Six Months Later

by Natalie D. Richards

  I shake my head because that kind of thinking really is crazy. Paranoid and neurotic and a thousand other things I should be medicated for. Blake doesn’t have a malevolent bone in his body. Adam on the other hand…

  But I can’t think about all of his evil. I’m pretty fixated on the feel of his hand on my hair, the memory enough to make me shiver now. Yeah, if anybody’s the bad guy in this relationship, it’s not Blake. It’s me.

  As if on cue, Blake’s phone buzzes in my hand. I glance at it and think about him slouched in the study room, texting under the table. Like texting a lot.

  I chew the inside of my bottom lip, glancing at the lit screen out of the corner of my eye. It’s absolutely wrong. An invasion of privacy and a breach of trust, not to mention how much of a stalker it makes me.

  And, hell, I’m going to do it anyway.

  The message is from a number I don’t recognize.

  Do your job and she won’t figure anything out.

  ***

  Riding home with a fake boyfriend sucks under normal circumstances. But now, said boyfriend isn’t just fake. He’s also hiding something from me. And it’s not an early Christmas present.

  I’m so relieved when he pulls up to the curb beside my house that I nearly fling my door open and leap onto the curb.

  “Whoa, you in a rush?”

  I offer the smile I’ve been flashing the entire ride home. So wide I’m probably showing molars and so fake it should come with a disclaimer.

  “Sorry. I’ve got an appointment. I don’t want to be late.”

  “An appointment?”

  “Dentist.”

  “On a Saturday?”

  “They’re booked up because he’s taking time off for Thanksgiving.”

  Of course they’re not booked up and I’m not going to the dentist. But I can’t tell him I’m going to my therapist. Where I’m going to proceed to tell even more lies. Seriously, I may want to ditch this whole psychology thing and go with a future as a con artist.

  “See you Monday?” I ask, and then I force myself to lean in and kiss him. His lips are warm and soft, but I feel cold and hard all over.

  Blake pulls back with a frown. “Why do I feel like you’re giving me the brush-off?”

  “I’m not,” I say too quickly.

  He looks at me, eyes sad. “That feels a little hard to believe. First I find you in the bathroom with Adam—”

  “That was nothing, Blake. He was just being a jerk and I…I overreacted.”

  “C’mon, would you believe that if you caught me in the bathroom with Abbey? Or maybe Madison?”

  The truth is, I’d pretty much expect to find Blake in the bathroom with either of those girls. They’re bouncy in all the right places, and they probably know all the important lacrosse rules. They are his kind. And yeah, maybe I dreamed about being in this position for years, but the truth is, I don’t belong here. There just isn’t a bit of sense in it.

  “Ever since that night you hit your head, you’ve been strange,” he says, looking down. “I feel like you’re hiding something from me.”

  I can’t hold back my snort. “I’m hiding something? Okay. Sure.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing. Just forget it.” I turn, but his hand closes around my arm.

  “What the hell, Chloe?” When I turn back, he doesn’t look like a villain. He looks handsome and sweet and terribly hurt. “What did I do to make you so mad? Why won’t you just tell me?”

  I bite my lip, weighing my options. I’ve been over that text a thousand times, and I can’t imagine it being anything but sinister. But it’s not like I’m the poster child for objectivity here.

  “Are you going to say anything?” he asks, and he doesn’t look suspicious. He looks like a guy who deserves better than this. Hell, stray dogs probably deserve better than this.

  “I saw something on your phone,” I say.

  He throws up his hands, clearly baffled. “My phone?”

  “I didn’t mean to. You have to believe that. It was a complete accident, but I saw a text on your phone.”

  Blake’s hands come down into his lap slowly. For one second, his face looks fractured, like there’s something cold and angry simmering just beneath his puzzled expression. When I blink, it’s gone, and he’s just an ordinary guy trying to calm down his obviously paranoid girlfriend.

  “What text?” he asks. His voice is too low. Too quiet.

  I look down at my hands in my lap, humiliated. “It buzzed while you were in the bathroom.”

