The Pact - Season 1: Episode 18

I arrived at David’s house, and Lynn opened the door for me. She told me that David was upstairs in his bedroom, and I went up. He was lying on his bed, lost in thought. It was obvious that the strain of the memory had been a little too much for him, but he smiled softly at me through his tears as I walked in.

I sat down on the bed beside him, and immediately he asked,

“How’s Steve?” I shrugged.

“I guess he’s coping. Mandy is with him. I’ve also been to see Tyrone. He thinks that you guys blame him for what happened.” David shook his head.

“How can I blame him? I was the one who pushed him.” I took his hand in mine.

“David it was an accident. You definitely did not want your brother to die, let alone kill him. You all have to stop blaming yourselves.” David nodded his head, and said,

“It’s not going to be easy, but I guess now that I know the truth, I have to move on. Danny would want us to move on. I guess that’s why I forgot – from wherever he is, he made me forget so that I could move on forward with my life, until it was the right time for me to remember. And that time was now – now that we all got back together. This was all supposed to happen, Michelle.”

I looked at him, not quite understanding what he meant by that.

He pulled me close to him, and softly kissed my lips. I kissed him back. I didn't know if this meant that he had forgiven me, or if he wanted us to be together still. But it didn't matter at that moment, because I knew that he needed to feel someone close to him at that moment, and I needed the same thing just as much.

He let go of my hand, and got off the bed. He walked towards his desk, and picked up a book from it. He handed it to me. It was a photo album.

“Take a look at this. This is a photo album of when I was a kid. There are a lot of pictures of Danny here. My parents and Lynn have kept this album hidden from me, knowing that if I saw them my memory could come back. But now that I can remember everything, Lynn has given it to me.”

I opened the album, and started going through those pictures. Like David had said, it was full of pictures from his childhood, starting from him and Danny as babies, and toddlers, and of them as little children. I recognised most of the landscapes too - and I wondered how I could have forgotten so much of my own childhood. Tears welled up in my eyes as I saw those pictures of Danny. He had been such a cute child. David and Danny had been identical twins, but as I looked at those pictures, I could recognise which one was David, and which one was Danny - we had always been able to tell them apart somehow, and now even after all these years, I could remember exactly which one was which.

I suddenly stopped at one particular photo. The tears that had been threatening to come out, now streamed down my face.

David saw me staring at that picture, and he gently pulled it out of the album.

It was a picture of all us together, in our backyard.

“See that picture? Do you remember the day that picture was taken?” I looked at the picture again, and was suddenly whisked back in time to that day. It had been a beautiful day, at the beginning of spring. It had been only a few days before Danny’s tragic accident.

Danny had been sitting on the swing, and we were just lazing about in our small backyard.

Suddenly Danny had looked at us all seriously, and said,

“Have you guys ever thought about what you want to be when you grow up?”

We all looked at him, and as he joined us on the grass, we started speaking of our dreams. I had said I wanted to be a movie star, and Steve had said he wanted to be a rock star. Tyrone had said that he wanted to be someone famous, and David had said that he too wanted to be Someone when he grew up. Mandy had said that she wanted to be a fashion designer, and I remember that Danny had said he wanted to be a famous reporter, and write in the most popular magazines.

Then I remember Tyrone had said,

“This village is so quiet, nothing ever happens here. No famous person has ever come out of this place. We will be the first famous people to ever come out of Sherwood.”

Danny had shaken his head at that remark.

“No that will never be possible. There is no way that we can ever get the skills needed for our dream jobs here in this village. We will have to move away to become famous.”

“But that means we might never see each other again. If everyone goes their own way, we won’t be able to remain friends.” And Danny had said,

“We will move away together. When we finish High School, we will be eighteen, and then we will move to some other place together, and follow our dreams. What do you think?”

We all agreed with what he was saying. We were still kids, and we could not realise how Fate sometimes has a way of interfering with the plans you make for your life. So Danny went on,

“We will make a pact, here, today, that the summer after we finish High School, we will move away together to some other place – a place where we can become Somebodies. And we will also make a pact that we will always remain friends – and will never break that pact.”

We all hugged each other, and took that picture, as a promise that we will remain friends forever. We did not have any doubt, and we did not even realise how hard it was to keep a promise like that. Well, we did not give it much thought, and as from the next day, we were back to playing in the woods, and hunting rabbits, and making tree-houses. And then, just a few weeks later, Fate had intervened, and we all had gone our separate ways.

“Do you remember?” he asked. I looked at Danny's pictures in the album again, and nodded my head, and said,

“Yes. That day we had promised to move out together the summer after we finish High School, and that we will always be together, no matter what.” I stared at him, as a sudden thought occurred to me, “Do you think…?”

“Yes,” he interrupted. “We were taken away from each other. My parents brought me here, your parents took you and Steve to America, and Mandy and Tyrone stayed behind. Last year was the year when the rest of us turned eighteen, and we ended up here together on this island, in the same University. Last summer was the summer after you finished High School, and you too chose to come to Lenton. And in some weird way we all ended up connected to each other.”

“That’s so incredible, isn’t it? It’s just like a story out of a book,” I said.

“Yes, it is weird. But I do have the feeling that it was Danny who wanted us to be together, just like we had promised.” I smiled at that thought. I was hard to believe that it was some dead entity from the beyond that was behind the strange occurrences of that summer, but it was such a comforting thought. And I knew that it meant a lot for David, because if he could actually believe that his brother was looking after him, maybe it would help him to get rid of the guilt.

“So what do we do now?” I asked. David shrugged.

“I don’t know yet. I don’t know if I can face Tyrone after all that’s happened between us in the past year. I know I want to be with you, because I love you. But as for the rest, I need some time to think about it, I guess.”

I smiled at him, and kissed him.

“I love you too, David. No matter what you decide to do, I will always love you.”

He pulled me closer to him, and held me tighter. He slowly started taking my clothes off. I wanted him badly that night. I always wanted to make love to him, but that night it was more important than ever. I wanted him to know that I loved him, and only him, and whatever stupid mistakes the alcohol had made me do, there shall be no place in my heart for anyone else, except for him.

I pulled him closer to me, as I said,

"David, I love you so much. I have always loved you, and I am so sorry for any pain I have caused you. I want us to be together forever."

He silenced me with a kiss, and then pulled away long enough to tell me,

"Shh, that's all passed now. I wasn't exactly the perfect boyfriend either, with all the strange things in my mind. We will be together forever. We had promised each other that, right?" I smiled as I pulled him in another kiss. Well, we hadn't known that me and David would be going this far, I smiled to myself, but I certainly had no problem with that.

I slept at his house that night. David didn’t get much rest, because I could feel him tossing and turning all night long.

At the break of dawn, I felt him get out of bed, and I looked up groggily.

“I have come to a decision. There is someone that I need to talk to. And I need you to be there with me.”

I got out of bed slowly, and went to the shower. David had showered downstairs, and was getting dressed when I walked in his room.

"There is no other way to do things. I've been thinking about this all night, and this absolutely has to be done." I hugged him, and said,

"You must do what you feel is best for you." He smiled as he hugged me back.

After we got dressed, we had a cup of coffee, and walked out of the house. We got on David’s bike, and he drove us to Tyrone’s garage.