I glanced down the hall to see them step onto the elevator, and as the doors slid shut behind them, I debated for all of a minute before jumping up out of my chair.
I had to see him. Just to see for myself that what the doctor had said was true, and then I’d leave him be and let him heal in peace.
Lucky for me, it just so happened to be shift change at the nurses’ station, and they were all too busy checking in with each other to notice it wasn’t an immediate family member of Reid’s slipping down the hall to see him…
Room four-twenty-four was dark and quiet as I entered soundlessly, the lights dimmed and the sun having long set. As I rounded the corner and Reid came into view, I could almost imagine he was merely sleeping peacefully. His hair had been shaved off to stitch the wound on his head, and he still wore the battle scars from the accident, but in my eyes, he’d never looked more beautiful.
He’s alive. He’s going to be fine.
Taking a deep breath, I slowly walked over to his bedside. Now that I was here, I wasn’t sure what to say or do, so I did what I always did when I was on edge: I rambled.
“You’re in much better shape than the last time I saw you. I’m glad you listened. You know, when I told you to hold on. And now look at you. Doc says you’ll wake up soon, and hopefully you won’t be in too much pain or remember the accident. I’ve heard some people say they don’t remember anything and others that say they relive it again in their dreams.”
I shoved my hands in the pockets of my faded jeans and rocked back on my heels. My eyes caught on the pictures and cards displayed along the wall, and a smile tipped my lips.
“It looks like your students miss you. I know I would.” My mouth snapped shut at that admission, but then I thought, Screw it. Not like he’d remember any of this anyway.
“So, I guess I won’t be seeing you for a while. I won’t complain too much about that, since at least you’ll be around to have a coffee. I’ll make sure to tell Joe to have the latte machine in perfect shape for when you come back. I have a feeling after the beat-down he gave it the other day that he’ll have to order a new one anyway.”
A noise outside his room had me freezing and listening for whoever might be about to come in and catch me, but after several seconds, it went quiet again, and I let out a relieved exhale.
Looking down at Reid’s face, I memorized his features in case it was the last time I ever saw him. There was no guarantee he’d be back at Castle Hill or stopping for coffee at Joe’s. Hell, there wasn’t even any guarantee that he’d be completely himself when he did emerge from the coma. Personality changes, memory loss… You name it, I’d seen and heard it. I hoped that wouldn’t happen to Reid, but just in case…
“Take care of yourself, Bluebird,” I told him, and then on an impulse, I reached down and gave his hand a gentle squeeze. “I’ll be seeing you.”
I turned to leave, glancing over my shoulder one last time at Reid’s peaceful expression, when suddenly the door to Reid’s room opened, and I heard his mom say, “I’ll just be a second, I forgot my—”
As soon as she caught sight of me standing by the bed, she came to a standstill, surprise and confusion crossing her face. But when her gaze drifted behind me, whatever she’d been about to say was forgotten as her mouth parted in a gasp.
“Oh my God.” She brought her fingers to her lips as she started forward, and I quickly moved out of the way, willing myself to blend into the wall already.
What a stupid idea it was to sneak up here. A truly stupid—
“You’re awake,” she said.
What?
I spun around so fast I almost lost my balance, and even more so when I saw that Reid’s brown eyes were open—and they were looking right at me.
Part of me thrilled at seeing him awake. The other part panicked.
I have to get out of here, I thought, backing away, ready to make my exit without any more notice, when Reid’s father and sister rounded the corner.
His father’s eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”
Oh, shit. I really hadn’t thought this through, and now I’d violated about ten different privacy laws, had a run-in with Reid’s family—oh, and Reid was now awake and watching the whole thing go down. Way to go, Ollie. Really.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, my hands going up. “I really shouldn’t be in here. Forgive me—”
As I went to move around him, I had every intention of leaving before they could call security to come up here and remove my ass, but at that moment, one word had that plan flying out the window.
“Ollie.”
I froze.
There was a wheezing sound, and Reid coughed a little, but then he croaked out my name again, and this time I knew it hadn’t been a figment of my imagination.
I spun around slowly, to where Reid’s family looked every bit as shocked as I was. Though I had Reid’s attention, theirs was fully focused on their son and brother.
“Reid… Oh my God.” His mother broke down into tears as she reached for his face, and then seemed to remember his wounds and kissed his forehead instead. They huddled around him, tears flowing as they hugged one another. “You have no idea how worried we were.”
“Mom?” Reid’s brow furrowed as he looked between his parents. “Dad? You look…different.” He squeezed his eyes shut before opening them again. “Am I dreaming?”
“No, baby. You’re awake now. You’re gonna be just fine.”
“I don’t understand.” Reid’s gaze shifted to his sister and he frowned. “Do I know you?”
His mom put her arm around the girl’s shoulders and pulled her closer. “You don’t know who this is?” she asked gently, as the teen’s eyes filled with tears.
Reid squinted at her. “I don’t think so.”
“It’s Anna,” she said. “Your sister.”
“No,” Reid said, shaking his head. “Anna’s only seven.”
It’s probably just the sedation, I wanted to say, but I didn’t want to attract any more notice than I already had.
