Before & After (5 page)

Chapter 8
:
After

Easy doesn't make the lonely

easier
to bear,
and less

Suffocating.

It simply is.

I've tried them both.

And I would rather,

Fight and laugh and puzzle

Through the riddles,

And all the
not
easy.

If it means being with you.

(
Rike’s
poems to Peyton)

I’m
leaving the hospital.

That’s
what they keep telling me. That I’m leaving, and I’ll be going—where?

Rike
keeps trying to come back, and I keep refusing to see him. He’s not offering me
anything and he’s holding all the cards. The fucking bastard is holding my
memory hostage.
It’s
psychological warfare and I don’t
care how he might make me smile, how sweetly he treats me—nothing can excuse
that. It’s indefensible.

But
there’s nothing more that the hospital can do for me. I have money—plenty,
according to the ATM I use with the debit cards I find in the purse the EMTs
brought in with me. So I make a plan.

And
when my doctor discharges me, two weeks after I wake up with no memories and a
shattered leg, I wheel myself out of the hospital. Alone. I think, very briefly,
about going to see Lindsay before I leave, but the truth is I’m not sure what
the point would be. She’s got her own set of problems, recovering from the
internal organ damage and the broken bones. They’ve moved her from ICU, but no
one is even starting to talk about her going home. It’s completely quiet on
that front, and I’ve asked.

I
think something is going on with her that no one wants to let me in on. Because
I’m so fucking fragile. I huff a breath at the thought.

I
hate
being weak.

It
takes the better part of two hours to get myself to a hotel, and settled in.
It’s not terribly nice. As much as I have in my bank account, eventually it’ll
dry up, and I’m pretty sure that whatever job I might have had is long gone. So
this little nest egg will have to last until I can find a new one or remember
who the hell I am.

The
hotel doesn't have a bellhop, but there
is
 
a
big black man from maintenance
sitting behind the counter, and he offers to help me carry my stuff up to my
room. There isn't much—three bags from the hospital with meds and clothes, a
bloody purse that came in from the accident, and the stuff that Rike brought to
me. Which I should get rid of. I've tried to, a few times. I almost left the
bag of his gifts on the bed when I left, but at the last second, I chickened
out. I'm furious and I don't think I'll ever forgive him, but I also can't seem
to bring myself to break ties completely.

I'm
clearly an idiot.

"You
shouldn't be here alone, ma'am," the guy rumbles at me as we take the
elevator up to the third floor. I glance at him, and he's staring at his feet.
The man is a giant, but he's got a shy gentleness about him that sets me at
ease.

"Why?"

"Dangerous.
And you're a lady," he adds, flushing a darker shade of brown.

I
glance away to hide my smile, and shrug. "Beggars and choosers. You know
the drill," I say.

“What
happened?” he asks, nudging the wheelchair.

“Car
accident. It left me a scrambled memory—I’m trying to put the pieces back
together.”

He
frowns thoughtfully but doesn't say anything else as he pushes my wheelchair
off the elevator when the doors slide open. I sit quiet while he opens the door
to my room and wheels me in, laying my bags across the bed. Without giving me a
chance to say anything, he crosses to the desk and scribbles on the pad of
paper there. Taps it with his pen while giving me a serious look.

"I'm
Tommy. I work here to fill my time—since my wife died, I don’t like being home
alone. You need anything at all—food or a ride to the store or help downstairs.
You call me. I'm here every day but Sunday." He says sternly. I nod
quietly and his gaze, so very fierce, gentles into the concern that looks like
what I imagine my father would look like, if he could be bothered to care.
"You should not be here, alone. I will help, if you'll let me."

"Thank
you," I whisper, and he grins. Bobs his head at me and ducks out the door.
I let out a breath and stare around the little room.

A
TV. Two beds. Three bags. A view of a city I've never been to, and that I live
in.

A
cell phone that has been silenced, blinking with unread messages.

It's
not much to build a life on. Not nearly enough.

I
shove that thought aside and work on getting out of the wheelchair, and on to
the bed.

I
don't know who I am. Rike holds the keys to everything, but he's not giving
them up and I'm not going to wait for him to tell me. So it's time to research.

***

I'm
lost in Facebook when I hear a tap on the door. My head jerks up and then,
muffled, I hear Tommy calling to me. "Ma'am?"

Relief
sags my shoulders. "Hang on," I yell. It takes a few minutes, but I
make it to the door and pull it open.

Tommy
is standing there with a bag of food and a hopeful look. “You hungry?

I
tilt my head. “Tommy you don’t have to take care of me. I’m ok.”

He
hesitates, some of the light in his going out. “Sorry. I—you remind me of my
wife. She was stubborn and brave. I didn’t mean to be pushy.”

“How
long ago did she pass away?” I ask, softly.

Grief
flickers in his eyes, “Four years ago. They said it’ll get easier, but it
doesn’t. It just gets familiar.”

"Peyton.
My name is Peyton," I say. "And I am hungry. I was working." He
glances over the bed, at the little notepad that I've scribbled on and ripped
apart, the notebook that's spread out with names and lines crisscrossing like a
fucked up map.

"Well,
eat something. And try to get some sleep tonight," he says.

I
nod and take the bag. "Thank you."

"Need
me
to bring you anything in the morning?"

I
shake my head and he wilts but doesn't push. Just gives me a quick smile before
he ducks out. "Lock up behind me," he advises and then he's gone.

I
do.

