“You can have his bed when he sneaks into my room,” she says. “He wasn’t kidding about that.”
Tomasz is already snoring away. Regine looks down at him in her gruffly tender way, and then turns to leave without a good night.
“Thank you for finding me,” Seth says. “And maybe try not to be such an ass**le about accepting the thanks, okay?”
Regine snorts. “It’s hard here. Toughness keeps us alive.” She gives a wry smile. “I used to be a really nice person.”
Seth smiles back. “I don’t believe that for a second.”
“Good,” she says. “You shouldn’t.” She looks at him for a moment. “First thing, we can start looking for your brother. If it’s really that important.”
“It is. Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. You’ll be doing all the work. Like, where do we even start?”
Seth shakes his head. “Something’ll come to me. It’s all there, I know it is. I’ve just got to sort it out.”
“Good,” she says, “because I’d like some answers, too.” She nods good night at him and leaves.
Seth lies down on the floor and wraps a blanket around himself. It’s quiet. Even between Tomasz’s little snores, he can’t hear the van’s engine outside, at any distance. Regine and Tomasz have hidden themselves well here, he thinks. And now they’ve hidden him here with them, too.
His brain is still overloaded with unsorted memories, but for a fleeting moment, before the endless exhaustions of the day catch up with him, he realizes he feels almost safe.
58
He does not dream.
59
“Wake up, Mr. Seth,” Tomasz says, shaking him by the shoulder. “We have survived another night.”
Groggy, Seth opens his eyes to the dim glow just barely filtering in through the blankets that cover the windows.
“There is corn and chili again for breakfast,” Tomasz says. “I am sorry for this.”
Seth opens his mouth to answer –
But he stops.
Something is different.
Something has changed.
Something –
He sits bolt upright.
“Oh shit,” he says.
“What is it?” Tomasz says, alarmed.
“Oh no.”
“What?”
“It’s all there,” Seth says, looking up at Tomasz in amazement. “It’s all clear now. Falling asleep must have processed it or –”
He stops.
“What is happening now?” Tomasz says.
But what can Seth answer? What can he say? All the chaos is now making sense. What he’d forgotten –
Oh no.
He gets up, barely stopping to shove his feet into shoes before hurtling out of the bedroom and down the stairs.
“Wait!” Tomasz says, coming after him. “Where are you going?”
Seth grabs the chair lodged at the front door, but his first confused attempt only manages to stick it more tightly.
“What’s going on?” Regine says, coming in from the kitchen, holding a bowl of the horrible breakfast.
“He woke up and went all crazy,” Tomasz says.
“Again?”
“I didn’t dream,” Seth says, grappling with the chair.
“What?” Regine asks.
“I didn’t dream. I slept and I didn’t dream, not one memory, nothing.” He feels on the verge of panic now. “I woke up and everything was clear.”
The chair finally springs free under Seth’s hands and clatters into the sitting room. Seth pulls open the front door.
“Where are you going?” Regine cries, but he’s already out, already racing down the pavement, already running down the street.
Because he knows.
He remembers.
Even though this neighborhood is unfamiliar, his feet are guiding him. The large street they crossed last night is a landmark he is suddenly sure of. He runs from Regine’s house, not even listening for the van’s engine. He’s about three miles north of his own house, he thinks, and his mind is mapping out a path for him.
He knows where he’s going.
He knows.
“WAIT!” he hears, some distance behind him.
“I can’t,” he says, not nearly loud enough for them to hear. “I can’t.”
He keeps running, taking a corner with unhesitating certainty. The blocks start to fall away behind him, and he’s running effortlessly, fast, purposeful. Another corner. And another. The roads are edging downwards now, coming around in a direction that’ll take him behind the supermarket and out the other side of the small park where he saw the ducks.
“For Christ’s sake!” he hears behind him in gasped breaths.
He takes a quick glance to see Regine, pedaling away on a spare bike they must have had at the house, Tomasz clamped on behind her, his bandaged hands wrapped around her middle.
“You are running away from us!” Tomasz shouts with surprising anger. “Again!”
“I’m not,” Seth says, shaking his head, not stopping. “Please, I’m not.”
“What are you doing then?” Regine shouts.
“I remember,” he says. “I remember.”
“Then you’ll remember that we’re not exactly out of danger, are we?” Regine says, not able to keep up with how fast he’s going.
“I’m sorry,” Seth says, pulling away. “I have to, I’m sorry.”
He runs. It’s not even a feeling he can name. It’s some kind of compulsion, something making him go –
Something he can’t believe –
Something he won’t believe –
The road is angling down steeply now and he reaches the bottom of a hill, whispering, “No. No, no, no.”
He turns away from the direction of the duck pond, running up a low rise and down the other side. There are very rich houses here, behind massively overgrown hedges. The road is better too, with fewer weeds breaking through what was probably more expensive asphalt. He passes a kind of community center, then sees a church on a corner and he knows he’s near. He can hear Regine and Tomasz distantly behind him as he turns a last corner.
He slows to a stop in the middle of the road.
He’s here. He’s found it. All of a sudden, too soon. Like the short walk to the prison, this is a journey that feels as if it should have taken much longer.
But here he is.
“No,” he whispers again.
Regine and Tomasz pull up behind him. Regine is too out of breath to do much besides hunch over the handlebars, but Tomasz is already off the bike and yelling. “You cannot do this! You promised! You cannot –”