“Seven?” His mom looked taken aback, but recovered quickly. “Go get the doctor or nurse,” she said in a low voice to her husband, who nodded, but when he turned around, he realized there was still a stranger in their midst—me.
“Ollie, was it?” he asked, eyeing me up and down as if what I wore would give me away. At least I wasn’t in my uniform.
“Yes, sir.”
“How do you know my son?”
“I…” How to answer that question without losing my job or giving up the goods that I had a big gay crush on their son?
Oh fuck it. I was no coward.
But it turned out I didn’t have to answer at all, because Reid spoke up again.
“He helped me.” Our eyes all shot to Reid, who stared at me with an expression that looked something like curiosity. And appreciation. “You told me…to fight.”
I stopped breathing then. How on earth did he remember that, but he didn’t remember his sister was now a teenager?
“Is that true?” Reid’s father asked. “Are you one of the doctors here?”
I shook my head, and my voice caught in my throat. “No, I’m just a paramedic.”
“Just a paramedic?” his mother said, walking over to me. “Just a paramedic that saved our son’s life?”
“I…” My eyes flew back to Reid, who was still watching me, and I swallowed hard. “It’s…it’s my job.”
Reid’s father surprised me then by drawing me in for a fierce hug.
“Thank you. Thank you,” he whispered, again and again, squeezing me tight before pulling away. Then he wiped his face and said, “I’d better go see about that nurse.”
As he left the room, I stood there awkwardly as Reid’s mom watched me.
“How bad was it?” she said, and I knew exactly what she was asking.
I gripped the back of my neck and looked down, not wanting to relive the accident so that she could watch it play out on my face. “Bad.”
> “Thank you,” she said, her voice wavering, and I looked up to see her twisting her fingers together. “Thank you for what you did for Reid and for checking on him. He might not be here if it weren’t for you.”
God, I didn’t even want to think about that. The what-might’ve-beens. Things had happened for a reason, exactly like they were supposed to. I had to believe that, though I wished he hadn’t had to go through any pain.
“I should leave you all to…catch up,” I said, and then I looked over at Reid. He would no doubt be overwhelmed by everything that had happened to him the last few days, and he’d need time to heal, to be with family, to remember. “I’m really glad to see you awake.”
“I’ll see you again, right?” he said, and the endearing way he looked up at me then made me want to give him whatever he asked.
And so I did. “You can count on it.”
Chapter Four
Six weeks later
THE SECOND HALF of February was proving to be miserably cold. We’d had a dusting of snow last week, but now it was nothing but below-normal temps and wind gusts.
That hadn’t stopped me from taking my daily five-mile runs. As I locked my front door, I thought again about stopping by the hardware store this week for paint. The door was chipped and faded, no longer the bright red it had been when I bought the house. Come to think of it, the hunter-green shutters could also use a fresh coat of paint, and shriveled leaves still littered the lawn from fall’s purge months ago. Unfortunately, my two-bedroom was in need of more love and care than I’d had time for lately, having again taken on more shifts than usual, since we were down a paramedic. I could’ve used several more hours in a day…or a clone.
It’s fine. I’ll fix it up when spring hits, I thought, heading down the front porch steps, and as I did, one of the bricks came loose, wobbling beneath my foot.
Great. Another thing to add to the list. Not that I had any reason to complain. All in all, it was a cozy home, a nicer one than I should’ve expected on my meager budget.
After shoving the house key inside my sweatshirt pocket, I began a slow jog across the street toward the lake that served as the central point of the neighborhood. A wide sidewalk lined the entire circumference of the lake, and since it measured almost exactly half a mile around, it made it easy to keep track of my laps.
I started out with an easy pace, letting my muscles warm up to the cold. Running was a way to clear my mind from everything work-related that threatened to drive me crazy. Pushing myself was the only way I’d found to let go of what I couldn’t control and put it behind me, so I guess it was a therapy of sorts.
The past week had been unusually rough, the icy conditions in the mornings causing a slew of car accidents, and with every call we responded to, my mind went back to Reid.
I hadn’t seen him since the day he woke up, but… I thought of him often. My guess was that he was still recovering and hadn’t yet gone back to work, but I didn’t know for sure. We didn’t have any mutual friends in common, that I knew of, to ask how he was doing, and I wouldn’t even dream of tracking down his address to find out for myself. Okay, that was a lie. Maybe I’d thought about it, but I’d never actually do it.
At the halfway mark directly across from my house, I upped my pace, enjoying the burn in my muscles as they stretched. My breath came out in white clouds as I took in the clear, crisp day, and it hadn’t escaped my notice that I’d only passed a small handful of joggers and walkers out this morning. Usually, it wasn’t surprising to see families feeding the ducks that hung around the lake, or nearly bump into kids on their bikes, but freezing weather in North Georgia didn’t entice people to leave their comfy beds.
Bunch of slackers, I thought with a chuckle.
“Ollie?”
I was so thrown off guard by the voice that had come from behind me that I nearly ate pavement when my knees threatened to go out. I slowed to a stop and then turned around, lifting a hand up as I squinted in the bright sun. When I got a good look at who it was, my jaw dropped.
