by Taylor Hart
“So you did go to the library?”
He smiled. “You were stalking me?”
“No. If you didn’t notice, you’re kind of an international incident, it seems. They reported it on the news. Someone saw you.”
Logan digested this. “Yeah, I guess that’s how it is now.” He tried to focus on what he was doing and not pay attention to this intense confusion inside of him.
Paris threw up her hands and turned toward the bedroom. “I’m showering.”
Logan went about the task of cooking the eggs. He toasted four pieces of bread, then went ahead and did another two in case Paris changed her mind.
He evaluated the cabin. The kitchen was the same; he remembered exactly where everything was. The living room, with the high vaulted ceiling and the loft room above it, with various stuffed animals on the walls, was still the same. Logan couldn’t help thinking about Paris’s grandfather and all the pride he’d had in this cabin. If Grandpa wasn’t here … was he dead too?
Sure, he’d been in his eighties, but he’d been in great shape. He’d been sturdy as a rock. He and Logan had been tight.
When Paris came out, Logan was still scarfing down his food. He had set aside a plate of eggs and two pieces of toast for her.
“Sorry,” he said between mouthfuls. “I’ll have to buy you some more eggs and bread. I think I ate a protein bar yesterday when Shane found me and took me to his office, but I didn’t eat anything else.” He shoved in a couple more forkfuls and then prodded the tender spot of his head. The pain had all but disappeared.
He pointed his fork at Paris. “At least my head is doing better, so that’s good.” He thought about how he might get his memory back at any moment, and he wasn’t sure if that would be good. The new him, waking up in the old place … Would the new him be upset at the old him? It was all turning into some Star Trek time continuum impossibility in his mind.
Tentatively, Paris took the seat next to him and reached for her fork. “Thanks. I guess.” She cleared her throat. “Even though you shouldn’t be here.” She took a bite of eggs and then a bite of toast.
“Where’s Grandpa?” he asked, ignoring her desire for him to leave.
“Oh.” She jerked her gaze to her plate and pushed the food around. “He passed away right after we left for college.” She shrugged. “Just fell asleep out on the deck one night. Ms. Pixley found him in the morning; she called my father.”
A pang of sadness filled him. “I’m sorry.”
Her eyes glazed with emotion, and she nibbled at her toast. “Thank you.”
“In the last eight years Grandpa died, my dad died, and your mom died.” He put his fork down, then let out a breath. “Man.”
She glanced at him, studying his movements.
“What?” he asked, after putting down his water.
“Nothing. You’re different.”
“No, actually I’m the same.” Which led into the main question he wanted answered. “Why, Pear? You still haven’t told me why it didn’t work out with us.”
She shook her head and pointed her fork in the air at him. “No, no, no. I am not doing this with you. You have amnesia and you need to leave.”
“Why?” He picked up his fourth piece of toast and held it in the air like some kind of flimsy shield.
She hesitated. “Because everyone is looking for you. Your fiancée is looking for you. You should go to her, talk to her. I’m sure it would be more comfortable for you. Being with her.” She averted her eyes and focused on her eggs.
“She’s not my fiancée.” He took another bite and the toast was gone. Maybe they were large bites. “Have you met her? She’s … annoying.”
Paris, caught mid-sip, sprayed water across her plate.
He looked at her and they exchanged grins. “I guess you have met her.”
“No, but I can imagine.”
Their eyes held and Logan felt hope that somewhere, somehow, everything was still there between them. He picked up his water and took a sip. “Man, I’m finally feeling better. More like myself. I think I just needed food.” He gestured to her plate with his next piece of toast. “How’s yours?”
Pausing, she eyed him again. “You really remember nothing?”
Deciding he was tired of acting weird around her because she was acting weird, he leaned back, turning and using a chair to prop his feet up. “Oh, I remember.”
Her eyes flashed like she’d caught him in a lie. “I knew it. This is all some publicity stunt.” She dropped her fork and stood.
Logan reached out and took her wrist. “I remember our very first kiss, ninth grade, after school. You were waiting for your dad to pick you up and I walked you to the front of the school. I had football practice, but I wanted to ask you to the Back to School dance, the next day. Do you remember?”
She froze.
He let go of her wrist. “I remember I was so nervous. I’d been planning on kissing you all summer, but couldn’t get my nerve up, you know. Or it was never the right moment.” He chuckled. “Man, I think that’s the summer we built that boathouse, and man, if your grandfather didn’t make good on making me sleep out there.”
Paris laughed. “He did. He was stern about it.”
Both of them shook their fingers like her grandfather used to. “You ain’t gonna tell me nothing,” they said at the same time, falling into laughter at the memory.
At this moment, he knew he still loved her. More importantly, he knew she still loved him. Time did one of those slow-motion things, and their eyes held.
Paris returned to her chair and a smile played at her lips. “I still remember our first kiss, too. I was the one who initiated it.”
“No!” He grabbed her hand and squeezing it. “No way.” They had argued about who initiated it after the fact.
She untangled her hand from his. “Logan, stop. We can’t do this. This isn’t how life is with us.”
