Page 44 of Memories of the Lost

“No,” he said. Rubbed her hand between his two. “Tell me.”

So between them, Jon and Tillie recounted all of it—the death certificate, the weird painting.

He listened with care and quiet. Tillie found herself wanting to lean into him, let him put his arms around her. Cry, maybe. Saying it all aloud, she felt the weight of it.

“Are you willing to play with questions a bit?” he asked.

She looked at Jon. He shrugged.

“Sure,” she said. “Why not?”

“Answer as fast as you can. Don’t think.”

She nodded.

“Who is the cat?”

“Sunny.”

“Who is Sunny?”

“My imaginary friend from childhood.”

“Was she a real person?”

“Maybe?”

“Why didn’t your mother tell you about this history?”

“She has something to hide.” A pinch twisted her heart. More quietly: “She has something to hide.” She took a breath. “How am I going to find out what it is?”

“We’ll figure it out,” Liam said, and drew a line encompassing the three of them.

“We got you,” Jon added. “Maybe you need to go back upstate and talk to some of her friends. See if anybody knows anything.”

“That’s a good idea.”

“I’ll go with. Tomorrow?” Jon said.

Tillie nodded.

“Tonight, you two do whatever. I’ve got plans.”

“You didn’t tell me that.”

He kissed her cheek. “You didn’t need to be alone. And now you aren’t. I’ll be by in the morning to pick you up. We can drive my car.”

He drove a ridiculously beautiful old-school MG, on which he had done all the work.

“Yum. I’ll love that.”

After Jon left, Tillie realized that all she really wanted to do was take Liam directly to her bed. It might have been avoidance of the hard things she faced, but maybe it was just that he cast a spell over her whenever he arrived. “How hungry are you?”

His smile was slow. “Depends on the menu.”

She wondered if she needed a shower after the long day at work, but he was already standing and taking her hand, and they stood by the bed in a bar of fading light and took off their clothes. She took her time, tracing the lines of poetry tattooed around his ribs, the tai chi symbol on his inner wrist. He kissed her throat and gently tugged her into the unmade tangle of the bed they’d only vacated this morning. They made love slowly and easily.

Lying together after, naked skin to naked skin, Liam rested a hand on her belly. “I have an idea if you want to try it, about your memory and all this.”