“Babette,” I said, in a state of besotted admiration, “you are an absolute genius.”
seventeen
Here’s the thing: when they called the drugs they’d given Duncan “amnesia-inducing,” they weren’t kidding.
He didn’t remember anything.
I didn’t hear from him again after that night we spent together, even though I’d written my number on the post-surgical instructions and written “Call me if you need anything”—with “anything” underlined twice.
I did half-expect to hear from him again, if I’m honest.
Minus the whole surgery thing, it had been a very pleasant time.
I found myself thinking about him. Wondering how he was. Picking up my phone to call, but then deciding against it. Thinking about the moment when he’d said, “Even if I don’t remember, I’ll remember.”
What would he remember, if he didn’t remember?
It was the feeling you get after you’ve had a great date. A kind of rising, excited feeling of anticipation … like, even if the moment itself was over, the connection still lingered.
One part of trying to control epilepsy for me was trying to keep my emotions in check. Like, I tried to avoid the extremes when I could. Which is one of the many reasons I didn’t spend a lot of time in the dating pool. Dating was hard. Dating was tense. For all the bliss people felt about love and romance, it was stressful, too. And potentially destabilizing.
I didn’t want to be destabilized. Any more than I already had been.
I was all about being the opposite, in fact.
So as I walked over to school that first morning after break, I had a wild sense of uncertainty. What would it be like to see Duncan again after all that? Would he be friendly with me? Flirty? And if he felt drawn to me like I did to him, what then? What on earth was going to happen next?
I had no idea.
But I felt almost hungry to see him. My last two encounters with him had been so very Old Duncan, I’d almost forgotten what New Duncan was like.
Until I saw him there.
He was in the courtyard, as the kids arrived, standing at attention in that gray suit, like nothing had ever happened. Hair swooped up and back. Navy tie knotted tight.
New Duncan, for sure. There he was.
Because when I walked over to him with a slightly goofy smile, the way you do with people you feel close to, people you’ve kissed, for example, or people whose pants you have removed, for Pete’s sake—he blinked at me like I was a total stranger.
“Hey,” I said, settling in pretty close next to him.
I could be wrong, but I thought I felt him edge away. “Hello.”
Just days before, I’d had my hands on his shirtless torso. I’d stroked my palms up and down over the velvet of his hair. I’d let myself melt under the weight of those arms. I’d slept beside him in his bed.
Not to mention: the kissing.
Today, that suit might as well have been made of metal.
He didn’t meet my eyes. “Thank you for the ride home the other day.”
“Oh!” I said. “You’re welcome! For a second, I thought you didn’t remember.”
“I don’t remember,” he said, all just-the-facts-ma’am. “But I know you agreed to come. And I woke up at my house. So, I figure you must have gotten me there somehow.”
“Oh,” I said, deflated. “You don’t remember anything?”
He shook his head. “I remember that I asked you to drive me home. And that you agreed to do it. But I don’t remember it happening.”
Oh.
It gave me a tree-falls-in-the-forest feeling. If a guy kisses you on painkillers, and the next day he doesn’t remember, did it really happen? Or, just as important: If a guy confesses having a thing for you but then, the next time you see him, he looks for all the world like he couldn’t care less … how can you possibly know what to believe?
Honestly, based on his expression, I’d have sworn he was utterly indifferent to me.
Indifferent—with maybe a touch of nausea.
What would he remember if he didn’t remember?
Nothing. Nothing at all.
“How are you?” I asked then. “Any trouble with the—?” I touched my palm to my side.
“No. All fine. Just some bruising.” He could have been talking to his doctor.
“You fell over a couple of times,” I said, watching to see if it sparked anything. “Once when you were trying to get undressed.”