"That's a very interesting decoration," Leonora said, gesturing to the antique key that hung from a bright red ribbon on Kara's bedroom wall. "Is there a story behind it? Does it go with anything? Does it unlock the secret treasure chest in your grandmother's attic?" The tall, curvy brunette reached out with pale, slender fingers that looked as though they should be playing a piano solo at Carnegie Hall and lifted the gleaming bronze tip away from the wall. She tilted it back and forth ever so slightly, studying the glint of light that reflected from the surface with an equally fascinating sparkle in her own hazel eyes.
Kara wished she had an interesting answer for her--she was feeling just a tiny bit awed by Leonora, by her grace and her beauty and her impeccable sense of style and the worldly-wise way the older woman carried herself. She wanted to be able to say that the key on her wall went to an old workshop in her father's basement where he made intricate clockwork toys for the wealthy and famous, or to a hidden room in her best friend's palatial mansion where the family held their secret rituals that Kara alone of all the outsiders had been invited to. Something exciting. Something as exciting as the woman who'd simply dropped into her life one day while she was window shopping at the Statement Boutique.
But the key was really so boring that Kara barely even remembered it existed most days. "No, it doesn't go to anything," she replied, dejection creeping into her voice. "It's just a cheap souvenir I picked up on a trip to Philadelphia." Her mind was already sliding off of the topic before she even finished the sentence, dismissing the little metal bauble to focus her attention back onto the intimidatingly gorgeous Leonora. Just watching the graceful, precise way her fingers curled into the ribbon and lifted it off the hook made her feel a little bit smaller by comparison.
"Well, even a key to nothing must have a story," Leonora teased, her voice gently conspiratorial. "Where did you get it, who were you with, what were you doing?" She swept across the room to join Kara on the bed, tugging the key through the air behind her at the end of the ribbon. "Did you find it at a flea market? I'm told there's a lovely one out in Berwyn if you're willing to make the trip." Once again, Kara felt a little bit smaller in comparison to the leggy brunette, and not just physically--Philadelphia was the farthest she'd been from Manchester in her entire life, but it was probably the least exotic of Leonora's travel destinations. Not for the first time, she wondered why the wealthy older woman had taken a shine to a flat-broke college student who was scraping by on tuition assistance and three jobs. The 'grand tour' of her apartment had taken all of five minutes.
"I... no, it wasn't a flea market," Kara muttered, her gaze sliding away from the key as if embarrassed by its very existence. "It was...." Her deep brown eyes went distant for a moment, thinking back to the wonderful memories of the trip--the long train ride, fascinatingly new and different compared to the usual rote functionality of airports and airplanes. The Museum of the American Revolution, a chance to get right up close to the history she'd been studying for the past several months. Giggly movie nights with Beth and Barbara, a chance to reconnect with her old friends after nearly a year away from each other. So many warm, happy memories... but her so-called souvenir brought back none of them. "It was nothing," she finished weakly, giving a dismissive shrug that sent her long curly hair bouncing for a few moments.
"Oh, it can't have been nothing," Leonora scolded playfully, holding the key up to the light between her thumb and forefinger. "It's a key, after all. Keys have to unlock something, even if the something they unlock is nothing. A key to nothing unlocks nothing, and you might just find that makes it the most valuable key of all. Don't you agree?" The bizarre, bewildering statement made Kara's eyes cross trying to think about it, but it was probably something very clever and profound that she wasn't getting. Leonora was like that.
The silence stretched out for a long, awkward moment as Kara stared at the key that Leonora was gently twirling between her delicate fingers, hoping against hope that she could dig up something from the back of her brain to elicit the older woman's interest. She always felt like a silly, clumsy puppy around Leonora, constantly eager to please despite her deeply felt immaturity, and it would mean so much if she could say something clever right now. Or even anything at all. "I... um...." she mumbled, feeling her light brown cheeks grow hot with embarrassment. She glared fiercely at the souvenir, willing it to give up its secrets.
"Just think about it, my dear," Leonora cooed, her voice filling the silent gap between Kara's hesitant thoughts. "Imagine this key sliding into a lock that doesn't exist, turning to open up the door to nothing and letting all the emptiness out. Wouldn't that make it such a magical key after all? Wouldn't you love to see that key do its work? Wouldn't it be so exciting to find out that the reason you don't remember isn't that there's nothing to remember, but that there's nothing... a whole world of nothing, right there in front of you... waiting for you to remember it?"
That--that didn't make sense. Nothing wasn't a thing; that was what made it nothing and not something. Kara couldn't remember nothing, that was the same as not remembering anything and she already didn't remember anything about the bronze key that Leonora was holding loosely between her fingers. She didn't have any memories because the memories weren't there, not because they were locked away behind some... some imaginary door to nowhere inside her head. She opened her mouth, trying to find the words to explain it all, but it all felt so clumsy and jumbled in her brain that she couldn't even speak. Kara just sat there, staring slack-jawed at the polished metal, bewildered and confused.
Wait... polished? Kara blinked hard, the glints and gleams of light still sparkling in her eyes even when they were closed. She knew a little something about old bronze from her work restoring historical artifacts--the professors didn't let her practice with anything really valuable, not yet, but she'd polished enough tarnished metal to know that a year hanging forgotten on the bedroom wall should have left a patina of oxidation on that key. It shouldn't shine like that. Not unless she'd done something to clean it. But she hadn't given the souvenir a second thought... had she?