It
begins a routine that quickly becomes comfortable. He comes by in the morning with
breakfast and whatever random thing he thinks I need. And in the evening, when
his shift is ending, he comes by again with dinner. Sometimes he stays and we
talk about the hotel and what he did during the day. He learns quickly that I
don’t like questions and stops asking after a few days. But he’s a constant
presence, with stories about his wife, and the forty years they spent together
before cancer ripped apart their happy life.

It
still bugs me when I call him for the first time.

“Tommy?
It’s Peyton, in 337.” I hesitate and he laughs.

“I
only know the one Peyton,” he teases. “Now what do you need?”

“Do
you think you could help me downstairs? I have appointments at the hospital all
day—”

“I’ll
be right down. Get your stuff together.”

He
hangs up before I get the “thank you” out of my mouth and I let out a little
sigh.

When
Tommy knocks on the door five minutes later, I’m ready and vaguely nervous.
I’ve got more information about the retrograde amnesia, and about myself.

But
knowing that I’m the daughter of a politician from Tennessee, that I hate my
family and spent a good chunk of my high school years in and out of rehab—none
of that tells me why I’m living in Austin or who the hell Rike is to me.

And
it should have come back by now. That’s the part that bothers me the most. That
my memory is still gone.

“You’re
quiet today, Peyton,” Tommy observes.

“Do
you think, that if a person doesn’t remember where they came from, they’re
still bound by the decisions that they made before?” Tommy throws me a startled
look and I wave a hand dismissively. “Never mind.”

“Is
that what’s wrong? That you can’t remember?”

We’ve
talked, briefly and vaguely, about my accident. He knows something is wrong,
and sometimes, when he’s talking about a movie he’s watched recently, I stare
at him with a blankness that is frightening.

I
stare at the city we’re driving through. I feel a strange longing for it, even
as I find it too big and too foreign. It’s not Nashville. Not Sweet Water. I
miss my quiet, backwater little town in the middle of nowhere Tennessee.

“Yes,”
I whisper.

“Peyton,
no one gets to decide who you are but you. Even if you had your memories.”

I
think of Rike, and how easy it is to be with him. How present he is, even when
we were both lost in our own worlds.

How
fucking happy I was.

I’m
so tired of thinking about him, of being pulled into feelings I don’t know what
to do with, and that stupid fucking feeling of loss.

I
can’t mourn losing someone I never had. And maybe, before was different. But
Rike was never mine. Not
the me
I am today.

I
let the thought roll around my head as Tommy pulls into the visitor bay at St.
David’s. There’s a line of cars waiting and I sit quietly, waiting as he inches
forward until he finally puts the truck in park and hops out, tugging my
wheelchair down before he helps me out and helps me into it, stepping back and
letting me situate myself. When I nod at him, he grabs my black purse—a new
purse, one he brought to me on the third morning at the hotel—and wheels me to
the sidewalk. “I’m going to park, and I’ll take you in,” he says.

“Tommy,
you don’t have to do that,” I say, but he’s already jogged away, sliding into
the truck and pulling away to park. He’s going to be in trouble if he stays
with me. They’ll miss him at the hotel.

“Peyton.”

I
jerk and look around. The voice is vaguely familiar, and it clicks suddenly
when I see Scott. He’s walking toward me, smoking.

He
looks like shit, exhaustion clear on his face even under the oversized
sunglasses and ball cap. He’s hunched forward, almost hiding. “God, where the
fuck have you been?” he breathes, leaning down and hugging me.

I’m
stiff in his arms, and he seems to realize it, because he pulls back and stares
at me.

“Holy
fuck. You don’t know, do you? You still don’t know who we are.”

“Feel
free to clue me in,” I snap.

He
takes off his ball cap and ruffles his hair, a scowl lining his forehead. “I’m
going to fucking kick his ass.” Scott crouches. “This wasn’t the deal. We wouldn’t
have agreed if we knew it was going to take this long for him to come clean
about shit. I’ll talk to him.”

“Don’t,”
I say, and his face goes pale. “I don’t know who or what I was to you or
Lindsay. I don’t know what Rike is playing at. And I don’t fucking care.”

“Peyton,
you don’t mean that,” he protests.

“I
do. I’m not that girl. I don’t even fucking remember that girl. So if he wants
to play god with someone’s life and memories, he’ll have to find someone else
because I’m done.”

“What
are you going to do?”

It’s
a good question. I refuse to go to my parents. That bridge isn’t quite burned,
but I’d set fire to it before I crossed it.

“It’s
not your concern,” I say.

“You’re
my girlfriend’s best friend, and you’re
Rike’s
—” He
stops, and I lean forward.

“I’m
what? What the hell am I to him?”

He
shrugs. “You’re his. You think you can walk away, and he might even let you,
for a time. Because he’s a dumbass. But it won’t stick, Peyton. Rike doesn’t
know how to be without you.”

I
smile, so cold it hurts even me. “He’ll have to fucking figure it out.”

“Peyton?”

Scott
tenses, and his gaze darts to Tommy. Back to me, questioning.

“
Pey
, is he bothering you?” Tommy asks. He sounds cold.
Threatening, for the first time since I’ve met him, and Scott straightens
slowly.

“Dude,
she’s practically family,” he says. As if it were true, and an excuse. It’s
neither.

“We’re
going to be late,” I say and Tommy’s pushing me forward.

“You’re
really just going to leave. Let this random dude into your life, and ignore
your family? Is that it?”

“My
family?” I bark. “Are you fucking insane? Because keeping shit like
who I am
isn’t what family does. Fuck
you, Scott.”

Tommy
pushes me forward, another two steps.