Amnesiac

Fourteenth

"Fuck." Karlos mutters from beside me as he eyes our house. "You live in there?"

I nod at him. "Yes," I said. "Quite the large thing, huh?"

"Large?" he asks as he looks at me, his small eyes now huge with disbelief. "Maybe you actually meant, massive!"

I laughed at him. "That's the same reaction I had when I first saw the house just three weeks ago."

"So that means you're just new in this place?" he asks me and I shook my head.

"I just came home three weeks ago."

"So you mean you went somewhere else before you get in here?" he asks and I shook my head again. "Okay well, do you plan on explaining it to me because I don't actually understand what you meant by being here just three weeks ago."

"I just got back from the hospital three weeks ago." I told him. "I was in a comatose for five months and I just woke up three weeks ago."

Karlos looked like he has seen a ghost. "You're kidding."

"I wish I am." I told him as I stepped in front of the gate and opened it. "Well, come on in."

I actually don't know what I am doing. I am very much aware that I should not let people in the house just like this. Especially now, since I just met Karlos and I just talked to him two or three times. But as I said, he has this gullible personality that just shows that he is trustworthy and with that, I really do think he won't rob the house.

Besides that, I do trust him with the information about my stability and health that I just shared to him. Karlos doesn't seem to be the one with the blabber mouth that spills someone else's secrets just like that. He doesn't seem to be a backstabber.

"It even looks larger in the inside!" he exclaims. "And oh my goodness, are those stargazers?" he asked as he points to the spot of the garden that is bundled with pink stargazer lilies.

"You know flowers?"

"I love flowers!" he breathes then turns red as soon as he said that, "But even though I love flowers, that doesn't make me a gay. I swear it to the Lord that I am straight."

I laughed at him. "I don't think loving flowers is enough to make you a gay." I told him. "Come on, let's get to the tree house in the backyard. We'll be having some privacy there, seeing that I can't bring you in my room. My mom would go apeshit if she sees some other boy besides my boyfriend inside my room."

"Your mom allows you and your boyfriend in your room? Alone?" he asks, baffled. I shrug then nod, as if it wasn't the biggest deal in the world. Apparently, it was for Karlos. "Goodness, if I were your mother I would kill you if you bring a boy in your room."

I rolled my eyes at him. "That is mainly why I am not bringing you there, right?"

"Right," he mutters, "But that doesn't mean you should bring your boyfriend there."

"Why not?" I asked him.

"Because, what if you guys thought of doing something? I mean, if you're in a room, it only takes locking the door, a protection and doing it." he exaggerates and I laugh at him. "Doesn't your mother prohibit the possibility of your boyfriend making a move to you?"

I looked at him like he was saying some sort of a joke. "Karlos, my mother doesn't even check us over if we lock the door or not when we're in my room. She doesn't really mind it." I told him, "There's the tree house. Can I help you with something? Water, juice...?"

"Nah, I'm fine." he declines.

We both climb to the tree house and sat at the bottom of it. Karlos leaned on the trunk of the tree and I leaned on the wooden banister of the tree house. We were facing each other at this moment. I took notice that even in the dark; the tender shade of brown of Karlos's eyes was still noticeable.

"Why are you staring?" he asked me.

"I was just admiring your eyes." I admitted.

"What do you think of them?" he asked me, a ghost of a teasing smirk.

"They're pretty. Totally brown." I described. "They look so sincere. But, okay this is weird but it's just my perspective, it looks like it's been hurt. There's something in your eyes that tells me you've gone through a lot."

"You're good at reading someone's eyes, Andromeda,"

"So you did go through a lot?"

His smile falters a bit and I knew that I just hit some nerves with the simple statements I said. "I do, but you know, let's drop that topic. It's a beautiful night and I am in a beautiful tree house with a beautiful girl and—"

"You think I am beautiful?" I asked him, amused.

Karlos blushes and looks down. "Y-yeah."

I chuckle. "Why, thank you. That's such a compliment." I said.

"About what you mentioned earlier," he says, quickly changing the subject to avoid any more teases. "Were you really serious when you said that you just woke up from comatose or were you just making fun of me?"

I sighed, looking down on the scrapped wood flooring of the tree house. "I was telling the truth." I said, "And I have the feeling that you won't believe me too if I tell you that I have amnesia at this very moment?" I asked him and watched his expression. I assumed he was showing a shocked reaction. "I thought so,"

"You have amnesia?" he asked, shocked. "H-how does it feel, you know, to have that kind of condition?"

I looked at Karlos. He was willing to listen. He's not willing to listen to judge me or to make fun of me. He really just wants to listen. That was just his intention. Nothing more and nothing less.

I inhaled before speaking. "I feel empty." I said. "I don't remember anything. I can't remember anything." I said. "Last time, I can't even remember what my name was, how old I am or who my boyfriend and mother were. I don't know a single thing about myself. And when you're just oblivious about everything, you just feel empty you know. It feels like the world moved on and left me behind."

"You know, Andromeda, I envy you." Karlos says. "I envy you because you have amnesia."

"Why? Don't you understand it? Being somewhat oblivious is like being empty." I said, "When you have a damn amnesia, you won't know anything about yourself, about everybody that is connected to your life and anything that happened to yourself. You know nothing."

Karlos sighs. "I've gone through a lot of shit too, you know." he laughs dryly. "There were times that I just feel so numb, because the pain numbed me."

"And your point is?" I asked, pushing him to continue.

"My point is," he says, straightening his posture before looking at me straight in the eye, "When you don't know a thing, you won't feel a thing as well." He says. "When you can't remember anything you've gone through, for some matter, you don't have to feel the pain that is bound to come with those obstacles."

I looked at my friend like he's going nuts as I tried to understand whatever he said. At some point, he was right. When you know nothing, you feel nothing as well. When Karlos told me that, my curiosity about this guy pokes out and I just feel like I have the need to know him a little more. I feel like the reason that we met was because maybe I could help him with whatever he's going through.

Or maybe the other way around. Maybe he could be another one in my life that could help me remember. Maybe he could be like Darren, only a level lower. Or perhaps, the reason that we've met is because we could help each other.

Karlos and I spent the night talking and talking, until it was time for him to go home. This was the longest time period that I actually talked to Karlos. In just a few moments, I have come to know that behind his warm smiles and perfect humour, there was a boy that probably have gone through something much more painful than being in sleep for five months and waking up with amnesia.