Page 84 of Alexander: Alexander's Story

“If she remembered, I doubt she would want me there.”

Blanks’s expression falls. With a lowered voice, he asks, “What did you do?”

“It doesn’t matter what. All that matters is you’re right. And I’ll let her go. I’ll, uh,” I nearly fucking choke on the words, “try to do it slow and easy, and I’ll keep making sure she’s taken care of, but…I’m done.”

I don’t —might be that I can’t— wait for his reaction. I just head straight for the stairs and up to our room. I shut the door, then turn and slide to the floor. I fist my trembling hands into my hair and try to fight the urge to throw something. To yell or fight. I fight against the desire to run back downstairs and hold her one last time as she sleeps.

Rocking on the floor, back and forth, I fight for breath. My fingers twist inside my palms, hot and damp. Extending my left hand, I slide the gold band off for the first time in over a year.

I’m sorry, Em.

february

Emma

“Good morning,” her voice is soothing, “let’s try and get going, yeah?” She’s always gentle with me. I can feel the bed dip as she sits on the mattress beside me.

“Go away, Becks,” I groan, turning my head into the pillow to block her and the light out.

“Nope. We are not starting today like this. Try again, Em.” She’s always gentle but firm. I flop back against the bed, still shielding my eyes from the sun, and I cave in.

“Good morning, Becks. Today is Friday, January 31st. My name is Emmaline Palomino, formerly Strait, and I’m 27 years old. I currently live in Spearhead Lake, California, with my husband.”That’s a lie and a joke.“And we have a dog named Delta, and a rescue named Blanks.”

“She seems fine to me,” Blanks snorts from the doorway.

I ignore him. “And my goal today is to make myself breakfast. Alone. ALL Alone.” I drop my hands from my face and catch Caleb giving me a smirk from the corner of my eye.

He’s been here every day and every morning since I came “home” from the hospital. He’s the one who carried me to the toilet to pee that first day. He was the one to feed me. He even bathed me once in a genuinely humiliating debacle that I made him swear to never speak of again.

And he’s held me as I cried on more than one occasion over the absence of said “husband.” My chest burns at the memory.

“Okay,” Becks moves two fingers to take my pulse in her routine morning check. “And can you tell me how you got here?”

“Well, I was working at this diner, and this really hot guy sat down at one of my tables…” Becks shoots me a look. This isn’t the first time I’ve tried this. “Fine,” I say in faux-aggravation because it always pisses me off that every day I have to recount this story. A story that had to be told to me because two months after the fact, I still have no memory of it.

“I was involved in a car accident, or so I’ve been told, and I spent three weeks in a coma, followed by an additional three weeks of mild consciousness. I suffered a traumatic brain injury, and most would say I’m lucky to be experiencing this level of recovery.”

I know I sound ungrateful, but I feel anything but. Lucky I survived so I could…so I could what? Become an obligation to the man I loved? To be tossed aside? To know that every day I will wake up in more pain than I ever did while lying in a hospital bed with a brain injury and bruised ribs?

I hate it here.

My manna from heaven has turned into hell on Earth.

Becks gives me a sad sort of smile that’s equal parts empathy and pity.

“Do you want help?” She means going to the bathroom, but I shake my head, feeling my throat grow too tight to speak.

Becks releases my wrist, typing my pulse into the chart on her phone as I roll out of bed.

Blanks is still watching from the bedroom doorway. He stands with a coffee mug in hand, leaning against the frame. He gives me the same sad smile as Becks and I want to flip him off for it.

I can’t believe I ever thought I had feelings for him. Some days, I feel ashamed of it. But then again, once he ingrained himself in my life to the point he probably knows what day I’ll start my period before I do, all I feel now…is angry.

I don’t want him to take me on as some charity project, or step in because his best friend stepped out. I know what I am to him now, and that quickly dried up any residual or lingering feelings.

I know I told Becks my goal is to make breakfast, but my goal is bigger than that. Leavinghereis the real goal. To move back to my little condo. To go to school and back to work at the library. I was happy-ish then. I was healthy then. And all I want is to go back tothen.

After washing my hands, I stand at the sink and stare at the waif-like being looking back at me. When I lift my shirt to change, I see ribs and bones I never knew I had before. My skin looks thin and crepey white.