“Why?” he demanded, crossing his arms. “Why? I deserve to know why it didn’t work out with us. Because I’m in love with you, Paris.” He felt emotion well in his throat, and his voice cracked. “I love you so much.”
Looking flustered, she pulled away before he could take her hand again. “Stop! You are marrying another woman. You are going to get your memories back and then you’ll understand.” She gave him a stern look.
His heart raced. Would he understand? Would he? Because in his mind, there would be nothing that could ever get between them. Nothing.
Deciding to chill out a bit, he approached this new life the way he would approach the younger version of Paris. He reached out and tickled her beneath her chin, where he’d always tickled her.
“Logan!” she cried out, trying to cover up her reflexive laughter.
He stood and grabbed his dishes. “You were not the one who initiated it. I knew I would kiss you when we were in third grade.”
“Don’t do that, I mean it.” Following him to the kitchen, she pointed at him with her fork and threw open the dishwasher. “You … we’re not … this can’t happen.”
He placed the silverware in the sink, brushing his shoulder against hers and breathing in her new scent. Tropical. Light. “I remember we had walked to the front of the school and we were holding hands. You were wearing that new shirt you’d bought that summer for school. It was pink.” He sniffed again, deeply. Her hair was still wet and it didn’t smell minty anymore.
She stared up at him. “What are you doing, Logan?”
“You smell different now, but I like it.” With a grin, he methodically moved across the counter, picking up the butter and putting it away, then taking the egg carton and putting it in the trash. “I mean it, I’ll buy you more eggs.” He fixed the toaster into place, picked up the trash, and then used his hand to gather all the crumbs, shoving them into the trash.
“Logan,” she said again.
Stopping, he turned to her. “Y-es?”
This time, she did look vulnerable. “Logan … I …”
&
nbsp; The center of his chest was pierced, as it always had been when it came to Paris. He never, ever wanted to hurt her.
“I can’t do this, Logan. I’m sorry you don’t remember.” She put the rest of the dishes into the dishwasher and closed it. “But I can’t get hurt again. I just can’t.”
Clenching his hand into a fist, he let out a deep breath. “What did I do to you?”
She glanced at his fist, looking resigned. “There was so much, Logan. It’s been eight years and a lot of crap. Too much. I know you don’t remember, but you would be better off getting back to your old life.” She pointed to a cell phone on the counter. “Use my phone, call your agent. Call your fiancée. Let them know you’re okay. Then go back. I promise you, when you realize, when you wake up … you won’t want me anymore.”
And he would have believed her if she hadn’t looked like she would cry.
She blinked and turned away, staring out the window. “Please, just go.”
Standing there, he thought of this new version of Paris. Of the things he did know about her. She had married and divorced Shane. They had a son. She planned events for companies. For his company, whatever that was. His brain raced to figure out how to get through to her. “Mrs. Cameron.”
“What?” She turned back to him in confusion, and he caught sight of a scar on her upper lip. He hadn’t noticed it last night, but now, in the light of day, he saw it. She looked different from the Paris he knew.
He frowned. “What happened there?” Stepping closer to her, he gently touched the scar.
She reared back at his touch, then swiped his hand away. “It’s nothing. I got a cut.”
“How?” he demanded, feeling like he wanted to beat up whoever hurt her.
Backing up, she stumbled and then tripped over the trash.
He reached out and held her, pulling her back to standing.
They stared at each other again, their breath mixing.
He didn’t kiss her. “Mrs. Cameron told us we need to paint to fill in the gaps for people. Right?”
She stilled in his arms. “Why are you thinking about her?”
Logan realized he had to convince Paris to help him remember the past. He had to. If he was to go about fixing this alternative timeline, he needed her help to understand what had gone wrong between them. He needed her. He had to fix things. “Because we were in her class last week.”
She studied his eyes and shook her head. “How is this possible?”
“Will you please help me fill in the gaps?” Everything inside of him wanted to kiss her, but he realized it wasn’t fair to her. So he pulled her to her feet and steadied her, then pulled his arms back. “Pear, you were my friend before that first kiss.” He managed a soft smile, hating to think that’s all they were. “Please.”
She frowned and turned away from him, going to the sink.
“Please, Pear. I mean, Shane told me stuff yesterday. I looked myself up and I have to know: how did I get to this place in my life? How did I get so far away from you?”
Chapter 11
Paris’s heart hammered inside of her chest and a mixture of feelings swirled inside of her. Was Shane right? Had Logan always been between them?
No. She looked at his face right now. He looked so vulnerable, and … young. As it had been before everything bad happened. The way he tickled her so innocently had almost amused her. He really didn’t remember. She remembered it all, the passion of her first love. The way it had surrounded her, and made her feel like she was surfing and the wave would never stop.
Being with Logan, in his life, in his world, was dizzying. Always had been. Sure, they’d grown up together, but when they’d gotten to high school and she’d become his official girlfriend, she’d felt a bit dazed by him. It wasn’t the fact he was a football star. It was just him. How he made her feel so loved.
It was happening right now. In this moment.
