If You Remember Me Tomorrow

The first thing I noticed when I woke up was the photograph. It was lying on my pillow. A man was smiling at me from the picture. He was tall, dark-haired, and ridiculously handsome. His eyes were the kind that seemed to know exactly what you were thinking. I stared at him for several seconds. I didn't recognize him. I turned the photograph over. Three words were written on the back in black ink. MY LOVE. ELIAS. My heart skipped. "Who the hell is Elias?" I whispered the question to an empty bedroom. Then my phone rang. Unknown number. I answered cautiously. "Hello?" For a few seconds, there was only silence. Then a man's voice came through. "Amelia?" Something about his voice made my chest tighten. "Yes?" A shaky breath. "It's me." "Who?" Silence again. Then, very softly— "Elias." I looked down at the photograph. The man in front of me was the same man staring back at me from the picture. "How did you get my number?" "I've had it for three years." I frowned. "That's impossible." "Why?" "Because I've never met you." He didn't answer. Instead, I heard something that frightened me more than anything he could have said. He started crying. "Please," he whispered. "Don't tell me you forgot again." My stomach dropped. "Again?" Before I could ask anything else, someone knocked on my bedroom door. I hung up. My mother stood outside. The moment she saw the photograph in my hand, the color disappeared from her face. "Where did you get that?" "It was on my pillow." She walked toward me slowly. "Amelia..." "Who is Elias?" She stopped. For a moment, neither of us spoke. Then she reached for the photograph. I pulled it away. "Mom." Her eyes filled with tears. "Don't contact him." "Why?" "Because he isn't good for you." "How do you know?" She looked at me like I had just asked the most painful question in the world. "Because you already told me that." I froze. "What?" "You told me that last night." My fingers tightened around the photograph. "I didn't talk to you last night." My mother stared at me. Then she whispered: "You did." A cold sensation crawled down my spine. "Amelia," she continued, "you've been forgetting things for weeks." I shook my head. "No. I would know if I had memory problems." She looked away. "You don't." I swallowed. "Then what happened?" She didn't answer. Instead, she walked to my bedside table and opened the drawer. She pulled out a small notebook. The cover was worn, as if it had been opened hundreds of times. She handed it to me. "Read it." I opened the first page. My handwriting filled the paper. My name is Amelia Hart. If you're reading this, you've forgotten again. My heart began pounding. I flipped the page. Don't panic. Another page. Your memory disappears every morning. Another. You will remember certain things for a while, but eventually they disappear too. My hands began shaking. I turned to another page. There were dozens of entries. Some were dated yesterday. Some were dated weeks ago. And every single one was written by me. Then I reached the final page. Only one sentence was written there. The ink looked darker than the rest. Fresh. Recent. If Elias comes back, don't believe anything he tells you. I stared at the sentence. My mother placed a trembling hand on my shoulder. "Now you understand why I'm afraid." Before I could respond, my phone rang again. Unknown number. I stared at the screen. My mother whispered, "Don't answer." The phone stopped. For a moment, the room was completely silent. Then a message appeared. I opened it. There was only one sentence. I'm outside your house. My blood ran cold. I rushed to the window. A black car was parked across the street. And standing beside it was the man from the photograph. Elias. He looked directly at my window. Then he raised his hand. Not to wave. He was holding something. A photograph. I zoomed in. My breath caught. It was a picture of me. But I wasn't alone in it. I was standing beside Elias. I was smiling. And written across the bottom, in my own handwriting, were four words: I remember everything now.