Forget Me Not

by K. S. Thomas

  “There was a girl,” he starts slowly. “She wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. Wound up being thrown from the cab. She was in bad shape when we found her. Hand was nearly severed off. Gashes from the windshield everywhere.” He shakes his head, searching the ground as if they hold answers, or maybe just a better image than the one he’s just painted for the both of us.

  “But she made it...right?” She had to have. She’s alive. I know she is.

  The officer lifts his eyes to meet mine. “I don’t know.”

  I shake my head back and forth, trying to clear the thoughts screaming inside my mind. “What was her name? Do you know her name? Anything that might help me find her?”

  He shrugs helplessly. “It’d be in the accident report.”

  “How do I get that?”

  “DMV. Have them pull up your driving record. Accident would be on there.”

  The golf ball at the pit of my stomach grows into a medicine ball with the weight to match. I don’t know if I’m relieved or terrified. That report could hold the answer I’ve been looking for all this time. Or it could give me one I’ve been avoiding. Maybe that’s why I can’t remember. She could be dead. Could have died in my truck. While I was driving. Certainly would give a new perspective on why everyone who’s supposed to love me has been lying to me since I woke up.

  “Thank you.” I clench my jaw to keep from saying anything else. Or worse, ask any more questions I can hardly stand to hear the answers to.

  He does his best to encourage me with a sympathetic expression I’m sure he’s had to use more times than he cares to remember in his line of work, then gets back in his patrol car and drives away.

  I should do the same. I should get in my car and drive. To the nearest DMV. Only I can’t. I just walked away from the woman I’ve loved for the last three years. The woman I was prepared to promise my whole life to. I was pulled away by something stronger than her. If I find out it’s been a ghost pulling the strings to my heart all along, I’m not sure what I’ll do. I may attempt to forget all over again.

  Cooper

  “Is he with you?” A frantic voice demands of me before I even manage to grumble a hello. It’s dark. Sometime between three a.m. and sunrise. Two fifty-seven was the last time I glanced at the clock. After two and a half hours of checking it every three minutes, I still remember. Even half asleep, I remember. And it pisses me off. Because sleep was hard to come by and I couldn’t possibly have gotten more than three hours’ worth yet.

  “Cooper!” The voice is impatient. It’s always impatient. I haven’t heard it in seven years but it still sounds exactly the same.

  “Hi, Kerri,” I mumble, struggling to sit upright in my bed and possibly form coherent thoughts. On second thought, I’m probably not even awake. Hell, if I’m talking to Kerri it’s gotta be a dream. Or a fucking nightmare. Guess time will tell.

  “I don’t have time to play games with you, Cooper! Just tell me he’s there. Tell me he’s with you so I can take a freaking breath and stop having a heart attack.”

  I reach for the chord of my lamp and find the switch. Kerri is dramatic even on the most average of days, but this seems excessive even for her. It’s time to wake up and really pay attention.

  “What are you talking about? Who is with me?”

  “Reed! Who the hell else?”

  Reed. It’s like the sound of his name electrocutes me, one shot straight through my entire being. I’m both wide awake and in absolute agony all at once. I haven’t heard his name in years. Not spoken by anyone else at least. On days when I miss him most, I whisper it to myself and it gives me comfort. Hearing Kerri say it, it’s anything but.

  “This isn’t funny, Kerri,” I whisper into the receiver. I have to wage war with the Jupiter sized lump in my throat just to get the words out.

  “Damn it, Cooper! You’re not listening to me,” Kerri screeches and the sound tears at my ear drums nearly as hard as the words do at my heart. “Reed is gone! Disappeared. Night before his wedding. No one knows where he went. His friends are calling it cold feet. Mom and Dad think he’s had some sort of a mental break, some sort of lingering brain damage no one knew about, it’s all bullshit. Cooper...I think he remembers.”

  My breath catches in my throat and I choke, coughing so hard I can hardly think about anything other than how much suffocating right now would suck. He was getting married. To someone else. Nightmare. Definitely a nightmare.

  “Cooper?!”

