Chapter 20
SADIE
“Do you remember anything about your accident?” Dr. Hatchet, a psychotherapist at the hospital, stares back at me with a pleasant smile. How she’s pulled her chair around the desk, close to mine, is supposed to ease my anxiety. But with a title that includes the word psycho, it’s not helping much.
I can’t remember anything of the last three and a half years, so why would I remember the accident? And by the way, I hate how everyone calls it an accident. It was a crash. I crashed into a tree, going twenty-five miles per hour. And I used to think I was a good skier—so good I didn’t wear a helmet.
Dr. Hatchet’s question is stupid, but I humor her anyway. “No, I only know what people have told me.”
She smiles warmly, using it as a choreographed pause before asking her next question. “And do you have any recollection of being in a coma?”
“No.” What is she looking for? A near-death experience she can write about in her medical journal? If that’s the case, she’ll be disappointed. There’s no recollection of a pillar of light.
“Are there any memories from the last few years that have popped into your mind?”
I shake my head as my answer.
“Nothing about your husband or your life in Chicago?”
“Nope.”
“The brain is such an unknown organ, and each traumatic brain injury is different. It’s hard to project how your recovery will go. This memory fog might last a few days or months, or it may always be like this. We just don’t know.” Dr. Hatchet smiles, even though nothing is reassuring about her words. “How does knowing that your memory may never come back make you feel?”
My eyes peek up at the clock behind her. We’ve already been talking for forty-five minutes. How much longer is this going to go on? I try to give her a thoughtful answer—because I forgot my memories, not my manners—and because Dr. Basu won’t release me from the hospital tomorrow until I’m cleared by a therapist as well.
How do I feel about my memory never coming back?
“It’s okay, I guess. It means losing almost four years off of my life, but I have to move forward as best as I can.” I smile, showing stability in hopes that I’ll pass this test with flying colors and be released.
Dr. Hatchet sits back, narrowing her eyes. “While I appreciate your positivity in a horrible situation, I’m not sure your answer is truthful.”
I scratch my ear then fidget with the lobe, tugging it down nervously. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You woke up from a coma, and everything is different. You live in a different city than you expected, you have a different job, and the biggest change is that you’re married to a man you don’t know. You have to have some feelings about that.”
“Anger,” I finally say.
She nods, encouraging me along. “Who are you angry with?”
I fold my arms, glancing away. I’ve never been great at expressing myself and telling people how I feel. Not even Stetson got the full scope of how I really felt. The vulnerability leaves your heart wide open for someone to pierce. I’d rather keep it hidden and protected, but staying silent now might not help me get discharged.
“It’s okay to feel anger,” she reassures.
“I’m angry at myself.”
“Why?”
I clasp my fingers together in my lap as if it will help keep my emotions in check. “I don’t like the choices I made or the life I was living.”
“What don’t you like about it?”
“For starters, I abandoned my family. I hurt the people I loved.” Stetson’s face runs through my mind. “None of this is what I wanted. I had a plan, and I’m angry with myself for deviating so far from that plan.”
“How do you know that the deviations were bad? Maybe those choices were the best ones you could’ve made at the time and made you the happiest.”
“I know myself, and I know they weren’t. I probably wasn’t even happy the last three and a half years. That could explain why I blocked it all out.”
“Why are you assuming the worst about yourself?”
My brows drop as my defenses rise. “What do you mean?”
“Why are you assuming that you’d willingly choose a life that made you miserable?”
I glance down at my fingers, not liking how her words resonate.
“What if, instead, you choose to believe that the life you created for yourself, while not the one you pictured, ended up being more beautiful than anything you could’ve planned?”
Tears funnel into my eyes, and I wipe at them before they can trickle down my cheeks.
“Give the Sadie you don’t remember the benefit of the doubt. Trust that she made the right decisions based on the information she had at the time. And then forgive her if she didn’t.”
Powerful words.
But easier said than done.
I walk back to my room after my session with Dr. Hatchet, feeling emotionally drained. The mental side of this has been far more taxing than the physical. Each step toward recovery is difficult and laboring. It’s like I have fifty miles to go, but the pathway is through thick mud and sludge, causing me to get stuck with each stride forward.
When I get to my room, my cell phone ringing steals my attention. I freeze, fearing who might be calling me, but my curiosity kicks in, and I lunge for the device, reading the name across the screen.
Edward Cullen—a nickname given to Autumn in seventh grade when we were both obsessed with Twilight .
I gasp, scrambling to answer.
“Autumn?” my voice cracks as I curl into a ball on my bed.
“Sades? I didn’t think I would get to talk to you.”
I immediately start crying, overcome with raw emotion. “Autumn!”
“Don’t cry. Don’t cry.”
But I can hear in her voice that she’s crying too.
Autumn Cassidy has been with me since kindergarten. She’s my ride-or-die. Even a cross-country move so she could attend UCLA couldn’t separate us. I remember being tight all the way up to losing my memory and hope I haven’t pushed her away the last three years like I did with everybody else in my life.
