The Soulless

Chapter Four. Secrets from a past life

The artificial lights seeped through every corner of the large mall. There were people everywhere, coming to enjoy a relaxing night at the movies or a Friday night shopping and the place would feel almost crowded if not for the large space and the cheerful chatter and music that surrounded everything. I felt excited for the first time since forever being here and not alone and trapped in my mind for a change. It was my first time outside the small town since I left the hospital, and right now everything felt new and amusing. I could hear laughter from so many directions around me, I smelled caramel popcorn and different colognes and the faint aroma of a chill early summer evening, that made me filled with excitement - everything was full of colour and soul. I devoured it all like a small kid and enjoyed every glance in my direction, which surprisingly were a lot. I liked to think it was more because I looked at least half-decent, and not because I felt like an actual fraud.

Carl’s friends had accepted me as one of their own. I couldn’t remember all their names, but I definitely liked the way they communicated with each other as if they were content and relaxed, and just glad to be together, talking about nothing in particular. It was nice to be amongst people my age, it kind of made me feel like myself, whatever the hell it meant. My only problem was Heidi, the other girl in the group besides me. I guessed she had a thing for Carl and for some reason she saw a threat in me, resulting in her bitching in my direction at any opportunity given. I tried talking to her several times and explaining, not that I was supposed to give her any answers, but she just didn’t give up shooting me with comebacks and looking at me like she didn’t like me. It was kind of stupid, in my eyes there was a place only for one other man, and Carl was just a buddy.

It was about a week later since that moment in the wilderness when the memory came back like a bullet from a rusted gun. It crawled at me at night when I was just about to fall asleep, it haunted me in my dreams and made me wake up covered in sweat and breathing heavily, heart frozen in my chest. I had no idea how it was possible, but it was a fact that a single memory, one that I couldn’t recognize out of the context of this only moment in the desert with Adan, but it was starting to consume my entire being and I didn’t like it one bit. I walked around the house like a ghost, sudden pain for a person I didn’t know slicing me when I was not extremely cautious at avoiding the thought of him. It turned out to be a hard week like this - a week after which I had finally decided that I couldn’t let this only glimpse of a past I didn’t recognize define me, or in time it would become the death of me.

Starting fresh however, is not always as great as it seems. Some people believe it means changing your address, your occupation, your boyfriend. There are hardly many who restart their entire existence from scratch. But when at twenty you turn up completely alone, without a single memory (or as in my case with the only one memory you should forget), it is normal to feel lost. You don’t have any idea what to do with your life and you spend every day wondering when fate will strike again and your past will catch up on you. You have only two choices then. You either succumb to your desperation, waiting for somebody to take your decisions, or you get your s**t together and you truly start anew.

I didn’t know what type of girl I was before, but somehow I was convinced that today I wouldn’t be the i***t who waited for other people, even fate herself, to direct their future. And if I had to judge by my single memory, by this only one moment in place and time that I did remember, I had to conclude that I was not someone who gave up easily. After all, I was the one who had commanded Adan to hurt me and I did it with such a determination that I didn’t leave him any choice… and now I suffered the consequences.

I missed him. I felt a longing that never left me even when I fooled myself I was well enough to make plans for the future. So, when Carl proposed that I joined him today, I accepted without hesitation – I needed the distraction even only for the reason not to be forced to spend the whole day fighting my endless inner battles with my new me and the blinding sparks of my invisible future.

I did try to clarify things with Heidi again – I had to spend the night in her room and it wouldn’t be the nicest experience if we remained enemies. Or whatever she believed we were. I started talking, commenting on some stupid scene from the movie we just saw, but she looked at me with an expression that screamed “is she insane or what?” and barely replied. She then passed by me as if I were some broken road sign and went straight outside.

