Lost & Found

Five

"Isn't this risky?" As he wakes up again, the sound of Antonio whispering from the other side of the room is the first thing he hears.

Then Curtis's voice can be heard beside Antonio, but he was so much quieter. "You know keeping him here is much riskier."

"C'mon, you and I both know he got a pretty bad blow to the head, he thinks it's 1999 for Pete's sake." Antonio reasons, the subtle sound of a sigh echoing throughout the room.

"Well you and I both know that the damage was supposed to be more severe," Curtis begins before turning his head to see him waking up in the bed, "Dustin! You're awake."

Dustin looks around the room with a puzzled look, sitting up in bed a little more. "Yeah, what's going on?"

Curtis pauses before shrugging it off. "How long have you been awake?" He asks, the desperation in his voice.

He just shakes his head. "Like two seconds." He says with a small laugh, before repeating his previous question.

Before a beat can pass on the clock, Curtis replies again. "You're being discharged, isn't that great?"

A pause goes through the room before he speaks up again, furrowing his eyebrows. "I guess, but I thought they'd wanna keep me a bit longer to check."

Antonio nods along in the back of the room. "Yeah, that's what I thought too, but I was wrong."

Curtis smiles to the man in the bed before grabbing a plastic see-through bag from beside the hospital bed and throwing it into his hands.

Dustin looks at the bag with furrowed eyebrows again before up to the two men in the room with him. "What's this?"

"Your personal stuff," Curtis replies, the impatient coming out in his voice as he walks toward the door, "You didn't have a lot on you, just your wedding ring, you left everything else at home before the accident."

"I'm married?" He asks, widening his eyes and sitting forward with a small smile on his face.

Antonio sighs. "You were, but she died."

His face drops back down again. "When?"

Curtis speaks up again, the impatience much clearer as he puts his hand on the doorknob. "Two years ago," he replies harshly before staring at the man in the bed, "Now, get dressed, we're going in five minutes."

Once they had left the hospital, they quickly got into a van and took off on to the road. All three men stayed quiet the entire drive, only Curtis and Antonio leaning in to speak to each other every few minutes very quietly.

It took them an hour and a half before the van parked up in front of an old barn-looking building.

As they stepped out of the vehicle, Antonio smiled widely and pointed up to the building. "Welcome home, Dustin!" He shouts out before being scowled by Curtis, who was up by the front door signaling for the two of them to enter the barn. "You recognize it?" Antonio asks as they approached and entered the building.

He looked around the first room they entered before shaking his head slightly. "No, not really."

Curtis smiles, for the first time since they had left the hospital. "Well, that just because we've changed around the decor a lot since 1999. Starting tomorrow we're gonna work on getting your memories back, we're gonna go all over the place and see if any areas spark anything back to you, okay?" The older man asks.

He nods and smiles subtly. "Yeah."

Antonio slaps him on the back before telling him to follow along. "I'm gonna show you to your room, as I take it you won't remember it."

He's taken on a small tour around the barn before they reach the second floor. "Your room used to be down the hall but dad changed it to make it into his office for work, your room is now right here," Antonio says before opening the door directly at the top of the stairs.

The room is somewhat clean, but it looks as though it was made together very quickly. The bed seemed to be at an angle and the only other thing in the room was a dresser sat against the wall behind the door. What he presumed is his wallet is sat on the top of the dresser, with what he presumed is his phone sat beside it.

"I'll let you get settled in." Antonio says before nudging him in the room and shutting the door behind him.

The room was quite small so he doesn't have to throw far to get the bag he was thrown at by Curtis in the hospital on the bed.

He looks to the wallet before opening it up. He checked the license inside and sees it was no longer valid - and that it hadn't been for a month. He guesses that's why his friend was taking him around in their car. When he sees the name printed in the license it definitely says Dustin Garner.

"That just proves it then." He mutters to himself before throwing the wallet down again on the dresser before going over and sitting in the bed, it creaking under his weight.

There was just a small part of him that thought maybe he wasn't who they said he was, but as he thinks about it again he knows how stupid he sounds. They're his dad and brother for god's sake, why would he think otherwise?

Downstairs, Antonio joins Curtis in the kitchen as Curtis was making something in the stove.

"Are you stupid?!" Antonio quickly breaks the silence quietly as not to be heard upstairs.

Curtis turns around quickly and glares at his son. "Excuse me?" He asks.

"Are we seriously gonna help him get his memories back? He's gonna know what we did!"

Curtis shushes him quiet before shaking his head. "No, we're not gonna help him. We're just gonna get him further away from where he comes from so the cops get thrown off. We'll take him places they won't know where to find him. Then we'll go someplace really obvious and we'll finish the job we started. This time though, he won't have amnesia and think it's 1999 and the cops will find his dead body."

Antonio nods but before he can say anything, Curtis speaks up again.

"But now, we've just gotta keep up with this reality and keep him believing we're his family."

Antonio nods again. "Okay... don't scare the shit out of me again like that okay?"

Curtis apologizes quietly. "Sorry, won't happen again."