Chapter 23 #2
Brain scans? Sharp. Those headaches might be caused by your eyesight, please have that checked. Might eventually need glasses. You’re getting old, Ford.
Amnesia? Not so fucking sharp. My head keeps hurting like something is trapped in there and there’s no key to be found but this time, I don’t mind admitting that there’s been no improvement.
I hold my hand out to Ash and he hesitates only one second before grabbing it and interlacing our fingers. For the first time that week, Ash smiles at me. And I offer one back.
Back home, I pick up the phone and select Lily Hale’s number.
“Ford.”
“Hello, Mom.”
“How have you been?” I can hear everything my mother is not saying. She’s been worried, she’s been anxious, she’s been trying to give me space.
Her voice is gentle, but her breathing is unsteady. It’s quiet around her, and I wonder where in the world she is, if she has yet another partner. A new family, even. Lily Hale is unpredictable. She has been since the morning she woke up and decided Dad and I were not what she wanted from her life.
“I’m alright.” It comes out naturally, and I bite my tongue. “I’m better. I had a follow-up appointment today and the doctors were very positive. And my memories, hum… Did you hear? They might still come back.”
“And if they don’t?”
I shrug, even though she can’t see it.
“You always knew what was best for you, love. Remember, you can do anything with your life. Anything. Change it around, make it yours.”
I can’t help it. “Like you did when you left our family?” I know it’s unfair. I know Lily is my mother but she’s a human, too. Still.
“Yes, honey. Like I did. And I apologised to you already and will apologise again, but we’ve talked about this.
I had to put myself first.” She takes a breath and it almost sounds like a sob.
“And I know you might have forgotten now, but since Win… Since you became a father, I’ve been trying to be there.
Trying to be present, be some kind of grandmother.
I might be unconventional, yes. I might not be who you think of when you think of your family.
But you’re still part of mine. You and Ashley, your father even.
Winnie. And I want to be there for her. I want to be her grandmother. ”
“Mom, you don’t have to.”
“No, please. Let me remind you. I’ve been trying to be there, when I’m around. And I know it is not much, but you have to know, you’re always in my thoughts. Leaving you was the hardest decision of my life. I told you this before, and I will tell you again.
“And I have been trying to tell you and Ashley that it is important that you do not forget yourselves. Even with Winnie, with however many children you might have. They are not your whole life. You are still Ford, you’re not just a father.
Please, try to remember this. Try to remember that I’m your mommy, and I’m Winnie’s grandma, but I’m also me.
I love travelling the world, I love to help the less fortunate.
I love my freedom. Doesn’t change how much I love you, baby. It never will.”
???
After that phone call, sometimes, there’s a flash.
Ash hasn’t been out on the patio in days and maybe it’s the cold air at the end of September, or maybe it is something else. I go to poke his shoulder.
It’s early Wednesday morning, yet Winnie is awake and demanding attention. The pack of cigarettes on the counter lays untouched and I haven’t tasted mint from Ash’s lips in a while. Lately, I haven’t tasted Ash’s lips at all.
“Are you a changed man?” I tease him, eyeing the cigarettes.
Ash catches my eyes, holds up a spoon for Winnie and a middle finger for me. “Can’t keep a bitch from her drugs,” Ash sing-songs while feeding an unimpressed Winnie.
It must be a quote of some sorts but it doesn’t ring any bells. In fact, “I-”
A flash.
“Less cigarettes. Less coffee.”
Ashley is staring at me with his big blue eyes and I’m trying to hold it together. As if I could ever deny Ash anything. Ash sees right through me. “You’re joking.”
“I’m serious. I’m not fucking you until you quit your drugs.”
Ash interrupts me. “What about me fucking you?”
“Not with that mouth, no.” I push him away, and there’s no kisses that morning.
I try chasing the memory, but there’s nothing else. In 2024, I lean in to kiss Ash and he tilts his head back to meet me halfway.
???
On Thursday I knock at the door of the dining-room while Ash is working on his PhD. I don’t like to interrupt him, but he greets me with a smile and gestures for me to come close.
I deliver a kiss onto his lips. “I know you haven’t been asking and I know you probably don’t want to push me. But maybe we could talk about the adoption order later?” I ask.
Ash stares at me wordlessly and a gasp escapes his parted lips.