“Reid?” I said, completely dumbstruck that he could be standing a few feet away, in my neighborhood of all places. It was like thinking about him just then made him materialize.
In a pair of black athletic pants and matching jacket, and wearing a beanie cap, Reid crossed the patch of grass that separated the walking path from the houses that backed up to the lake. His smile was friendly as he walked toward me. “I thought that was you.”
“Wow. You look…” Unbelievably handsome? Surreal? Alive?
“Better?” He chuckled and shoved his hands in his jacket pockets. “Yeah, not hard to be.”
“Definitely better than the last time I saw you.” I tried not to give him a once-over, but it was proving impossible. I’d almost forgotten how gorgeous the man was. “Are, you, uh…doing okay?”
“I am, yeah.” He looked down at himself and then smiled back up at me. “My body’s all healed—just waiting for my mind to catch up.”
Oh no… “What do you mean?” Even though I knew exactly what he meant.
“The doctors told me I might have some short-term memory loss due to the amount of drugs they used to keep me in a coma for a few days. Seems to be a bit more permanent, though.”
Jesus. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It’s okay. Frustrating, but…” He shrugged and kicked a small rock on the path into the lake. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to stop your run, it’s just…well, I don’t recognize many people nowadays, so I guess I got excited to see a familiar face.”
Familiar…me? I was familiar? Definitely surreal.
“I also wanted to say thank you,” he went on. “It’s strange that I can’t remember much from before my accident, but I remember what you did for me.” His voice dropped low. “I don’t think I could ever forget.”
Despite the cold, heat crept up my neck. My first instinct was always to downplay my role, but with Reid, I found myself saying, “I’m just glad to see you’re doing better.”
We stood there awkwardly, neither of us really seeming to know what to say, but then again, we didn’t actually know each other, did we?
“Did you… Were you going for a walk?” I asked finally.
“Oh, yeah, I’ve been trying to get some fresh air. Slowly get myself back up to speed, you know?”
Screw my run. I wasn’t about to pass up the chance smacking me in the face. “Would you like to join me? I don’t really feel much like running this morning anyway.”
Reid’s face lit up. “Sure.”
I moved to the outside of the path so he could take the shorter inside and then let him set the pace, not wanting him to overdo it.
“Is this too slow?” he asked as we settled into a casual stride. Not speed-walking, but not a leisurely stroll either.
“Not at all. This is great.”
“I’ve been trying to work up to sprints. I’m just not quite there yet.”
“Oh yeah? Do you run?” Shit, how would he remember that? “I mean, uh…”
Reid laughed. “I know what you mean. And I don’t think so. From what I’ve been told, I wasn’t really into sports all that much. Or any cardiovascular activity, for that matter. I just saw people out here jogging and figured it seemed like a healthy thing to do.”
I chuckled at that. I didn’t need to look him up and down again to see that he was probably wrong about not breaking a sweat. He was much leaner than he’d been before the accident, but prior to that, Reid had had an athletic build that I’d taken notice of—and thought about often—so he had to be spending some time in a gym.
As we passed by my house, I said, “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?”
“I might not know the answer,” he joked.
“Maybe not,” I said, my lips quirking up. “But… What exactly do you remember?”
He fell silent beside me and looked out at the ducks passing by in the water. “It’s weird. I remember pieces from the day of the accident. Like sto
pping at a gas station for a drink, but they didn’t have what I wanted.” His cheeks tinged the slightest shade of pink as he said, “I remember your face. I know we spoke, but I have no clue what was said. I know I was dressed up to go somewhere, to work, I think, but I can’t tell you where that is or what I did. And before that? I guess that’s where it gets tricky.” He pulled his beanie down and blew out a puff of air. “When I woke up in the hospital and saw my parents, I thought I was dreaming. They look so much older than the last time I saw them. And Anna, my sister? She’s not even in middle school yet, but they tell me she’s getting ready to graduate high school. And, sure, she looks it. But my brain doesn’t really comprehend that I seem to be missing a ten-year chunk of my life.”
I let out a low whistle. “Damn. Ten years? So that’d make you, what?”
“Seventeen,” he said. “Almost eighteen. But my driver’s license says twenty-seven.”
Oh my God. Seventeen? He thought he was still seventeen? I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do with that information besides stroke out.
“It’s not all cut and dry,” he continued. “I have flashes of things that seem to have come after high school, but nothing makes sense.”
“Like watching a movie of your life, only you don’t recognize the characters.”
He squinted at me, the sun in his eyes. “Exactly.”
We were coming back up to the house he’d come down from, and I inclined my head toward it. “Is that your house?”
“What?” He followed my gaze. “Oh. No, it’s my parents’ place. I’ve been staying with them since…” He shrugged. “The house they say is mine doesn’t feel like mine.”
“I can’t imagine.” What would it be like to lose all that time, all those memories? The people you knew, the places you went. Your job. Your whole life as you knew it, bam, gone in a flash. And would he ever get them back, or would he have to basically start over from scratch? How did you push a reset button on your life?
Forget Me Not (The Unforgettable Duet Book 1) Page 3
