Forget to Remember

got home, he went to bed, too tired to even watch TV. He awoke several hours later with an unease that was close to panic. His heart raced like it did when he had a nightmare. It took him a minute to figure out the cause.
    It was Carol. She had said she was a non-person as far as the government was concerned. The full meaning of this hadn’t sunk in until he was asleep and dreaming. As a non-person, it would be easy for her to disappear. If she did, he would never find her. There would be no official record of her. He had a lot of emotion invested in her, having found her almost dead, and he wanted to make sure she was all right.
    Having made a decision, he finally relaxed and went back to sleep. Then he overslept. By the time he awoke, his parents had gone to work at the business they owned. He jumped out of bed and dressed. While he was eating a bowl of some sugary cereal, he called his mother on his cell phone and spoke to her for several minutes. Then he drove to the hospital.
    Rigo walked into the hospital about ten. He didn’t remember any signs concerning visitors’ hours. He went rapidly past the reception area and straight to an elevator. Nobody questioned him. He exited at Carol’s floor and walked to her room, trying to look as if he belonged there.
    Her room was empty, and the bed was made. There was no sign anybody inhabited the room. Rigo’s panic started to return. He accosted an orderly in the hall and asked where Carol was. The young man said she’d left the hospital an hour ago. He didn’t know where she had gone.
    Rigo raced to the nurses’ station. The nurse behind the counter was on the phone. He impatiently shifted his weight from one foot to another, waiting for her to get off. After what seemed like an eternity, she hung up and started writing something. Rigo couldn’t wait any longer. He asked where Carol Golden had gone.
    The nurse, interrupted, looked up at Rigo. When she didn’t answer immediately, he said, “The young woman in room—”
    “I know who you mean. The girl with amnesia. She was taken to a shelter, I believe.”
    “Where is it? What’s the address?”
    “Are you a relative?” Apparently rethinking that, “Are you—”
    “A friend. I’m a friend.” When that didn’t get an immediate response, he said, “I’m the one who found her.”
    She looked at him with new respect and picked up the phone. She made a call and engaged in a brief conversation about Carol while writing on a pad. She hung up, tore off a sheet, and handed it to Rigo. “Here’s the address. Do you know where it is?”
    Rigo looked at it. “Downtown L.A.”
    The nurse nodded. “If you’re going there, be careful. She’s a nice girl. I hope she’ll be okay.”
    “You and me both. Thanks.” Rigo headed toward the elevator, clutching the piece of paper.
    Once he was in his car, he headed east toward the 110, aka the Harbor Freeway. He took it northbound. After a few miles, the tall buildings began to materialize in the distance, buildings he could see from his parents’ house on the hill when the air was clear. He passed through some sections of the city that were better avoided during daytime and more so at night.
    Traffic slowed near the intersection with the I-10, as it always did. It was funny to think the I-10, although it started only a few miles west of here at the Pacific Ocean, could be taken east all the way to Florida. Sometimes Rigo just wanted to get on it and drive.
    He took the 4 th Street exit and headed east to San Pedro Street, passing between skyscrapers that loomed over him. Turning right at San Pedro Street, he looked for a reasonably priced parking lot. In downtown L.A., the sky was the limit as far as parking rates were concerned.
    He glanced along 5 th Street as he passed it, expecting to see tents, cardboard boxes, and blanket rolls, just as he had when he visited this area on a field trip with a college class, several years before. Unshaven men and unkempt women had hung out or exchanged cigarettes for whatever they needed, probably including drugs. Possessions had been stored in supermarkets carts.
    They were all gone. A few homeless men sat here and there, on benches or on the sidewalk, but the tent city had disappeared. All those people couldn’t have found homes. The police must have cleaned up the area. Where were they now? Where would Carol end up if she joined their ranks?
    Fortunately, parking was less expensive here than it was a few blocks west