Thirty seconds of unintelligible conversation go by as we try to calm ourselves.
Autumn is the first to be successful. “I was honestly just calling to get an update from Nash. He’s been filling me in the past month.”
“Wait.” I wipe my tears on the bed sheets as I sit up. “You know Nash?”
“Of course I know Nash. I was there when you married him.”
“But I thought I eloped.”
“If you call a private wedding in Moorea, Tahiti eloping.”
I’ve always dreamed about going to Moorea. I can’t believe I actually made it happen and got married there. It’s the first thing I’ve heard from the last three years that I actually like.
“So you were the only one at the wedding?”
“No, Lindy was there too.”
“I don’t know who Lindy is.” My head drops into my hands. “Autumn, I can’t remember anything after college graduation. I don’t remember moving to Chicago, falling in love with Nash, or breaking up with Stetson. It doesn’t feel like my life. Just some story about someone else that people keep telling me.”
“I know.” Her voice is solemn. “It’s terrible, Sades.”
“I just assumed I pushed you away too. Did I? Please tell me we’re still friends.”
“We’re still close. I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you woke up. I flew in right after the accident but had to go back to California for work. I work at SeaWorld.”
“What!” My hand flies to my heart. “That’s been your dream job since forever!”
“I know! You freaked out last year when it happened, but it’s kind of fun celebrating it with you again. And”—she squeals a little—“Silas proposed to me over Thanksgiving!”
My mouth drops open. “I don’t know who Silas is, but?—”
“You do, and you love him!”
“So I approve?”
“Wholeheartedly.”
“Then, congratulations!” Tears fill my eyes again. “I’m so happy for you.”
“You’ll meet Silas sometime.”
“I can’t wait.”
“Now, this phone call is not about me. How are you holding up?”
“I think I’m still in shock just trying to process everything.”
“I heard your family is there. How has that been?”
Why wouldn’t they be here? I’m their daughter.
I shake the thought away and just keep talking. “It’s been nice to have people around me I actually remember, but they keep saying I never went home to visit them the last few years. Why did I do that?”
“There’s been some friction between you guys.”
“Over what?”
“I don’t want to get in the middle of it, but I know for sure they aren’t the biggest fans of Nash.”
“I’m not either,” I grumble.
“Seriously?”
“He’s a complete stranger.”
“No, no, no. Nash is the absolute best. When it comes to incredible husbands, he’s the poster child.”
“So I take it you like him?”
“Oh, I’m so on the Nash train I’m driving it, or conducting, or whatever they say about trains. He adores you, and honestly, you adore him.”
“I don’t know.” I rub my temple where my head hurts. “It just feels wrong. Stetson’s the guy I adore.” Autumn is the one person I can be honest with about this. “My heart still loves him. How does that happen if I’ve been with another man for the last three years?”
“Sheesh.” Autumn blows out a heavy breath. “I don’t know how that happens—complicated stuff. It’s like the wires between your head and your heart got crossed up.”
“You’re telling me.”
“Have you talked to Nash about it? Told him how you feel about Stetson?”
“No! I’ve barely talked to him at all.”
“Why not? He’s the sweetest.”
“Because it’s awkward. He’s like a random guy you see on the street.”
“And he’s seen you naked.”
I smile at Autumn’s joke. “If that isn’t awkward, I don’t know what is.”
“You once told me Nash Carter was the best thing that has ever happened to you, and I saw the proof of it. Don’t you owe it to yourself to discover why you believed that?”
I rest my head in my hand and close my eyes, avoiding her question.
“Will you talk to him? Please? For me.”
I suck in some air. “I’ll try.”
“What’s the worst thing that could happen? You end up falling in love with him all over again?”
Exactly.
“Let’s talk about something other than my screwed-up life, okay?” I pop my head up, infusing my voice with cheeriness. “Tell me all about Silas.”
“Are you sure?”
“One thousand percent. Give me all the details since I don’t know them anymore.”
I lie back against my pillows and listen as Autumn starts from the beginning of their relationship. It’s much easier to hear about her love life than mine.
For a few seconds, I feel normal again.
When the call ends, I look down at my phone in my hands and the lit-up screen full of apps.
Instagram’s icon taunts me, and I click on it against my better judgment. Instead of scrolling through the feed, I go to my page. I see myself in the different pictures—arms around Nash, kissing him on the cheek, smiling as he hugs me—and although I know it’s me, it feels like I’m looking at someone else. Like I’m looking at a lie.
I return to the home page, my fingers hovering over the search button as I wrestle with morality. The devil gets the best of me, and I type Stetson’s Instagram handle in and watch as pictures of him fill my screen. He looks the same, maybe even better looking than my mind remembers. He doesn’t post often, but it’s enough to give me a complete picture of his life. He didn’t stray from his life plan. He graduated from law school. Became a partner at his dad’s law firm. Spends weekends boating on Skaneateles Lake. Does a lot of outdoor recreation. The only thing that didn’t end up how it was supposed to is me, and if Instagram can be trusted, Stetson is still single.
The hope that piece of information gives is scary.