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She forces a smile. “Okay, well, just shout if you need anything.”
My shoulders sag, and I sigh when she leaves. Everyone has so many expectations of me, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to act. I’m pretty sure Birdie thinks I’m going to fall apart at any moment, and it’s been impossible to miss the pity in Ace’s eyes too.
What I saw today undoubtedly made me sick, but I don’t know how to sort out something of that magnitude when I can’t remember any of it. Dr. Woods assures me that however I feel is okay, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t wrap my mind around it. The people who were part of my life before are strangers to me, and it feels like they’re talking about someone else’s past when they show my photos on the news. Logically, I know I must be her, but sometimes I wish I wasn’t.
There is no guidebook for losing your memory and then finding out you were engaged to a psychopath while you were really in love with his brother. Facing it all seems like too much, and when I try, I just want to shut down completely. So avoidance seems to be the way I’m dealing with it. Or at least, it was.
As I get to work cleaning and prepping the vegetables, I can’t stop the endless newsreels from replaying in my mind. The haunting images of Adam’s face. The narratives of him tormenting his victims.
I close my eyes and try to get a grip as a tremor moves through me. I keep telling myself it can’t affect me because I have no memory of it. That’s how I’ve been surviving. That’s how I’ve managed to get through each day, by disconnecting from all of it. Only this time, I can’t.
As much as I want to, I’m incapable of shoving these emotions down and locking them away. They feel like a volcano inside me, and I don’t know what’s going to happen when they erupt, only that I’m terrified of when they do.
I try to force myself to think about something else, and my mind drifts back to a song Madden and his friend played at the clubhouse. A song about a girl named Peaches.
As I hum the tune and get to work cutting up the carrots, I realize I know all the words, but I don’t know how. It leaves the strangest feeling in my chest, just like it did when I heard him sing it. It’s a longing for something I don’t understand.
It makes me question everything that’s happened with Madden up until this point. He’s tried so hard to put me at ease, but I don’t trust the way I feel around him. The way he looks at me—like he’d burn the world if I asked him to—it overwhelms me. When I’m near him, my heart beats too wildly, my breaths become shorter, and my armor starts to crack. Being in his presence feels like standing too close to a flame, and everyone around me is telling me it’s safe, but my mind screams that I’m going to burn.
It wasn’t until I saw him at the clubhouse, and he pulled me into his arms and kissed me, that I felt my vulnerability falling away. For those few brief moments, he was familiar in a way I couldn’t explain. He was safe. And that was disturbing because, more than anything, I wanted to stay right there. But then my thoughts took over, and I froze.
What if I’m not like the girl he loved before? What if I’ve changed so drastically, he won’t recognize me either? And what if I give him hope, only to realize I can’t love him back in the end? I don’t trust my own feelings, and I hate it. I hate everything about this situation, and the longer I stay here, the more I wonder if this is where I should really be.
My eyes blur with tears unexpectedly, and the knife in my hand slips, catching my finger and slicing it open. I inhale sharply at the pain, and the knife clatters onto the counter. Blood begins to drip from the wound, and before I even realize what’s happening, a wave of nausea overtakes me. Instinctively, I bring my palm to my face, trying to stem the bleeding. Except it isn’t my face that’s bleeding. Confusion clouds my reality as a distant voice reverberates through my mind.
“It’s okay, baby.”
It feels so real, I can almost see it. His face is distorted, but I know it’s Madden. He’s helping me up off the ground, wiping the blood off my chin after I’ve fallen.
“It’s going to be okay. In time, you’ll see that.” His voice drifts away as I squeeze my eyes shut, only to be replaced by another one.
