Piece By Piece ~ Snippet 5

Lana

"Well, Viren is true to their word." I sigh, watching as they bounce their way across every bed in the mattress section. "It is their, right?" I whisper to Savannah. 

She smiles. "Yeah, to my knowledge anyway. Not that any of us remembers much." 

"True." I bite my thumbnail. "My mind feels empty." 

Elise turns to me. "Really? I mean, who would ever peg you for an airhead?" 

My eyes narrow. "Hey. If I'm an airhead, so are you. You can't remember anything either." She giggles behind an upraised hand and Savannah laughs behind me. Aiden shakes his head, clearly trying not to join in. 

Unconcerned with our mild squabbling, Danger walks over to one of the beds, stepping in the way of Viren's path. "Hey, kid, are you done? I want to get some shut eye." 

"Kay." Viren settles on the bed, bouncing to a halt. 

Danger looks down at them. "You only get one bed for the night, so are you staying here?" Viren nods."Fine." Danger walks over to the next one and sets his bag down next to it before flopping his long frame down onto the bed. "I'm sleeping next to you, so don't be loud." Viren shrugs and falls down onto his back. 

The rest of us spread out among the nearby mattresses. There are more than six available, but we choose the four closest to Danger and Viren's chosen places. 

Aiden sits on his bed cross legged, facing in towards the rest of us. "Hey, should one of us stay up, in case there's something out there?" 

Savannah leans towards him. "Why? Are you scared?" 

"No." He leans back, even though she's still on her own bed. "I was just going to offer, that's all." 

"If anyone's going to stay up, it should be Viren." Danger mumbles, face down in a pillow. "Kid's full of energy." 

"Do you think we need someone to watch for us?" Elise asks, looking over towards Danger. After a moment he doesn't respond. 

"Is he asleep?" I wonder. 

Savannah shrugs. "He's been busy thinking for the rest of us. Can't really fault him for crashing like that." 

"You've got a point." Elise nods. "Alright, I'm going to sleep." She turns over on her side. 

"Me too." Savannah stretches before laying down. 

"But guys, what did we decide?" Aiden looks between the other two girls, Viren, and me. 

I shrug, but Savannah answers. "I'd say don't worry about it. Clearly Danger isn't." 

Aiden still looks uncertain. "I don't know guys. What if something is out there?" 

Elise replies this time. "It hasn't found us yet, and we need rest so that we'll be able to run away when it does." 

"Real reassuring." Aiden sighs. "Thanks, Elise." 

Savannah laughs. "Go to bed, fraidy cat." 

Aiden shakes his head and grumbles. "Whatever." He rolls over grumpily. 

"Don't worry, Aiden," Viren adds. "I'll probably be awake for a bit. Danger wasn't wrong about my energy." 

"Shhh!" The girls shush Viren quickly. 

"Okay, fine!" Viren throws up their hands in surrender. 

After the brief outburst, the store settles into an eerie silence. I look towards the large window I chose to be nearest too. A golden yellow light pours in from the outside lamp, illuminating my bed. Most of the others are turned from the light in order to sleep, but I sit propped up against the headboard of my bed. I set aside my new survival pack, and pull my dingy shoulder bag up onto my lap. 

I start to pull items from my bag and lay them out beside me, hunting for useful items to transfer into the backpack. I'm also hoping that maybe I'll find some of my memories buried in the depths of the satchel. I grab out a myriad of pens and pencils, along with the notebook I'd found previously. I pause with my hand on that notebook for a moment. When Danger and the others first rescued me, for a moment, I remembered my bag. I hunted for this notebook, and then, I wasn't sure why. 

My fingers trail across the light blue cover, and flip it open. The initials L.L. are written in my handwriting on the inside corner. The first page has a simple grocery list. That much, at least, I can determine without my memories. Turning the page, I see an intricate drawing of a bird. My thumb brushes across the pen lines as though the picture might suddenly come to life and fly from the page. 

Come on Lana, remember. Remember this bird. Remember why you drew it, when you drew it. Remember something, anything. I sigh when my mind remains blank. It's okay; maybe I'll remember something from the next page. I lift up the paper, but my hand hesitates. 

"What are you waiting for?" Viren asks from beside me. 

"Aah! Viren!" They put a finger to their lips, trying to calm me. I switch to whispering. "What are you doing here?" 

Viren shrugs. "I was bored over there. Are you surprised by how quiet I could be?" I nod, my heart still racing from its recent shock. "That's okay, so was I." They look back to my notebook. "Why'd you pause?" 

I exhale. "I'm trying to recover some of my memories. I thought, since I had so much written and drawn in here, that it might stir something up. But so far, I don't recognize a thing. I don't even know what my last initial stands for." 

Viren shrugs. "I guess, all you can do is keep trying. Keep looking through that book of yours. Not just tonight, but every night, if you want to reclaim your memories. Maybe eventually something will come back to you. Maybe it won't, but tonight's the first night, so it seems a little early to give up." 

I look at Viren, seeing something other than the kid full of energy. I flip to the next page. It's another shopping list. I laugh. "Well, I don't remember this, but somehow I'm not really concerned by that. I doubt it was that important." 

"Hey, what else have you got in here?" Viren starts to dig through my bag. 

"Hey!" I snatch it back. Then I peer inside. "Huh. It's just a bunch of junk." Errant napkins, paper, and gum wrappers fill the bottom of the bag. 

"Lana," Viren starts, and I turn. "Feel better?"

I nod. "I do, thanks."

Viren smiles. "Get some sleep." 

"Okay," I agree. "You too." 

- Hi everyone. Sorry, I'm running behind again. I will try to be better in the future. For now, enjoy this week's snippet, and I'll see you next week.