Page 36 of Forget Me Not

Present Day

“So...she’s your fiancée?” Sam can barely get the words out. I don’t blame her. If she had told me ten days ago she was already engaged to someone else before she met me, I would have lost it. “I don’t understand. How is any of this even possible? How do you remember her when you remember nothing else?” The questions pile up one after the other and I can still see more building in her eyes. She’s scared and confused, and hurt. And I can’t undo it.

“I don’t know, Sam. Maybe because she was the last person I was with before the damage? I don’t understand it any more than you do. But now that I know she’s real, that she’s not just some strange figment of my imagination,” I pause, hesitant to finish. I don’t know where the line is between being honest and giving her answers and going too far, hurting her with words she doesn’t need to hear. I sigh, taking both her hands in mine and fighting back my own hurt before I quietly deliver what is ultimately the death sentence to our future together. “I can’t pretend I don’t remember.”

“You still love her,” she whispers, tears glistening her beautiful eyes and making her thick dark lashes shimmer in the light. When I don’t answer, she nods, confirming it for herself. Her gaze breaks away from me, she clears her throat loudly several times and I can completely relate. There’s a sizeable lump in my throat right now as well. But I don’t fight it. I just let it be, because painful as all of this is, it’s the most genuine, most true experience I’ve had in the years since the accident. Pain can kill you I suppose, but it can also startle you back to life.

“Why now?” Her tone is more controlled this time around. Sam’s always been strong, as long as I’ve known her. She’s the kind of woman who can watch the whole world combust before her eyes, take a deep breath, slick on a new coat of lipstick and march right back out there to catch the next explosion. It’s one of the ways she’s helped me over the years. One of the ways in which being with her made starting over so much easier. It didn’t matter how angry or frustrated I got, she’d brush it off, insist I get back up and keep us both moving.

“Because I saw you.” I drop my gaze to the floor. I can’t face her for this. Can’t face anyone. I knew she’d ask, why now, and I’ve dreaded the moment I’d have to answer her. “It was an accident, but I walked in and the door to the bedroom was cracked...and there you were, in your wedding dress. And then...suddenly, it wasn’t you I was seeing. It was her.” Cooper. Her copper colored hair spilling down just past her shoulders in soft curls. White flowers tucked all around her head like a tiara. Her bright blue eyes so vibrant and full of life, they almost look violet. And her smile. Nothing in the world could ever compare to it.

I feel the sting of her hand across my face before I can comprehend it’s happening. As soon as it’s over, regret washes over her face and the same hand she used seconds prior to slap me, now clasps her own mouth.

“I’m sorry.” Her wide, tear streaked eyes search mine. “I didn’t mean to.”

“Yes, you did,” I say quietly. “It’s okay, Sam. I know this is horrible. I’m doing this terrible, painful thing to you, the last person on earth I ever wanted to hurt.”

She lowers her hand slowly, her fingertips catching on her chin and resting there thoughtfully. “What about her? Seven years is a long time. Are you saying she never moved on? Never got over you?”

“It’s complicated.”

She laughs derisively. “No shit.”

“More...complicated. They were friends before. After the accident...it became more. But he knows about us. He knows she never would have fallen into this thing with him if I had been there all along.” I know how I sound. Like I’m trying to convince myself he hasn’t really ever filled my spot. Like she was settling. Maybe she was. Selfishly, I’d like to think that, but I can’t. No matter what it does to me to think of her being capable of sharing what we had with someone other than me, it would hurt more knowing she went all this time without love. Feeling it. Being consumed by it. And most importantly, having it returned.

“And that’s it. Just like that? Their relationship goes back to just friends?” She frowns, clearly having her doubts about it.

I take a moment before I answer her, letting everything we’re saying settle. We’re not just talking about Cooper and Gun. We’re talking about us. “They can’t be friends now, Sam. It’s just...over.”

And so are we.

Cooper

It’s dark out already. I have no clue where this day went. It seems like an eternity ago now that I was sitting here at my kitchen table watching Gun drink his coffee and read the paper, yet it was only this morning.

Reed called a little while ago. Sam had a lot of questions. Sam. His fiancée. I suppose we both are. I hadn’t really thought about it. Technically, we never ended our engagement. I still have the ring, too. It’s buried in the back of my dresser, but I know exactly where it is. I wonder if he’d like me to wear it. I wonder if I’d like to. But I won’t figure it out tonight. Too many feelings are still wreaking havoc on my spirit, swirling about undefined and sucking me dry of all thoughts and energy in their determination to take shape and be understood. I don’t understand. No matter how I twist and turn everything around. Nothing makes sense. My heart is both fuller than it’s ever been and shattered beyond repair at the same time. Maybe that will work in my favor one day. Maybe my heart will be able to hold more while it’s in pieces. Provided nothing else comes along and turns the remaining shards to dust.

I’m not counting on anything anymore. Not after today.

My eyes move for the clock above the window for what’s probably the two hundredth time since I sat down here. Gun always makes fun of it. Says it’s a weird place to hang a clock. I think I’ll move it. Not because he’s right. Because I don’t want to look at it two hundred times in ten minutes when it’s two hundred times I’ll think of Gun.

I tap my fingers on the table nervously. I still don’t know what time it is. I don’t suppose it matters much, except that Reed said he’d be back by eleven and I have no idea if I’m even remotely close to seeing him. I let him take my work van when he took off today, so at least I know he has a way back here which is easier to navigate than the bus system.

When I hear footsteps moving in the stairwell up to my loft, my heart starts to race with anticipation. I immediately get up from my seat and start for the door. Then I stop. I should wait until he knocks. On second thought, it can’t be Reed because I’d have had to buzz him in and I didn’t. So it’s someone with a key. Or someone who doesn’t have a key, in which case I should definitely go to the door. But maybe with Gun’s old baseball bat in one hand and my cell phone all set to dial 911 in the other.

I’m still undecided on how to proceed when the door swings open. No knock. No nothing.

“Is it true? Is he really back?” It’s Cammie, my neighbor from the apartment below me and the only real chick friend I’ve ever had.

“What are you doing here? I thought you were in Boston until next week.” Cammie makes the most amazing jewelry and spends most of her time on the road selling it at everything from Farmer’s markets to medieval festivals. She’s had plenty of offers to sell in local boutiques, but she refuses them all. She’s destined for a life on the road. Most of the time I think she only keeps the apartment so she has some place to collect her mail.

“Art Walk was canceled. Apparently there was some sort of scheduling conflict with the annual food truck stop,” she explains, rattling off her words a mile a minute. “Never mind me, is it true? Did your prince’s evil amnesia curse really get lifted? Did Reed really show up here looking for you?”

“You really need to lay off of the Renaissance Fairs.”

She flicks her wrist at me, dismissing my comment. “Would you stop making this about me? I want to know about you!”

Me is the last thing I want to talk about right now. “Who told you?”

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