Forgotten memories.

"Has it happened before?" Hypatia asked worriedly. "You said it was the first time."

"You've blocked it, Stella," Kevin congratulated me, happy that it finally turned out he could erase memories.

"I owe you an apology, sis," Styles' voice was no more than a whisper, enough for both he and I to hear. "I'm really sorry."

"It's okay," I smiled a little hurt.

"Tell me, what do you think is the trigger this time?" Styles tried to fix the situation. "Me?"

"If it had been you, brother, I wouldn't have slept a wink yesterday. I slept partially well, but because I've had nightmares for many years. The same ones I had when I was little."

"The clown's?"

"Bingo!"

"So, what happened..."

"It's like having nightmares, but awake. Nothing to worry about," Kevin had Lydia hand me the chocolate with a gesture as he explained the situation. "The only thing to worry about is where she gets these flashbacks."

"Thank you," I said to Lydia, and she hugged me and, then, stood on the other side of Hypatia.

"It's ten o'clock in the morning," said Hypatia. "We should find any café open when we leave this house."

"But they have to tell us what they wanted the book for," I objected.

"Stella, your friends are the bomb," Lydia grabbed both my hands and sat me on my brother's bed. "If they join us we won't have to do so many things, we'll each stay in our own speciality. Hypatia will finally perform and we'll be able to see it!"

I couldn't put the pieces of what I had been told together, I was still a little dizzy from what had happened to me earlier. I raised one of my eyebrows and opened my mouth slightly to ask.

"They want to find out the truth above all else. To know and make it known, you know. UFOs, assassinations of presidents, disappearances of some of the greatest cultures... Murders," Hypatia seemed to be happy with the idea. "The theft of the Mona Lisa in 1911."

It had taken them more than a year to trust me and they had been given the green light in less than three hours. I remember feeling a bit hurt, cheated. Hypatia would explain to me that it was much easier to read people who were less closed than those who were locked behind layers and layers of iron, fire and steel, in an impenetrable bubble without the trust of the person inside. They had opened up to them in two seconds, Lydia confirmed they were who they said they were and Hypathy threatened them both. I had taken longer and hadn't even opened up completely.

"Besides, they've been investigating a series of strange occurrences on their own. Are you familiar with mutations and senseless murders? Corpses appearing as a gelatinous mass?" I nodded slightly. "They have found a pattern. The government has been hiding them and no one asks why. Instead of putting the killers in jail, they put in people who might give them the boot. Dangerous people. To death row undesirable partners from the dark history of all countries. Improve relations with the rest of the countries and earn money for getting rid of them. If an agent seems to suspect something, he disappears without a trace and turns up a few days later dead in an occasional shootout between gangs and cops."

"There's also insurance that we won't get the boot: If they try to do it or even think about it, there's your friend to tell on them."

"I don't think he's willing to talk to me after almost a year without doing so."

"You have a head and a good body, she thinks," Lydia opened her mouth at Hypatia's comment, "What? He recognised her perfume! If he didn't feel something, he wouldn't have done it!"

"He gave it to me, Hypatia, we were seven years old and I was his only friend. That's why he remembers it. We were friends. He sent it to me when we were fourteen because he remembered me..."

I went blank.

"See?"

"He remembered me in a clothes shop," I closed my eyes tightly. "I'm going to kill him. That's the end of it. He'll be dead."

"Wait... Did you really consider him your friend when he remembered you in a clothes shop?" Kevin was about to burst out laughing. "In a clothes shop!"

"I hate you, Kevin," I mumbled.

"I love you too, mutant. I love you too."

Hypatia rolled her eyes and sat down next to me. She looked sideways at Kevin and then at Styles curiously.

"Look, we can do it like this: We take your friend, torture him and threaten him like only you know how. If he really is your friend, we can skip step two."

"I know you expect to have someone on the inside, someone I trust blindly. I remind you that we spoke twice a year on the phone and wrote letters to each other every day. We haven't spoken in six months. How do you expect me to solve that little detail?"

"You can get mad at him," Lydia's dreamy voice made Styles smile. "You fight, you make up, and that's it."

"You said he was loyal to you. That he swore undying loyalty to you or something," Styles scratched his jaw.

"Yes, but I am not the president."

"Stella, if you can get him on the team, we'll have it all sorted out. He has the confidence of the highest levels of government. You saw that," Hypatia squeezed my knee.

"Why don't we use Kevin and Styles' contact?"