  He cocks his head at that. “After you’d been with Adam, right?” His tone says it all.

  Ouch. And he’s totally right. He found me in the men’s bathroom with my hand on another guy’s arm, and I’m getting bent out of shape over a totally vague text message that I had no business looking at in the first place. Hello, Kettle, my name is Pot.

  “Blake, I know what that probably looked like, but that wasn’t what it was.”

  “And neither is this. What did the text say, Chloe?”

  I feel my cheeks growing warm. “It said, ‘Do your job and she won’t figure anything out.’”

  “That’s all you read?” he says.

  I nod, even though it seems like an odd thing to say. Was there something worse I could have read? Ugh, why can’t I just stop?

  “That’s it?” he repeats, obviously waiting for me to say something.

  “Yeah. Yeah, that’s all.”

  He laughs then, like he thinks I’m completely ridiculous. And I have a bad feeling I’m about to agree with him. “Chloe, it’s about Christmas. Dad bought Mom a bracelet for Christmas. He’s keeping it in my room in case she goes snooping in his usual hiding spots.”

  My cheeks go hotter, and I look down again. “Oh. Well, I…”

  There isn’t a thing I can say that will make this better, so I trail into silence. God, what is wrong with me? I finally get the guy of my dreams, and I’m going to lose him because I’m a neurotic whack job. Terrific.

  Blake laughs again, which makes me flinch because I feel like I’m going to cry.

  “Chloe, look at me,” he says.

  I feel his hand on my face, cooler than is exactly comfortable, but it is November I guess. I look at him, holding back my tears.

  “I’m really sorry,” I say. “I guess I was just feeling insecure.”

  “It’s cute that you’re jealous,” he says, looking a little smug.

  “No, it’s not. It’s obnoxious. I really wasn’t trying to invade your privacy.”

  “I know that. We both have enough respect for each other not to do that.”

  I sigh in relief, and this time, when he leans into kiss me, I try to savor it. It’s still harder than it should be. I don’t remember kissing being a difficult thing before. Hell, maybe it’s just one more thing I forgot.

  When he pulls away, I zip my coat and ease open the passenger door.

  “So I’ll see you Monday?”

  He grins, checking his collar in the rearview mirror. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

  Blake’s engine rumbles as he pulls away, and the front door creaks open behind me. I hear the hum of the vacuum cleaner before Dad closes it again. He’s got a paper under his arm and keys in his hand.

  “Back from tutoring?” he asks.

  “Yeah, but I have an appointment with Dr. Kirkpatrick.”

  “I know. I, uh…I thought I could drive you.”

  Read: Mom wants me to drive you so I can try to figure out how nuts you are.

  I take a breath, but to my credit, I don’t sigh. It takes everything in me to hold it in. I can’t blame him though. I know better than anybody that with my mother, sometimes it’s easier to just give in.

  “I’m hitting Rowdy’s anyway,” he says, and I smile.

  Rowdy’s Roasters. Otherwise known as the best coffee along the coast of Lake Erie. A steamy café mocha sounds amazing. Or it does until I think about the way my stomach turned itself
inside out at one whiff of the pot the other day.

  But this is Rowdy’s. I can stomach that, right?

  “Maybe you could grab me a mocha?”

  He heads for the garage, eyeing me over his shoulder. “Thought you gave up the good stuff.”

  “Call it a relapse.”

  We climb into Dad’s pickup, settling into an easy silence. The hum of talk radio and rumble of the engine keep the quiet comfortable as we cut our way through town. It’s only a ten-minute drive to the office. If he doesn’t get on it, he’s not going to have any dirt for my mom.

  Unless maybe this isn’t about me at all.

  “You and mom aren’t fighting are you?” I ask.

  He lifts his fingers from the steering wheel, halfheartedly waving that off. “No, Mom’s deep cleaning. I’m looking for excuses.”

  He’s still a bad liar, but I didn’t expect anything about him would be different. It took him a year to get used to the idea of a weeping cherry tree in the front flower bed. The guy’s not big on change. He’s kind of like a glacier with hair. The steady, unflappable presence that keeps Mom from exploding and me from floating away on a whim.

