“Something like that.”
“You staying up at the boarding house? Pretty nice folk up there, doubt they’d do anything to scare somebody. When we get storms, it’s no sweet Georgia rain. The snow comes in and it pounds us. Generators keep us alive; sometimes we go days without power. I doubt you have to deal with that down south.”
“The accent gives me away?” I paused before signing my name.
“It’s a beautiful accent.” He held up the receipt. “Nice to meet you, Lynn… Stanson.”
“What’s your name?”
“Joseph, but I go by Joe.” He reached out and shook my hand. “Please let me know if I can be any assistance to you.”
“The coffee helps a lot. Are you from here?”
“Wish I knew,” he grinned. “Now, don’t you start thinking I’m one of those old guys with Parkinson’s or dementia. I can tell you the names of the starting lineups in the bullpens for the Rockies since the early nineties and every song on Johnny Cash’s first album. But anything from my childhood or teenage years… nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Woke up in our little medical center on the edge of town with absolutely no idea who I was. Can you believe it? Memory never came back. I assume I was some messed-up kid. Maybe some drugs fried my brain, or I got into some hell of a bar fight. No one ever came looking for me, so I must not have been a real charmer. Anyhow, people in this town were really good to me, so I stuck around. Started stocking shelves here, got friendly with the owner, Mr. Climbers. When he got sick, he asked me to run the place till he got better. That was fifty years ago! So here I am. Just me and Moses.”
“Moses?”
Joe pointed out the side window at what appeared to be one of the largest pickup trucks in the world.
“That’s something else,” I said.
“Instead of parting the Red Sea, I part the snow. My other job is helping to clear the streets when the snow comes in. I’ll have a busy next couple of days, if what the radio says is true.”
“So,” I started hesitantly, “do you listen to the radio a lot? Aren’t there more accurate warnings on TV or online?”
“Spend about five minutes in Argentum and you’ll see we’re a bit behind the times. Internet service is for shit up here, and no company is going to invest in fiber lines for a small town with less than five hundred people. Plus, most folks here like living off the grid, it’s why they’re here. Our major news source is pretty much AM radio. We don’t even get the Denver TV stations.”
At least there’s one town in America that doesn’t think I’m insane, I thought.
“It’s been nice talking to you, Joe, but I really have to go.”
“You be careful Miss Lynn. You run into any problems, you know where to find me. Especially if you get stuck!”
I waved as I walked out.
“Jesus, did you give him your number?” Roxy said as I climbed in. “Give me that coffee and those Doritos, in that order. So, what did Mr. Handsome have to say?”
“I didn’t realize you were watching that closely through the window.”
“That’s a fine-looking man, Lynn, like you didn’t notice. I may be postmenopausal, but I’m not dead. Maybe he’s the one who left you the note.”
“I flat-out asked him.” I sipped at the coffee.
“Well, someone left her shyness back in Tennessee.”
“What are we going to do if we get snowed in?”
“We best get a move on and do whatever it is we’re going to do, and maybe drive back towards the interstate for a bit to try and get a signal to call Tom. Did Romeo in there have any suggestions as where to start?”
“Poor man, he doesn’t even know if he’s from here. He doesn’t remember—”
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” Roxy put down her coffee.
“He said he can’t remember anything from his childhood, had amnesia of some sort—”
“He really said that?”
“Yes. Why does that matter?”
“Because if you were eavesdropping properly last night, you would have heard young Sarah at the front desk say she doesn’t remember her last name. And she doesn’t remember where she’s from either. That’s why she freaked out when I demanded to know who owned the inn. She said she was afraid she’d lose her job if he found out, because who would hire a girl who didn’t even know her last name.”
Roxy placed her hand on my leg. “Lynn, my God. My God.”
“What?”
“You always thought that brain tumor caused you to lose your memory as a kid. You always said your first memory was waking up and not recognizing your father. You had to relearn everything. But your father’s letter stated you never had a brain tumor. What if, Lynn, you were just like them?”
I remembered Daddy’s words from his letter to Steven: I’ve always been plagued with guilt that she doesn’t know her own true story.
I felt hot all over, regretting the coffee. I tapped the power window to allow a crack, letting the icy air brush my face. Daddy had concocted the story. Faked the medical records. All to cover up the fact that his daughter had no memory and couldn’t explain why to anyone.
I lowered the window even more, taking several deep breaths, the air stinging my lungs.
“Lynn?”
“Let’s just drive.”
“I could be wrong. Let me turn down the heat—”
“I just need some more air. I promise to roll it up in a minute.”
We drove down the same few streets, seeing no one. Finally, we found one woman walking her corgi. She shook her head sadly at William’s picture. “He’s a handsome boy. A few of the kids play up at the old ball field around the corner; you might find someone there who has seen him.”
“You should have asked her if she knew her last name,” Roxy said as we drove away.
We arrived at the park and found it to be as deserted and neglected as the rest of the town. A tiny yellow bus was parked nearby, and a few kids ran and screamed on a weary-looking playground.
“Hang around here. I know you said Mr. Hot Stuff back at the store got all his news from crappy radio, and so far no one has recognized you or William, but let me take it from here. Looks like there are a few houses around the baseball diamond down there. I’ll look for signs of life. I’ll be right back.”
“I need to walk a bit. But I’ll stay close.”
We both exited the Suburban, and I watched as Roxy walked away. I huddled in my coat, wishing I had bought thicker gloves. I’d gone from hot to bitter cold quickly, and I shuffled along to keep up the circulation.
I brought out my phone to power it up. Maybe I could get cell reception out here. I needed to call Anne—
A laugh in the distance caused me to almost drop the phone.
Four boys on the other side of the park were playing a game of touch football. One of them had dropped his hat, exposing his red hair.
The boy turned around. For a split second, I saw his face.
William pulled his hat over his ears and laughed.
SIXTEEN
“William?”
I started at a jog, not daring to take my eyes off the boy chasing the others. “William! William!”
He was giggling, holding his sides at whatever joke someone had said. I had heard that laughter a hundred times before, at SpongeBob on television, when Chris tossed him over his shoulder, as Tom pretended to gnaw off his fingers when ice cream dripped on his little hands.
“William! Baby, it’s Nanna! William!” I was sobbing as I reached him. I grabbed the sides of his face, seeing replicas of Anne’s eyes, my own freckles on his cheeks, his dimpled chin.
“Oh, thank you God, thank you,” I pulled him close. “Oh baby….”