34. Echo
ECHO
There was some shit you couldn’t brush away with sex and food. I had no problem reassuring my wife she was my everything, but last night really did something to a nigga chest.
That look in her eyes when she finally opened them was embedded in my mind. Her painful cries? Yeah, not easy to forget. No matter how good she took the dick this morning.
I watched Forever take another bite of her French toast, eyes occasionally drifting to meet mine before looking away. She was acting normal, like nothing I told her was more important than breakfast.
This shit felt like a blimp in the fucking matrix.
Before she forgot me, Forever had trust issues that my consistent nature broke through. There were no nightmares that ended in tears and then forgotten by morning.
What was happening now felt like the universe unearthing secrets that might’ve destroyed us before we ever got started.
“You’re staring,” she said, setting her fork down.
I shrugged and leaned back, meeting eyes with the couple at the table next to us until they looked away.
“My wife amazes me. Am I not allowed to stare?”
They’d been staring in our direction since we arrived, and I couldn’t tell if they recognized one or both of us, but having their undivided attention was adding to the drop in my mood.
Forever and I never ate out in public together; our entire relationship had developed in secret for the most part.
“It’s because your thoughts are suffocating me. “ She pushed her plate away. “I know you’re concerned, but this is all too much, and I’m hoping you’ll let me process slowly.”
I thought about what she was asking, how it was the one thing in this life I preferred not to let her get away with.
“Baby…” I kept my voice low and leaned forward. “Letting you process is hardly what I want to do.”
Her eyes flashed with frustration or fear, I couldn’t tell, before softening.
“I know,” she said, nodding. “And that scares me more than I want to admit. Mostly because I can tell how much this is bothering you. I’m not asking to sweep it under the rug, just to leave it for later.”
I leaned back, studying her face. The way her eyes held mine without wavering. She wanted me to know that my concerns mattered, and I was grateful for that, grateful that she wanted to consider me at all.
What choice did I have but to follow her lead? Pushing too hard might push her away entirely, and that wasn’t an option. Never would be.
“Alright,” I conceded, deciding to let her process in peace, while I put the pieces together for her. “Whatever you need, baby.”
The relief on her face was immediate, and then she smiled, and it settled me a little.
“I think…” she started, sliding out of her side of the booth to sit beside me. “…your presence is healing a part of me, and that maybe we should let it without interfering.”
Her hand found mine under the table as she slid closer.
“What makes you say that?” I asked, wanting to understand her logic.
“Because when I’m with you, I feel like all is right in my world,” she said simply. “Before, it felt like there were pieces of me missing, but I didn’t understand it until you came around. I don’t have the memories, but the feelings are there. They never left.”
We stared at each other, the voices fading around us until it was just her eyes and mine, having a conversation our mouths hadn’t caught up to yet.
“I wish I could live in your mind,” I whispered, unable to stop myself from expressing it. “I want to know everything you’re feeling.”
Forever hadn’t opened up easily in the beginning either. She fell for me, but the rest took time. Love was more than just a feeling; it was a commitment. I knew the more I offered, the more vulnerable I allowed myself to be, the easier it’d be for her to rely on me and do the same.
“I love you, Demetrius,” she said so softly I almost missed it. “You deserve to know that.”
Those words coming from her mouth, in this moment, were more satisfying than I imagined this go ‘round to be.
I felt the corners of my lips lifting before I could stop them.
“Tell me again, baby. I don’t think I heard you clearly.”
A smile pulled at the corners of her mouth as she shook her head, eyes never leaving mine.
“I’m in love with you,” she repeated, stronger this time. “I never needed my memories to know my feelings for you have probably always been beyond our comprehension. So, yes, I’ll tell you everything because your wants are my needs, too.”
It wasn’t like the first time she’d said those words, sitting on the hood of my car in the red light district. That confession had been quick, thrown out in the moment before she tried to take it back.
This one wasn’t a surprise to either of us.
“I love you,” I told her back, pressing a kiss to her forehead, then the tip of her nose, before hovering just above her lips. “Always have, always will.”
I sealed the declaration with a kiss and then draped an arm over her shoulder, wanting to savor this moment before secretly going against everything she asked of me.
Later, after she went to work, I met Kai at the psychiatric facility. Forever wouldn’t appreciate the intrusion, but my mind had been made up since last night; everything that happened today solidified the decision.
Kai was waiting at the entrance when I arrived, tugging the door open after we exchanged silent greetings.
“You got an hour,” he said, following me in. “She’s awake and talking today. Use it wisely.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “And try not to pull a gun on my ma like you did me.”
I ignored the request, though I had no plans to do Quinn how I’d done him. Pulling the gun was a knee-jerk reaction in the first place.
Forever didn’t cry. Not like that.
And as her older brother, how could he not know?
But when I really thought about it, after he agreed to get me this uninterrupted time, I realized just how different he and Forever were from me and my siblings.
We moved past the empty reception desk and took the elevator up to the third floor.
“For the record, nigga,” he said, breaking the silence as we moved past the empty reception desk and took the elevator up to the third floor.
“There’s a lot of shit I wouldn’t know. Forever and I were never meant to have a close relationship, and they raised us that way.
Most of my childhood was spent with my grandfather until I hit fourteen and he passed away. ”
I hummed, tucking that information for later.
Kai stepped out first, and we walked down a hallway lined with numbered doors that looked more like hotel rooms than patient quarters.
“My sister is different,” he went on, stopping in front of room 307. “She was raised to be a miniature version of Eliel, trained to take more than most. I’m not surprised that somewhere along the way she got hurt.”
Forever had always kept her family at arm’s length, even before we met. The way she talked about her mother always hinted at distrust but respect.
There was love there, whether she wanted it to be or not.
“Got any idea why she was chosen to be his protege and not you?” I asked, lifting an eyebrow.
He chuckled, swiped his entry card, and then answered.
“Because I’m not his son ,and had my father not been killed before I was born, Forever wouldn’t be his daughter.”
I reared back a little, genuinely shocked by the confession.
Kai pushed the door open.
“No, Forever doesn’t know,” he added, waving for me to enter. “Don’t really give a fuck if you tell her, because it ain’t that kind of secret. Anything else you want to know will have to come from our ma. May the odds be in your favor.”
I took that for what it was and stepped through the doorway, not moving until the door shut.
Quinn was sitting up in bed but didn’t look at me, though I knew she’d heard me enter and probably our conversation, too.
“I’ve been expecting you,” she said. “The man who clearly stole my daughter’s heart without my permission.”
She turned, and I saw Forever’s eyes looking back at me, just sadder.
For a moment, I considered turning back. Walking away and letting whatever secrets she carried stay buried. But how could Forever really be free from any of this if she couldn’t remember?
Protecting her had become my life’s mission.
“Let’s talk,” I said, stepping further into the room.
Even if it meant going up against her past without her knowledge.