A million times she’d stopped and wondered how it’d all unraveled between them. They’d been in love.
He’d looked at her back then just as he looked at her right now. It would pull her under, this wave she was surfing. There had been too many times she’d been pulled under by it. She stared at him, unsure if she could trust herself or if she could even explain why life had ended up this way.
“I need you,” Logan said, moving into the living room and sitting. He patted the couch next to him. “Please, help me remember.”
Staring at him, the sincerity in his eyes, she slowly moved into the living room. She may have been able to say no to the twenty-six-year-old Logan, but he wasn’t that Logan. He was her Logan, who looked at her like he used to eight years ago. That was a different story.
She swallowed, feeling emotion rise into her throat. Part of her wanted to run into his arms and soak in the love she’d longed for. Her hand trembled and tears filled her eyes.
She needed another anxiety pill. She pulled in a long deep breath through her nose.
He leapt to his feet. “Pear, what’s wrong?”
She blew out her breath and took a step back from him. “It’s okay.” Yes, here he was. This Logan, the one who cared for her. She swallowed again. “Okay, I’ll do this.”
They went to the couch and she sat across from him, feeling like she was facing a firing squad. It wasn’t that she couldn’t fill in the timeline, but the gaps were tricky. “The composition of your life,” she stated simply. “That’s what you need to understand.”
He smiled. “Shane said you went to Juilliard. That’s so awesome.”
Her heart squeezed because she could feel it, he was proud of her.
“I knew you could do it.”
She remembered how he’d taken her out for a nice dinner when she’d gotten the letter. “Yeah.” He wouldn’t remember that.
“I bet you composed so many cool things.” He pumped his eyebrows. “I’d love to hear some new stuff.”
Of course he would think she still composed. It used to come so naturally for her. Like breathing. She clasped her hands together, trying to act casual. “I don’t.” The words sounded stilted.
Logan narrowed his eyes. “You don’t compose?”
Rolling her eyes and looking at the piano her grandpa had put in the cabin just for her, she let out a breath. “It’s not a big deal.”
Logan cleared his throat, leaned forward, and put his elbows on his knees. “Don’t lie to me, it’s a big deal.”
Meeting his eyes, those intense green eyes that knew her, loved her, was overwhelming. She wished she could explain it to him, this him. Maybe he would understand why she couldn’t compose. When everything happened, it’d dried up. She focused on him and blinked. “Let’s see, where to start …”
“I used to watch you sit right here at the piano and compose all the time.” He gestured to the small piano. “Why don’t you compose anymore?”
Knowing her face was turning red, she held his gaze. “I still play, I just don’t …” She trailed off, throwing her hands into the air. “It’s fine. I have a child. A company. I—”
“Cut the crap, Pear,” Logan said, looking somehow hurt that she didn’t play.
“No.” She looked away. “Don’t look at me like that. You have no idea; do not judge me.”
“Then tell me,” he said softly. “I just want to understand.”
For a few moments neither of them spoke, searching each other’s eyes.
She looked away. “I can tell you what I know of your life, but there’s a lot I can’t help you with, Logan.” She shrugged. “We haven’t really known each other the past few years.”
It was unimaginable how this had happened, but Logan took the morsel she offered. “Okay, then just tell me the melody, I guess.”
She realized he was talking in composition terms, and she squinted at him.
The side of his mouth curled up. “Or the chorus.”
She shook her head, but focused. “Right. The chorus, the melody, intermixed, turned into something beautiful, or
off key, or something completely new. The composition of a song is one of the hardest things to undertake. Many piano players won’t do it.” She sounded like some professor.
His smiled widened. “Yes.”
She was faced with the task of pulling apart his life. It was tricky, picking just the right point in the song that made the melody change. The tune that changed the way the song moved forward. It wasn’t like the composition was just him, and he did need to understand the intricacies of what had happened. It felt heavy. This sudden responsibility she was taking on was too close to her, because she never really felt she understood it all.
He leaned back, putting his feet on the footrest, looking so much the same as his high school self. “I see your brain formulating something. Just like so many times when you would grab a piece of paper and start jotting down notes or phrases.” His brow creased. “You were so passionate about it. And man, you’re good, Pear. You know that, right? Like, I can’t imagine how good you are now—after Juilliard. I’d love to hear you play.” He crossed his arms like he had all the time in the world and they were eighteen again, just hanging out.
It made her feel jittery, having all his attention on her. Just like it used to be, but not at all like it used to be. It hadn’t occurred to her that he would compare her to her younger self, but of course he would. Like he said, they were in art class last week together.
Was this Logan at eighteen? Was this Logan in his senior year, about ready to play in the state championship? His father drank most of the time. A functional alcoholic, they said, but he still raged at Logan. Sometimes Logan would come over after, at night, and his eye would be black, or a bruise would be on his arm. It’d broken her heart and made her so mad, but she’d learned even in high school not to ask.
She sighed. “Let’s focus on you. Do you want to go forward or backward?”
“Start from right before the championship, please.”
She rolled her eyes. “We’ve already talked about kissing outside the locker room before the game.”