  “I’m sorry,” I croak. “Just inhaling my shock. It didn’t go down so well.”

  “He’s really not there.” It sounds like she’s telling herself. She won’t believe me, but if she says it out loud, she’ll accept that it’s true. “And you had no fucking clue. God, I’m sorry.”

  “Kerri?”

  “Yeah?” Her tone is empty. Hollow. She’s much better when she’s frantic. It gives her energy. This, this is the kind of Kerri I find really scary because she seems fragile. And if she breaks, I don’t know who’s around to pick up the pieces. At this time of night, probably no one. Unless Kerri’s suddenly become the cuddling type and I seriously doubt that. Kerri loves sex, but hates intimacy. She never has her overnight guests stay ‘til morning. And she never has guests that come back more than once.

  “Why do you think he remembers? I mean...did something happen?” I won’t have hope. I won’t get excited. I won’t. I can’t.

  “I can’t explain it, Cooper,” she says quietly, tears filling her voice. “I just know it. There was something in his eyes the last time I saw him. It was like he was there. Inside. Stuck. And he knew it. He’s never known it.” She sucks in air and it sends a loud swoosh over the phone line. “He looked sad, Cooper. Sad...and terrified.”

  I sniff and it’s the first time I realize I’m crying too. Tears are flooding my eyes and I can barely see beyond the foot of my bed. But I don’t care. All I can see is him anyway. Seven years later and I still know every inch of his handsome face by memory.

  “He’s going to find you, Cooper. I know it. Wherever he is, whatever he’s doing...he’s coming for you.”

  Then the line goes dead just as suddenly as it exploded to life in the dark of night and I’m alone again. Alone. I’m used to alone. I’ve been alone most of my life. Reed gave me a brief reprieve once upon a time, but then he left me too. And alone was all there was left.

  Chapter Two

  Reed

  It’s been three days since I visited the scene of the accident. The place where it all happened. Where I died and came to life all at the same time. I left there and hit every ATM I could find until I successfully cleaned out my bank account and maxed out every credit card I have. I’m not ready to be found yet and paying cash will help keep me hidden. Especially while I’m still in town.

  Three days of sitting holed up in a motel room watching bad cable and eating a constant flow of delivered pizza have done as intended. I’m ready to get the fuck out. Even if the next place I go is the DMV. The place I’ve been avoiding. I can’t put it off any longer. I need to know. If I ever hope to make a future for myself, I need to learn about the past. Need to learn about her. And why she disappeared.

  Since I left my car at the last ATM I visited, I’m traveling on foot for the moment. At least until I find the nearest bus stop.

  What should have taken no more than half an hour by car, winds up taking nearly four. But I make it. Just in time for everyone who works here to go to lunch while the entire world now on lunch break, is ready to run in and try and get their driving issues resolved before they have to clock back in. This is going to take a while. And I’m not sure I have the nerve to sit here and wait that long.

  Trying to avoid feeling trapped, I opt to stand along the back wall. I’m not alone here, but at least there’s still some sense of personal space requirements among those of us who choose to forgo the chairs.

  Fidgeting with my phone, I catch a glimpse of the screen. Sam called. Again. I’ve had this thing on sile
nt since I left, but I keep charging it. It’s a sick sort of game I’m playing, torturing everyone involved while still maintaining a minute degree of sanity. My phone stays on, the calls go through, maybe people at home won’t worry as much. On the other hand, the ringer’s off, so I don’t have to hear their attempts to reach me, but I still see their names, so I know they’re trying. I haven’t decided yet whether this helps or hurts. Knowing they care. Knowing that after everything I’ve put them through, they still refuse to give up on me. It’s hard to believe those same people would lie to me about something so monumental for seven years. Unless they had a good reason to.

  G306.

  My number flashes across the large screen. I’m up.

  I stumble making my way to the counter. If that wasn’t humiliating enough, I wind up standing at the wrong window for a solid three minutes before I realize I’m in the wrong place.

