by Chase Connor
“Oma lives to make a ruckus.” I laughed with him.
Lucas looked over at me and smiled. The compulsion to kiss him was too strong to ignore, so I leaned across the cab and kissed him on the lips quickly. He was smiling even wider when I pulled back and sat back in my seat again, just like a good little passenger.
Chapter 9
Ohio in April is always chilly, but the wind was whipping down through the football stadium and whistling up through the bleachers as we sat on the bottom row of the stands at the fifty-yard line. So, it felt chillier than usual. Lucas had his arms wrapped around me, his head on my shoulder as I stared down at the field.
We had successfully gotten away from Oma’s house without getting hurt and made our way to the stadium. Oma had texted minutes later to say that all of the paparazzi had taken off and: ”I didn’t hit a damn one. Ya’ happy?” That did make me happy because at least she wouldn’t be doing jail time if she got into trouble. I shot off a quick reply to her instructing her to let me know if Sheriff Dennard or anyone else came out and gave her trouble, but otherwise, I’d be home in the morning at the latest. “Yeah. Yeah.” was the reply.
Lucas and I had parked in the field behind the stadium so no one would see Opa’s truck in the parking lot and investigate. Then we had snuck over to one of the chain link fences that surrounded the property and hopped over. Easiest breaking-and-entering job ever. As soon as we walked onto the field, I expected to feel something. To remember something. Anything. But nothing came to me. No sudden realization or memory or thought. We were just walking along the grassy field, hand-in-hand, as though it were any other place for us to take a moonlit stroll as a couple.
After walking the field, Lucas and I walked up into the stands, up and down rows waiting for anything to strike me. Lucas had no idea what I was waiting for, but I honestly didn’t either. I was simply hoping that some memory would be jogged or I’d have a sudden revelation about why I couldn’t remember things like a normal human being who had lived nearly twenty-seven years could. But the football stadium felt as empty as my head—as far as memories go. Lucas stuck with me as we walked the rows of bleachers, holding my hand when it was possible. When I finally walked down to the front row and fell onto the bleacher at the fifty-yard line, Lucas sat down next to me and laid his head on my shoulder. It was comforting, but it didn’t fix my problem.
“Nothing?” Lucas finally asked, his breath hot against my neck.
“Not a single thing.” I sighed. “Fuck.”
“What did you expect?”
“Something besides nothing.”
We sat there for a few moments before Lucas said anything else to me or moved at all.
“Won’t it be good enough to keep going the way we’re going, babe?” He whispered as the wind whistled under our seats, making it hard to hear him. “I mean…I’m happy. Are you happy?”
“May as well get a lobotomy, Lucas.” I sighed. “I mean, if we’re just happy because we can’t remember what led to this moment, is it really happiness?”
“Fair enough.”
“Can you remember anything?” I asked again. “Anything else? Anything you haven’t told me?”
“I remember a lot of things I haven’t told you.” He chuckled against my neck. “But nothing about us. I clearly remember you being the talented, special kid in high school. That you were kind. And, of course, hot. I remember always wanting you.”
I could practically feel him blush against my neck, which made me smile.
“When you delivered Oma’s manure and tiller the other day?” I questioned him. “She said you were starstruck. What did you truly feel?”
Lucas didn’t answer for several moments.
“Completion.” He said. “I felt overwhelmed.”
“Please explain that to me.”
“I had felt like something had been missing for a very long time.” He sat up to look me in the eyes. “Then, I saw you, and I didn’t feel that way anymore. I guess I had been missing you, too.”
“That doesn’t make sense, Lucas.” I pleaded with him. “I know exactly what you’re talking about…now…but it just doesn’t add up.”
“Do you believe in fate or destiny?” He shrugged. “Maybe we were always destined to end up together, and something inside of us knew that, so when you left, we both started to feel that something wasn’t right?”
