“You can’t do that.” Frustrated, Mom turns to Dad, begging him to make me understand. “Talk to your son, please. I need to go get some coffee.” Breezing past him as she walks out of my hospital room, Dad cups his face in his hands.
“Listen, I know you don’t want to–”
“I’m not moving in with my parents.” Standing at the window, I look out at the scene that once brought me some solace. Now, it just annoys the shit out of me. It turns out that one week is all it takes for cabin fever to set in. Well, that and the two weeks and two days I spent in here unconscious. Dr. Thompson informed me this morning that I would be discharged today. My recovery is nowhere near over—and I’m not even talking about the memory part. That’s still more than fuzzy.
Having suffered nerve damage on my right side, I’ll need weeks of physical and occupational therapy to regain full motion in my right arm. And my leg, well it’s broken pretty badly. Which in turn means that I need to use crutches to help me hobble around.
And that’s where the argument with Mom comes in. Despite Dr. Thompson reassuring her that I’m strong enough to live on my own, she won’t hear of it. It doesn’t help that my apartment is up a flight of stairs, either.
“You know she isn’t going to let up on it.” Dad joins me at the window, dropping a hand to my shoulder. “Just for a few weeks. Do a little rehab and heal a little more. Prove to her that you’re doing better and then she’ll ease up.”
“No.” I stand to my conviction. “I’ve felt like enough of an invalid these last few weeks. I’m going home and that’s–”
“You’re going home?” Grace’s shocked voice calls out from the door. Her face lights up, bringing to life the hundreds of freckles dotting the creamy skin of her nose and cheeks. “Oh my goodness. That’s fantastic news. I’m so happy,” she rambles on. Fuck if I’ve tried my hardest, but I still can’t remember who she is, what part she played in my life. But in the week since I’ve been awake, she hasn’t missed a day of visiting me.
That tells me something no memory can offer.
I nod, walking over to my bed. “Yes, I can go home. And that’s exactly where I’m going.”
“So you’re still stuck on that?” Mom stands at the door, Dr. Thompson at her side. “Please tell the doctor what you think you’re going to do.” Grace watches on as if she’s a spectator at a ping pong match.
“Oh, great,” I huff, settling down onto the hospital bed.
“David. I think it’s in your best interest to stay with your parents for a while.” The doctor looks down at my mother, her face splitting into a huge ‘I told you so’ smile.
“No way,” I challenge him.
“Look.” His face softens as he approaches me. Sitting in the seat usually reserved for visitors, he addresses all of us. “You’re young and strong and those things have helped you tremendously in your rather quick recovery. But your leg and arm, those are damaged enough that you’ll need someone there to help you. I’m not saying you need around the clock help, but you shouldn’t live on your own at first. Besides, you can’t drive. So you’ll need the help. And,” he adds as he stands from the chair, “being somewhere familiar might bring back some of your memory. I’ll be back in a few minutes with your discharge papers and the contact information for the rehabilitation center. I believe it’s the same one where your friend is staying.”
I don’t know if I was an angry man before the attack, but it’s not something I like about myself right now. Yet I have no other way to deal with what I’m feeling. Essentially, I’ve been reverted to a child. I can’t drive on my own. I can barely walk. And now I have to move in with my parents.
“John,” my mother calls out. “Come over here and help me pack up some of these things.” Busying themselves with the flowers, cards, and clothes I have here, they leave me and Grace alone.
Grace walks over to me, letting my parents pack up on the other side of the room. “I know it’s none of my business, but I think the doctor is right.”
“You’re right. It isn’t any of your business.” She pulls back from me, as if my words physically harm her. Immediately regretful of my meanness, I apologize. “I just want to get back to my life. The parts I remember at least.” And some of those parts have been coming back to me. The firehouse. My fellow crew members. My job and what a big part of my life it is. With every visitor, I gain a small piece of that part of my life back.
So when Grace suggests, “You could stay with me,” a million thoughts race through my brain. The primary one is that I still don’t remember her completely. It would be so unbelievably unfair of me to take her up on this offer in the blind hope that I might remember her. It’s clear she cares for me, that she remembers what we once were, that she wants it all back.
How cruel would it be for me to live with her? To offer her a glimpse of the life we apparently used to have only to remember nothing. “I’m on the ground level,” she explains. “And there’s an extra bedroom, so you don’t, you know . . .” Her voice turns bashful and her cheeks turn red. “And I work during the day, so you’d have the place to yourself, but I’m home early enough to take you to any doctor’s appointment you might have. And it would ease your mom’s concerns,” she rambles on and on. She takes my silence as a no. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have even bothered. You should be with your parents.” She turns away from me, robbing me of the deep, sparkling blue in her eyes.
“Wait.” When she spins back around, something inside slides into place. Maybe it was the sway of her hips. The movement of her bright red hair flowing in long waves. The light in her eyes, that no matter the challenge, never seems to dim. She’s only a few steps away from me, but it feels like it takes me forever to cover the few feet.
Standing in front of her with the help of my crutches, I take a deep breath, weighing my options. For the last week, I’ve been too afraid to tackle this part of what my life used to be. Learning about my family and my job, those were easy enough somehow. But if I try to remember Grace and the couple we used to be, and I fail, I’m not sure I’m strong enough to recover from that.
Worrying her lower lip in between her teeth, she waits for me to say something else, not wanting to push me into something she feels I might not want. “I know you don’t remember me,” she says, cutting through the emotional silence in our tiny corner of the hospital room. “And I know you don’t love me like I love you, but I want to help you remember. And if I can’t . . .”
The end of that sentence seems as if it’s too painful for her to verbalize. And that knowledge is enough for me to say, “Yes. I’ll do it.”
Shockingly, my parents are okay with this move. Based on how adamant Mom was about me moving in with her and Dad, I can only take this to mean one thing: they trust Grace with my life.
That says something that forgotten memories don’t have to.
The two-hour drive back to her apartment takes more out of me than I’d like to admit. The fact that my parents are trailing behind us only adds to the stress. Grace apologizes over every bump and pothole, which in New York is a lot. When we make it back onto Long Island, my parents stop at my apartment, offering to pack up some clothes for me. Part of me wants to go with them, to just head home in the hopes that all my memories would be waiting there for me. But I know that wouldn’t happen. So instead, I go to Grace’s apartment with her.
A vague sense of recollection washes over me as I crutch my way into the door. There’s a framed picture of me and her at the beach. A wisp of smoke filters through my consciousness, but it’s extinguished before I can make anything of it. Balancing my weight, and situating the crutches under my arms, I lift the frame from the table. Standing at my side, she looks at the picture with me. “You threw me in the water that day.”