  He sighs, and I know he’s going to confess. “All right, she wanted me to talk to you.”

  “Yeah, I figured.”

  “She’s just scared, that’s all. Scared that you’re not telling us everything. Some of your stories don’t match up.”

  I glance out the window, watch the town passing by in a blur of old houses and storefronts that need sprucing.

  “Mom thinks maybe you’re afraid to talk to us,” he says.

  “I’m not,” I say.

  “Because you can tell us what’s going on. Even if you don’t think we’ll like it, we want to hear it.”

  I turn to the window again. This time, the tears in my eyes blur the images I see. “I’m not crazy, Dad.”

  Suddenly, I need him to believe it.

  “Never thought you were.”

  “But, Mom…”

  “Mom worries, Chlo. It’s what she does.”

  I laugh. “Yeah, she worries that I’ll let her down.”

  “She wants you to be happy.”

  “She wants me to make her proud, Dad. That’s not the same.”

  He makes a face, and I think it’s because he wants to defend her. In the end, he doesn’t. He pulls up to the curb by my doctor’s office and puts the car in park. “I want you to be happy.”

  I lean across the seat between us, squeezing him in a hug. I want to hold enough strength from his broad shoulders to make me believe things will work out fine, but when I pull back, it disappears. Steam vanishing into nothing.

  Chapter Nine

  Inside Dr. Kirkpatrick’s office, I mentally prepare while she pours me a glass of ice water. She offers me hot tea first, top-notch imported stuff, she assures me. In the end, I opt for low-rent tap water because I’m too scatterbrained to pick flavors and sip carefully.

  “It’s hard to believe it’s been almost a week since we spoke,” Dr. Kirkpatrick says as she sets down my glass.

  This is shrink speak for Just how crazy have you been in the last few days?

  And my answer would be pretty freaking crazy, but I’m not here to give answers. If I’m forced to sit in this stupid office, I’m going to pick her brain until I find something that will help me get my memories back.

  “I’ve been busy,” I start. “But I think I’m starting to have things come back to me.”

  Blatant lie. If you add my new vanishing computer files, my list of missing items is actually expanding.

  “That’s terrific,” she says. “Would you like to talk about some of those things?”

  I bite my lip and glance over at her bookshelves. It’s a calculated move. If I look too conflicted, she’ll know I’m faking, so I do it fast, hoping to sell it just enough.

  “I’m not sure. I might not be ready yet. Is that okay?”

  “Do you feel that you need my permission?” she asks me with a smile.

  “It’s not that. It’s just…I don’t want to jinx it, you know? I want to be sure I’m really making progress.”

  More importantly, I haven’t invented a memory to discuss today.

  “All right, Chloe. Is there something else specific you’d like to talk about?”

  And that is shrink speak for, Obviously there’s something specific you’d like to talk about.

  I stand up and head over to her bookcase, scanning the shelves. “I want to talk about psychology. I don’t know if you remember, but I got really interested in it last year after that class I took.”

  “I do. I believe I provided a list of recommended books and some additional elective courses that I thought would be beneficial.”

  Okay, I didn’t take the courses. After months of panic attacks and therapy sessions, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to open that can of worms. No one needed another reminder of my Prozac Princess past, thanks.

  I look down at my shoes and sigh. “I guess last year I was still tossing the idea around. Now, things are different. I’m a senior, and I’m applying to schools.”

  “You worked very hard this summer,” she says, which almost makes me laugh. For all she probably knows, I spent my summer painting my toenails and watching Tom and Jerry reruns.

  Still, I smile at her. “You’re right. And now that I feel like I have a real shot at a future in psychology, I think it changes things. I’m pretty committed to this.”

  She leans back, looking proud. “Well, I think it’s a terrific idea, Chloe. People are often called to help others who’ve experienced similar hardships to themselves.”

  “Exactly. And I guess that’s what I want to talk about. I want to start with myself. I want to take control of my own recovery and be proactive.”

