"But what do you believe?"
"I don't know. I don't even know if any of this is even real."
I placed my hands over my face in frustration. Was I losing it?
Suddenly his hands touched mines and pulled it away from my face.
"Throw reason out and just...
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Nine
Help Me, Help You
"Hey, are you still with me?" I asked, snapping my fingers at him.
He started rapidly blinking and moved back a little. He put his hands up to his head in excitement and beamed down at me.
"Fascinating." He gasped.
"Are you alright?"
"Yes, it's just I was collecting so many..."
"So many...?"
"Memories."
"So, do you remember that night?"
"No, only the memories of my life right up until the moment I first saw Annie with her parents. After that...nothing."
"So, who are...I mean were you?"
"Some things are a little hazy, but I know for sure I was born in New York City. I could see my mother. She was so beautiful. I remember her taking me to see the Towers. It had just been built and I was maybe three or four at the time. The design was awe-inspiring and my mother couldn't believe the architecture. I couldn't believe the architecture."
He was going to be in for a rude awakening when he found out about the Towers.
"My mother was a dancer, she taught mostly contemporary dance, but she aspired to be in a ballet company. She was still quite young enough to do it and my father was a car salesman. We were in a really bad car accident when I was around five or six. My father and I were fine and were lucky to only walk away with a few scratches, but my mother's legs were never the same. She could eventually walk again, but her career in dancing was ruined. She started taking pain killers."
His smile faded and he sat down on the bed beside me.
"She got really addicted to them. My father thought moving us out to Los Angeles would make her feel better and she could maybe get better treatment to wean her off the drugs but this only made things worse and he got worse. He had always been bad about money. Getting into dealings he shouldn't have..."
He trailed off.
"I'm sorry."
"Well it doesn't matter anymore. It's been thirty years. For all I know they could be long gone by now."
"Do you think maybe his dealings could have gotten dangerous? Like to the point where they would murder someone he loved?"
"It's a possibility but I wouldn't have let them kill her."
"You don't know what happened. It could be a possibility."
"We have to go back. I have to find out what actually happened."
He slid closer to me and I could feel a tingling sensation in the pit of my stomach and my body heating up. He moved so close that his lips were almost touching mines.
