Anamnesis: A Novel (28 page)
Read Anamnesis: A Novel Online
Authors: Eloise J. Knapp
I wanted to hate Fearnley but even that
took too much effort. I was drained and depressed and couldn’t muster up the
energy to try and hunt him down or do much about it. I tried to get Olivia the
justice she deserved and failed. I failed at everything I did. It was in my
nature.
Donovan quickly discovered the men knew
nothing about how to get more Whiteout. He came by my apartment and sat on my
easy chair, his head dropped in his hands and spoke quietly. His father might
kill him for the stunt he pulled at the gala. He was going to move to Italy to
avoid his wrath. He hated himself for failing. No one would keep me in the game
anymore since I was so close to him. I should go to Oregon where his cousin
was. They’d help me out.
I was surprised he didn’t blame me. I was
the one who told him the men would tell him everything he needed to know. As it
turned out, Bolt and the Ravens said the mayor was the only one who knew
anything and he was dead from a bullet through the brain. Donovan hated Olivia,
not me. I did everything I could.
He told me he was sorry he couldn’t be
there for me anymore. He gave me a wad of cash and a shitload of drugs as a
parting gift, with regretful words on how sad he was he had to leave.
After that, time didn’t exist anymore. I
was in and out of consciousness, my body pumped with a cocktail of drugs and
booze that would intimidate the worse of the worst.
Some days I lay on my bed and saw Laurel
and Olivia smoking cigarettes on my apartment floor. They smiled and laughed. I
crawled to them and they were gone. Sometimes they stayed and told me I was a
fuckup.
I got jacked on cocaine and Adderall and used
a comb to vacuum my floor three times. When I finished my hands shook and I
couldn’t form a fist. I had basketball sized lumps of dirt and carpet fibers
stacked by the front door next to the library books I still hadn’t returned.
When I crashed from exhaustion I stared at
the mold on the ceiling and saw a riveting Shakespearean play that brought me
to tears. I shouted
Encore! Encore!
from my soiled mattress.
Eventually the drugs ran out and my binge
came to a hard, bitter end. I realized I should’ve saved some to sell. I used
all the money Donovan gave me to buy more, to keep the rampage going. Now I had
nothing.
I panhandled for a while. Or tried to. I
was going through withdrawal. Withdrawal for me meant frantic eyes, mumbling,
and lots of foul smelling sweat. I was the kind of person people crossed the
street to avoid, or pretended to make a call so they could feign distraction.
Penniless and months behind in rent, I got
kicked out of my apartment. I knew it was coming and left before the landlord
could make me clean up the place. Packed my duffel bag with all the clothes I
owned. The easy chair and coffee machine had to stay. Maybe the next owner
would love them as much as I did.
I went to Lucya’s first, hoping Artur
would convince her to show mercy. No luck. Both had been good friends of
Chuck’s. Accident or not, I murdered their buddy. There was no place for me
there. A few people under the overpass took pity on me and helped me for a
while. Of course, they didn’t spare any of their own drugs for me, but they
gave me food. Let me sleep in their tents when they weren’t using them. I’d
been through hints of withdrawal before, but this was real. My body punished me
for what I’d done to it.
For weeks I kept checking the library and
TVs every day, waiting for Fearnley. Hoping he hadn’t given up. Hoping he would
do what was right.
And finally, he did.
4 Months Later
That’s not what my happy ending looked
like because this is real fucking life. My happy ending was misty and cold
because Portland weather was almost the same as Seattle. Mine was made up of
the same things as before, because the people there might be stranger but were
still just as willing to buy drugs. A good apartment still cost more than I
could afford and the endless self-help knowledge I’d accumulated could never
dissolve the trauma that held me back.
At least, not completely.
My shitty apartment wasn’t as bad as the
one in Seattle. The walls weren’t moldy and I got a corner unit, making the
place quiet. There was a donut shop downstairs and every morning I was graced
with the delicious smell of carbs, sugar, and fat. At night I got the donuts
that were going to be thrown out. I still dealt drugs for the Melnikov family,
but hundreds of miles away from the scene of my misery. I had no education, no
skills, and my blood was still primarily made of nicotine.
But I hadn’t done a single drug since I
came down off the binge. Since it all ended and I moved, my nightmares weren’t
as frequent. Not all my income came from drugs; I worked security at one of the
Melnikov strip clubs downtown. And I had my own damn computer, sitting neat and
pretty on a desk. It was one of five nice things I owned and I spent a lot of
time on it.