"Because, although he is our friend, whom we told you about yesterday, he is not fully trusted by us."

"He knows nothing of your personal vendetta, am I right, Styles?"

"No. And he certainly doesn't share it."

"You don't know," Lydia reminded her. "People can be extremely unpredictable. Look at you, fighting with your sister, even if you didn't mean to."

Styles nodded thoughtfully at Lydia's words. He always turned a deaf ear to people who gave him advice and made me momentarily forget that he had a girlfriend. I started to ship them.

"We can call him," Kevin proposed, "and let Hypatia and Lydia work their mind- and feeling-reading magic."

"We could do it," nodded Lydia. "Before lunch. I have to be home early, we're going to an expensive place to eat with Hypatia's family, so she does too."

"Well, if you want, we go to a coffee shop, call this man and the telepath and the empath work their witchcraft."

Later, Kevin would call Hypatia a Snake Charmer and Lydia a Sorceress. I still find Hypatia's nickname funny. I loved spending time with them, laughing and giving each other stupid nicknames.

"I think it would be ideal to raise our flight, friends," Kevin stood up and showed us his mobile phone. "I've made a reservation at one of the best restaurants in town and it's being paid for by one of the biggest mobsters in the country."

Hypatia raised an eyebrow.

"You're a cocky little prick," she folded her arms. "You love to show off," she showed the screen of her mobile phone and we saw a transfer of three million euros from different accounts to the account of the mobster in question, so that he would be caught. "Give two hours to the police in charge of the case."

"What do I have to do to impress you? Are you capable of doing everything I do?" They left the room arguing like old friends about how Hypatia, while not able to do all the computer tricks Kevin did, was able to imitate them flawlessly, following instructions like a good soldier would - because to be a good leader, you have to be a soldier first, Hypatia used to say. And Hypatia was our leader -.

Styles gave us both a worried look, scratched the back of his neck and let us both out before he did. Lydia took one last look around her room before my stepbrother closed the door. She noticed a detail she hadn't seen before. Her eyes sparkled and she looked at Styles with her big, magnetic eyes for him.

"Do you like it?" she pointed before closing the door.

"Yes," his cheeks flushed.

"That's great! Me too!"

They went ahead and chatted pleasantly about what Lydia had seen in Styles' room. They were so happy talking openly about the freaky thing Lydia had seen in my brother's room. It was great to see them like that, especially him, who was terrible at talking to people. That's why I was really proud when I found out he had a girlfriend and that they had made a new friend. Kevin was only interested in one class of people, and he had no problem with socialising, but he didn't like to waste his social skills on a bunch of inept people. Styles was a case apart. He had a hard time making friends, partly because of his mother and partly because they tended to use him consciously. Lydia would do him good, help him open up. Then Hypatia would come in and help him fight the world that his mother had blocked him so that he would stay at home for the rest of his life. I supported him every step of the way, as he had done when his classmates picked on me.

I was so focused on the two of them that I didn't see the shadow of the harpy looming over me. She caught me completely off guard. She attacked me from behind, doubtful whether it was me or not. Before I was completely through the door of the house, she grabbed my arm and turned me around to look her in the eye.

"You can fool Styles, but you can't fool me, you filthy girl."

Her claws were squeezing my wrist tighter and tighter. The circulation would eventually be cut off if she continued to exert the same pressure, I thought. I tried to break free from her grip. I underestimated the strength of her thin, seemingly fragile fingers. When I made a strong movement with my elbow, her grip didn't loosen. She tightened even more. The nails began to dig in. They weren't metal, we weren't in the past, I reminded myself again and again. No. Now they were silicone. They were hard, but not as hard as the metal ones from years ago. They were red, not grey with small inlays that simulated screws. They didn't have chains that went from one to the other. They were red. Red like my blood. Red like the rivers of blood that woman managed to draw from me. Red like the anger I felt in my chest. That fire that burned in my throat, that worked like the forges of my heart.

I looked up from her hand. I faced her for the first time in my life. I wasn't going to cower in the face of a smug harpy. Not after watching my uncle die facing his greatest fears, not after knowing that my parents faced the world to make it better for my unborn sibling and me.

I noticed how my jaw tensed tightly and the muscles she held under her hand began to twitch, trying to break free for good measure.

"You haven't changed, you're still the impudent child you used to be," she mumbled through her teeth. You're still a troublemaker. "What have you stolen this time, you freak?"

Freak. That was the trigger that made Hypatia run and grab my other arm.

