Page 55 of Ruthless Riches
“Let’s just hope it doesn’t happen like that,” I said. “Let’s also hope you’re right about the drugs being bullshit. If you are, there’s way more of a chance that you’ll remember enough to help me.”
She nodded slowly. Then she stood up. “I have an idea,” she said. Before I could reply, she smashed her left arm against the bar directly in front of her.
“What the hell are you doing?” I said, eyes widening.
She clenched her jaw and smashed her arm on the bar again. “I’m trying to give myself a massive bruise,” she said, wincing as she drew her arm back and rubbed it. “Even if I can’t remember anything at first, the bruise might jog my memory, because I’ll wonder where I got it when I see it.”
“Okay. Just be careful. I don’t want you to break anything.”
“I won’t.” She grimaced and raised her arm again. This time, a yelp escaped her mouth when she hit the bar. “Fuck. I think that’s enough.”
“Are you okay?” I asked, brows wrinkling with concern. “That sounded bad.”
“I’m fine. It just hurts.” Sascha went over to the velvet seat in her cell and sat down, leaning against the wall. “Hey, do you remember that beach we always used to go to when we were kids?”
I gave her a faint smile and nodded. “Yeah. Do you remember when we saw a bunch of washed up jellyfish, and we thought they made Jell-O out of that, so we took some home to Mom and told her to make it?”
She let out a tiny giggle. “Yes. We were so stupid.”
We spent the next several hours talking about our lives and rehashing our favorite childhood and teenage memories. Neither of us wanted to say it, but we both knew it might be the last time we ever saw each other, so we wanted to talk about everything we possibly could, just in case.
Several hours later, when we were both getting sleepy and trying our best to hang on a little longer, the robotic voice sounded from somewhere nearby. “Give me a name, Alexis. Who is it going to be?”
“Sascha,” I said. “Take her home.”
“Are you sure about this?” Sascha asked. She sounded weak from exhaustion.
I nodded. “Yes. Just promise me you’ll do your best to remember everything.”
“I promise.”
The disembodied voice didn’t say anything else to us after that. We sat back and waited for footsteps to echo in the tunnels, but nothing happened.
“Shit. Maybe that was the real game,” Sascha said. “He made us choose just so he could laugh at us when we finally realized neither of us were ever getting out of here.”
Tears welled up in my eyes again. She was probably right. “At least we’re together,” I said, trying to stop my voice from cracking.
“Yeah. I guess he can’t take that from us.” Sascha stuck her right arm through the bars of her cell in an attempt to reach across the tunnel and touch my hand. I did the same, but our fingertips fell short of meeting by several feet. The tunnel was simply too wide.
We sat down at the edges of our cells and started talking about our childhood memories again. There were a lot of things Sascha remembered that I’d totally forgotten about until now and vice versa. We laughed, cried, teased each other about silly things we’d done, commiserated with each other over unfortunate hairstyle choices we’d made in high school, and shared our absolute favorite memories of our father.
At some point, the creeping exhaustion finally caught up to me, and I fell asleep.
When I woke up again, Sascha was gone.