“What the f**k is your problem?” I murmured, loud enough for her to hear, I sure as hell wouldn’t leave her stomp on me, whatever the reason. If she enjoyed her pointless pouting, the problem was hers, not mine, and I wouldn’t let her spoil my good mood. I was not here for her and Carl was now waiting for me at the stairs, clueless for my little fight with his to be girlfriend. I smiled and waited for him at the main entrance of the mall. The rest of the guys were already out.

Then I saw him. Usually, I wouldn’t even notice him, or look in his direction – he was supposed to be just some guy in a sea of people, crowding the mall. Maybe I would miss him, but he stared at me with such intent as if he was trying to hypnotize me. He was just standing there among the crowd and his eyes gleamed with the greatest amusement, confusion, even anger – all of it at the same time focused on me. His stare was so deep and compelling, that I trembled. It was not supposed to be normal for a fifteen-year-old kid to look at people like this. I had no idea why, but it frightened me, making the hairs of my neck stand with horror.

I saw him approaching, his walk gracious and confident as if he was some middle-aged royalty and not a kid. His height is completely normal for his age, I thought like a fool. Everything in him seemed kind of normal for his teens. Everything, but his eyes. These were eyes to hide an old soul – they seemed wise and mature, even wild; dark, hooded eyes, completely contrasting with his blond hair and pale skin.

“What is this?” He asked when he was close enough with a low hoarse voice as if barely contained his rage inside, as he couldn’t believe others dared to exist.

I blinked, surprised again by the way he was talking. His tone sounded completely uncharacteristic for a kid – proud, collected, hiding meanings I couldn’t quite catch. And what kind of a question was that? I turned around, looking for the person he could be talking to, because, why would he even mean me? “Are you talking to me?”

Curiosity sparkled in his deep eyes. Why didn’t he act like a child, even the amusement seemed sarcastic and well calculated? “Who are you?”

“And who are you?” I shot back, angry at myself for falling for the dumb jokes of some kid at the mall.

“I asked first.” He insisted.

I rolled my eyes, annoyed. “None of your business. Piss off.”

“What are you doing here?”

I glanced at Carl who was quickly approaching, now that he noticed I was being harassed. “What do you care? You’d better piss off, or my brother will kick your but!”

“Is he really your brother?”

“You got a problem?” Carl asked, finally here. He looked down on the kid, taking full advantage of his height. “What’ya staring at?”

“I just want to know who she is. I don’t see a problem with that.”

Carl growled. “If you spot somebody staring like that at your sister, you’d see the problem alright. Let’s go already, I don’t see why you are wasting time with this hobbit here!”

And we were gone, leaving the kid staring after us with such deep intent that I felt I had to take a double shower tonight just to clean myself from that look of his.

We spent the rest of the night at some bar near the dorm, where we played pool and drank gallons of beer. We shared funny stories, well, the rest did and I was just happy to be included, we laughed and sometime later even Heidi let her stiffness drop. I knew I should be enjoying my evening, and I did, but the feeling that I was being watched didn’t leave me for even one moment. It was as if the black eyes of that kid had somehow followed me, demanding answers I didn’t have.

Yes, I thought when I stole some time alone near the jukebox, listening to an old rock ballad, that kid’s questions did scare me. I couldn’t answer them even for a million dollars and it was unsettling to know it. This and the amount of beer I drunk was surely the only thing that made me jumpy. It turned out I couldn’t handle my alcohol. And somehow, I finally knew a bit more about good old Theresa – she was not a good drinker.

Carl noticed I was laughing alone and sat next to me. “What’s up?”

I smiled widely, a bit absent, but I didn’t care, when I blurted out: “I think I am drunk.”

Carl shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, as if he didn’t care, just like a big brother would. “Well, you can’t give up. We need another one to team up for the next game, Heidi got mad again, so…”

“I think she is into you.” I blurted out.

“What? No way.” He laughed too quickly for someone who was considering it for the first time. If I didn’t feel so dizzy, I would definitely take better notice of the way he blushed and tease him for it. “You are horrible when you are drunk.”

