Page 43 of A Lab Rat’s Guide to Fated Love

He nodded again.

“Look, Vir. Vir…” She paused, puckering her lips before mouthing his name again without sound. “It feels weird… saying your name.”

Questions bubbled within him, demanding to be asked.

He wasn’t sure if he could, though. If he should.

But more urgent was the need burning in him to scoop her into his arms. His ribs strained to feel her pressed close to him.

His lungs begged for the proximity, as if they’d suddenly forgotten how to function without it.

“Anyway, I think I should give you a disclaimer first,” Nori continued, oblivious to the wreckage clattering inside him.

“I was in a traffic accident about four years ago, and I lost a big chunk of my memories because of that. It’s a condition called Retrograde Amnesia, where the brain forgets memories from a chunk of time preceding the accident that caused it, while much older memories remain intact. I lost—”

—four years, Vir finished in his head.

She’d lost four whole years of her memories, only to regress back to the day she was supposed to be discharged from the hospital after that horrible assault. She hadn’t recognized Vir at all. She’d been fearful of him. And any strange men in her vicinity, including the male doctors there.

They’d tried reminding her at first—small, inconsequential facts, things about her cat, events from a few years prior. But anytime someone brought something up, Nori would start panicking and become physically sick.

The doctors suggested letting her be. Retrograde Amnesia patients evidently regained their memories slowly, over a period of time. Or they never did. If Nori remembered, then she remembered.

“—but if she doesn’t, then help her focus on her life ahead and leave the past in the past,” the neurologist had told her family.

Vir had given his contact details to her parents before they’d taken her back to Calgary. They’d assured him they’d call if she remembered anything.

That was four years ago. He never got a call.

“—so, if we were friends and you think I’m pretending to not know you, that’s not the case. I genuinely don’t remember you,” Nori was still talking. “Were we?”

“Were we, what?”

“Friends?”

Vir swallowed, then nodded again.

“This is really good.” She took a big sip of her tea. “Umm… Did I hurt you, Vir? Before… when we were friends?”

I hurt you … he wanted to say. But he didn’t know how to answer without reminding her of all the things he didn’t want her to remember. Her very last memories of him before the accident. She wouldn’t be sitting across from him if she knew.

“No.” He looked away.

“Then why did you tear up earlier when—? ”

“Allergies.” He cleared his throat. “Seasonal allergies. Sorry. It was rude of me. I shouldn’t have walked away like that.”

They sipped their beverages in silence for the next few moments. Nori gazed out of the window while Vir kept stealing glances at her. A part of him was afraid she’d turn out to be a hallucination after all. That she’d vanish without a trace if he looked away from her for too long.

Nori turned to him again, and as their eyes met, color seeped into her cheeks.

God. His hands balled into fists over his knees as he fought the impulse to reach over and touch the warmth. He’d missed watching these random bursts of color in her face. A familiar sense of ease spread through his chest as his heart ballooned once again into the pufferfish he’d thought long gone.

“You stare a lot.”

“Sorry.” He averted his gaze.

“It’s strange how easy it is to talk to you,” Nori said after a while. “I’m not usually much of a talker. Well, except with this one friend I grew up with. Wait, you must’ve met him, too. Ryan Matthews. He was there at the same university when—oh, I’m blabbing. Sorry.”

“No, you’re not,” Vir said quickly. “We’ve met.” He remembered something then. “Wasn’t it supposed to be your wedding today?”

Her brow shot up in surprise.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry. There was an announcement in the newspaper.”

“I can’t believe that reached here, too.” She groaned. “It wasn’t—ugh, right, I’ll tell you. But please interrupt me if you feel I’m oversharing. I don’t know what’s going on with me today.”

She waited for Vir to respond and didn’t start till he gave her an, “Okay.”

“Over Diwali dinner, one of Ryan’s friends jokingly asked when we were planning to get married,” she said.

“Our parents were there, too, and they—our dads, specifically—thought it was a good idea, and the next thing we know, there’s this wedding announcement in the local newspaper.

I was getting married in a month, and I had no idea. ”

The pufferfish in Vir’s chest began shriveling at her words. He didn’t want to hear this particular story .

“I confronted Ryan, and we found out his dad had taken it upon himself to get the ball rolling, since we were clearly too shy to initiate things ourselves. Used an old photograph of us, too.” Nori sighed.

“I thought it was ridiculous and laughed it off at first, but then Ryan asked me if we should just go along with it, and I didn’t know how to respond.

Don’t get me wrong, he’s a great guy. But I’d never seen him that way, you know, and I didn’t think he saw me that way either. ”

Of course, he didn’t. The now raisin-resembling pufferfish in Vir’s chest took out a butter-knife and proceeded to stab itself to death. For someone so observant, Nori was still too painfully oblivious.

But why was he , the forgotten ex, listening to her talk about her best-friend-slash-fiancé?

“I asked for some time to think,” Nori said. “I couldn’t see a logical reason to say no. I mean, I’d dated a bit before but had always found the experience… lacking. I didn’t think I’d ever find anyone. Or want anyone, honestly.

“But I also didn’t want to say yes either, just because the idea of growing old alone bothered me on some level.

Ryan deserves someone who chooses him, not settles for him.

That would be a horrible thing to do to your own best friend.

I knew he’d understand, and we’d eventually laugh it off.

” She grimaced. “So, a week later, we met for dinner. And as I was about to speak, he pulled out a ring .”

“He what ?”

“Everybody at the restaurant started cheering. I couldn’t say no, because it would’ve been awkward, and he’d have felt insulted. But how could I say yes, either?”

“But you said no.”

Nori shook her head.

“You said yes?” Vir scanned her bare fingers for a ring.

She shook her head again with her beet-red face and the fresh swirl of emotion inside her spelling GUILT in all caps.

“Nori… what did you do?”

“I ran.”