For a while after Olivia died, thoughts of
Skid came with guilt. I let my remorse and mourning take its course, and over
time I let myself acknowledge Skid would’ve been proud of what I accomplished
with my new life.
I scrolled through another article, this one
on CNN since the story of the ‘Ward Sex Club’ scandal hit it big. The title
didn’t do the horror justice. It made it petty when it was anything but. Two
girls had come forward claiming the mayor sexually assaulted them and paid them
off not to say anything. There were dozens of these stories between the mayor
and his friends; some were proven legitimate while others remained only claims.
More articles had popped up over the
months about people who played small roles in the operation. Lincoln Johnston
had numerous officers on his payroll. He had unauthorized taps on dozens of
girl’s phones, which he and his buddies used to monitor them. The Mayor had
ties to a coroner’s office and doctors to forge death certificates. The network
of people involved in the Whiteout ring was bigger than I thought. The public
was shocked at how deep it went. Olivia and I had already known; we just didn’t
have exact names.
Fearnley’s confession and evidence was
kept under wraps for months. It wasn’t that he’d bailed; the accusations were
so severe it took longer to make things public. I know because I visited
Fearnley shortly after the news aired. He was on house arrest in Seattle until
trials began. He gave me his fancy tea and bitter healthy cookies and gave me
every last detail.
He also gave me the name of the cemetery my
parents were buried in. Both died in a car accident two years earlier. He gave
me Sarah’s last name. He apologized again for what he’d done and offered me
help in any way he could. I thanked him and meant it. I also asked for one of
his sculptures to sell on eBay since they were going for fifty grand a pop now
that he was famous from being involved in a high profile case. I guess you
could make a living off art.
News coverage went from portraying Olivia
as a deceitful bitch to a true hearted vigilante. Yeah, she murdered Lewis Ward.
Who wouldn’t considering her circumstances?
It wasn’t for me to decide if what I did
gave Olivia the justice she deserved, but that didn’t stop me from hoping it
was what she would’ve wanted. All the men were dead, their evil exposed, and
the reputation of the girls involved was upheld.
I closed the articles I’d been reading and
put the computer to sleep. In a few hours I was due at the club.
I went to the kitchen and started brewing
a pot of coffee on my newer, better machine. A box of the previous night’s
stale donuts were piled high in a pink cardboard box beside it. I grabbed a
bacon maple bar and ate it as I leaned on the counter watching my coffee drip
into the pot.
It took a while to get used to the idea I
was just a victim in a drug study gone wrong. There wasn’t a grand plot against
me. I wasn’t the center of the universe. Making myself and everyone around me
suffer wasn’t going to fix anything. Wanting to fill in the blank spots in my
memory wouldn’t, either.
If I really wanted to say fuck you, I had
to control my life.
The thought came so clearly that it
startled me. My gaze fell on the photo on the fridge. Beneath it was her phone
number. I hadn’t moved to Portland because I wanted to. The job offer had
something to do with it, but it was because I’d found her after months of
searching. I thought moving there would help me build up courage. I hoped one
day I would run into her. It had been two months and I hadn’t.
Everyone has to live and die for
something. You decide what that something is.
I swallowed the bite of donut and washed
my mouth out with a gulp of water from the faucet. Cracked my neck and rolled
my shoulders. I got my cell out and typed the number in, hitting send while I
still had it in me to do it.
It rang.
It rang.
“Hello?”
“Sarah?”
“Oh god.” Her voice was meek, shocked.
“Will? Is that you?”
I took a deep breath. I wasn’t Ethan
anymore. I was whoever I chose to be.
“Yes,” I said. “It’s me.”
Thank you so much for reading! I hope you
enjoyed this tale of identity, corruption, and retribution. If you have a
moment to spare, please leave a review. Not only will you help other people see
if they want to read the book, but also have my humble gratitude. Your review
helps and inspires me to continue writing better books.
Huge thank you to all the people who
supported me and encouraged me to pursue Anamnesis even though it was outside
of my usual genre, especially the handful of beta readers who gave this book a
shot.
Thank you to Jonathan Lambert, who has
been one of the most amazing readers, fans, editors, writers, and friends I
could ask for.
To all my fans who made it this far,
thank
you
. I cannot do this without you.
Eloise J.
Knapp hails from Seattle and never complains about the rain. She is a graphic
designer by day and author by night. Knapp's work includes The Undead Situation
trilogy and Anisakis Nova series. When not writing you'll find her hiking the
Pacific Northwest.
Feel free to
contact her at
[email protected]
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Anisakis Nova
Series
The Undead Series
(Permuted Press)