Bloody Souvenirs

Chapter 2

It was completely silent as I watched roads, parks, houses and even whole neighbourhoods whizz by from the passenger seat of Matt's car.

He was taking me home finally. To be honest, it felt good to be wearing something other than that stupid hospital gown, even if it's just skinny jeans and T-Shirt.

After spending 3 days in the hospital, which was mainly because they wanted to make sure the wound was properly healing, and running various tests like cognitive ability and all to determine and assess the damage to my brain, Dr. Whittaker had come to the result that the blow to the head had only damaged some part of my brain's frontal cortex. The part called hippocampus was intact, meaning that I shouldn't have any problem making new memories. It was just my past memories that had been wiped clean.

He also said that my memory might come back in small flashes or all at once, or it might never come back at all, that is, in an extremely rare case. But he also said that there is a fair chance of at least some part of my memory never coming back.

I sighed, the car still awkwardly silent as Matt kept his hands on the wheel and his eyes trained on the road. The tension in the air was so thick, you could practically cut it with a knife.

"It doesn't have to be so awkward, you know?" I finally said, not being able to bear the tense atmosphere a second longer. "If you're my brother, then it doesn't have to be so awkward between us."

He sighed and finally looked at me for a second, before returning his gaze to the road, "I know. I just didn't want to overwhelm you by making you feel everything at once. I wanted to give you time to open up again."

"Really?" I asked, "That was really thoughtful of you Matt, thank you. But I think I'm ready to-" I was in the middle of saying soemthing but he cut me off.

"I didn't want to force you, Katelyn. I didn't want to force you to feel comfortable with me when you clearly couldn't."

I scoffed. Me feeling uncomfortable? More like, he's feeling uncomfortable in my presence. But I decided not to say anything.

It fell silent again as Matt turned rounded a corner and turned into York Road. After driving for a couple more minutes, he finally entered the driveway of a house.

"This is where we live, Kat." Matt said with a smile as he got out of the car. "6023, York Road, Battersea."

It was set in a row of many other houses, which were all built differently from one another. From the outside, it looked like a modestly sized, bungalow kind of house, with a slight Victorian touch. Two storeys high, it was made mainly of brick and wood and painted an off white on the walls and pure wood brown on the slanting roof.

The house also had a small garden, but it was very unkempt and all the plants were dying of thirst and neglect. A large French window opened up into the garden from what seemed like the living room.

Taking the keys out of his pocket, Matt unlocked the front door and went inside, motioning me to to do the same.

The living room we entered was pretty spacious too. Some decorative pieces, a couch, a bean bag and a flat screen were the main pieces of furniture.

"I think a house tour is in order?" he joked and I smiled, relieved that the air wasn't as thick as it was a few minutes ago.

"Absolutely." I replied, "I don't want to be tripping around."

"Great." he smiled, "Follow me then."

I followed him into what seemed like the kitchen and into the drawing room, which even had a fireplace.