Page 51 of Shameless Vows

Nothing can make you feel as helpless and crazy as not being able to trust your own memory and perception of your life. Except maybe waking up in an unfamiliar place that you don’t remember going and being informed by your parents—who are not concerned, ratherlividwith you—that you killed someone.

Even if it was inallegedself-defense.

ISLA

Nineteen Years Old

THE FIRST THING I remembered was a concrete room with a large metal door, and I was lying on a concrete slab. The stench of stale human waste filled my nostrils, and I dry-heaved more times that I could keep track of.

Voices ricocheted off the hard walls, speaking in Spanish, and despite it being my native tongue, I couldn’t understand any of it.

There was very little airflow, and it was hot and stuffy despite the cold concrete I was lying on, curled up on my side.

Every part of me hurt. There were dull aches from internal bone and muscle pain, and the biting, stinging sear of scrapes and cuts on my skin. There was also enervating fatigue and soreness, like I’d been clenching every muscle in my body for millennia. My head throbbed and pounded from both dehydration and what felt like more injuries.

I was dirty.

There’s a specific feeling that accompanies the state of beingtruly filthyin every single way. Like I hadn’t showered in weeks, but also like something bad had happened and I just didn’t know what. There’s a dirtiness that comes from the dread of perceiving that something terrible had taken place, but you don’t know what, and you have no idea what your involvement in or contribution to it was.

I had never been drunk, but I’d been to a couple of parties with my friends during which they had too much to drink and woke up totally disoriented and afraid of the unknown of what they did. And that’s what this was like, but to the nth degree.

The last thing I remembered was getting off the phone with Malachi, getting into the shower, and getting dressed before opening the door of my dorm for my friend, Elise.

Everything else was missing.

And given that I was suddenly in a rank, stuffy, hard concrete room, which looked scarily like ajail cell, I could tell that I was missing alotof time. And I’d probably done somethingawful.

But in the first few moments of waking up, I was too sick, and sore, and tired, and scared to be concerned with whatever it was.

Another span of time passed, and I woke again to more Spanish, this time from voices I recognized. Those of my parents.

Papá: Sit up, goddamn it. It is time to go.

Mamá: Don’t do this to her yet, Ernesto. We don’t even have all the information yet. Look at her. She is injured and sick. Do not punish her with your words yet.

Papá: I have all the information I need, which is that she wound up like thisat all.

Mamá: Enough. We will deal with it later. Come here, darling. Sit up, darling. Give me your hand. I will help you. We are taking you home.

Home.

After a span of time traveling that was rendered a complete blur amidst my realization that I had ended up inMexico—holy mother fuckingshit—I finally staggered through the doors of my home.

It was nowJuly. The date of the party I had been getting ready for was inOctober.

Something awful had happened. And my parents were angry at me. And that had to mean the awful thing that had happened was at least partially my doing.

They allowed me to go to my room and sleep, but the first thing I did was wonder about my phone because I needed to call Malachi.

If it wasJuly,and I couldn’t remember speaking to him sinceOctober, I needed to talk to him.

I needed to talk to him more than I needed to sleep, so I took a shower and changed clothes, and then waited until quiet had descended upon the house, and then I tiptoed down the stairs and slipped out the front door.

Just like I always had since I was a little girl, I crossed the lawn and then blindly sifted through the ivy to locate the loose portion of the fence. Pushing the plank aside just enough to squeeze my way-more-slender-than-usual body through, I slipped into the Sterlings’ summer estate and staggered to the front door.

Agnes, a member of the estate staff, whom I had known my entire life, answered the door and then her eyes widened. “Miss Isla? Are you all right?”

My throat was still as dry and rough as sandpaper. “Where’s Malachi?”

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