The Cost of Memories

In Which My Story Draws To A Close

"You're still upset with me," I tell Finn, not bothering to state it as a question. "What was I supposed to have said to you? There is no good way to broach the subject that I was memory-pawning, and when you told me that Charlie suspected that there was still a bigger dealer out there, there was no way I was going to tell you that I was the one supplying that dealer."

"You should have trusted me. I know that things didn't end very well for us, but I wouldn't have just thrown away the trust that we had built during those years because the director had suspicions."

The memories around us brighten with the anger radiating from his body. "I didn't know that you were having money troubles. I didn't know that you picked up this job both to help make sure that you could keep this place running and to help others who needed money. You shut me out of your life after everything like what we had was worth nothing."

I sigh. "I should have told you, but I figured that it wasn't your problem to deal with. There was no way for me to know how you would have reacted at that point in time, and by the time I would have been able to build up enough courage to try to talk to you, I didn't remember what had happened."

"If we had continued on the path that we were going, we would have been sharing all of those problems. I had been walking around with the ring in my pocket for weeks at that point, waiting for the right moment to ask you to entwine with your life with mine for the rest of our days. Then you went on that stakeout without me because I had missed all the messages you had sent me, and when I saw you next, you weren't the same person, Mae."

It has been a week, and we have been running the same circles around each other, neither one of us wanting to be the first to throw another punch. The joking front that Finn always put up has cracked beyond repair, and for the first time, I am seeing how badly the past five years and all of the secrets have been hurting him.

"I wasn't any different in the parts of me that had counted," I whisper, reaching for his hand. "I didn't know how to tell you about what happened, that suddenly, I had the ability to pull people's memories out of their head just by touching their foreheads. I was terrified of what was going to happen if even a single person at the Department knew what I could do, but I was never mad at you. Perhaps a little upset for not having my back like we had promised and terrified to think what might have happened to you if you had come with me that night."

His fingers curl around mine. "By the time that I had managed to come up with some way to tell you what had happened, because I wasn't just pulling memories from someone each time I touched them, Shadow had shown up to make use of me and taken away any ability to remember what had happened. I was in too deep already with no intention of hauling you past the point of no return with me."

Finn pulls me into a hug, rocking me back and forth with quiet words I can't quite hear, as my tears leak out against his shirt. I have been able to acknowledge how scared I was, both for myself and Finn, with the full context of what had happened back within my mind.

"You think that this Shadow was the one who somehow gave you this ability?" He asks later as we curl up together on a couch tucked in the corner of the pawnshop. My bare feet are hiding underneath the warmth of his leg. "Do you remember seeing anyone there before you woke up later with the feeling that something wasn't quite right?"

I lean my head against the back of the couch. "I'm not sure. I think that he had a hand in what happened, but there is no way that he could have known that I was staking out that particular area that night. The only people who should have known were you and me. However, since you never got my notes, someone else must have intercepted them."