Reminiscence

Chapter .14.

"Who are you and what are you doing in my house?" He asked, his tone was angry but also had sincere curiosity and alarm ringing through it.
Also, he sounded weirded out. I don't blame him though.

No. It can't be. Has he forgotten me? No way. It's been just eight years, and we were so close, you can't just forget a person like that.

Right?

I step forward and he tenses, ready to defend himself like a cornered animal.
"You don't remember me?" I say, cautiously. "At all?"

He doesn't relax even a little. His posture says it all. Stranger. Danger.
"No! What are you doing in my house?" He asks, getting agitated now.

I'm treading on thin ice. And here I thought we would have a beautiful sappy reunion with birds chirping in the background. "My name is Renesse, your best friend, before you dissapeared remember?" My voice leaking with disbelief. He's got to be shitting me.

He stands up suddenly without warning, and I flinch and reach for my taser on instinct. He walks up to where I was standing near the bed and his eyes travel over every inch of my face.

He doesn't tower over me, he just has a couple inches on me since I'm 6'2. Being on the Basketball team helped a bit. The rest was just genes. He must be 6'5 approximately, atleast.
Why are you measuring his body anatomy?
Back to the point. Ah yes, the face scanning. His eyes are weird, now that I've seen them up close. They've changed colour slightly but the difference is shocking. What once used to be a warm light brown, was now a pale hazel, the wisps of green and brown swirling together sharply. I used to think his eyes were beautiful. Now, they are just unrecognisable. Just another pair of eyes that aren't embedded in my mind.

He flinches suddenly, and sits back down on the bed. I carefully dip down on the bed as well, leaving a respectable gap between us. "What's wrong? Is it the concussion?" I ask, my hand reaching forward tentatively.

He looks over at me. "How do you know? You a stalker or something? I have enough problems without people following me around, thank you very much." he huffs indignantly, and brings his long fingers up to massage his forehead.

I withdraw my hand, not knowing what to say to that. I guess I was a stalker, considering all the investigation and stuff. "I guess you could call me a stalker, but we actually have a history, which gave me a reason to stalk- I mean investigate on you. I swear I'm not the stalker type. Although stalking celebrities doesn't count right? Because Shawn Mendes is fucking hot. I can't not stalk his Instagram." I shrug. Is it even called stalking when it comes to celebrities?

His eyes widen slightly, but he relaxes a little. "We..we had a history?" His eyes hold curiosity but are still alert.

I sigh. He really doesn't remember. "Yeah, we did. A beautiful history. A history of being there for each other and causing each other pain, in the end." My voice is wistful, hopeful that he might remember. I unzip my backpack and take out the memory box. Yeah, I had brought it along. Then suddenly my hand freezes.

If he doesn't remember who I was then who texted me?

I have to make him remember. I could be in danger. He could be in danger. I take out the box and set it in front on him.
His eyebrows tug together in confusion at the rusty, worn out box. "What is this?" He asks, looking up at me.

I push it forward. "Open it."
He looks even more confused and reaches out to the handle slowly. Lifting the lid open, his eyes widen and his face looks pained. Not normal pained. Stubbing-your-toe-on-the-table kind of pained.
He takes out some of the photos and traces them with his fingertips gently. He looks up at me, his eyes brimming.

Woah. Was he crying? Wasn't I supposed to be doing that right now considering the circumstances?
He looked like he genuinely wanted to remember. He was on the edge. I was on the tip of his tongue. But he couldn't.
It's like the face you make when you're about to sneeze but it just never comes.
That shit sucks.

The tears fall from his eyes and he brushes them away.

"I can't remember my own mother, Renesse. How do I remember you?"