Remembering Us

by Stacey Lynn

  “I love you,” I whisper against his cheek. Now that I know how I feel, I never want him to doubt it again. I can’t seem to stop myself from saying it.

  Now I know that I’ve never been able to stop myself from saying it.

  I can feel Adam’s grin against the crook of my neck. “I love you. More than anything.” He shifts and presses his forehead against mine, his eyes closed. “I’m so glad you’re here. Thank you for coming.”

  I hold him even tighter, not caring if his weight crushes me. “There’s nowhere else I could possibly be. Not now.”

  I mean it. Every single word.

  “So what exactly is going to happen today?” I ask Adam through the bathroom doorway. I’m standing at the vanity in the hotel applying my make-up and fresh from a shower that just caused us both to get clean, then messy, and clean all over again.

  My legs are still a little bit shaky from it.

  He walks to the doorway, dressed in a pair of black jeans and an actual polo shirt with a collar. The baby blue makes his eyes shine.

  Or the fact that we’ve had sex five times since we entered the hotel room last night is doing it.

  Whatever the reason, he’s the most gorgeous guy I’ve ever seen, and my pulse speeds up just looking at him leaning against the doorframe.

  He smiles knowingly and my cheeks flush. At least now I don’t need blush.

  “I have to meet with the parole board in the prison. They’ll ask me questions about my dad, and if I think he’s a threat to the public, and if I’d be willing to help with his probation. Keep an eye on him if he gets out.”

  I frown in the mirror, my eyes locked on his. “What are you thinking?”

  He sighs heavily and runs his hands through his hair, staring off into space.

  “I think he’s evil. I never got to tell my story before … what it was like living with him as a kid. I have to do this. I have to make sure they hear what kind of monster he really is.”

  My lips purse. I don’t know the right thing to say to him to make him feel better, but I can tell by the dark color in eyes that Adam hates that he has to do this.

  I set my mascara down and go to him, wrapping my arms around him. His head instantly drops to my shoulder. I feel him take a deep breath and his arms tighten around me.

  “God, I’m glad you’re here.”

  I pull back and kiss his cheek. “I want to be here for you. I don’t know what you need …”

  “You.” He kisses me and then brushes his lips against my cheek, moving back to nibble on my ear lobe. I squirm in his arms and he laughs. “Just you.”

  “Well, then you have everything you need.” I pull away and walk back to the mirror, finishing my make-up and smiling haughtily.

  “That I do,” he confirms seriously, and leaves me to get ready.

  Today, it feels as if the last three months are a dream. Something that wasn’t quite real. I know we’ll have to work things out. I most likely will have doctor’s visits to make sure my memory coming back means that everything that was wrong – whatever it was – is better now.

  But we’re not dealing with it today.

  Because today we’re making sure Adam’s dad stays in jail. I shudder at the thought and go to find him.

  When I walk through the doorway, he’s looking down at the ring box, smiling at the ring that I still haven’t seen except for in my memory. But I’m dying to rip it out of his hands so I can feel it on my finger.

  “Ready?” I ask.

  He snaps the box closed and shoves it in his pocket. My eyes follow it.

  “Yup.”

  I hesitate as he walks toward me, still staring at the box.

  “You’re not going to ask me?” I raise my eyebrows when he gets closer to me.

  He shakes his head with a grin.

  “Nope.” I frown and squish my nose up. He taps the tip of it and laughs. “I will. But not today. Do you really want to remember getting engaged on the same day we go to prison?”

  I scoff. “We’re just visiting. And besides,” I tell him, grabbing my purse as he leads me out the door, “It’s not like I don’t already remember you asking me.”

  “And look how well that day turned out,” he mutters.

  I pull on his hand, stopping him in the hallway so I can see his face.

  He looks … guilty?

  “That wasn’t your fault.”

  He shrugs and squeezes my hand tightly. “If I hadn’t insisted we go there that day, if I had picked somewhere else …” his voice trails off. I can only imagine the horror Adam lived through that day.

  “Enough. It was an accident, and I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” I smile and pull him into the elevator, tugging him until his body is flush against mine. “Let’s go send your dad to jail.”

  We laugh at the absurdity. He silences me when his lips find mine and then we make out like teenagers until the door opens in the lobby. We ignore the judgmental looks from the wrinkly women with curly blue hair on our exit.

  Walking into a prison is a lot less intimidating than I thought it was going to be. We sign in and are assigned our “visitor” stickers. We have to leave my purse and empty our pockets into a locker that looks like a small gym locker. Then we’re ushered through a metal detector and down a maze of white hallways. I don’t know if I was expecting armed guards at every entrance and men in orange jumpsuits raiding the hallways like zombies, but the overall experience is a bit of a letdown.

  I’m let down by not being mauled by prison inmates. I shake my head at the ridiculous thought and let out a garbled sound.

  “Are you okay?” Adam asks as we’re ushered into a waiting room. It’s as pleasant as my dentist’s office.

  “Yup.”

  I regain control of myself and turn to Adam who stands with the guard. I’m not allowed into the private meeting room where he’ll be meeting with eight members of the parole board. This is my home for the next who knows how long. I have no idea if it’ll take hours, or minutes, and I’m suddenly annoyed and flustered that I don’t at least have my phone with me.

