Chapter 8
Aria's eyes met Emily's, steady and calm despite the storm inside her. She took a deep breath and spoke clearly, letting her voice carry the weight of her decision.
"Next time," she said, "if there is a next time... meet me at the lake. That's where a lot of our shared memories are. That's where it's safest for me to be myself."
Will's expression flickered, a mix of surprise, understanding, and a glimmer of shame, but he didn't protest. Emily's lips parted, but she didn't argue either.
Aria turned slightly, giving them the faintest of nods. Her hand brushed the doorframe, and she pulled it closed gently, firmly, signaling that this meeting, and this house, was hers to navigate in her own way.
The muted click of the lock echoed in the hallway. Outside, she could hear Emily's soft exhale and Will's murmur, but she didn't look back. She let herself feel the tension splinter in her chest, allowed herself the full measure of grief and longing, before finally taking a deep, steadying breath.
The lake. That would be the next step. And somehow, she felt just a little stronger for having made that choice.
Will felt Emily tense beside him, her hands still clutching his arm. Her fear was palpable, raw, and he could sense that she wasn't ready to process what had just happened. He didn't move, didn't speak; he let her steady herself against him.
Then he heard it. A faint click.
Aria.
The door.
Locked.
A slow smirk tugged at the corner of his lips. He remembered exactly where he had hidden the spare key, a small instinct from the past life he had retrieved with a few other memories.
He didn't say a word. Emily was already shaking slightly, afraid of what the house might stir in him, afraid of what she couldn't control. He did not want to add to that worry or let that fear linger.
For now.
He would protect her. And he would also protect Aria's peace. But in the back of his mind, he was calculating, remembering, strategizing. Every little detail of that house, every memory flicker from the box, every whispered laugh from the lake.
Emily glanced up at him nervously, sensing a shift. "Are you... okay?"
He smiled softly, careful not to give anything away. "I'm fine," he said. "Just... processing."
Processing, yes. And remembering, too.
The key to the door would wait. His memories would wait. Emily's trust wouldn't wait.
He glanced at Emily again, brushing a stray lock of her hair behind her ear, his protective instincts kicking in, masking the storm inside him. For now, she was his priority. And Aria's locked door was a boundary he would respect.
Will guided Emily back to their hotel room, careful to keep his hands gentle and steady. The apartment-style suite smelled faintly of vanilla from the candles Emily insisted on lighting earlier, and he felt some measure of calm return as he closed the door behind them.
"Rest," he said softly, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "Take a nap. I'll be right here if you need me."
Emily didn't argue. She sank onto the bed, curling beneath the blankets as if the weight of the last few hours had pulled every ounce of energy from her.
Will lingered a moment, watching her chest rise and fall with steady breaths.
Even in sleep, she radiated the strength and courage that had made him fall in love with her in the first place.
Once she was settled, he pulled a chair up to the balcony, leaning on the railing and staring out at the Tennessee skyline. He felt a flicker of something, curiosity, restlessness, the itch of old instincts reawakening, and decided a walk and some fresh air would help him clear his head.
However, Emily needed her sleep, and he would not leave herside.
She slept for half an hour before she stirred.
He asked gently, "Do you want to go out for dinner?"
Emily shook her head, tugging her tablet toward her. "I have a video call with my mom. I really want to chat with her."
Will nodded, brushing a hand over his jaw, a small smile tugging at his lips. "Alright. I'll go grab something on my own then. Do you want me to bring you anything back with me?"
She shook her head no, already dialing her mom.
He left quietly, strolling down the streets of town, letting the familiar hum of the city calm him.
His steps carried him toward a small local bar.
At first, it seemed like any other nightspot, warm lights spilling onto the sidewalk, laughter drifting through the open doors.
But then he paused, something clicking in his chest.
He had been here before; he was certain of it. Without knowing why, he had gone straight for this particular bar, and now he realized this was a place he probably frequented when he was the old him.
And there she was.
Aria.
With her friend Lila, spinning and laughing with two men on the dance floor. The way her hair caught the light, the smile that seemed impossible yet completely hers, the effortless rhythm she moved with, every detail pulled at him, tugging memory strings he hadn't yet realized were intact.
His breath hitched. Every instinct, every flicker of remembered emotion, surged through him.
He glared at them, at the man dancing with his girl... his girl?
Shaking his head, he moved further into the bar, went to a table, flagging a waitress with a hand motion.
He came for a meal, and that is what he was going to focus on, but his eyes kept wandering back to the woman dancing like the world was not watching, and she couldn't care less if it was.
He slid into a chair near the back, trying to focus on the menu in front of him.
