17. Nash
NASH
The subway ride home feels longer than usual, the weight of the day settling into my bones like sediment.
I check my phone for the third time in ten minutes—still no missed calls from Mom.
I've been trying to reach her practically since I found Eve, leaving voicemails that probably sound more urgent than I intended.
The Marcus Chen situation sits in my stomach like a stone, but not for the reasons it should.
I don't feel guilt about letting him slip away—that part of my conscience went quiet years ago.
What bothers me is how easily it still comes, the clinical detachment, the measured delays.
Sometimes I wonder if the line between saving lives and taking them has blurred so completely that I can't see it anymore.
My phone buzzes just as the train pulls into my station. Mom's name flashes across the screen, and I answer before the second ring.
"Hey, Ma."
"There's my son." Her voice carries that familiar mix of exhaustion and warmth that comes from twelve-hour shifts at the hospital. "Sorry I missed your calls, honey. I've had a rough few shifts and it's just been a struggle for me."
"It's fine." I push through the turnstile and head up the stairs toward street level. "I know how it is."
"You sounded worried in your messages. Everything okay?"
The December air hits my face like a slap, sharp and clean after the stale underground atmosphere. I pull my jacket tighter and start the familiar walk toward my building. "You're not going to believe this, but I responded to a call couple of days ago. Pedestrian versus vehicle."
"Yeah? Bad one?"
"It was Eve Turner."
Silence stretches across the line long enough that I check to make sure the call didn't drop. When Mom finally speaks, her voice has shifted into that careful nurse tone she uses when she's processing unexpected information.
"Eve Turner? Our Eve? From Wintervale?"
"The same one." I sidestep a puddle of slush outside a bodega, the neon signs casting fractured light across the wet pavement. "Broken ribs, head injury, mild concussion. She's stable now, but..."
"But what, Nash?"
I pause at a crosswalk, watching the stream of late commuters hurry past with their heads down, lost in their own worlds.
How do I explain this without sounding like I've completely lost my mind?
That I've essentially kidnapped a woman with amnesia because some twisted part of me sees this as an opportunity?
That I don't trust anyone else to take care of her like I will.
"She has retrograde amnesia. Can't remember much at all. She didn't recognize me at all."
"Jesus." Mom's intake of breath is sharp. "That's... that's serious, Nash. Is she getting proper neurological care? Sometimes with head injuries?—"
"She's been cleared by the attending neurologist. Her memories should come back gradually, but they want her to rest and not force it.
" I turn onto my street, the familiar buildings stretching out in neat rows under the amber streetlights.
"The thing is, no one's come looking for her. No family, no friends. Nothing."
"That's strange. You'd think someone would notice if she went missing."
"That's what I thought too." I stop in front of my building, keys already in hand. "I was hoping you might know what she's been up to lately. Whether she's been in touch with anyone back home. Obviously, she isn't sure."
Another pause, and I can almost hear Mom thinking, sorting through years of small-town gossip and half-remembered conversations.
In a place like Wintervale, information travels in carefully curated channels—church ladies, grocery store encounters, the occasional funeral or wedding that brings everyone together.
"Honestly, honey, I don't know much. Her parents don't talk about her the way they used to.
" There's something careful in Mom's voice, like she's choosing her words deliberately.
"I heard she got engaged, though. Maybe two years ago?
Sandra Mitchell mentioned it at the grocery store, said Eve's mother was over the moon about it. "
The words still make my hands fist even though I was pretty sure I knew that. "Engaged?"
"That's what I heard. Some lawyer from Boston, I think? Or maybe New York. Somewhere big and important, anyway." Mom pauses. "Why? She wasn't wearing a ring when you found her?"
I think about Eve's hands—delicate fingers, short nails, no jewelry except for small gold earrings that somehow survived whatever happened to her. "No ring. No wallet either, though. Could have been lost in whatever happened."
"Hmm." Mom's voice carries that particular skepticism that comes from thirty years of nursing, thirty years of seeing the gaps between what people say and what actually happens.