  Although I doubt they have free Wi-Fi in prison.

  Adam leans in and kisses my cheek. He squeezes my hand. I wonder if he knows how often he’s squeezing it, or if he’s just nervous.

  “I’ll be back soon, okay?”

  I nod, not knowing what to say.

  “Have I mentioned that I’m really glad you’re here with me for this?”

  I chew on my bottom lip and nod again, smiling.

  “Once or twice. I love you.”

  His hands reach out and cup my cheeks, framing my face in his slightly rough hands. I ignore the security guard watching us.

  “When we’re done here, we’re going to put all of this and the last three months behind us.”

  “And then?” I choke out.

  “Then we get to the good stuff.”

  He winks and plants a kiss on my lips that still has my head swimming long after he has left the room.

  While they’re gone, I mindlessly flip through an entire year’s worth of People Magazines. I couldn’t care less about the celebrities; I just have nothing else to do with myself. So it’s either mindless magazines or my fingernails are going to be a mangled, nasty looking mess by the time Adam gets back if it takes too much longer.

  Just as I’m considering flipping through a ratty looking motorcycle magazine, the door opens.

  My eyes fly to Adam and I’m instantly on my feet and holding him in my arms. His hair is a wreck like he’s been pulling on it for the last hour, and his eyes are red-rimmed.

  “Are you okay?” I ask, trying to pull away so I can see his face.

  Adam feels like he could collapse in my arms. He holds me tightly to him and shakes his head. “That fucking sucked.”

  I squeeze my eyes closed, holding him quietly and trying to be there for him.

  There’s nothing I can say that will make him feel better about talking about the abuse he and his
mom suffered with for years. The guard clearing his throat is our cue to leave, so we follow him back out into the barren hallways while Adam keeps an arm wrapped around me, leaning his weight on me.

  He’s exhausted and I want to do nothing else besides take care of him.

  I exhale slowly as soon as we enter our apartment on Friday night. It feels so good to be home after the insanity over the last few days. Nothing like getting two years of your memories back in a span of a few hours, a trip across the country, and a visit to a prison to wear a girl out.

  I have to laugh or I’ll cry from exhaustion.

  Adam must feel the same because we’ve been utterly quiet the entire time back from the airport. Both of us lost in our own thoughts. He’s barely said anything about his dad or his meeting with the parole board. All I know is they meet with his dad next week for his actual hearing, but will take Adam’s statement into account.

  The man could be free in a week. Or back in jail for the next fifteen years before he becomes eligible for parole again.

  “Hey.” Adam nudges me and I drop my bag on the kitchen table. “You want something to eat?”

  I turn to him and grin. “You’re going to cook?”

  He scoffs and opens our takeout drawer. Of course not.

  “Name your pleasure.”

  You, I think. By the look I give him, Adam clearly knows what I’m thinking.

  “Food, woman. What do you want to eat?”

  I raise an eyebrow, and I laugh at his exasperated look. “Fine. Pizza is good. Fast and easy.”

  “That’s what she said,” he says, laughing, and he smacks me on the rear with a menu.

  I roll my eyes. I’m amazed that after just a few days together, our banter is relaxed and … loving. I feel like maybe he should be making me pay penance for the last few months of stress and anger. Or there should be an awkwardness. But there’s not. It’s relaxing and strange at the same time.

  “Do you mind if I go take a bath while we wait for our food?” I ask, but Adam’s already on the phone with Martino’s ordering gyro pizza.

  He waves me away and I skip off to the bathroom, laughing at how much I love that pizza and how thankful I am of the day he took us there when I wanted to go to all of our favorite places.

  He took me to every single one of them. And now I know why they’re my favorite. And how special they are to me.

  I’m soaking in the tub filled with a relaxing bubble soap when Adam walks in. He changed his clothes into a skin tight white t-shirt and a pair of green athletic shorts. I almost swallow a mouthful of bubbles.

  “I thought you could use this.”

  He sets a glass of white wine on the counter and I lay my head against the back of the tub, letting out a low moan.

  “God this is good,” I say, swallowing a crisp Riesling and closing my eyes. “This feels like heaven.”

  I look at the glass when I pull it away and frown into it.

  Then I look to Adam. He’s bending down on the side of the tub, crouched into a squat and his arms are crossed on the edge of the tub.

  He’s smiling at me, amused by my frown. “Do you really think I’m so clichéd that I would put an engagement ring into a wine glass?”

  He kisses my nose quickly and squats back down. His eyes scan every inch of my completely hidden body in the tub. By his frown, I can’t tell which one of us is more disappointed.

  “Of course not.”

  “Good,” he says, and then he sets the opened blue box on the ledge right next to me.

  I drop the glass of wine into my bath water.

  “Oh shit!” I yell, and I dive my hands under the water to get the glass.

  Adam’s hands grab my arms and I freeze. I look at him, hearing my pulse beating in my ears.

  “Leave the glass in the water and look.” He nods towards the box. “The first time I gave this to you, I was so nervous that it wasn’t as big as you’d expect.” He bites his bottom lip and his noses twitches. “You told me-”

  “That I couldn’t give a shit about the size of a diamond, just that I get to have your arms around me every day for the rest of my life.”

