Chapter 7 #2
"You need a bump?" he asks. "You seem like you're getting the shakes or something."
I shake my head, holding up a palm instead of speaking. I'm not sure my dry mouth could form the words right now.
"Ahh," he slurs out in what he believes is understanding. "You're too high. You need a downer. I got some of those too. Just to mellow me out."
The thought of clawing my eyes and ears out to escape him enters my mind briefly before I abandon all hope of quiet and return to the throbbing sound outside.
The same bartender from before finds me as soon as I enter the hall, shouting my name to get my attention.
"What?"
She jogs up to me, placing a hand on my forearm, "She's here."
All the sound around me stops, my entire world revolving around those two words.
"Here?"
She nods, "At the VIP lounge. She's with my girlfriend's cousin's someone or other, I'm not sure."
She's here.
Should I go say hi? Should I wait until she's apart from her group or just find her now?
Will she be excited to see me?
Relieved that I'm okay?
What if she's terrified of me and never wants to speak to me again?
I don't think I could deal with the devastation of finding out the person who was my everything is so afraid of me that I've lost her over crimes I don't even fucking remember committing.
"Don't do anything crazy, Cormac," the woman warns, her face filled with a worry that's too familiar for just an employee.
I take a step back and try to breathe for a second. Rationally, I know that I'm not supposed to storm up and find this woman. Brigit.
If she's with her friends and a strange man shows up with a bunch of tattoos and a million questions about what the fuck is going on, it can only end in disaster.
But my chest aches with the need to see her. She was my... something. Now, because I don't remember it and I'm a murderer or fucking serial killer, I'm just supposed to go on pretending she wasn't?
"You don't remember me," she breathes, her hands on my forearms to ground me. "But I'm Stella. I've been working here since we opened. We're friends."
Jesus Christ, if this is another woman I've been with and don't remember, I'm really going to have an aneurysm.
Wait.
"You said your girlfriend?" I ask.
She nods slowly, "Yeah, Brigit is like someone's boss that lives with my... I'm not sure how they're all connected, but I bet Skyler knows."
"So you and I, we don't," I can't stop sweating long enough to ask the fucking question, "We don't know each other."
"Like biblically?" Her nose and mouth scrunch up with abject disgust.
I nod.
And she barks out a laugh, "No. I'm sure for people who are attracted to men, you're great, but I am not."
I finally let out a sigh of relief.
"We're friends," she assures me. "Basically family."
The knowledge that I've built an entire life I know nothing about haunts me. All the time I've spent with these people, the familiarity with which they look at me, and I can't offer any of it back. These are strangers who know more about me than I do.
"You're not yourself right now, Cormac," she gently pushes me backwards, away from the dance floor and apparently Brigit until I'm leaning against the wall, catching my breath. "You need to relax."
"So I'm not allowed to go find her?" My voice fails.
With a sigh, she wraps a dark strand of her hair nervously around her finger, "I'm not going to tell you what you're allowed to do. But I suggest you do nothing until you're more steady."
I don't think I have any chance of becoming steady until I have some fucking answers. And this Brigit woman might have them, along with the last remaining string I have to my humanity before I fucking lost it and started killing people.
"If I can't track her down, why come tell me that she's here?" I finally ask, reining in my disturbingly angry thoughts of tearing through every person between the stranger who was my whole world, the only thing I thought important enough to have photos of in my private office.
"I didn't want you to be blindsided if you saw her," she explains. "Skyler and I love you like family, even though you don't remember that right now. So we're going to protect you like family. That includes keeping you from spiraling from running into her."
But now that I know she's here, I won't be able to think of anything else until I get eyes on her.
"I won't spiral," I say, knowing it's a lie.
I'm going to. It's not a matter of if, it's a fact. But I can spiral from not seeing Brigit, or I can spiral from getting eyes on her and not being able to remember how it felt to know her.
Her expression is one of disbelief, but she releases my arms anyway, "I'm not going to tell you what you can or can't do, but I highly suggest you turn around and walk out that side door. Leave your what-ifs and questions for her until after you've found the answers about yourself."
The weight of knowing she's here sits heavily on my chest.
This Stella person in front of me clearly wants me to be safe from the madness in my own head, but it won't be sated until I can get eyes and hands on my... my whatever she is.
She sees the exact moment I abandon any thoughts I had of leaving, muttering under her breath something about stubborn fucking white men. "Fine. But if you do anything stupid, Skyler will have you thrown out. This place is his fucking baby."
"I won't make a scene," I promise. "I just need to talk to her."
She doesn't respond, sighing and walking away from me, likely returning to her post at the bar.
With a deep breath, I wind my way back into the overwhelming crowd of people, searching for her, feeling like a fucking hunter sifting through the brush to find my target.
Mentally, I think through the few things I do know about her.
She's beautiful. Duh.
She dresses her curves impeccably.
She's tall. Likely taller than most women here. And if she's wearing heels, she'll be towering over them.
And she's in the VIP section, which is... cordoned off.
Do I have access to that?
Before I can make a more concrete plan, someone drunkenly bumps into my side, and I reach out to steady them with both hands as they stutter out an “Oh, shit.”
The group of people around the man who nearly fell over starts laughing, a few of them offering apologies and scolding their clearly drunk friend.
And all at once, my world stops spinning, and my lungs cease to move.
Dark eyes meet mine for the briefest second from the group.
Brigit.
She does tower over the rest of them in her high heels. And her short little skirt can barely keep up with her long legs.
Wavy brown hair falls messily down over her shoulder as she gently grabs the drink from her friend, “Okay, I think that’s enough of that.”
The gaggle of people holds their friend up, and I get to finally see in person the adorable little lines that dance across Brigit’s nose when she laughs.
“I’m so sorry,” she giggles, clearly feeling well past tipsy herself, leaning on the more upright parts of her group, “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” I mutter, my eyes narrowing.
Why would she need to pretend to these people that she doesn’t know me?
Nodding, she pulls on her friend's elbow, encouraging them all to keep moving as if I’m not here at all.
They disappear into the crowd, leaving me reeling.
If she’s acting like she doesn’t know me, is it because it’s safer for her to do so? Or because she’s hoping I really don’t remember her and she can get away from whatever we had now that I’ve lost all memories of it?
For the rest of the night, all I can think of is why the hell she pretended not to know me. It’s probably for the best, honestly. She’s likely safer without me in her life.
But I’m incapable of letting this go.
If she’s the only person I had, she’s the only one who might have some fucking answers. And if she doesn’t want to give them to me, I’ll just have to take them.