He kept reminding himself: he was here for dinner. That was all. Nothing more. But his mind betrayed him. Pieces of the past kept surfacing: the way she laughed in the diner, the tilt of her head when she listened, the quiet mornings on the porch, the lake at sunset.
He watched her twirl, spinning carelessly with Lila and the two men, and something inside him clenched with a mix of longing and recognition.
He remembered, vividly, how it felt to hold her hand, to brush her hair from her face, to tell her she was beautiful without ever having to lie because if there was a truth he could never deny, it was that Aria was gorgeous without even trying.
The memories brought a sharp pang, almost like a physical ache, and he gritted his teeth. He couldn't act on it. Emily was with him, and she was scared enough already. But the pull, the undeniable, magnetic pull of Aria was something he could not ignore.
He set his jaw and forced himself to take a sip of the soda the waitress had brought. He needed to eat and leave before he did something crazy like get up from the damn table, cross the room, and knock that handsy bastard touching Aria on his ass.
The past and present were colliding, and he had no choice but to step carefully through the storm that was Aria Callahan.
Aria needed the night out more than she realized, to shake the weight of everything from earlier.
Lila slipped an arm through hers, dragging her to the dance floor with a grin. "Let's show them you're still alive, girl."
Aria laughed lightly, letting herself get lost in the rhythm, trying to push away the images of Will or Chase and Emily from her mind. She felt the humid bar air on her skin, the music in her chest, and for a fleeting moment, she almost believed she could let go.
Then she sensed him.
She didn't know why, but something shifted in her chest, something familiar and impossible. He was here. And suddenly, she wanted him to see her. To see her living, breathing, existing without him, like he was without her.
A man stepped behind her, hands on her hips.
Instinctively, she stiffened. But she let herself be guided into the dance.
She smiled, laughed, and moved her body as if she were enjoying herself.
And in a way, she was... but only because she wanted to provoke him, to make him notice, to ignite a reaction.
Her frustration grew with every step. This was futile. Chase was gone. He didn't exist. Will was a stranger with a familiar face.
Just as she was about to let go, a whisper from Lila made her pause. "Looks like he wants to come over and beat the crap out of that guy."
Aria's gaze shot upward, and there he was. Eyes locking with hers across the room. Intense. Burning. Focused.
Her heart leapt. Every nerve, every memory fragment, screamed at her. He was moving toward her, purposeful, commanding, familiar in a way that no one else could ever be.
The man behind her tensed. "Hey, buddy, I was here first."
Will didn't flinch. His voice was calm, sharp, and final. "I'm here to dance with my wife."
Time slowed. Aria's breath caught. And just like that, the music faded into the background, leaving only him, only them, and the undeniable pull that had never truly disappeared.
The man behind her finally stepped away, muttering an awkward apology as he disappeared into the crowd. Will turned fully toward Aria, his hands still lingering near hers, and his voice lowered, earnest and rough.
"Aria... I'm sorry. About... the whole 'wife' comment." He took a breath, swallowing hard, his eyes locking on hers. "I needed to talk to you. That's why I asked for this dance."
Her brow furrowed, but she let him guide her gently to the center of the floor, moving with her but not touching her too closely.
Will's jaw clenched. "After... after opening that box in your bedroom... a lot of memories came back. Memories, feelings, and moments. And I didn't want to believe them because... I'm still Will. But I'm slowly... slowly feeling more like Chase again."
Aria stiffened, her heartbeat echoing in her ears.
He continued, almost pleading now. "I still love Emily... you know I do. But the love I had for you... It's coming back. And I need to know everything. I need you to tell me about us because I... I'm so confused, and it's tearing me apart."
Aria's chest constricted, and she forced a sarcastic laugh, bitter and sharp.
"Oh, well, lucky me. You're remembering some other life, having this other love, and you're... confused?
Imagine being the wife, Will. Imagine having everything ripped from you, having the world tell you to move on while you stayed faithful, physically, spiritually, and emotionally.
Imagine not touching another man. Not even looking.
And then suddenly, you're standing here in front of me, not recognizing me, married to someone else, doing all the things we swore we'd never do with anyone else. "
Her voice cracked, and tears spilled freely down her cheeks. "And while I stayed faithful to you... You didn't. You..."
The sobs choked her words. She shoved him away from her, spinning out of his grasp. The bar blurred around her, the music turning to white noise. She ran, heart hammering, lunging through the door into the cool night.
Will froze for a fraction of a heartbeat, then surged after her, instincts overriding hesitation. He wrapped his arms around her waist from behind, holding her tight against him, trying to ground her, to steady both of them.