I threw my arm against the rope that held the knives. But Hypatia saw the move and stopped me before I could do anything. Her pulse was racing a mile a minute as she grabbed my arm and denied with wide eyes, terrified at what I had almost done.

I managed to break free from Styles' mother's grip.

The worried look I gave Hypatia, truly sorry for what I had almost done, turned into a death threat as soon as I looked back at the crone.

I didn't open my mouth when I said goodbye to her.

Hypatia placed one of her hands on my back to get us out of there without a fuss. She took my hand and lifted it enough to see the marks the lady of the house had left on me. There were three drops of blood and the surface was red.

"What were you thinking?" she scolded me. When she saw that I wasn't looking into her eyes as usual, but at a point behind the van, she knew that something she had said had made me react that way. "Are you all right?"

"Yes," I lied.

"I know it's a lie," I smiled at her comment. "It's all right."

We parted before we reached the vehicle where everyone was waiting for us.

"What has she done to you?"

"Nothing," I covered the stains on my wrist with my other hand and got into the back of the truck. "Seriously, Kevin, I'm fine."

He squinted and sat down next to Bob, between Hypatia and the robot. Styles helped Lydia up and then held out his hand to me.

During the time it took us to get there, the blood kept sliding down my arm. It was only a couple of drops from each of the holes the harpy had made. However, they were enough to send me suddenly back into the past. Back into the clutches of that horrible woman.

The swaying of the van stopped and it was completely silent. I could only hear the leaves of the trees fighting against each other in front of the open kitchen window. Styles' mother was holding me in her hands, shaking my little body back and forth. She was screaming loudly and my ears hurt. She was squeezing my arms as hard or harder than I remembered.

The finger that pressed against my face was extremely thin and slender. It was cold as metal and cut at the slightest movement of my head. I thought it was a finger. But for that I would have to have one hand on top of the other. I could see both hands, each and every finger. What was on my face was not a finger, I concluded. I saw the wooden handle the woman was holding and followed its outline until I saw the stainless steel edge in my face. It was a kitchen knife. She had sharpened it thoroughly. It prevented any kind of movement. The fingers of the other hand dug into my arm, making wounds that gushed blood.

She pulled her hand away as soon as she felt the heat emanating from the wounds. She looked with delight at the crimson liquid gushing from each of them and running through her blood. She brought her hand to her mouth and licked it slowly, not taking the knife away from my face. She closed her eyes, enjoying the foul taste of the blood. As his eyelids parted, I could see pupils so dilated that only a thin line of iris was left.

The thoughts of my memories and my own at that moment merged into one: I have to get the heck out of here. I needed to get out of the reach of this bloodthirsty, sadistic vampire. I had to get out of there any way I could.

"It was a good idea to have you with us after all," I swallowed and shook hard, not caring if the knife cut me or not. "Maybe all those vampire novels are right," she grabbed my arm again, harder than before. "I feel so much better."

She was truly insane.

Her eyes had become more youthful. The wrinkles that the operations had failed to erase magically disappeared before my eyes. I was terrified. After a few seconds, the creases reappeared with more intensity and her eyes darkened, losing the sparkle she had momentarily gained. For a few seconds I caught a glimpse of the person she might have been had she not given herself over completely to the mundane shadows of aesthetics and money.

The front door slammed shut with a loud bang, enough to throw Styles' mother off the scent and allow me to escape. I heard her put down the knife and turned to see that she wasn't following me. No. She was greeting and showering her son with kisses.

I wasn't looking where I was going and bumped into Styles' father before I reached the stairs. He had been watching what his wife had done to me in the kitchen.

"Did she give you all those wounds?" he crouched down to my level.

Not knowing what to say, I looked away from him to the floor to my right, the one covered with red carpets.

"My little girl, I need you to tell me," he stroked my hair softly and took my hand. "She' s a monster. I know. But we have to learn to live with them."

He caught my attention.

"But you don't have to live with a woman who only loves her family," he slowly led me to the upstairs bathroom and sat me on the toilet. "We're going to heal those wounds and you'll look like a princess again in what the cat said... What did the cat say?"

I let out a small sigh, a small laugh that came out much more weakly than I had intended because of the rapid drop in adrenaline and sugar.

The man reached into the cabinet under the sink for the first aid kit. He shook his head when he saw in it a small bag with what I thought was sugar when I was little and which I distinguished as cocaine when I remembered again. He ducked his head in shame and stuffed the bag into his back trouser pocket. It was his wife's.