“Yeah, cause you are fresh and rising. If Abbey sees you like this…”

“If she sees you…”

We both laughed like idiots, while Heidi was still mad somewhere behind us (I had noticed her pouting before). And just like he was smiling with me at one minute, the next Carl froze. I got quiet too, trying to trace his gaze.

And there he was. The teenage guy from earlier. He stared at us with such intent that I felt chills running down my spine and instinctively lowered myself on my seat. The guy seemed as if he had heard everything we were talking about, and he was now trying to figure out whether we were honest or not. A second later the boy noticed us staring back and walked towards us like it was the most normal thing in the world for a kid to strut around bars.

“Isn’t it like illegal for babies inside?” Carl asked and slowly stood up from his chair.

“Drop it, Carl, he is not worth it,” I told him and tried to turn my back on the boy, but the kid had already reached us and now he grabbed my arm and kept me in place with such a strength that I couldn’t move. He squeezed me exactly at the spot where just two weeks ago I had a bite wound – the same spot which now didn’t have even a scar. Weird, I suddenly got worried for the lack of any scar from such a wound, but not because of the coldness the kid’s touch brought.

“Just answer me.” He said with his un-childlike voice, making chills run down my spine. “I promise I won’t bother you after that. I still want you to be happy.”

He looked me directly in the eyes like he could reach to my soul like this. He wanted me happy? Who the hell was this i***t? I shivered again with the realization that struck me when I returned his gaze – no one wishes happiness to strangers out of the blue. So, he had to know me from somewhere, I just was sure. Why else would he follow me? At some point in our lives, we had met. He knew Theresa. For a minute I didn’t even know what scared me more – the fact that it was possible I would never remember, or from the truth hidden behind these memories. I just somehow felt it was too early for me to know. How f****d up was that?

Without noticing my internal fight, or turning a blind eye to it, the boy nodded, tilting his head a little to the side, as if he were inspecting me. “How did you do it?”

“How did I do what?” I asked him blankly. For some reason, I knew that whatever was happening between us, it was no joke. Suddenly, all the intoxication left my brain.

“How did you come here?”

“No,” I insisted, “you first. Do you know me? You talk to me like we have met before. Have we met before, little kid?”

“I am not sure.”

“Fair enough,” I murmured, realizing how plausible it was right now for me to find Theresa. And it made me scared beyond comprehension that right now, at this moment I didn’t want to know anything about her. Whoever she was. “So you ask how I got here in the bar.”

“No. I ask how you got here among these people.”

I blinked with indifference and shrugged my shoulders, trying to suppress the little voice inside of my head not to do it. “Well, they are my brother’s buddies, the big guy over here.” I pointed towards Carl, who stood at the edge of his seat, menace pouring off of him, his gaze shooting darts towards the kid. He looked as if he were ready to snap him in half just for touching me. “They asked me to join, I agreed.”

“Fair enough.” The kid mocked me. His dead eyes still bore into mine. “They are really a part of your family? Then why is the girl looking at you with such malice?”

I snorted at his choice of words. “Well, we don’t like each other much. But I won’t tell you why because it is none of your business.”

The kid finally blinked with what seemed a lot like relief. He finally let go of my arm and turned to leave. “Thank you.”

I didn’t mind him being gone. If someone like him were a part of my past, I wasn’t sure if I needed such a creepy past. I preferred being here with my brother and his friends who I believed were my friends too. I didn’t need Alex or either of these people who didn’t even care to look for me. Adan, Adan, Adan – a small voice pulsed in my head, but I was quick to silence it. I knew I wouldn’t regret telling the little guy the truth. I was Terry now and it was time I started taking my life into course. I wouldn’t allow Theresa’s ghost to ruin my future anymore, or take away the family I was beginning to choose.

“Hey!” I called the kid who was just reaching the exit. “You didn’t tell me your name.”

He smiled at me, his thin lips curving in the ends, and tilted his head again in my direction, but not turning, “You never asked me.”