Newt x Reader || A13

18 | thomas

As the boy falls in front of me, I stand in shock, unable to move.

At once, a wisp of some lost, elusive fragment of memory comes to my lips, and I open my mouth to speak, but before I am able to say what I feel, the words are lost on me, and I know that they are now gone forever.

I slowly lean down and place my hand on the boy's shoulder. The gladers behind me look on in confusion.

"You know him?" Someone asks from behind me. Newt. I keep my eyes trained on the boy's face, eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

"I can't-" the boy's eyes are closed, his face a mask of peaceful rest. "I can't remember." I say, pushing a little on his shoulder in frustration. He doesn't stir.

I stand, facing the group. Everyone stares at me, a strange expression bordering on skepticism and accusation masking each face.

My eyes skim the group, searching for the one pair which I know won't hold the same hostility.

"Come here." Newt says after a moment's silence. The understanding in his brown eyes lessens the burden of remembrance upon my shoulders, and I make my way over to him, leaving the boy in the grass.

We've just turned to go when I pause.

"I know you all want an explanation." I say, inhaling as something tugs at my insides. I gaze at the boy's face, hoping for a stirring of something within. "And I can't give you one. I'm sorry." I finish quickly, then turn to Newt. The Gladers stare at me, their gaze following me as I tug on his arm, starting away from the group.

In my peripheral vision, I can see Newt staring at me as well, but I don't look up. My eyes are trained still on the brown haired boy's face, perhaps in hope of it stirring within me the lost memory.

- - -

Someone says my name, jerking me out of my sleep.

I open my eyes. Alby stands over me, peering down. I sit up in my hammock.

"What is it?" I rub the sleep out of my eyes as Alby grabs my wrist, quickly hoisting me to my feet.

"He's asking for you." He says quickly before exiting the homestead, myself close behind in his wake.

- - -

Alby stops by the gardens. It's night in the glade, and there's a peaceful silence throughout the night air. The usual bustle of working gladers is absent; all that can be heard is the steady shuffling of cattle down by the blood house across the field.

"He's down in the cells," Alby says, turning to walk away, "strange one- never seen anything like h-" He pauses again and looks at me, "never mind." I stare after him as he walks away, not even wanting to know what he's thinking.

As I near the one cell with just the light of a lantern illuminating the ground around it, I try to tread lightly. I bend down beside the cell and slowly peer through the hatch.

The boy sits on the dirt ground against a wall of the cell, his arms wrapped around his knees. As soon as I peer in, his eyes flicker to mine. They're brown, blown wide, still in shock from the earlier events of the day.

For a moment, neither of us speak, then I move closer and sit down on the other side of the bars.

"You asked for me?" I say slowly, carefully.

As I speak, I try to read him. His face is a mask- I cannot read it, yet at the same time, it provokes something inside of me that tells me that I am able to, that I once was able to. He opens his mouth.