Silas

I felt like an absolute tool, begging George to come back. We weren’t together anymore. He was my ex. He’d already bailed on work today and tomorrow to help me out. Did he really need to put up with my clingy, panicked ass?

But I didn’t know what else to do. He’d been gone all of ten minutes before I’d started to come unraveled, and though I’d tried to talk myself out of it, I’d eventually broken down and texted him.

He’d read my message. A couple of minutes later, he still hadn’t responded.

I told myself he wasn’t at my beck and call, and even when we were still together, sometimes it took either of us a little while to respond. Plus, he was probably driving. George was scrupulous about not texting while driving, though he would read messages at stoplights. So that was probably what he’d done this time, and once he’d actually stopped and killed the engine, he’d respond. How long that would be, I had no idea. I didn’t know where he lived these days, and for all I knew, he was heading off to God knew where to get laid or something.

I was such a mess. Jesus.

I’d been about to scroll through my contacts and reach out to someone else when George had replied.

George: Lia wants to another look at my arm. She’s worried it’ll get infected. So, I’m going to run by the clinic, then I’ll be on my way over.

I’d chuckled to myself.

Silas: She doesn’t think you can recognize the signs of an infection?

George: LOL, she trusts me to hide anything that might warrant a needle.

Silas: That sounds like you.

He’d responded with an eyeroll emoji. At that, my humor had dimmed a little; he’d usually send me a middle finger emoji or eat a dick, either of which would have me cackling.

But that wasn’t who we were anymore, was it? Somehow, in that missing year of my life, we’d stopped being who I swore we’d been just yesterday.

That niggled at me even more than some of the other missing pieces in my mind. It was like the truth was right there at the edge of my thoughts, staying just out of reach like an answer on an exam that I knew but had tucked away too far. It was frustrating, that certainty that it was there but I couldn’t get to it.

I needed to know, damn it. I needed to know something—anything—about the last year, whether it shed light on me and George or just filled in some of the gap between yesterday and today.

Scrolling through social media had been too overwhelming earlier, but it occurred to me that I’d started with my most recent posts. What if I skipped back to the time right before my memory went out? Maybe that would jostle something loose in my mind. If nothing else, it would catch me up on my own life, not to mention the world around me, starting in a familiar place and moving forward. Worth a try.

I settled on the couch and pulled up one of my social media apps. With a few taps, I’d gone back in time, and I found the last thing I remembered posting, which was a selfie of George and me in my car outside the airport.

BF acquired. Welcome home, baby!

The photo made my chest hurt. We looked so happy right then. George was obviously tired from traveling, but he was smiling, cheek pressed against mine as we’d leaned in between the driver and passenger seats of my car.

Where the hell had we gone wrong after that? What in the world could’ve happened?

I scrolled a little farther down, to the very next day, and—

My heart dropped through the floor.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME? 6 years together, and he fucking CHEATS ON ME?

I stared at the screen, not even breathing for long, painful seconds.

George… cheated on me?

Numbly, I scrolled the comments, where dozens of friends, relatives, and online acquaintances had posted messages of support and Fuck that asshole! And You deserve better, honey! My brother had threatened to come to town and kick George’s ass. Two of my coworkers had invited me out to get me drunk until I forgot all about George and found some fresh dick.

Deep in the thread, my sister asked when it happened and how I found out. Though I had no memory of reading her comment or replying, I swore I could feel how hollowed out and devastated I must’ve been as I’d written, He told me. Hooked up at his conference. I can’t believe this. I’m such a mess.

I could feel it in my own words, and I could sure imagine how I’d have felt right then, but I couldn’t remember feeling it. It was beyond unsettling how none of this actually unlocked my missing memories. I was reading my own words, watching my own emotions play out, and while it angered me and it hurt like hell, it wasn’t familiar. It was legitimately like I was finding all this out for the very first time. There was no, “Oh, right, I forgot about that,” or “Man, that pissed me off so bad back then!”

No, it was all completely new. As new as my unfamiliar bedroom and George’s absence had been this morning.

George’s absence.

The fact that we weren’t together anymore.

The fact that he’d fucking cheated on me.

I lowered my phone and sat back against the cushion, staring numbly at the wall.

“Did we break up?” I’d asked in his office just a few hours ago.

He’d stared at me, a mix of emotions on his face that didn’t fully make sense even now.

“We did, didn’t we?” I’d said. “Shit. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come here, and—”

“Silas.” He’d touched my arm. “Stay. I’ll… I want to help you figure this out.”

I’d stared at him, trying to make sense of… of… fuck, anything. Finally, I’d managed, “What happened to us?”

The silence that had hung between us had left me off-balance. He’d watched me for a long time, chewing the inside of his cheek as he apparently tried to figure out what to say. What eventually came out was, “We realized we weren’t right for each other. A few months ago.”

Here in my condo, rage boiled up in me so suddenly and fiercely that I almost threw my phone across the room as I shouted, “You motherfucker!”

That liar! That cheating asshole who could look me right in the eye and grab on to the chance to pretend that, no, he’d never cheated. We just hadn’t worked out. Things were amicable. We were good.

That he hadn’t ruined the best relationship I’d ever had.

Six years. Six. Goddamned. Years.

And he’d quite literally fucked it away.

I put my phone down, leaned my elbows on my knees, and pushed my hands into my hair. I wanted to throw up. I wanted to cry. I wanted to remember everything, so I didn’t have to think any more about what might’ve been, and I wanted to forget everything, so I didn’t even know it existed anymore.

How could he do this? Had he explained it back then? Or just dropped the bomb and walked away to let me live with the aftermath?

I wanted to believe he wouldn’t do that. But I’d believed for six years that he wouldn’t cheat, and here we fucking were.

I slid my hands from my hair to the back of my neck, squeezing my eyes shut as I tried to fit all this into my brain.

It was no exaggeration to call this morning traumatic. Waking up in a world that was all wrong with a missing year of my life—yeah, that fucked me up. It was terrifying and disorienting, especially when I still didn’t know if it was reversible.

But this? If waking up this morning had been the rug getting yanked out from under me, this was the floor collapsing.

How, George? Why?

And of course, right then, my phone vibrated.

George: Arm is fine. Heading your way. See you in 20.

It was so, so tempting to respond that he could go fuck himself. I didn’t want to see him. Not now. Not ever. Especially not after he’d lied to me and pretended he hadn’t done what I now knew he had. We hadn’t “broken up.” We hadn’t “figured out we weren’t right for each other.” He’d stuck his dick where it didn’t belong and ruined everything. Like hell did I want to see that asshole, never mind let him into my condo.

But no. No, I wasn’t letting him off the hook that easily. We were doing this face to goddamned face.

So, I sent back a thumbs-up emoji.

And then I waited.