After I Lost My Memory, Both My Enemies Came for Revenge

The first thing I remembered was the ceiling. The second was the pain behind my eyes. The third was the man holding my hand. "Hey," he said. His voice was low and worn thin at the edges. "You're awake." I tried to pull my hand away. A needle tugged at the back of my wrist, and the room swam. The man let go at once. "Where am I?" "Port Aster General. You were in a car accident." His face was familiar in the way a song might be familiar when I couldn't remember the words. Dark hair, a thin scar through one eyebrow, a mouth that looked like it had learned to smile reluctantly. "Who are you?" His expression changed before he answered. It was small, almost nothing. I caught it anyway. "I'm Elias," he said. "Your husband." I stared at him. "I'm married?" "You are." He nodded toward my left hand. A narrow gold band sat on my finger. "We've been married four years." I should have felt something. I felt the hospital sheet under my fingers and a hard, empty silence where the feeling belonged. A nurse stepped in, checked the monitor, and asked me a few questions. I knew my name. Nora Bell. I knew my birthday and the town where I'd grown up. I knew how to read the discharge board on the wall. I didn't know what I did for a living, where I lived, or how Elias's hand had come to rest on my bed. The nurse called it retrograde amnesia and warned me that recovery could be slow. Elias answered a question about my emergency contacts before I could try. "He's listed on her phone," she said, glancing at me. "We've already confirmed his number." That seemed like evidence. So did the ring. So did the way he knew I hated sweet tea and asked the nurse to bring water instead. "Did I hit my head?" I asked. "Yes," Elias said. "You were driving home in the rain. A truck clipped the rear of your car. You went off the road." "Was anyone else hurt?" "No." He paused. "No one else was hurt." I held on to that answer, though I couldn't explain why it bothered me. The nurse said I could go home that afternoon if I had someone to stay with me. Elias immediately offered. I looked at him, waiting for the part of me that knew him to speak up. It didn't. "Do we have children?" I asked. "No." "Pets?" "Not anymore." Again, that almost-pause. When the nurse left, Elias moved his chair closer to the bed. He didn't touch me. "You don't have to pretend you remember me." "I'm not pretending." "I know." His gaze stayed on my face. "I'm sorry." "For what?" He seemed to search for an answer that wouldn't hurt me. "For all the things you can't remember." That sounded like grief. It also sounded rehearsed. I looked at the wedding band. It fit well, but there was a faint pale line beneath it, as if I had worn a different ring for a long time and only recently replaced it. "Can I see our wedding pictures?" "Of course." He handed me his phone and opened an album. The first image showed me in a simple ivory dress on a rocky shore, laughing with my head tipped toward him. In the next, his arm was around my waist. The pictures looked real. They looked like us. I waited for recognition. Nothing came. "Was I happy?" I asked. Elias's thumb brushed the edge of the phone. "You were." There was another pause, smaller than the last. When the doctor came to discuss discharge, he asked whether my husband could get me home safely. Elias said yes. I watched him sign the paperwork and wondered why a stranger's signature seemed more important than his face. At the elevator, he put his hand near my elbow without quite touching it. "You can tell me to back off," he said. "I don't know what I want." "Then I'll wait until you do." He said it gently. I believed he meant it. Outside, rain striped the hospital windows. When the elevator doors opened, Elias stepped out first, then looked back at me. For one second, he looked more frightened than relieved. I followed him anyway. *****