Invincible

Chapter Two

It's been two days now. Brad has been working his butt off trying to find out information about me. I knew myself that nothing would come of this. I mean, he kept calling the police and every other authority using my real name, for Christ's sake! But it wasn't like I was complaining. He was determined, and wasn't going to stop until he found my family. Whoever they were.

During those days, he's been buying me clothes, cooking me breakfast in the morning, always checking up on me to see if I was okay. I was beginning to feel very grateful of him. He didn't have to do all this. He could've left me wherever he found me and that would have been it. But he didn't. And I respected that.

I didn't sleep on the couch like I'd expected. Instead I slept upstairs with Brad in one of the two bedrooms.

I remember the first night I saw it...

"...And you can sleep in here," said Brad, after giving me a full tour of the house.

I noticed the light green walls first, then the wooden floor. It was cold, but then I laugh. What was I going to expect walking around with bare feet? I looked back up and noticed the bed, then the desk that held an outdated computer, and besides that, a window with purple curtains.

This confused me. The house seemed fairly vacant, and judging from these last few days, no else seemed to be living here. I was curious to know why the room was, well...this room.

"Whose room is this?" I asked.

He didn't face me, his body petrified as he looked around the room. "It...it was my daughter's," he stammered, his cheerful tone shifting into a faint whisper.

Of course. The little girl and woman in the picture. The one I saw in the living room when I'd first woken up. That must've been her.

I tried my best to resist asking him my next question, since I already had a feeling I knew the answer, but judging from my current state of mind, I didn't want to go off misconceived. So I decided to ask.

"Where is she?"

"She's...dead."

So I was right. She was dead. I wanted to congratulate myself for finally getting something right, but I didn't want to be happy for something as wrong as predicting a little girl's death.

"I'm sorry," I said.

"It's okay," he said.

"If you don't mind me asking, how did it happen?"

His eyes pierced the bed, his face now full of emotion. He then closed them as he sighs, lifting his head toward the ceiling. He remains like this for a few seconds until finally he lowers his head, and begins to talk.

"She and my wife, Sara, were driving home one night from the store. I told them I would go, but they wouldn't listen. They always wore a seatbelt."

He laughed for a moment, and as his face returns to seriousness and he continues to speak, his voice now barely audible, I begin to notice his eyes turning red.

"They stopped at the light for a few minutes. It finally turned green and they went ahead. A man in the other lane was driving home, just leaving from the bar. He thought that the light was green, then realized he was wrong, and tried to hit the brake at the last minute, but..."

Tears started to spring from his eyes. He put his hands to his face and started whimpering.

"Brad," I said, my voice calm with sympathy. "I don't have to sleep in here if you don't want me to. I'll be just fine on the couch-"

"No," he said between his tears. "It's fine. You can't sleep on that thing. You can sleep here. I want you to. It's fine. "

Brad sighed as he wiped away his tears. There were no words I could say to comfort him. Just looking at him like that almost made me want to cry. As a matter of fact, I was starting to feel them building up.

After he found his attempts to stop crying futile, he finally murmured a soft "I'm sorry," and quickly exited the room, going into his, and shutting the door behind him.

Later on, he eventually tried to forget about what happened, completely ignoring the event, and to be honest, I was trying my best not to think about it either.

Other than Brad's emotional breakdown, another big event had also occurred. I was beginning to regain more of my memory. I could read, I could write, I knew certain details and memories of the world.

But I didn't know the stuff I wanted to know. Like my birthday, my real name, my parents, my life. There was not one thing I could seem to remember about my past. Not one person I could remember or a single memory I could recall. Nothing.

So yes, the days with Brad have been pretty great and all, but who really knows how long all of this is going to last?

---

It was in a Sunday afternoon. I was in the living room, watching TV. Brad was gone for most of the morning because he had return to work at the dentist's office after using his sick days to stay at home with me. I wouldn't see him until far later into the night because he said he would continue searching for clues with some guys from the neighborhood, using a picture he had just taken of me earlier before he left. Hopefully, he would find something. Just something...

As soon as the sun turns pitch black, and I change the channel to the reality show marathons, he enters the front door.

"How's it going?" he asks.

"Okay," I say, nodding my head with a smile as I turn down the volume. "Anything new, today?"

Brad shakes his head. "No. Nothing."

I sigh. "I'm never going home. I'm never going to get found!"

"It'll be fine, Troy. Just give me some time, okay. We'll figure this out."

"This really sucks, you know that? I can't remember anything, and nobody knows who I am around here."

How could this be possible? How come nobody has a lead on me? Is it that Brad is giving people information using my so-called name? No, that can't be it. Even if he did use my fake name, there were still the pictures he had. And then someone would at least recognize me. But they didn't. So either way, I'm still stuck.

"Yeah, it's pretty rough," he says. He comes over to the couch and sits next to me. "Listen, Troy. I know you're having a hard time dealing with this, and believe me, I'm trying my best to help you. But there just doesn't seem to be any trace of where you came from, or who you are, or where your family is. But you know what? I was thinking on the way home and well..., I've kind of got an idea."

"What is it?" I ask.

"What if you stay here with me?"

There is no other way to describe my feelings of this moment. Confused seems like the obvious one.

"Aren't I already staying here?"

Brad laughs. "Yeah, but I mean really stay here. I don't want to give up and I know you don't either, but until your memories come up or we get some more information, you can stay here with me for a little while longer. Kind of start over."

My mind is taken aback by his response. He really wants me to stick around? He doesn't just want to throw me out and hand me over to the police? He really cares?

Kind of start over, he said. Maybe that isn't such a bad idea. Since I don't really have a clue as to what's happened to me, it would be kind of nice to start anew for the time being. And why shouldn't I? I've basically already started with the name.

I smile. "Really?"

"Yeah."

As adrenaline rushes through my veins, I lean forward and hug Brad. "Thanks, Brad!"

"Well, anytime, kiddo," he says.

I let him go and he laughs as he notices my smile has not disappeared. I laugh, too, but not for the same reasons as Brad. I'm laughing because I couldn't believe he would do such a thing. I mean, I knew he was nice, but not this nice.

I couldn't sleep at all the rest of the night; my mind going in too many directions for it to rest. All I could think about was me, and the new life I could possibly begin to live.