Sandra stared at me like I lost it. “Well firstly, it’s definitely not him. I have dibs.”
I almost choked on the sip I had just taken. “What?”
“I’m serious. And secondly, what you’re missing are your memories not ‘the one’. You were just ten at the time—”
“Eleven,” I corrected automatically.
“Well, even if you were eleven, no one and I mean no one finds ‘the one’ when they’re eleven,” she finished aggressively.
“Calm down, Sandra,” I said. “I was just playing around.”
She looked at me seriously. “No, you weren’t. You’ve been this way ever since I met you in high school. Losing such a chunk of your memories is a massive deal, and it’s bound to always leave you feeling like something’s missing because you don’t have the whole story. I understand that, but you can’t let it hold you back from the present.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re incredibly guarded, Willow. It’s near impossible for you to trust anyone or anything, especially men, as though you’re afraid that if you live a little, something terrible will happen. It’s like you’re tip-toeing around as if you’re scared you’ll fall into some hole that you weren’t aware of.”
“People do fall in holes,” I mumbled.
Her voice softened. “‘Stop that, babe. Those years, although important, shouldn’t be more important than your present and the memories that you can make with it. You’re here and you’re alive, and I want you to start acting like it. For instance, tonight, you’re going to kiss someone. And I’m going to make sure of it.”
I jerked back in horror. “No way!”
“Yes, way,” she said firmly. “And if he’s hot enough I’m going to make him take you somewhere and screw your brains out. It’s Valentine’s Day, and you’re twenty-three years old and as uptight as a nun in a brothel. What you need is to start making some new stories and a good drill in one of the toilets of this bar is a good place to start.”
I was astounded. Quietly, I took my drink and moved away from her to the next stool. “You’re insane,” I told her.
She burst out laughing.
Someone soon came up to her for a little chat, and soon they were lost in each other’s mouths. I rejected the few advances that came for me and was content to just relax alone with my thoughts. My chest began to warm up as a very familiar memory came to mind.
The memory of a kiss being pressed against my forehead … and then my cheeks. Maybe even softly on my lips. Of strong warm arms, completely embracing me. Feeling so safe. Nothing could ever hurt me while I was in those arms.
For the longest time, I’d assumed that it was my father’s arms before he had been snatched away, but in my memory, my heart was always pounding so hard it felt like I would pass out. That couldn’t have been because of a hug I’d received from a parent. It had always made me wonder. For years and years, I had chased the memory, but it had always remained so near, but just outside my grasp. Until finally, I had given up. It was alive in that dark blank space inside my head that I could never access no matter how much I tried.
Sandra decided to go home with the man, and the other two girls had somehow disappeared too, so I took a taxi home. It was a relief to fall into my own bed … and dream of Caleb Wolfe.
8
Caleb
The flowers arrived just after the clock struck noon. I stared at the blood red flower for the longest time. She had twined it with some other red flowers and the effect was quite spectacular. I felt oddly proud of her. She had made something of herself. In spite of it all, she had made it. It made every long second I spent in prison worth it. I hadn’t wasted my life there if this was what she had achieved.
I reached out and touched a soft petal. I let my finger gently stroke it. She had touched this. I bent my head and breathed deeply, but only the faint smell of the flowers and the plastic wrapping it had come in filled my nostrils.
God, how I wanted her. I longed to rush over to her shop and blurt everything out. Tell her what we were to each other. Tell her about the promise we had made, take her in my arms and kiss her until she remembered me again, but I filled my lungs with a deep breath instead.
Patience, Caleb. Patience. You have waited this long. You can wait a little longer.
I turned away from the flowers and went back to my computer screens. Work had been the only thing that could take my mind away from her. It had been much harder in prison to run my stock brokerage business without the latest software or even these real-time screens, but I had found a way. It was instinctive with me. I was good at this. As soon as Frank the fraudster taught me something, I instinctively knew exactly how to implement it. Now, with the help of the latest AI software and screens, trading had become a doddle. I almost couldn’t believe how easy it was.