Chapter 11 #4
Berries…something about them felt important.
I stared at the rich crimson color, trying to grasp the recollection hovering just beyond my reach.
There had been berries. Rain. A clearing.
And…something else, something I felt certain should have mattered.
Yet the harder I reached for it, the farther it seemed to slip away.
I glanced towards Gabe, troubled by the strange certainty that he possessed something I’d lost. His expression softened. “Are you remembering yesterday in the berry clearing?”
Something stirred, a sensation rather than a memory, the feeling that something precious had happened there. I didn’t remember, yet somehow I sensed that had been what my heart had been trying to piece together.
His eyes widened, and his expression transformed to something closer to grief. “You’ve really forgotten that moment we shared in the clearing?”
The question seemed to affect him far more deeply than it affected me. I frowned, trying once again to grasp whatever memory lingered beyond the fog.
“You laughed because I got trapped in a raspberry bush,” he prompted.
A faint image flickered at the edge of my thoughts before dissolving again. My heart stumbled strangely. “I…laughed?”
His smile appeared briefly. “Quite thoroughly.”
Each of his words stirred some faint recollection of what had been taken, something I vaguely remembered not wanting to sacrifice.
The sensation reminded me of at a flour-dusted counter after a cookie jar had been removed; I could still see the outline where it had once rested, yet had no memory of its contents or sweetness, only the hollow absence left behind.
Part of me wanted to leave whatever had been lost forgotten, the other part longed to know what had once occupied that empty space.
Yet my indecision seemed insignificant in the face of Gabe’s determination.
He leaned forward in his seat, his dark eyes filled with an urgency that bordered on desperation.
“Let me help you remember. We foraged for berries,” he quietly began. “As we picked them, our hands kept touching.”
He reached across the table, his hand hovering briefly over mine before he cautiously but gently brushed my fingers with his own, as though a single touch might somehow restore what had been lost.
“I got tangled in the raspberry patch, and you laughed.” He swallowed. “You seemed…happy. I don’t understand how you thought such a beautiful moment was worth sacrificing.”
With every word, the memory seemed to gain shape around its edges, set in a hidden clearing tucked deep within the woods.
Another vague recollection stirred, faint but insistent.
I abruptly pushed back my chair and hurried towards the map I’d been creating of the surrounding area, still tucked inside the pocket of my red cloak where I kept it whenever I explored.
My heart beat fast as I unrolled the parchment across the table. My gaze frantically traced each careful line and notation, following the path we’d taken through the forest. My breath caught when I reached the small notation written near the edge of the clearing where the enchanted berries grew.
I heard Gabe rise from his seat and approach behind me, his warmth enfolding me like a cloak as he leaned over my shoulder to study the map.
Written in the margin, squeezed between two notes regarding landmarks and terrain, were words I didn’t remember writing: the place where I laughed again.
My fingers lightly traced the words. When had I written that?
Perhaps while recording the clearing yesterday, before the tart had taken the emotion away.
If they hadn’t been written in my own hand, I almost wouldn’t have believed the memory they recorded was real.
The proof lay plainly before me, impossible to deny.
Yet rather than bringing comfort, the discovery only deepened the ache inside me. Forgetting something that had once been precious didn’t erase its value; it only made me aware of what had been lost and could never be taken back.
I reached for the map, but Gabe’s hand landed atop it first. His fingers didn’t stop me; they simply rested there, protecting the page. For a moment neither of us spoke. “I’d forgotten,” I finally murmured. “This was the emotion I gave up for your tart.”
A heavy silence followed my whispered admission. Beside me, Gabe went completely still. “You…” His voice caught. “You sacrificed your first laugh…for me?”
I glanced up at him. “You needed the spell.”
His sadness washed over me through our connection with such force that it left me breathless. He stared at me for a long moment before slowly shaking his head in disbelief. “For someone who claims not to feel, you’re remarkably selfless.”
I wanted to protest—there was nothing selfless about sacrificing emotions so I wouldn’t have to endure the pain they caused. Yet the argument faltered before it could fully form. Some hidden part of me that I still didn’t understand cherished his good opinion far more than it should have.
He reached into his pocket and withdrew the worn journal I’d seen him carrying since the day we met.
Opening it carefully, he turned several pages before removing a single pressed leaf.
I immediately recognized it as one from the raspberry bramble in the clearing I’d seen him preserve after our time together.
He removed it with surprising gentleness and placed it in my palm. I stared down at it for a long moment before lifting my questioning gaze to his. “Why are you giving me this?”
His thumb brushed the edge of the journal.
“Because it’s from a moment that was precious to me,” he said.
“I keep leaves so I won’t forget the places I’ve been and the moments that mattered.
” His gaze met mine. “Since your maps serve the same purpose, I thought you deserved something to help you keep this one too.”
For a brief instant, a fragment of memory surfaced at the touch of the leaf—rain glimmering on raspberry leaves, laughter echoing through a hidden clearing, dark eyes watching me with quiet wonder. The image vanished almost immediately, leaving behind nothing but an ache.
I had no words to describe the feeling swelling my heart at his selfless gift.
All I knew was that whatever emotion was trying to break through my carefully constructed defenses was far too dangerous to explore, especially when it involved a man cursed never to remain in one place and a girl without feelings who could likely never return all the new emotions he was causing her to discover.