“That’s a stretch, babe.” I shook my head. “I mean, fuck, that’s a beautiful thought. But we didn’t know each other. At least not really. We knew of each other. Maybe exchanged a few pleasantries—but nothing memorable. How would something inside of us know that we were meant for each other? And, not to piss on your parade, but I’m still myself here. I don’t know what the future holds for us. I love what’s going on here…but I can’t say, without a doubt, that we were meant for each other.”
“Ouch.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yeah.” He sighed. “I know what you mean. Who knows what the future holds? Who knows if we’re not just in the honeymoon phase here, ya’ know? Who knows if this isn’t just lust masquerading as something else?”
I looked at him, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking down at the field. Slowly, his head turned, and he locked eyes with me.
“But…I know, Rob.” He gave me a firm nod. “Even before you came back and I saw you there in Mrs. Wagner’s backyard, I knew. You were coming back, and we were going to…”
I waited, but he just stared at me.
“What, Lucas?”
“We were going to be together again.” He finished, biting off his last word like it was sharp and had pricked his tongue. “That we would no longer be forced to be apart. I knew that. I know things. Remember?”
“What else do you know?”
“Is Ernst one of the little creatures that live in Mrs. Wagner’s house?” He asked lowly. “Lena? You said their names before we left the house.”
My eyes grew wide.
Lucas tapped the side of his head with one finger.
“I know things. Maybe I can’t fill in all of the details, but I know things.” He said before I could ask. “Eggs, bacon, and pancakes was your favorite breakfast when you were young. You never made any friends in Hollywood because you knew you wouldn’t be staying. You never bought a house because you knew you wouldn’t be staying. You never stayed in one place for long because you never felt at home. You didn’t leave Hollywood because you were worn out and lost all the weight. You left because you knew that if you stayed, you’d keep on not caring how much you wasted away.”
I took a deep breath, shocked at how deep Lucas’ words cut.
“When you met me…again…behind Mrs. Wagner’s house the other day, you thought I was a weirdo vegetarian loner who probably had bodies in his basement.”
He chuckled at that.
“Were you reading my mind?”
“I just knew.” He shrugged. “Later.”
“That’s almost exactly what I thought.”
“What do you think now?” He asked gently.
Shaking my head, I stood up.
“That none of this makes sense,” I grumbled. “All of this makes sense, and it doesn’t make sense. It feels right, but it doesn’t add up.”
Stomping up the steps, I ascended six rows and then plopped down on the end of one of the bleachers, feeling defeated. Lucas turned to look up at me as I leaned forward and put my head in my hands, trying to figure out what was wrong with my brain. Lucas knew absolutely true things—stuff I’d never told anyone. He knew everything I felt when I had gone off and lived the Hollywood lifestyle. Truthfully, he could have guessed any of those things—they weren’t uncommon for people who sought out fame and fortune in such a way—but I knew that he hadn’t guessed. I knew that as well as I couldn’t remember the things that I wanted to remember.
“Hey, babe.” Lucas sighed.
I lifted my head to look down at him.
“I’m so tired, L
ucas.” I shook my head. “Jacob Michaels is tired. But Robert Wagner won’t come back and switch places with him. At least, not permanently. And that’s frustrating as fuck because I’m not Jacob Michaels. I’ve never been him. I didn’t go to Hollywood to act in movies. I went to Hollywood to act like Jacob Michaels. But I’m not him. It was like I was running away and pretending to be someone else so that I wouldn’t be Robert Wagner for a while. And I don’t know why. I don’t know if I just don’t remember why…or if I never knew why.”
Lucas’ face dropped.
“What could have happened that made me not want to be Robert Wagner so desperately that I just pulled up stakes and snuck away in the dead of night?” I was pleading with him as though he were an oracle. “Because I don’t remember. My brain tells me that I wanted to get away. Live my life. Find fame and fortune. But…I swear to you right now…that’s not true. I know it’s not true even though my brain says it is. I know, without the shadow of a doubt, that that was something I told myself to make the whole thing easier. Easier to do and easier to understand.”