He washed his hands and took out the cotton balls.

"You want to help me, be my sidekick on this super-secret mission?" I nodded timidly. "We have to do it quickly, without anyone finding out. It'll be our little secret."

He smiled sweetly at me.

"Partner," he whispered, "I need you to lift up the sleeves of your precious shirt a little bit."

I nodded strongly and did so. I held it up until he put the band-aids on me after applying alcohol and Betadine. It didn't sting as much as I had expected because my arm was numb from the pressure the woman had applied.

"Now we're going to help your facial skin regenerate. Because, shall I tell you a secret?" I shook my head strongly in the affirmative. "Your skin has a superpower, just like you. It is able to regenerate, to heal itself. But if we want it to go fast, you'll need this," he waved the iodine in front of me. "Let's see that little wound," I pushed my hair away from my face. "That's it. Very good," he spoke slowly, patiently and with a lot of dedication.

I would later learn that he was one of the best paediatricians in the country. He was dedicated to his work. He didn't care what his wife thought of his work or if she belittled him for working with children and not charging the most needy.

"Thank you," I sighed.

"Thanks to you, super sidekick," he put a sticking plaster on my cheek, covering the big crack. "You've been very brave, little one."

We both came out of the bathroom. I was holding on to his hand as if something bad was going to happen to me again if I went down the stairs. Like one of the times before, when the woman had thrown me against the front steps just because I had caused Styles to lose his focus and end up getting hit by a bat thrown by an opponent.

He took me to the bedroom and sat me on the bed.

He disappeared out the door and returned with a small suitcase.

"You know how to get out of the window, don't you?"

It was in my file. I used to escape from the houses through the windows.

"I'll leave the suitcase downstairs and you'll run back to the orphanage. Remember the way?"

Of course I remembered. When I went to school, I would take the long way only so I could pick up my best friend, we went to the same school.

"Remember, don't come back here," he finished packing and went downstairs as Styles' laughter as he snacked filled the house.

I opened the window and climbed out. The suitcase was on the floor. I grabbed it and ran quickly to my old orphanage.

I hadn't eaten for two days and fainted just before they opened the door.

I woke up the next day. On the other side of the infirmary bed was my best friend, sitting in a chair reading the book in his hands. I was a bit disoriented, but I remembered what happened the day before and relaxed.

"The headmistress has found your origins somewhere on the net..." was the first thing she said, "If you distract everyone who works here for three hours, I'll find out if it's true or false."

"Brian?"

"Yes," he looked up from his book.

"Could we leave it for another day?"

"Sure," he closed the book and hurried off to his room. He came back ten minutes later with a very old and used wooden chessboard. "Since I know you're not going to tell me anything, here's what we're going to do: Every time I eat a piece from you, you tell me. If you eat one, I'll give you all the sweets and desserts for the day. One dessert per piece."

Neither of us liked to talk about what had happened to us. If he got beaten up at school or something out of the ordinary happened to me, we tended to withdraw into ourselves and stopped talking to each other for a few days because of embarrassment. We didn't talk to each other or cross each other's paths, even if the other was looking for it. So we invented a less difficult way to talk to each other and to communicate more easily. Because spending a day without each other was like spending the day alone.

We would play any game and every time someone lost he or me would say something. It was always the one who hadn't gone through anything that day. When nothing happened, we always gave food to the other. If one refused to talk, we vowed not to leave each other's side and wait patiently for him or me to talk. Not what he had done after his birthday: stop talking to me. I should remind him, I thought.

"I don't want to."

"I'll read you something, then," he smiled.

"No. Why don't you just stay?"

"Okay," I turned to look at him, exposing the bandage. "What have they done to you this time?"

"Nothing," I pulled the covers over my face.

"That doesn't sound like anything. I told you I should pull all the background checks on the families coming to adopt you and you said no. I should have done it anyway. I should have done it anyway," he folded his arms and his reddish-blonde hair blocked his view.

"No."

He shrugged his shoulders and continued in the same posture until the orphanage headmistress came through the door.

"Young Brian, why aren't you in the lunchroom with the rest of your colleagues?"

"Madam, there are a large number of colleagues here and there is fruit on each of the tables, so we can consider this as a lunchroom, because we eat here too. So I am in the lunchroom with my colleagues."

He was sly and I laughed at the guts he had shown in answering the headmistress. She smiled too and, as she set my tray of food down on my lap, she reached out her hand to my best friend to take him to the real dining room.

