Page 194 of When Hearts Remember

“You’re wrong.” Her gaze roves over my face, her lips tipping in a watery smile. “My love for you isn’t only for a few months… It’s for a decade too.”

She rests her hand on my cheek, and my breath hitches. I feel her touch in my heart. “You’re the keeper of my dreams. My north star.”

My breath freezes, her words reverberating in the slither of air between us.

Keeper of her dreams. North star.

“Nova, wh-what are you saying? Are you saying you—”

A teardrop slides down her smooth cheek and she nods. “I remember, Ethan. My heart has always remembered you, but now, I rememberus. I remember it all. Our journal, our literary riddles, our texts. I remember my keeper and Delaney, the man who’d have a beautiful picnic here in this courtyard with me because I loved him. I remember planning out our future, starting with the ghost pepper challenge.”

My muscles seize, a burning sensation forming rapidly behind my nose and eyes. I snatch her hand in mine, my fingers trembling, shaking at what she’s telling me.

“Ethan,” she sobs, “you must’ve been so lonely all these years.” Alexis shakes her head, her face crumbling as I press my lips to her icy fingers, a multitude of thoughts throwing themselves around my mind.

I can’t think. I can’t process.

I’m afraid to hope.

“How could I’ve forgotten you? How could I?” She bites her lip as more tears wet her cheeks.

Her grief and guilt wreck me. I don’t want her to feel this way. It isn’t her fault.

“Shhhh,” I whisper.

She throws herself into my arms, and I bury my face in her lavender-scented hair.

I’m finally home.

“It’s not your fault, Lexy.” My voice is raw. “You’re a fighter—against all odds, you came back to me. You clawed your way back from death’s door and gave us a second chance. And for that, I’m forever grateful. So damn grateful.”

“P-Polaris.” She shakes in my arms and I hold her tighter against me. I don’t want to let go ever again. “That’s the name for the north star. You’ve given me all these clues all along—teaching me finance, just like before, your emails, your poems, your photos, I-I’ve been blind to them!”

I shush her, not wanting her to beat herself up anymore. “Do you blame me, Lexy? Maybe if I’d taught you how to swim back then, if I insisted on coming to you that day, we wouldn’t have lost all this time.”

She shakes her head vehemently. “Stop it. If you aren’t angry at me for losing my memories, why would I blame you for something you couldn’t control?”

Alexis cradles my face, her voice urgent. “You listen to me, Ethan Anderson. Youdidsave me. You taught me how to swim. Without you, we both would’ve drowned in the Hudson. I’m not mad at you. Not a single bit!”

A weight lifts from my chest. “You once asked me why I always stood to the side in the photos, and I never answered you. But I want to tell you now.”

Drawing back, I wipe her tears from her cheeks. “Because you stood next to me as I completed each bucket list item. You were there in my heart, on my mind. Every item I did was me hoping to send good karma into the universe, because I knew you believed in it.”

Her breath hitches and moisture gathers in her eyes again.

“Don’t cry, Lexy. Everything I did was out of love. I was hoping you’d feel the love and hope I had for you. That I held on to the belief one day you’d come back to me. That I never forgot you.”

My voice is raw. “Because you’re unforgettable.”

She hiccups and hooks her arms around my neck before slamming her lips on mine. Our kiss is desperate, fire and ice, a winter storm brewing for a decade. My nerves come alive, a warmth spreading from my heart to the rest of my body.

There’s no room for fear, doubts, or anxieties.

There’s only room for our love and the certainty that we’re the readers of each other’s books, that we’re the happily ever after poets and writers pen in the novels housed in the beautiful building next to us.

I taste her tears and swallow her moans, and she does the same with me. Our lips and tongues tangle, my hands gripping her tightly, molding her to me.

She remembers. She remembers everything.

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