“Rob…”
“Do you know what I did when I first went to L.A.?” I asked. “I found an agent on my first day. She let me stay with her until I was eighteen-years-old. We had to lie about my age. I had auditions the next week. Within two years, I was starring in movies and had a record deal. Two years, Lucas. I was already a multi-millionaire by age twenty. By age twenty-one, I had been around the world at least three times, filming here, filming there, performing concerts everywhere, being a household name.”
Lucas was staring at me.
“That doesn’t make sense either,” I said. “I could charm my way into any job I wanted. And when I did the job—acted or sang or performed in any way, I could make people believe that it was a good job. I wasn’t even trying. It was like something took me over, Lucas. Jacob Fucking Michaels possessed me. I don’t even know who he is—but he’s not me.”
“That’s really…messed up, babe.” Lucas shook his head with a smile. “It’s like you believe that you are literally two separate people.”
I chuckled bitterly.
“No.” I shook my head. “Not like two different people…but he’s this personality that lived inside of me, peeking out when he was needed so that another goal could be achieved. Do you know how I know that?”
“How?”
“I was in London,” I said. “I was about to do my first show there—before things really took off with the music. I was standing in the wings of the stage, totally petrified. Like, literally petrified. I couldn’t move. But then, my cue came and that all just sloughed off. I strutted out there and gave a performance that would have made any season artist envious. Here I am. I’m Jacob Michaels, and I will make you love me. Then the concert was over, and I was riding a high—so damn chuffed. And when I got back to the hotel…and I was alone again…Jacob Michaels disappeared. I cried myself to sleep that night—horrified at how phony I was, how scared I had been the whole time I was on stage. Jacob Michaels was a buffer to all of the people and the cheers and the flashes of lights and the…insanity of being a celebrity. But, when he wasn’t needed, Jacob Michaels dipped. I was Robert Wagner again. And I was terrified. Because I had no idea what I was doing there. Well, not literally. I’m not crazy. I knew that I was there, performing a concert, that I was also an actor…but I had no idea why I would want to be there. That began my day-to-day existence, Lucas. Every day I wasn’t at home, in Point Worth, I used Jacob Michaels as a mask for Robert Wagner. To shield me from how I truly felt, to make myself feel like everything I was doing was exactly what I wanted. But I didn’t want it. None of it.”
Lucas was wide-eyed.
“I would have been happy staying here and going to college—if I could get into one,” I said, “or working at Barkley’s or the café or the bank or…wherever. I didn’t need to be famous or rich. So…why did I get up and leave in the middle of the night and do exactly that?”
The wind whistled under the bleachers again as Lucas and I stared at each other with six rows of bleachers between us. Cold April Ohio air ruffled my hair, and I pushed it back onto my head to keep it out of my eyes. Lucas looked pensive as he stared up at me, as though unable to decide what it was he could say or do to help. Or he couldn’t determine the answer to the multitude of questions I had posed.
“I’m sorry.” I sighed, but I didn’t look away.
“Don’t be sorry, babe.” He said though he was barely audible over the wind. “It’s not your fault.”
“Do we know that?” I gave a bitter laugh.
“I guess not.” He returned the laugh as he reached up to rub the back of his neck. “I know the things I know. And I’m sure that I’m right. But those are the only things I am sure of, babe. I wish I could help more, but that’s all I have. All I can offer.”
“I wish I had something…anything…to offer.” I snorted.
“Hey.” Lucas frowned as he stood and moved into the aisle of stairs that led further up into the stands. “Don’t say things like that. You are extraordinary, Rob. Even if your memory is shit.”
I laughed.
“You wouldn’t happen to want company up there, would you?” He grinned wickedly.
I shivered.
“What?”
“Did you want someone to keep you company?” He reiterated.
“Were you waiting for me?”
