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“You don’t remember?”
Something shifts inside my thoughts. It’s like a stuck door gives way and all these thoughts and memories come tumbling out, flooding my head. I gasp in surprise, then cry out. It hurts. My head feels like an explosion went off in it and I can’t make sense of all of this. I grab both sides of my head to keep it from splitting open, or at least try to ease the pain of it feeling like it’s going to. I drop to my knees, holding my head.
“Ahhhhhh.”
“Ooops,” the creature says. “I’m going to take my leave. Let you process.”
It moves past and I want to stop it. The part of me that isn’t overwhelmed by the jumble of memories and anguish screams to stop it, beat it down, make it tell me what it was doing and why. That part of me is buried by the opening of the floodgates.
I struggle to stand up, leaning against the wall. My head is pounding. How did I not remember this? Tears blur my eyes as I stagger walk to my dad’s door. When I reach it, I hold onto the doorknob to help keep myself upright while resting my forehead against the cool wood.
“Daddy?”
“Quinn?”
The door unlocks and the handle turns in my hand. It swings open and I stumble into my dad’s arms. I bury my face against his shoulder, inhaling deeply the familiar scent of Old Spice, Irish Spring soap, and hair gel. He wraps his arms around holding, me tight.
I don’t know how long we hold each other. Time doesn’t matter in this moment, but as it passes the memories straighten themselves out. Mom has been gone for almost ten years. All that time it was Dad and me, tight as thieves, left caring for each other.
Yet she was here when I returned from Scotland. As I push through the grief of losing her again, I grow angry. These sons of bitches keep playing with my life. This is the last straw. I don’t know which one of them had this bright idea, but someone is going to answer for this.
“Quinn?” Dad says, his voice muffled by my hair. “What is happening?”
My heart skips a beat. What do I tell him? He shouldn’t be a part of this and he’s ill; I don’t want to stress him out.
Except he’s not. I have no memory of him being diagnosed, only “Mom” telling me he was sick. Oh my god.
“Dad, how’s your memory?” I ask, pulling free of his tight embrace, but keeping my hands on his arms. I study his face, looking for any signs of confusion.
“Fine,” he says, shaking his head. He runs a hand through his thin, black, slicked back hair and smiles in a goofy grin that is one-hundred-percent my dad. “I’m not crazy, right? That… thing was pretending to be your mom, right?”
“Yeah.”
“We should call…” He trails off before he finishes the thought, realizing before I have to say anything that it would be pointless.
“Yeah,” I agree.
“I’m sorry, Quinn. It feels like a fog is lifting from my head. What was that thing?”
I purse my lips as I try to think of an answer to his question. I know it was a Fae, but what kind I don’t have a clue. The fact that it’s a Fae is more than I want to tell him but how do I hold the truth back from him, especially now?
“We should make coffee,” I say, stepping away from his embrace.
“Quinn—” I cut him off with a glance and lead the way to the kitchen.
“Trust me, you’re going to want coffee.”
Dad stares into his cup for the longest time after I quit talking. I want to say something, but what?
“Crazy,” he says at last.
“Yeah.”
He looks up from the coffee and meets my eyes.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? I should have seen this.”
