Page 16 of Forget & Forgive

Matteo:LOL She trusts me to hide anything that might warrant a needle.

Owen:That sounds like you.

He’d responded with an eyeroll emoji. At that, my humor had dimmed a little; he’d usually send me a middle finger emoji oreat a dick, either of which would have me cackling.

But that wasn’t who we were anymore, was it? Somehow, in that missing year of my life, we’d stopped being who I swore we’d been just yesterday.

That niggled at me even more than some of the other missing pieces in my mind. It was like the truth was right there at the edge of my thoughts, staying just out of reach like an answer on an exam that I knew but had tucked away too far. It was frustrating, that certainty that it was there but I couldn’t get to it.

I needed to know, damn it. I needed to know something—anything—about the last year, whether it shed light on me and Matteo or just filled in some of the gap between yesterday and today.

Scrolling through social media had been too overwhelming earlier, but it occurred to me that I’d started with my most recent posts. What if I skipped back to the time right before my memory went out? Maybe that would jostle something loose in my mind. If nothing else, it would catch me up on my own life, not to mention the world around me, starting in a familiar place and moving forward. Worth a try.

I settled on the couch and pulled up one of my social media apps. With a few taps, I’d gone back in time, and I found the last thing I remembered posting, which was a selfie of Matteo and me in my car outside the airport.

BF acquired. Welcome home, baby!

The photo made my chest hurt. We looked so happy right then. Matteo was obviously tired from traveling, but he was smiling, cheek pressed against mine as we’d leaned in between the driver and passenger seats of my car.

Where the hell had we gone wrong after that? What in the world could’ve happened?

I scrolled a little farther down, to the very next day, and—

My heart dropped through the floor.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME? 6 years together, and he fucking CHEATS ON ME?

I stared at the screen, not even breathing for long, painful seconds.

Matteo… cheated on me?

Numbly, I scrolled the comments, where dozens of friends, relatives, and online acquaintances had posted messages of support andFuck that asshole!andYou deserve better, honey!My brother had threatened to come to town and kick Matteo’s ass. Two of my coworkers had invited me out to get me drunk until I forgot all about Matteo and found some fresh dick.

Deep in the thread, my sister asked when it happened and how I found out. Though I had no memory of reading her comment or replying, I swore I could feel how hollowed out and devastated I must’ve been as I’d written,He told me. Hooked up at his conference. I can’t believe this. I’m such a mess.

I could feel it in my own words, and I could sure imagine how I’d have felt right then, but I couldn’trememberfeeling it. It was beyond unsettling how none of this actually unlocked my missing memories. I was reading my own words, watching my own emotions play out, and while it angered me and it hurt like hell, it wasn’tfamiliar. It was legitimately like I was finding all this out for the very first time. There was no, “Oh, right, I forgot about that,” or “Man, that pissed me off so bad back then!”

No, it was all completely new. As new as my unfamiliar bedroom and Matteo’s absence had been this morning.

Matteo’s absence.

The fact that we weren’t together anymore.

The fact that he’dfucking cheatedon me.

I lowered my phone and sat back against the cushion, staring numbly at the wall.

“Did we break up?”I’d asked in his office just a few hours ago.

He’d stared at me, a mix of emotions on his face that didn’t fully make sense even now.

“We did, didn’t we?”I’d said.“Shit. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come here, and—”

“Owen.”He’d touched my arm.“Stay. I’ll… I want to help you figure this out.”

I’d stared at him, trying to make sense of… of… fuck, anything. Finally, I’d managed,“What happened to us?”

The silence that had hung between us had left me off-balance. He’d watched me for a long time, chewing the inside of his cheek as he apparently tried to figure out what to say. What eventually came out was,“We realized we weren’t right for each other. A few months ago.”

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