DON'T LET ME FORGET YOU.
1031 Words
CHAPTER FIVE
“You always come back.”
The words didn’t echo.
They settled.
Inside her.
Her breath stopped—not sharply, not violently—just enough to make the next inhale feel like something she had to earn.
“I didn’t come back,” she said.
But even as the words left her mouth, something inside them loosened.
Unconvincing.
Unstable.
Because her body hadn’t followed the logic of leaving.
It had turned.
Without permission.
Without consultation.
And now she was standing here again.
Facing him.
Like the moment had simply paused instead of ending.
“You just did.”
His voice didn’t rise. Didn’t press.
It didn’t need to.
Certainty sat inside it like something that had already proven itself too many times to require argument.
Her fingers curled slowly at her sides.
Control.
She needed something to hold onto.
“I walked away,” she said, quieter now. “I remember that.”
“Yes.”
That single word unsettled her more than denial would have.
Because it didn’t contradict her.
It absorbed her.
“You always remember that part.”
Her chest tightened.
“What does that mean?”
But even as she asked, something inside her resisted the answer.
Not fear.
Recognition trying to stay hidden.
He stepped closer to the glass—not touching it, not crossing anything—just enough that the distance between them felt intentional instead of accidental.
“You leave,” he said. “Cleanly. Completely. Like nothing mattered.”
Her breath shortened.
“That’s not—”
“But you never remember what happens before you leave.”
Silence.
Not empty.
Heavy.
Her throat tightened before she could stop it.
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“No,” he agreed softly. “It doesn’t.”
And that agreement—
that quiet refusal to force logic into place—
made something inside her falter.
Because he wasn’t trying to convince her.
He was waiting for something inside her to catch up.
Her fingers pressed lightly against her chest again.
There.
That feeling.
Not pain.
Not exactly.
But pressure.
Like something inside her was pushing against a door that wouldn’t open.
“I don’t forget things like that,” she said.
But the statement came out thinner this time.
Less solid.
Because she wasn’t sure anymore.
He watched her.
Not closely.
Not intensely.
Just… steadily.
Like he had already seen this exact moment before and knew how it would unfold.
“You don’t forget,” he said quietly.
Something in her eased for half a second—
too quickly—
before he finished.
“You lose it.”
Her breath broke.
That word—
lose—
landed differently.
Not choice.
Not failure.
Something taken.
Her fingers tightened instinctively.
“That’s not possible.”
But even as she said it, her thoughts hesitated.
Because something inside her had already begun to question that certainty.
“You felt it, didn’t you?” he asked.
Her eyes flickered.
That pause—
that hesitation—
answered for her.
“The gap,” he continued. “Just now. When something didn’t line up.”
Her chest tightened sharply.
Because he wasn’t guessing.
He was describing.
“You stopped walking,” he said. “Not because you wanted to.”
Her breath turned uneven.
“That—”
“You didn’t choose to come back either.”
Silence collapsed around her.
Tight.
Precise.
Unavoidable.
Her mind searched for something—anything—that could prove him wrong.
But every attempt came back incomplete.
Like pieces missing from something she couldn’t fully see.
“I would know if something like that was happening to me,” she said.
Too quickly.
Too firmly.
Because the alternative—
the alternative meant she didn’t even have control over her own awareness anymore.
His gaze didn’t shift.
Didn’t challenge her.
Didn’t soften.
“You didn’t know last time either.”
The words slid under her defenses before she could stop them.
“…last time?” she whispered.
Her voice didn’t feel like hers anymore.
It felt pulled loose from her chest.
Unsteady.
Exposed.
He didn’t answer immediately.
And that silence—
that space where something should have been explained—
pressed harder than any response.
Because it felt full.
Like the answer already existed.
Just not where she could reach it.
Her throat tightened as she stepped back slightly, instinctively searching for distance again.
But even that movement felt wrong.
Incomplete.
Like she had already made it before and forgotten the ending.
“I don’t understand what you’re trying to do,” she said, forcing steadiness into her tone.
“I’m not trying to do anything,” he replied.
A pause.
Then softer—
“I’m trying to keep you from losing what you don’t even realize is slipping.”
Her lips parted, but no sound came out.
Because something inside her reacted before her mind could intervene.
Not agreement.
Not denial.
Recognition trying to surface through something heavier than confusion.
Her eyes searched his face, trying to find manipulation, exaggeration, anything she could name and dismiss.
But there was none.
Only exhaustion.
And certainty that had survived too many versions of her silence.
“I should remember this,” she said quietly.
It wasn’t a question.
It was a fracture.
Because the moment she said it, the truth of it pressed against her—hard and immediate.
If this was real…
then what else had already slipped past her without permission?
He exhaled slowly, like he had been holding that exact moment in place for too long.
“You were never supposed to notice it this soon,” he said.
Her stomach tightened.
“Notice what?”
But even as she asked, her voice faltered.
Because part of her already knew the answer would not be simple.
And he looked at her then—not like she was confused…
but like she was finally arriving late to something that had already begun without her.
“Your life doesn’t continue the way you think it does,” he said quietly.
And that was when the room stopped feeling like a place.
And started feeling like a question she had already failed to answer.
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