  I stop there because I’m out of fifty-cent words that I’m hoping will appeal to her.

  She tilts her head, her too-black hair sliding over one cheek. “You know, even trained psychologists still need outside help sometimes. Going it alone isn’t always possible or wise.”

  I resist the urge to roll my eyes. Barely. “I’m not trying to get out of therapy. But you always told me I will get as much out of therapy as I put into it. And I want to put my mind to work. I feel like I need a better understanding of how memory works.”

  She smiles, but it doesn’t erase the tension from her eyes. “I’m happy to see you tackle this head-on, Chloe.”

  “Great.”

  Dr. Kirkpatrick purses her lips, and I can tell that we’re not quite there yet. “But first, I’d like to talk here about memories. About what they are. These are fragile, subjective recordings of past events that change over time and evolve with your emotions.”

  I nod, leaning forward in my seat, ready to skip to the part where she tells me exactly how I can get these fragile, subjective recordings back.

  Dr. Kirkpatrick leans forward too. There’s something about the way she pauses that I’ve never seen. I can’t help thinking she’s rehearsing what she’s about to say. Or maybe just second-guessing herself. Whatever it is, it creates a long pause before she speaks again.

  “Chloe, during our last session I sensed you were reluctant to share the details of your memory loss with me. You know that this is a safe place, and I want you to feel comfortable with what you share, but I also feel it’s important that I understand the extent of your impairment so we know how to proceed.”

  I should have expected this. I should have known at some point she’d want to know how serious this is. And I can’t tell her. Something deep in my bones tells me to stay quiet.

  It feels wrong, lying to her. Last year, when I could barely make it through a pep rally without feeling my throat close up, she’s the one who told me how to cope, the one who told me to never doubt my own strength. She never once told me I was weak or overly dramatic or crazy.

  I trusted her once, but I don’t anymore.

  “I guess I’m not sure how to answer that,”
I say, twisting my fingers. My stomach is knitting itself into a series of knots, each one a little tighter than the last. “I’m forgetting lots of little things. Deadlines. Bits of conversations. I feel sort of tuned out.”

  Dr. Kirkpatrick watches me very closely. I’m not sure if she believes me, so I focus on keeping my breathing even and my face serene. I force my hands to my knees and command them to stay loose and still. I take a breath since she is still silent. “Maybe it shouldn’t bother me so much, but it really does. I feel like I’m missing pieces of my life.”

  Big, six-month-shaped pieces, but whatever.

  “All right,” she says at length, and I can tell by her tone that she’s not buying this. She sits back in her chair anyway. “A good first step to reconnecting with the details of your life is to revisit recent events. Do you have any recent pictures?”

  “My mom does,” I say.

  Luckily, I know this for sure. My mother is a rabid scrapbooker. Which sounds really loving and sweet, but actually means every moment of my life has been documented in ridiculous detail. She pulls out the camera for a good batch of lasagna, so I guarantee there’s plenty of photographic evidence of the last six months.

  And why in God’s name didn’t I think about this sooner? I probably could have filled myself in on all kinds of crap.

  Dr. Kirkpatrick starts scribbling in her notebook as she talks. “I’d like you to look at some recent photographs and compare them to some of your older photographs.”

  “Older ones?”

  “Yes. It’s possible that revisiting an event you remember well will help you tap into more robust recollections of more recent events. Do you have any photographs from a school event? Prom maybe? Or a trip with friends?”

  I nod, swallowing hard. “I have a scrapbook from art camp. A year and a half ago.”

  Maggie and I went together. Not because I have an ounce of talent, mind you. I don’t. But Maggie is gifted. And I like to play with the pottery wheel. Plus, art camp has its share of good-looking boys—the kind with paint-spattered jeans and tortured souls.

  Mom made me take her digital camera, demanding I take pictures of everything. We took this as literally as possible, snapping shots of the most inane details we could find. We had pictures of the bottom of people’s shoes and wads of gum stuck to the underside of the tables.