"You know, now that I think about it, Eve's been pretty distant the last couple of years.
Her mother used to brag about her all the time—her job, her apartment, her social life. But lately... not so much."
I climb the steps to my building, each footfall echoing in the narrow stairwell. The hallway smells like cooking onions and old carpet, familiar in the way that home always is, even when it's not really home.
"Distant how?"
"Just... not coming back to visit as much.
Missing holidays, that sort of thing. Her parents hate it, from what I've heard.
They think she's gotten too big for her britches, moving to the city and all.
" There's a note of defensiveness in Mom's voice that surprises me.
"Personally, I think they should be proud she made something of herself.
Not everyone can stay in Wintervale forever. "
Like I couldn't. Like I tried to escape and ended up somewhere arguably worse, morally speaking. I was wrong about so many things that I thought when I was younger.
"So if she's been distant from her family..." I pause outside my apartment door, wanting to finish this conversation in private.
"Then maybe no one would know if something happened to her," Mom finishes my thought. "Especially if she wasn't talking to them regularly. And if this fiancé is traveling for work or something..."
"Right." I lean against the wall, my jaw working.
The conversation is heading exactly where I hoped it would—toward justification for keeping Eve's situation quiet a little longer.
Not just because I'm looking out for her best interests, though I tell myself that's part of it.
Because I want time with her that doesn't come with the weight of our history pressing down on everything we say.
I don't want to lose her again.
"Nash, honey, are you sure she's okay? I mean, really okay? Head injuries can be tricky, and if she's alone..."
"She's not alone." The words come out faster than I intended, carrying more emotion than I meant to reveal. I clear my throat and try again. "I mean, I'm making sure she's looked after. She's staying in my spare room until her memory comes back and she can figure out next steps."
Silence again, longer this time. When Mom speaks, her voice is very careful. "Is that... appropriate? Given your history with her?"
My history with Eve. Like it's something that can be summarized in a neat phrase, filed away under "childhood complications" or "unresolved feelings.
" Like it doesn't include thousands of memories engraved in my mind, the sound of her saying my name in the dark, the way she looked at me with pure hatred after she found out about Morgan answering my door in New York.
My mom knows most of it, of course. How Eve couldn't stand me. How I stared after her too often. She picked up on it. She never knew I gave Eve my virginity, though. That things went as far as they did.
"It's complicated," I say finally. "She doesn't remember any of that. To her, I'm just someone who grew up in the same town. Someone who happened to be there when she needed help."
"And you think that's... better somehow?"
The question hits closer to home than I want to admit. Is it better? Is this twisted do-over actually an improvement on the truth? Or am I just a fucked-up enough person to see amnesia as an opportunity rather than a tragedy?
"I think she needs someone," I say carefully. "Whatever happened between us when we were kids... maybe that doesn't have to define everything."
"Nash." Mom's voice carries that particular tone she used when I was sixteen and trying to convince her I hadn't been drinking at the quarry. "What exactly are you thinking here?"
I move to the landing and look out at the street below.
A couple walks past, bundled in matching winter coats, their breath visible in the cold air.
They're holding hands, leaning into each other against the wind.
It looks easy, uncomplicated. Like love without history, without the weight of old wounds and half-forgotten cruelties.
"I'm thinking that she needs someone who knows her, and I do, Ma. And…maybe I can be the person she deserves this time," I say quietly. "Instead of the person I was."
Fuck the fact that she's got a fiance. That asshole isn't even calling hospitals looking for her. I'd stop at nothing if I thought something was wrong.
The person who pulled her pigtails and called her names because I was eight years old and didn't know how else to get her attention.
The person who kissed her at fifteen and then walked away because I was too much of a coward to deal with how much I wanted her.
The person who made love to her at nineteen and then watched her run away because I couldn't find the words to make her stay.
The person who let her walk away when she came to New York because I thought she deserved better than someone like me.
"Oh, honey." There's something in Mom's voice—sadness, maybe, or recognition. "Are you sure this is about what she needs? Or is it about what you want?"