“Favorite pastime?”
“Depression.”
“Favorite pastime?” he asks again. We’ve been playing this game for the last hour. It’s very one sided since he can’t remember his favorites.
I scratch my chin. “Eating.”
“Favorite memory?”
I pause at this one. All of my favorite memories include him.
“There was this…guy…he planned out a super-extraordinary date. He sent me on a scavenger hunt and I had to figure out answers to clues like, where our first date was and where the best place to buy a bra was. Each time I went to one of the places in the clues, there would be a gift and another clue waiting for me. It ended with me going to the place where we had our first kiss. He’d set up a table with dinner and music. We danced. It was….” I don’t know how to finish that sentence.
Caleb is quiet. When I turned to look at him, he is staring up the sky.
“What was his name?”
I shake my head.
“No way.”
“Why? Rock my world-tell me….”
“The stars look silver tonight,” I say changing the subject. “Maybe soon you’ll remember your favorites,” I say quietly. He shrugs.
“Or, I’ll just make new favorites. Starting with you.” This should make me excited, but it just reminds me of the ticking time bomb our relationship resembles.
“Can I be your favorite girl?”
“You already are, Duchess.”
My vision blurs and my heart does a little skip. Did I just imagine that?
“What did you just call me?”
Caleb looks embarrassed.
“Duchess, but don’t ask me why, it just popped into my head. Sorry.”
I stare straight ahead and hope he doesn’t notice the horror on my face.
“No, no it’s fine,” I say softly. But it isn’t. Duchess was his nickname for me in college.
“I better get going,” he says, standing up quickly.
I want to ask him if he’s remembered something but I’m too scared.
I walk him to the door and he leans down to peck my cheek.
“Bye,” I say.
“Bye.” And then he walks into the stagnant night air, leaving me alone.
He is going to remember and soon! I have to think of a way to buy myself some more time.
Duchess thinks about getting drunk, but calls Cammie instead.
“Well it’s about time!” her voice sounds far away.
“Sorry, Cam, I’ve been busy.”
“Busy with what? And I thought you gave up eating chips.”
My crunching stops. I hold my half eaten Dorito in my cheek and say nothing.
“You’re up to something,” Cammie says after a minute. “Tell me what it is…”
“Hmmm…uhhh…” I mumble. I can hide nothing from this girl. She has gossip radar.
“I saw Caleb, Cammie,” I blurt out, biting my nail, nervously.
There is silence on the other end of the line. She knows I wouldn’t joke about something like that.
“He has amnesia and doesn’t know who I am.”
I hear her sigh.
“Olivia…..tell me you didn’t.”
“I did.”
“ARE YOU INSANE?” I hold the phone away from my ear.
“Cammie, when I saw him, I felt things just as strongly as I did when we were together. It’s like everything is still the same and the past three years didn’t happen.”
“You have a right to love him, that’s not something you can control. What you do not have the right to do is take advantage of him…. AGAIN!” Where has this mature little monster come from?
“I liked you better as a freshman.”
“Yeah, well, some of us grow up, Olivia, and some of us play the same tired games forever. Have you ever thought that maybe you are not together because you aren’t supposed to be? Let go!”
“I can’t,” I say softly. Cammie’s voice is gentler this time.
“Olivia, you can have any man you want. Why him? Why is it always about Caleb?”
“Because….because I didn’t need anyone until I met him.”
“You know he’s going to find out.”
“I have to go,” I say. I don’t want to think about that. Tears start oozing from my eyes.
“I love you Olivia, be careful.” I hang up feeling like my stomach is full of rocks. He forgot me. I can make him remember not what I did to him, but what he felt for me.
I wander to my closet, reach up to the top shelf and pull down a dusty box. Laying it on the carpet, I gently remove the lid and stare at its contents. There are a couple of envelopes stuffed with letters, some pictures, and a small wooden box with a flower painted on its lid. I reach for the box and open it. My hand sifts through the jumble of memories, a keychain, a CD, and a frayed book of matches. My hand stills when it brushes against the most important keepsake. I jiggle the box until everything moves aside and I can see the shiny oval penny.
“You,” I say accusingly, picking it up and rolling it between my fingers. "This is all your fault."
Chapter Six
The Past
“I’m not getting in the pool! It is freezing!”
“It’s November in Florida, Olivia. It’s seventy degrees out. Besides, it’s a heated pool. Man up.” Caleb was wading around in his boxers in the turquoise water of the campus swimming pool. I was trying to avoid looking at his muscles.