AARON
“Do I know you?”

The guy standing at his locker looked at me like he wasn’t sure I was actually talking to him. It’s hard to not tell I’m talking to him. I’m staring right at him. No one else is immediately around us. I mean, it might be a passing period, but still. It’s kind of hard to tell I’m not talking to him.

But he still asks, “Me?”

I shuffle my foot on the linoleum floor. My stomach needs to unknot itself. “You. Yeah.”

He opens his locker door. I can’t see his face anymore, and for some reason, it makes me more frustrated. “I don’t think so.” He withdraws two books from his backpack and one from his locker; they switch places. He adjusts his glasses. “You’re not in any of my classes, are you?”

I squint my eyes and stare. This whole process – talking to someone I don’t know – is not my style. But I’m pretty sure I know him. From where, I’m not sure. I just have that sense. “Did we go to the same school?”

He briefly chuckles. “I mean, we’re going to the same school right now.”

I tap my fingers on the locker doors, listening to their echo. ‘I’m this close to punching him.’ But I just look away because I don’t have anything to actually say. ‘This isn’t how I imagined it.’

“You okay?” He closes the locker door and swings his backpack on his back.

I catch him looking at me with his very grey eyes. “Sorry, what?”

“Don’t beat yourself up over it.” He smiles, and my skin crawls; I know I’ve seen it before. “Look, I’m gonna miss class. See ya.” He presses his hands on the locker door, probably to make sure it’s closed all the way, and turns and heads towards the P Stairwell.

My foot taps against the floor in irritation and disappointment. ‘That was…unfulfilling.’ I turn and head in the other direction, and Erica’s waiting by the girl’s bathroom door.

“So?” she asks.

“I was wrong.”

She groans and follows me down the hall. “My connections in this school…for naught!”

I look at her. Erica’s that rare kind of theater person where she just knows when to talk, like she feels no need to fill the silence. She’s also sarcastic and it makes me want to punch her. Subsequently, it’s this uncomfortable limbo where you not entirely sure if she’s disingenuous, or she’s too interested. But her connections throughout the school make her invaluable to me. She’s like a mafia boss.

And we’ve been best friends for 12 years. So why wouldn’t I ask for her help?

“Cut the theatrics, Erica,” I say, my pace slowing down. I watched the floor pass underneath me in thought, and I don’t hear the school bell ring. “I’m not in the mood anymore.”

Erica’s catches up to me and says, “Aaron, you asked me to help. I helped you. What do you want me to do?”

“I don’t want you to do anything.”

She pouts – a rare moment for her in school. “Aw.” Erica asks something, but I don’t hear it. I’m staring at the library doors and I can feel the gears in my head turning. I impulsively go in. She follows after, because I hear the door shoved open behind me. “Why?”

“Shush.”

I look for the shelf numbers – N243.77, J289.01, A301.428 – and they eventually turn into a blur. ‘I have to find it.’

“What are you doing?” Erica whispers. She hasn’t caught up with me.

And I stop. I look between two shelves and find exactly what I was looking for.

There’s a big window with metal, white Venetian blinds, but the window isn’t lighting up the weird book corridor. The school doesn’t get enough illumination in the courtyard for there to be a lot of it during the day, so it feels like the mysterious back corner of an old library. There’s a low window seat and either side of that there’s the bookshelves, which reach the ceiling. Under the seat, there’s two rows of books, and it feels secure and safe.

Just like how I remembered it.

I kneel and finger my way through the bottom shelf of books, my eyes moving so fast that I actually go past it the first time. It’s this weird German folklore hardcover book, with what I always imagined Erica in her dream role on the front – Snow White – and she’s surrounded by five drawfs in this weird painting.

“Ooo, Snow White,” Erica says, snatching the book from me.

Something bothers about this part of the library. And why it bothers me, I’m not completely sure.

I slump to the floor. I put my hands on my temples and concentrate. “See, I remember this,” I begin, gesturing to the space. It feels so far away from the rest of the library because the light gets about halfway down the bookshelves and then it stops. It’s such a distant place, such a forgotten space in this high school’s library, that it’s amazing it’s still here. “I remember the book because I thought, ‘Wow. A book Erica can look at and say ‘I T   M E’’.”

Erica laughs. “You know me too well,” she says, staring at the cover still.

I roll my eyes. “But…but someone was here. I’m sure of it.” I’m giving myself a headache. “So…why don’t I remember them?”

Erica sits down in front of me, and her knees are touching mine. She softly smiles. “Aaron – ”

“Please, Erica, I’m not in the mood right now for a stupid theory on, how we met in a past life, or some shit like that.” I sigh and run my fingers through my hair. “Like, I’m kind of…I’m fucking disappointed.”

She sighs. “Dude, I’m sorry. But I don’t know what you were expecting from this.” Erica puts her hand on mine and squeezes it. “You asked me to find someone with short black hair and grey eyes, and I found someone with short black hair and grey eyes. It isn’t my fault you two minutes figuring out that he didn’t know you.”

“I also spent three trying to gain the courage to talk to him.”

She smirks. “OMG, actually, though. That was kinda cute.”

I frown. “Shut up.”

“I’m not gonna lie.”

I sigh again and mess up my bangs; I let it be because I like the feel of them undone. ‘He did have nice eyes.’ My gaze drops and I keep thinking. “Maybe I imagined it all.”

Erica shrugs, but I know she thinks the same thing. “What do you remember?”

I inhale, and the dust from the shelves tickles my nose; I brush it away. “I remember this.” I look up at the ceiling, and I slowly move to the window seat. “And I remember the blinds.” I run my fingers over them, and they’re expectantly dusty. “But…” I rub my dusty fingers together, as if this nostalgic memory has resurfaced. “…mostly, I just remember them.”