Free The Girl I Used to Be by April Henry Page B

want to head back here,” Bill says. “And if you ever feel like telling me why you’re there, you know how to get hold of me.”
    â€œThanks. That means a lot to me.” Especially now, when I’m starting to think I’ve made a big mistake.
    After an awkward pause, we fumble through our good-byes.
    On hollow legs, I retrace my steps and go down the hall. There’s a single bathroom and three bedrooms. The one on the left is the biggest, but all of them are small, barely big enough for the beds they hold. Two rooms each have a twin bed, and the bigger one has a queen. They all have the same gray carpet, faintly stained in places. I think the carpet wasn’t here when I was, but I can’t be sure about that.
    There’s no magic. No memories. No flashbacks. I lived here the longest of any place I’ve ever lived, spent the first seven years of my life here, but it feels like a stranger’s home. Nothing leads me back to my old self, my old family, to the dead who once walked through these rooms.
    As I head back down the hall, tears close my throat. I was crazy to do this. Crazy to think this would jostle loose my memories. I reach out and touch the wall, steady myself.
    Then I notice marks under my fingers. Faint pencil lines. They start at about midthigh and stop at about my chest. Next to each one is a bit of spidery writing, so light I can’t really make it out.
    But I know what the writing says. Each line has a date written next to it.
    I close my eyes and put my heels against the wall. Stand straight and tall, lengthening my spine as if it’s an elastic cord. I can almost feel the pencil parting my hair as it pushes through to mark my height.
    When I open my eyes, I see the cream-colored curtains behind the living room couch. Now I remember hiding behind them while Grandma pretended not to be able to find me. In the far corner of the living room is the spot where we always put up the Christmas tree. On that corner shelf in the dining room, there used to be a fat blue teapot.
    Everything looks so much smaller and shabbier than I remember. But at least now I’m remembering, or whatever you call a feeling caught between dreaming and déjà vu.
    Through the living room window, I see a guy skateboarding down the street. When he sees my car in the driveway, he stops, kicks the board up into his hands, and starts up the walk.
    Duncan.

 
    CHAPTER 17
    BROKEN-OPEN INFINITY
    I step out on the porch as Duncan comes up the walk, his board tucked under his arm. He’s wearing a red sleeveless T-shirt, jeans hacked off at the knees, and no helmet. His arms are muscled, and he has a scab on one tanned knee.
    â€œIs this place all yours now?” he asks.
    For an answer, I hold up the key. “And I think I got a job at Fred Meyer.”
    â€œFreddy’s? That’s where my mom works. In the garden center.”
    Crap. Chuck knows I’m from Portland. What if he tells the other staff that? Why did I tell Duncan I was from Seattle? Maybe I can think of a new lie that covers both the old lie and the real truth.
    â€œWere your parents at the funeral?” I can’t remember who he was sitting with.
    â€œThey were at work. My dad works for Glass Doctor. But they thought someone from our family should be there, and I didn’t have to work on Saturday.”
    â€œWhere do you work?”
    â€œZumiez. At the mall. Mostly I sell skateboards to kids and helmets to their moms.” Medford is so small it has only one mall.
    â€œAnd where’s your helmet?” I’m the kind of person who always wears a seat belt or a bike helmet or work gloves. The world is full of too many risks without adding more.
    â€œIn my backpack.” He gives me a half shrug. “I don’t bother when I’m just street skating, like now. Only if I’m learning a trick. Or at the skate park. You have to wear a helmet there.” His gaze flicks up to me.