His silence makes me panic, my eyelids twitch. “If you are still interested, that is?” I add, and Ash almost falls off the chair.
“Of course! Yes, of course we can talk about it.”
“Good. ‘Cause I clearly have no idea where we’re at and I don’t even know our social worker.” I consider taking a seat at the table but Ash looks busy, a thousand tabs open on his laptop. So I walk backwards, to the door. “I want to keep her, Ash. I want-”
A flash.
“I want Winnie to be completely ours. I don’t want anyone else to be her parents and I don’t want to have any other child. I want the recitals, the abandonment issues, the curfews. I want everything with her. With you.”
My back hits the door and I cry out in pain.
“Are you okay?” Ash asks, jumping off his chair and reaching for me.
One of his hands sneaks around my neck and he towers over me, holding my weight up and off the wooden door. I don’t know what’s harder, Ash’s chest against mine or the literal wood behind me. How could I ever forget how tall this man is?
“I just… stumbled. Keep doing what you’re doing. We’ll talk later. I’m okay.” I hold onto Ash’s shirt a tad longer and he must know I’m bluffing. With a tentative smile I leave the room and hide in the kitchen. Closing the door behind me, I try to make sense of the memories. Why now?
With every new piece of information, I feel more imbalanced. Instead of going back to its normal axis, the world keeps shifting further and further until I have no idea where I am standing.
In the kitchen, I take a deep breath, hold it in and let it go. I stare at my feet and count to ten, thinking of Winnie.
That afternoon, Ash talks me through the entire adoption process. He hands me our folder and explains to me every document, from our application in 2023 to the moment we were assigned a small human.
“You know you cannot go back on this decision right?” Ash warns me in his protective father voice.
I wish I didn’t find it extremely sexy. “Once we decide we’re in this, amnesia or not, we are in this.
Together. We cannot give her up, we cannot decide we can’t keep her.
No returns, this is not negotiable. We choose Winnie, Winnie stays forever. ”
“I’m sure, Ash,” I assure him, tracing a line around his pale wrist.
“Are you? If we go through with this, she’s ours, Ford. Until the day we die.”
Time stops.
Ash greets me with a bare chest and a wet tongue. “Happy Birthday, love.”
“Thanks, Ash.” I chuckle.
“I never want to spend another birthday without you. Or another day.”
“We spend most of our days together. Clingy fucker.”
“And so it shall be until the day we die.” I have a feeling Ash wants to add something, but then his hand slips into my underwear and all words are forgotten.
???
If the days are for our family, the nights are for us. By now there’s two things I’m sure of: Ash loves me, and Ash loves fucking me.
I knew, deep down, that sex with Ashley Bergman was going to ruin me. I wasn’t ready for the real thing, for the feeling at the pit of my stomach whenever I get to watch as Ash’s body gives in to lust.
He loves giving himself to me—sweet eyes pleading for more, harder—but quickly enough I discover that he loves being in charge just as much. He towers over me and pushes me down with his surprisingly strong arms and I wonder how can someone so skinny be so strong?
Ash loves taking his time, pushing his tongue deep between my glutes until I’m begging for more.
Begging for what, I don’t even know. And he loves taking me fast, against the bedroom door, propped up on the kitchen counter.
With him I’m loud and desperate and completely myself.
It feels much more intimate than anything I have ever experienced and maybe Ash is what I’ve been waiting for my whole life.
Scrap that. No maybes. Ash is definitely the reason why sex with everybody else always felt wrong.
And then on Thursday night as I’m lying in bed sweaty and naked and empty, I realise: I have been treating this like sex.
But Ash has not. Every time Ash is kissing me, every time he’s searching my eyes for permission to do, take, give, come…
this has been something totally different.
I close my eyes at the realisation: Ash has been making love to me.
Resolute, I turn around. I wrap my arms around Ash and I rest my forehead against Ash’s nape and let out a long breath.
Although, this is still Ashley. He calls me “daddy” that night, and it’s clearly meant as a joke, until it’s not. It turns me on like crazy and I spit on my fingertips, reaching for Ash’s arse and spreading his cheeks tentatively.
“Yes, please…”
“Fuck me.”
“Uh, are you sure?” I’m lying under Ash and the feeling is delicious. I want to die under Ash’s weight.