"You''ll see her again later."

"Goodbye," he stuck his tongue out at me in reply to my farewell.

Reality went with him. They disappeared through the door of the infirmary.

In place of all the stretchers, Lydia and Styles reappeared, talking quietly about books that were good for learning self-defence.

"She' s come round," Styles said as Lydia ran her hand over my face and I pulled away slightly.

"Your eyes were red, then blue, then back to normal green in less than three minutes," Lydia explained. "You've been out of it for three minutes. Do you know the reason for your trips down memory lane yet?"

"Yes," I agreed. "Styles' mother."

"That's great. Now we know who to avoid," Hypatia applauded. We can charge her with some crimes and she can spend the day in jail. We forge a few cheques in her name..."

"Hey, that's my mother," Styles reminded him.

"It's true," Hypatia clicked her tongue, "What a bad luck!"

Styles sighed heavily at my friend's comment.

"Definitely, you are Mutant for my."

"Thanks, Kevin."

"We have already called Kevin and Styles' contact. We have given him the name of the reservation and he is already waiting for us there." Hypatia said.

"Great."

We parked right at the entrance of the restaurant.

I was speechless when we walked in. It was breathtaking. Greek columns, marble statues on gold pedestals, hand-carved fountains. It looked like something out of a mobster movie. I was thrilled to be there.

Everything seemed wonderful until the waiter showed us to the table where we had to sit. There he was, sitting there in his best suit with tie, impeccable jacket and sunglasses, like a secret agent.

Styles, Kevin, Hypatia and Lydia covered for me. He stood up to greet them with a handshake, while Styles introduced the girls. They held back laughter, they had recognised him. But he didn't know them.

"And this is my sister," they all stepped aside to make way for me. "Stella."

He took off his sunglasses and smiled at me.

"Hello, princess. You look absolutely breathtaking."

I smiled back and my fist landed on his nose, sending him stumbling back to the chair from which he had risen. His eyes filled with tears, which he wiped away as he blinked. He checked with his napkin that his nose was not bleeding.

No one in the room reacted. It was a gangster bar, I concluded.

"Lovely as ever, Stella."

"Now you deign to talk to me, you jackass?"

"I missed you too."

"Spare me the bullshit."

"Did you know each other?" Styles asked as he sat down in one of the chairs.

"I am her best friend."

"You were," I smiled sweetly at the president's aide.

"You know that yesterday I had the strangest feeling that I would see you" he forgot the rest of the world and concentrated on me. "I was working and I smelled the perfume I gave you."

"You smelled my perfume," he agreed. "I know. I was there. I can't believe you've stooped so low."

"You didn't tell me what happened to your late parents either," I didn't know how he found out until later. "We're at peace... Wait. Yesterday you were in...?"

"Yes," I didn't smile, I remained serious looking at him, killing him little by little in my head, "What the hech is wrong with you, are you breaking oaths now?"

"You don't understand."

Lydia rested her head in the palm of his hand, interested in the conversation he and I were having.

"Tell me about it, Brian. Make me understand."

"I did not break the oath. I followed the saying: Keep your friends close and your enemies even closer."

"You skipped the first part."

"I didn't mean to, the bosses made me stop talking to you."

"I don't buy it. But go on about how you haven't broken your oath."

"Stella, there is a conspiracy against the American people. I discovered it by looking in the national library one afternoon. They offered me two things: jail and then death row or work with them."

"You took advantage of them."

"Yes."

"Prove it to me."

"I told them where the Great Book of Secrets was."

I sat in the chair next to him.

"For the record, I haven't forgiven you yet."

The waiter passed by us and asked for a note from all of us. Brian ordered a strong coffee with some alcohol, I can't remember what kind. Styles preferred to order something to eat. Kevin and Hypatia ordered an Irish coffee. Lydia ordered a Manhattan and I ordered a red tea. We didn't have to show any ID cards Hypatia had prepared for us on the road while Bob drove. The waiter assumed we were all the children of some mobster or other and were carrying guns.

When he left, we continued our conversation.

"How do we know you're not going to give us away?"

"Because if I was going to give you away, I would have come forward with all my colleagues."

The waiter brought everything we had ordered and as he served, Brian whispered in my ear.

"To arrest you."

My world came crashing down. I couldn't remember anything I should stop for... The lawyers, the light bulb went on. The lawyers and the two girls, their disappearance. I was the only witness... Right? I didn't remember at the time.