clawfoot tub was outfitted with a modern massage style shower head. It was just the right balance of old and new.
“Alright, well, my husband is expecting you at our house for dinner. The address is on the fridge,” Fred said.
He went out, closing the door behind him.
I sat down in a leather club chair, taking it all in. I had a home. It wasn’t my home, but it was a home. For the first time in six months, I was welcome somewhere.
There was a large, central room, with vaulted ceilings, a row of huge wooden windows overlooking the street, and overstuffed leather furniture. Off of that, a rectangular archway led to a combination kitchen and breakfast nook.
The antique appliances were immaculately kept and the old refrigerator chugged so quietly, it sounded like new.
Four chrome chairs surrounded a chrome and laminate table that must have been sixty years old, but looked showroom new.
There was a short hall, on one side was the bathroom, tall and narrow, with a huge clawfoot tub standing like an island in the center of a sea of antique subway tiles, in black and white.
A pedestal sink stood in one corner, under a vintage medicine cabinet. A large window let in light, filtered through a pull-down velum blind. The toilet, thankfully, had been updated, as had the sink’s faucet.
The bedroom held a dresser, a wardrobe, a dressing table, and a bed, with matching side tables. They were all made from the same heavy, dark oak, in a simple style that looked a lot like mission. I ran my hand over the quarter sawn tiger striped oak dresser top. It was a beautiful piece.
They all were. I admired this kind of craftsmanship. Someone had to stamp their number on each piece of this, and it meant something.
I went to the bathroom and stripped down. I hadn’t had a shower in almost a week. It was time. I stepped into the big tub and pulled the curtain closed around me on the brass rail that ran high up above the tub in an oval. The hot water felt amazing.
I only had one change of clothes, a plaid work shirt and a clean pair of blue jeans I’d washed in a laundromat at the last town I’d been in that had one. Laundry and showering hadn’t been a huge priority for the past six months. I wondered if they ever had been for me. Another memory swam by, too murky to see.
I felt like if I could just stand under the water long enough. Maybe something would happen. Maybe I’d wash away the cloud of confusion, the web of secrecy that lay between me and who I was. I turned off the water and toweled dry.
I repeated the same ritual I’d been doing for six months, every time I took a shower. I’d carefully laid the medallion out on the sink, next to my watch and I put it on first. Making sure the string was carefully knotted.
I ran my finger over the raised design, a rosary. There were slight ridges running diagonally, across the design. They made it look as if the rosary were trapped behind glass. They felt comforting against my fingers.
I finished dressing, boxers, white socks, a soft black and red “lumberjack” plaid long sleeved shirt, with a chest pocket, indigo blue jeans, with a black leather belt, and a pair of short, brown “chuka” style boots.
I walked into the bedroom and checked my look in the full-length mirror on the door of the antique wardrobe. My image was a little wavy, due to the antique glass, but not bad, for a guy who didn’t know his name.
I took the address from the fridge and tapped it into my phone. The map came up, it was about ten minutes away, just a little outside of town. I walked back into the living room to retrieve my jacket. It would be getting cooler before I got back. I turned to leave, but something had caught my attention.
What was it? What had I seen, some item in this room was familiar. I turned back, searching each surface in turn, then I saw it. In the center of a large, heavy, square oak coffee table, was a wooden box. There, carved in relief in the center of the box’s lid, was an emblem I’d known intimately for six months.
I rubbed my fingers across the medallion on my wrist, then held it up, next to the box. They were identical. My hands trembled. I fumbled with the lid, looking for a hinge. Maybe it was locked. I picked the box up and looked at it. The lid slid into place in a shallow groove along both edges.
I gently slid the lid back. My heart pounded.
There was nothing there. A wave of frustration rolled over me. I wanted to throw the box to the floor, smash it to splinters. But I knew that wouldn’t help. So it hadn’t held the key to everything neatly wrapped up, but this box could still unlock a clue to who I was. It was the first hope I’d had in six months.
My eyes welled up. I sat in the chair. I stared at the box and cried. The frustration had passed and in its place, I felt nothing but relief and gratitude. Finally, after all of my searching, I’d found somewhere that I felt welcomed. Someone who needed me, and now this.
The universe had finally given me a tiny sliver of hope. I just sat, letting the tears stream down my face for a long time. The shadows grew longer in the room. Then my phone rang.
“Dalton?” It was Fred.
I cleared my throat. “Yes?”
“It’s seven. Are you still coming?” Fred asked.
I could almost see him, looking nervous as he had that afternoon. Afraid that I would change my mind. Decide to leave.
“Oh, yes, I just. Sorry, lost track of time. I’ll be right there,” I said.
I placed the box back on the table, exactly as I’d found it. Almost every fiber of my being was screaming for me to take it with me, to find out what it meant. But in one still corner, the part of me that I believed was keeping me alive and safe, sat quietly.
Asking about the box would mean sharing things I wasn’t ready to share yet. I’d have to look into it on my own, until I was certain I could trust my new-found friends.