Lucas was standing at the bottom of the bleachers, his letterman jacket on, making him look as sexy as he was. I was sitting in the bleachers, my boring coat pulled tightly around my torso to keep me warm. I had been waiting on Lucas. Just like I always did.
“Of course I was waiting on you,” I replied, my voice not as deep as it now was. “I’m always waiting for you.”
He smiled.
“I thought I was always waiting on you.”
“Well,” I shrugged comically, “one of us is always waiting. But…the wait is always worth it, right?”
“Abso-fucking-lutely,” He replied. “Don’t you get scared out here all alone? What if someone tried to get you?”
“You’d protect me.”
“How can you be so sure?”
I shrugged. “I just know.”
“I’d argue,” He said, “but I’d be wrong. And I don’t like being wrong.”
“You nearly fumbled the last pass.”
“I held on. For you.”
“For me?” I chuckled.
“So we’d have a reason to celebrate.”
“How do you think we should celebrate?”
“Maybe you can give me one of your amazing kisses?” He said, glancing around, as though he thought we might not be alone.
“You’re the football star,” I said as I lifted my legs to place my feet on the bleacher row below me. “Show me your skills. Come get it. Make a play.”
Lucas grinned wickedly then slowly stalked up the stairs, his eyes never leaving mine. When he got to my row, he stepped over my leg, then brought his other leg over it as well, positioning himself between my legs. He looked down at me as his hand came up to cup the side of my face as I looked up at him. I wanted him to kiss me so badly.
“You’re…beautiful.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Is that a compliment for a guy?”
“I wasn’t talking about your looks.”
That made me swallow back any retort.
“Do you want me to kiss you again?”
“Yes.” I exhaled.
“Do you love me?” He asked.
“Yes.” I breathed the word. “I love you.”
Lucas sighed.
“I love you, too.”
Then he leaned down…
The concrete behind me felt like a hammer against my tailbone and was icy cold when I hit the ground. My legs were still up on the bleacher row I had been seated upon before the memory flashback. My vision blurred, hazy, streaks of color, as I flailed, trying to get my bearings.
“Rob!�
�� Lucas gasped from somewhere lower in the stands.
Suddenly, he was beside me, his hands sliding under my arms, trying to lift me off of the icy concrete. I flailed again, unsure of what was going on, unsure, really, of where I was. My vision continued to blur in and out as I felt him pulling at me, trying to gently fight my flailing and get me off of the ground. Through the blurriness in my eyes, I saw Lucas, though one second he looked like he was wearing a letterman jacket and then the next he looked like he was in his Carhartt. I shut my eyes tightly, willing away whatever it was that was blurring my vision.
When I opened my eyes again, all I could see was Lucas trying to get ahold of me in an attempt to pull me off of the ground. The wind was whistling under the bleachers again, cutting into the exposed flesh of my face and hands as I finally stopped fighting against Lucas. Then he was pulling me up until I was seated upright on the bleachers again and he was kneeling to look into my eyes, worry etched all over his face. I stared back into his eyes, barely able to breathe as he reached up to turn my head as if examining me to see if I was bleeding from hitting my head or had otherwise hurt myself.
“Rob.” He breathed out heavily. “Shit. You scared the hell out of me. Are you okay, babe?”
I just stared back, my eyes wide, trying to process what had just happened. Had it been a real memory? Could I remember it?
Lucas. Letterman jacket. Banter. He was standing in front of me between my legs. I told him that I loved him. He said he loved me. We kissed.
The memory hadn’t fluttered away. Mentally, I imagined wrapping an iron fist around the memory. It had been alarming, but it was also one of the most precious I currently held within my brain. There was no way I was going to let it go. I had told Lucas that I loved him. That should have terrified me. Instead, it made me reach out suddenly and wrap my arms around him. Lucas made an “oof” sound and then laughed as I hugged him to me, pulling his body into mine with all of my strength.
“Jeez, babe,” He said, “it was just a little fall. I know you’re an actor, but you don’t have to be so dramatic.”