  “How can I help you today?” The woman sitting behind the tall desk is lower than I expected. It’s not that she’s unusually small or the desk is abnormally large, she’s just got her chair adjusted in a way that’s keeping her seriously low to the ground. And out of sight. It’s like she’s retreated into a secret fort amid the DMV instead of a help desk slash cubicle. If all of my muscles weren’t pulled stiff to the point of breaking from the stress of the last few days (and this very moment) I might have cracked a smile at the visual.

  I slide my driver’s license across her counter toward her. “Uh, I was hoping you could pull up an accident report for me?” At least, I think that’s what I say. She’s typing, so I must have at least gotten close. Without looking, she swipes my ID and keeps working.

  “May of 2010?” she asks, for the first time really making eye contact with me. She has dark eyes, almost black, but they’re warm and surprisingly caring given her initial impression.

  “Yeah. That’s the one.”

  She nods, clicking her finger over the enter key. “Printer just takes a sec.”

  Turns out to be more like a minute, or ten, but I probably wouldn’t have noticed the difference anyway. Any amount of waiting feels like an eternity until that piece of paper lands at my fingertips.

  Now that I’m holding it, standing out here on the sidewalk, alone, time can’t slow down enough. I’d like it to stop all together. To cease all at once and keep me from having to decide once and for all. Once I see what’s on this report, that’s it. There will be no going back.

  Two more people come out of the DMV, one of them was standing against the wall with me. If I’m not going to look at the report I need to at least leave the premises before people start to wonder about me.

  I start walking. I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m walking. Except this is what I’ve felt like for as long as I can remember and I hate it. I fucking hate it.

  I stop. I flip over the pages in one determined motion and force my gaze to scan the document in search of one thing. Cooper.

  At first, nothing catches. Then, I see it. Her name. Jane Cooper. Passenger.

  Cooper

  My eyes seek out the scar across my wrist. Most days I hardly even notice it anymore. Today, it physically hurts, as if it’s insisting on being seen. Insisting on being remembered.

  I turn my hand in small circles, first left, then right. It doesn’t help the pain, but it feels good to know it still moves. It’s still alive. Still a part of me.

  “You okay, babe?”

  I break my gaze from my wrist and look up across the table at Gunner. He’s got the paper open, the comics section, the only part he reads with his coffee. But he likes the paper. The real deal. Holding it. Feeling it. Likes the idea of it. I get it. It’s one of those visuals you have as a kid of a grown-up thing to do. Grownups who have it together. He was eleven when he first started this habit. There weren’t any grownups around who had it together, so he was determined to become the first one in our midst. He succeeded. Against all odds, he got there. And it looks good on him.

  “Coop?” He asks again, concern growing in his voice when I don’t answer.

  “Of course.” I drop the leg I had propped up on my chair and sit up straighter. Because somehow sitting up straighter gives a better illusion of my emotions. The illusion that I’m not having any. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  I reach for my bagel but the thought of putting it in my mouth makes my stomach turn.

  “You seem off. Distracted.” He folds his paper, laying it down on the corner of the table. Finally, I get to see his whole face. His exceptionally handsome face. He’s not a boy anymore. Not that he’s ever been boyish...or soft. Everything about Gun has always been laced in strength and shielded by a rough exterior. And it shows in every aspect, right down to his strong jaw which is covered in a careless scruff, his mouth which rarely yields to a smile and his dark green eyes, which only seem darker and deeper the longer you look at them, in part due to his dark brows and thick black lashes. But, he exudes so much more than just his strength now. And I get a fresh taste of it, as he leans over the table, hand moving over my wrist, gently stroking my skin. There’s no denying the chills he sends through me, or the way my heart still races when his voice drops deeper in that quiet intimate way it only does when it’s just us. “Is it work?”