  He presses his lips together and his eyes get wet. My own eyes water right along with him. I can’t believe I just made Adam get teary-eyed. I don’t know what has made me more emotional – the engagement or seeing him like this.

  He swallows slowly and does some sort of man swipe across his cheeks with the back of his hand.

  “I want more than anything to know that’s still true.”

  “It is,” I tell him without a doubt in the world.

  I lean toward him, as much as I can in the narrow tub, and let him take my hands.

  The drowned wine glass is completely forgotten.

  He takes the ring from the box and holds it right in front of the ring finger on my left hand.

  “Will you marry me? Spend forever with me?”

  “Yes,” I say, swallowing tears. “Again. Of course I will marry you.”

  Once he slides the ring on my finger, I reach behind his neck and clasp my fingers together. Adam leans over the edge of the tub as our lips meet, but it’s awkward and uncomfortable, so I pull him to me.

  The next thing I know, he is in the tub with me, completely dressed, and he has me situated so I’m sitting on his lap. I’m straddling him in our narrow bath tub and the bubbles and water are splashing all over the sides of the tub as our arms move ferociously over each other’s skin. My hands lift his shirt off his body, and he pulls away when we have to separate so I can pull it over his head.

  He leans back, admiring my body with his hands and his eyes.

  “I’m the luckiest man in the world. You chose me, twice. I will never let anything bad happen to you again, Amy.”

  “I know,” I tell him with absolute conviction. “I love you.”

  Adam wouldn’t have ever let anything bad happen to me in the first place. The mud slide was an accident and not his fault at all. I only hope someday – and someday soon – he can let go of the guilt he carries.

  Our mouths reconnect passionately and we move against one another. My hands free Adam from his gym shorts and he goes to work, pleasing me until the water gets cold and the pizza arrives.

  It’s the best memory I have of us. Ever.

  And I hope I never forget it.

  Seven months later …

  “Hey, wake up sleepy head.”

  I shift back into Adam’s arms, ignoring the sun light coming in through the windows in our room.

  It’s freezing cold in Denver right now, and I know we had at least another six inches of snow last night. The only place I want to be today is in his arms, under our warm comforter, with maybe some coffee and sex.

  Okay. Lots of sex.

  “I don’t wanna go,” I whine, and laugh when I end up on my back.

  Adam’s smile is a few inches from me. His elbows are next to my shoulders, propping him up. My eyes roll back into my head when he presses his erection against me and my legs widen instinctively.

  “It’s Tilly’s birthday, today,” he reminds me.

  As if I need reminding. You would think she’s turning thirteen with the insane way my mom has been the last few months planning her birthday party.

  “Come on, there’ll be ponies to ride and everything.”

  He’s joking. But there probably would be ponies if it wasn’t the middle of February.

  I grin, clasp my hands together behind his neck, tug on his hair, and pull him to me. He lets me, even as he lets out a low laugh that makes my stomach warm.

  “I’ll come,” I tell him right before I crush his lips to mine. “I promise.”

  He sets out to immediately prove me right. An hour later, we’re finally finished with our showers, dressed, and almost ready to head to my parent’s house.

  “You nervous about today?” he asks, giving me a strange look.

  “No, I just know it’ll be a lot of planning talk.”

  Be
cause not only has my mom been insane about Tilly’s birthday, but I decided to try to help mend my relationship with her by giving her full reign of planning my wedding.

  Adam and I would have preferred to get married last fall in the middle of a park somewhere with our closest family and friends.

  Instead, we’re getting married in June on the anniversary of my accident and first engagement. And instead of there being our closest friends and family joining us, the guest list – last I heard anyway – is around three hundred of my closest strangers, family, and family friends. I’ll know about ten of them.

  But it’s made my mom happy, and secretly, I enjoyed getting hauled to dress shop after dress shop, trying on thousands of princess looking dresses.

  “What’s she on now?” he asks as he struggles with his tie.

  This was another concession Adam and I decided on together. My parents are finally starting to accept that I’m not the daughter they wanted me to be, but instead of immaturely shoving it in their faces just to prove my point, we dress how they would like us to whenever we’re together.

  And on the flipside, the last time we were there, my parents actually smiled at me.

  My mom hugged me and then Adam. And when I asked them for help in giving me a loan so I could start my own coffee shop, Hooka Two, they handed it over gladly.

  My dad’s expertise has been beneficial, and for the first time in my life, I’m doing exactly what I want to do. I run my own business, and now that the economy is picking up, Adam’s job as an architect for a local home builder is growing, too.

  The only thing we’re not growing out of is our apartment. I’ve decided I’m completely in love with the tiny little place and don’t want to move anywhere else, even if we can afford it.

  “Invitations, I think,” I tell him, while finishing up my make-up in the bathroom mirror. “And then we still have flowers and place settings and cakes. Who knew a wedding took so much work?”

  “No kidding,” Adam says, and not for the first time since my mom turned our wedding into Denver’s event of the year. “I think Zander and Kelsey definitely had the right idea.”