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Taylor

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

The Same Day

“You can’t just go from home to work and back forever.”

“I don’t have the courage to go out until I remember everything, Jackie, because one thing I’m sure of is that I didn’t run off to be with that man who took care of me for more than a year.”

She looks at me the way she’s done so many times before. “How can you be so certain?”

“Because I couldn’t stand his touch. Besides, after what you told me—that I was in love with his son—I doubt I’d betray the man I loved by getting involved with his father. I refuse to believe I was some tramp.”

“You weren’t, Taylor. I can vouch for that.”

I only returned to the United States about three months ago. The guy who rescued me—Jackie’s friend—who only gave me the first letter of his name, “L”—got all my documents in order and let me stay for nearly a year in an apartment he owns in a dreamy Mexican coastal town.

While there, I had access to everything I’d been denied during my time with the man I now know is William Marshall IV. I got a phone, internet access, and at least learned who that “Mr. William” really was: a wealthy businessman who, around the time I came out of my coma, was newly divorced, and is the father of a doctor.

When I saw the date he officially became a free man, my blood ran cold. If what he said was true, I’d been his mistress, since the divorce decree only went through right when I woke from the coma.

“L” said he wouldn’t let me come stay with Jackie straight away for my own safety. She visited me twice, and the first time, she cried with me for over an hour.

Ignoring the doctors’ advice—who examined me and said my memory should return naturally and gradually—she filled me in on who I was, bridging some gaps, though many things will only become clear once my memories really return. For instance, how did I end up in Southeast Asia?

A month ago, I worked up the nerve to start closing certain doors to the past. Until I landed back in the States, I had no idea who anyone in my life was; it was only when I moved back to Manhattan that Jackie urged me to start looking for the people who’d mattered to me before. I didn’t remember any of them, but I did it anyway.

The first was a woman named Bonnie, who according to Jackie, lived next door to me and got me the job at that “Mr. William’s” mother’s house—my supposed protector. When I identified myself on the phone, Bonnie said she was relieved I was alive but had known that for over a year, and told me that I shouldn’t contact her again.

My former employer, mother of the man who’d rescued me, was a bit warmer but brutally honest: she said she knew her son was a cheat, still cared about me deeply, but wouldn’t condone adultery and wouldn’t accept my friendship going forward.

Finally, I sent a message to the man I’d left behind in Asia. I had no desire to speak with him, so all I said was I appreciated him taking care of me but that I needed to sort out my life on my own and he shouldn’t contact me unless I reached out first—which I’m certain I never will. He never replied. He tried to call me once, but I refused to answer.

Only last week did Jackie give me another blow: she told me I was romantically involved with the doctor—this Mr. William’s son. Father and son at the same time? I can’t believe I did something like that.

After I tried apologizing to everyone around me, I called the hospital Jackie said he owned, to do the same. But I found a slammed door in my face. His secretary practically laughed when I said I wanted to speak with William Randolph Marshall IV, and I doubt she even passed on my message.

In hindsight, it’s probably a good thing—because that same night, when I searched for him online, I saw all sorts of celebrity magazines showing him with a range of female companions over the past few months. Maybe not being able to reach him saved me the embarrassment of hearing he doesn’t even remember me.

“There’s something I need to tell you that might upset you,” my friend says in the living room of the two-bedroom apartment we share. She says she bought it shortly after I disappeared.

“Believe me, after spending years in the dark about my past, any news you can give me is better than not knowing who I am.”

“It’s about our work.”

Jackie’s studying to be a social worker. She told me we both used to work at a bar but she quit right after I left and decided to focus on something she’d always been passionate about. She found a job with a charity organization for kids with special talents—music, sports, theater. She also said I once confided that I played violin as a child and suggested I could work there, too. Technically, it’s more volunteer work than a real job, because the pay is negligible.

At first, I was afraid that, like everything else in my life, I’d forgotten how to play violin as well. But the moment I picked up an instrument, the music flowed as if I’d been doing it all my life. I cried at that tiny link to my past.

A few days later, Jackie offered to go with me to my hometown so I could visit my parents’ graves. I cleaned their headstones but remembered nothing about them, though I do have some photographs she kept from the time they emptied out my old apartment after I disappeared.

“What is it?” I ask, forcing myself to hold on to the present and what’s real.

“We’re having a performance next Saturday at the charity.”

“Yes, I know.”

“William, your doctor, will be there. He’s one of the patrons.”

I pretend not to be fazed. “Sooner or later, we’d have run into each other.”

“Do you plan on speaking to him?”

“About what?”

“The truth. Telling him you lost your memory.”

“What for? If I was involved with father and son simultaneously, he must hate me, Jackie. He never answered my calls.”

“Taylor, there were pictures online of you and his father,” she says, uncomfortable.

“Pictures?”

“Yes. Most of them didn’t clearly show you. Maybe a stranger wouldn’t recognize you, but I doubt he didn’t see you at his father’s side.”

She told me that, at first, he looked for me, but if he kept doing so afterward, he never involved her again.

“Then it’s basically guaranteed he hates me.”

“How will you handle seeing him on Saturday?”

“There’s no way to be sure, but I can’t control where he goes or which places he visits, Jackie.”

“There’s a good chance he’ll be with someone.”

“He’s a free man. He has every right to date.”