  I nod out of reflex. Then, my brain jars its way back to reality and my current mess, and I realize I’ll need a reason for work to be distracting me and I don’t have one. “I mean, no more than usual.” I place the bagel back onto my plate without taking a bite. “New season, new line, you know? I’ve been toying with a few different styles and colors but nothing has really clicked for me yet.” I own a small pottery studio located in the shop below my apartment. I do lessons a couple of times a week, but mostly I work on creating my own pieces which I sell through several local boutiques. Especially in the tourist district, the stuff sells like hot cakes, local artist and all. Anyway, I’m not getting rich off of it anytime soon, but I’m twenty-five, running my own business and doing what I love. I depend on no one, and I always have enough of what I need to get by. It’s safe to say, I’ve surpassed the expectations people had of me. And me, I’m content. It’s not everything I ever wanted, but it’s more than I thought I would ever be capable of.

  “You’ll come up with something.” He smiles. I take a moment to bask in it, his smile. It only appears on rare occasions, like now, because Gun believes in me. Always has. “And, it’ll be amazing.” Somehow, when he says it, I believe him. Someday, I’ll believe in myself, too.

  “Thanks, Gun.” I try for the bagel again. I get it closer to my mouth this time, but as soon as I can smell the cream cheese, I’m out. Breakfast might be the most important meal of the day, but it’s hardly worth it if it’s going to cost me dinner. Of course, at this rate, I can’t imagine any meal appealing to me ever again.

  “Kerri called me,” I blurt out, hoping it will help ease the anxiety I’ve had pent up inside me for days now while also keeping me from starving to death.

  Gunnar freezes in the middle of stirring his coffee. The liquid continues to swirl around his stiff spoon. I feel a lot like that coffee. Spiraling.

  “Kerri who?” But his slanted eyes tell me he knows exactly Kerri who.

  “Don’t do that.” I turn away from his accusing gaze and pull both knees up to my chest. “We both know there’s only one Kerri.”

  His jaw tightens as his hand abandons his coffee entirely. “Why now? What did she want?”

  I take a deep breath. I’m the one who opened this can of worms. To ease my own guilt. It was selfish dragging Gun into this and now I need to suck it up and deal with it. Make him feel okay again.

  “Reed is missing. For some insane reason, she thought he might be here. I told her he wasn’t and that was the end of it.” I fight the urge to bite down on my lip. He’ll know. Gunnar knows all of my ticks. All of my cues. He’s known me longer than any other person in the world. He’s heard all my secrets. Seen all of my heartache. But this...I can’t tell him th
is. It’s not right. Gunnar’s not just my best friend anymore. He’s more. After everything he’s been through with me, all the time he spent waiting for me, standing by me, looking out for me, he deserves to be.

  “Why is he missing?” His expression is softening up ever so slightly. He can’t stay mad at me. It’s his biggest downfall. And a constant source of guilt for me.

  “I have no idea.” It’s the truth. Every reason Kerri gave me was complete speculation. Baseless. And definitely not worth upsetting Gun over. “Apparently, he just took off and didn’t tell anyone.”

  He nods, digesting everything I’ve just dropped on him like a bomb with his coffee and comics. I’m a horrible person. He brings me breakfast and I bring him stress and heartache.

  “Well, I hope he’s okay. I used to wonder if he would just snap one day. Going through what he went through...”

  I wonder if he’s thought the same thing about me. Probably.

  “Gun?”

  “Yeah?” His eyes are warm when they land on mine again.

  “It’s in the past. He’s in the past.”

  He smiles, almost completely hiding the sadness I can still see in his kind face. “I know.”

  And then we stop talking about Reed and he goes back to his paper. The bagel on my plate continues to taunt me, but I give up attempting to get close to it. Instead I just wrap both arms around my legs as tightly as I can and try to snuff out the fear swirling inside me. I keep an ironclad focus on Gunnar sitting across from me. My constant from the time we were nine and landed in the same home. My best friend. My savior. And the one person on earth I never want to hurt... but inevitably always do.

  “I can make pancakes.”

  “What?” I look up from the spot on the floorboards my eyes had landed on.

  “If you’re not in the mood for bagels. I can make pancakes.” Gun is still hidden behind his paper, but somehow my not being able to see him never stops him from seeing me. If it wasn’t him, it would be creepy, but it is him, so I’m used to it. Depend on it even.