"Aria," he murmured against her hair, his own voice shaking, caught somewhere between Will's logic and Chase's raw emotion. "I... please... just... breathe with me. Don't run from me."
She jerked against him, twisting to face him. "How can I not run? How can I not scream? You've been gone for five years, and now you're here... with someone else. You don't even remember... you..."
"I remember enough," he whispered. "Enough of you. Enough to know that I need you. I need to feel you, to hear you, even if it's hard, even if it hurts."
Her tears fell freely, staining his shirt as she buried her face against his chest. "Do you understand what it's been like for me? To be torn between grief and hope, to live every day thinking that maybe you would come back, and then..."
"I know," he said, his hands tightening around her, desperate. "I know. And I'm sorry. So damn sorry. I never meant to hurt you. I never... I just..."
He paused, the weight of both identities pressing down. "I don't know who I am yet. But I know this. I don't want to lose you. Not again."
Her sobs hit him like a physical blow, her body trembling against his. "I... I can't... I can't keep reliving this, Chase... Will... I don't even know what to call you."
"You can call me whatever you need," he whispered. "Just don't cut me out."
The night air wrapped around them, blending with the faint music leaking from the bar. He pressed his forehead against hers, feeling every heartbeat, every sharp intake of breath.
"I've missed you," he admitted quietly. "I've missed you even when I did not remember you.. Something was always wrong without you. And even if my mind was stolen from me, my heart... my heart remembered you."
She trembled, shaking her head against him. "Do you know what it's like to wait for someone to come back, to believe in a life you were promised, only to find that life has been replaced while you were faithful? Do you know what it's like to be me?"
"I'm learning," he whispered. "And I'll learn faster if you let me."
For a long moment, she didn't move. She shivered in his embrace, trying to hold onto the anger, the grief, the betrayal. But she also felt the pulse of him against her, the pull she had never truly been able to ignore.
She soon pulled away and turned to face him.
"So, what does this mean?"
He groaned, pressing his fingers to the bridge of his nose and tilting his head back, a familiar gesture he had always done when the weight of the world felt too heavy to bear.
It was such a Chase move, a small physical echo, and it grounded her even as her mind threatened to unravel.
"The problem," he said, voice low and ragged, "is that I am not two separate men.
And now, as all my memories crash together, overlapping, colliding, fusing, I am drowning in it.
Every memory, every feeling, every choice I ever made or did not get to make is hitting me at once, and honestly, it is driving me insane. "
Aria shook her head slowly, her hands slipping into the back pockets of her pants as she paced, a nervous rhythm of foot to foot, trying to absorb what he was saying without crumbling herself.
"I love Emily," he continued, voice thick, "she has been my rock through this.
But with these memories resurfacing, I feel it all again.
I feel the love I had for you, raw and fierce, like it never left.
And I feel the weight of betraying you by loving her, even though I did not ask to forget you.
And I feel like betraying her by remembering you.
Every piece of me is pulled in both directions, and I do not know how to reconcile it. "
He swallowed hard, a shudder catching in his chest. "I remember the thrill of hiking as Chase, the freedom and the sun and the wind, but as Will?
I hate it. Because, as Chase, I crossed a desert half dead, tortured, desperate to come home to you.
And as Will, I have become someone Chase never could have imagined, an engineer, methodical, disciplined, building things with my hands, with my mind, something I never would have thought possible as Chase.
And yet, both are me. Both are real. Both ache for pieces of my life that exist only in memory. "
He ran a hand through his hair, his eyes meeting hers, pleading for understanding. "I cannot turn one off, Aria. I cannot separate them. All I can do is try to hold onto both and hope that I do not destroy myself or anyone I love in the process of becoming the completed combination of both."
Will's hand moved to reach for her instinctively. She took a half-step forward, heart pounding, letting herself be drawn toward him, trusting even just a fraction of what had always been theirs.
His eyes softened for the briefest moment, but then a flicker of tension crossed his face. His jaw tightened, a hand pressed to his temple, and his body stiffened. Aria's eyes widened in alarm.
"Will?" she whispered, stepping closer.
He opened his mouth to speak, to reach out again, but instead his eyes rolled back. His knees buckled slightly, and he swayed dangerously.
"No!" Aria cried, her hands shooting out instinctively to catch him. But he collapsed before she could fully reach him.
Her chest heaved with terror as she clutched him to her, panic clawing through her. "Stay with me! Please, stay with me!" she screamed, voice breaking.
Everything narrowed to this single moment, to the weight of him in her arms, the strange blend of fear and familiarity, and the terrifying uncertainty of what had just happened.