Page 203 of One of Those Amnesia Stories

Alessia’s footsteps came up beside me. She stopped, following my gaze to the photograph, and I felt her shift—waiting, watching, figuring out exactly what was happening in my head.

“Why,” I said, my voice coming out flatter than I intended, “is there a photo of a man on your desk?”

My eyes stayed locked on the photograph.

The corner of her lips twitched. I caught it in my periphery. She cleared her throat, her voice carefully neutral. “That is my father. My mother sent me his photo a while ago.”

The words took a second to land.

Her father.

I had been glaring at her father for the last several minutes.

I straightened immediately. My whole posture shifted—shoulders back, jaw unclenching, the cold thing in my chest dissolving into something warm and deeply embarrassed. I softened my face into something I hoped looked pleasant and not like I’d been silently interrogating her dead father.

“Hello.” I offered the photograph a small, respectful nod. “I’m Cassian. Your daughter’s husband—”

“Ex-husband,” she murmured beside me.

“—and I want you to know,” I continued, louder, “how amazing your daughter is.”

I looked at the smiling face in the photograph and meant every word. “She’s the most hardworking person I’ve ever met. The most passionate. The kindest.”

I felt Alessia shift beside me, but I kept my eyes on her father.

“The funniest.”

A pause.

“And the most beautiful.”

I finally turned to her.

She was watching me with an expression I couldn’t name. Something serious. Something soft.

I held her eyes. “I feel so lucky that I get to be a part of her life.”

For a moment, she didn’t move. The moment stretched. Then she looked away, heading toward the couch. “I lied. That’s a random stock photo.”

“What?” I stared at the photograph, then at her. “Are you serious?”

She sat down, biting the inside of her cheek, fighting a losing battle with her own face.

“No,” she admitted, the word cracking. “That was the lie. It is my father.”

She broke.

Laughter spilled out of her, bright and helpless, and she buried her face in her hands. “Your face—”

I stood there, caught between outrage and the sound of her laughing, and realized I didn’t care about the photograph. The joke didn’t matter either. I just wanted to keep her laughing like this, warm and open and unguarded, for as long as she’d let me.

I narrowed my eyes at her as I dropped onto the couch beside her. “You’re evil. I should snitch to your father.”

She opened one of the takeout bags, completely unbothered. “Snitch away. He’s still going to be on my team.”

I grabbed my sandwich. “I’ll make up stuff, then.” I took a bite. “I’ll tell him you kicked a puppy once.”

She paused mid-bite. “What?”