“Fuck, yes.”
I reach for lube and Ash stops me, bringing my fingers to his mouth and wetting them with his saliva. Yes, fuck.
When Ash releases my fingers, I waste no time. I reach for Ash and find his rim, the skin soft and hot. Scorching hot. Just like the rest of Ash.
“Ford, just...”
I’m too horny to articulate words, my brain is just a puddle of embarrassing goo and horniness and Ash.
“Or should I say, daddy?” Ash says, pushing his arse up into my hands. “Fuck me, daddy, please.”
???
On Friday morning Ash is getting ready to go to university for a fancy professor meeting.
“Do you remember when you started your PhD? You and I weren’t talking.”
“Thanny,” Ash acknowledges darkly.
“I wish I could’ve been there to help you.”
Ash sighs, tapping at his chest. “You always were.” Then he lets out a humorous laugh.
“What?”
“I was just thinking. That was such a horrible time, I wish we could erase it from our memories.” Spoken out loud, the words cut through both of us like a knife.
Ash’s blue eyes focus on the tip of his feet and then breathing is hard.
Instinctively, I bring my hands to my face, knowing what is about to happen.
The melodic beeping of a monitor in a hospital bed, the sound of a truck hitting the side of a car, the sirens coming in the distance.
Red blood dripping down Ash’s face, the airbag blowing in my own.
“Ford,” Ash calls out and I feel the warm touch of his hands on my skin. I need his touch more than anything, I need his hands off me, I need to stop my head from spinning.
“Ashford, come on.” And this time, he throws his arm around me and cuddles me to his side. “It’s all good. We’re all good. Look,” he says and forces me to face him. “We’re fine.”
“I was driving too fast.” It’s the first time I’m speaking these words and we’re the only two people in the world.
Ash looks surprised but he shakes it off quickly. “You weren’t. You never drive fast, Ford. It just happened. Sometimes, things just happen.”
“It happened because of me,” I tell him, but Ash simply shakes his head. With his white shirt and cream pants, he looks calm and loving. He kisses the tip of my nose and the knots in my brain loosen. “Do you really have to go today?”
“Teaching makes me feel alive.” Ash shrugs and with one last hug, he moves to stand up.
Sliding on a black blazer, Ash winks at me and adds, “Also, someone’s gotta keep the money coming.” He lifts his brows pointedly but I see right through him.
“Get the fuck out, you love it.”
Ash grins at me, all bright and sunshiny and ridiculously handsome. “I do love providing for you, my love.”
Winnie doesn’t take it as well. She holds her arms up until Ash gathers her in his arms, and then she hides her face in his chest. “Papa’s gotta work today, honey.” A pause, and then, with a reassuring tone, Ash adds, “You will have so much fun with Dad.”
Winnie mumbles in his shirt. “No fun.”
“Of course Dad’s fun, peanut. He plays with you all the time. You sing your song all the time, don’t you like that?”
“fun befowe.”
“I know, sweetie. I know. But Dad loves you so much, he’s still the same Dad. We gotta be patient with him until he remembers us, alrighty? Do you like my tie?”
Winnie shakes her head and for some reason, it brings tears to my eyes.
“Rude. It’s a perfectly good tie.” Ash places Winnie down and nudges her towards me. “Be good. Both of you.”
Later that night, I carry Winnie to bed. I kiss her goodnight but before I can leave, she opens one sleepy eye.
“Da wemembe?”
For a moment I’m not sure what to say. How do you explain to a toddler that yes, she is my whole world. Yes, I wouldn’t change this life with anything else. And yes, I forgot her, I have no idea how I came to be her dad.
“I don’t know, Ashwin.” I walk back to her crib, leaning in so I can whisper against her little ear. Her soft curls tickle my nose and tomorrow, tomorrow I’ll braid her hair. “But I love you. Even if I forget some sh-… some stuff and I never remember you, this will never change. I won’t leave you.”
She grasps my arms and holds me together. “No leave me, Da.”
This time, the memory is like a slap across the face.
A cold hand around my wrist. “Don’t leave me.” There’s panic in Ash’s eyes and I’m confused, why would I leave?
“Why would I leave you?”
“Cause I’m about to do something.” He’s got something in his hand.
Something that he’s hiding.
“What something?”
“I’m about to ask you to marry me.”