Chapter 2: The Memory I Lost
The first thing I noticed was that the handwriting in the notebook looked like mine.
The second thing I noticed was that I was afraid of it.
I stood outside the hotel entrance, holding a piece of my own past that I couldn’t remember creating.
The rain had stopped, but the world still felt blurred.
Cars passed on the street.
People walked by carrying umbrellas.
The city continued moving as if my entire reality hadn’t just cracked open.
Adrian watched me carefully.
He didn’t look victorious.
He didn’t look like a man who had finally proven he was right.
He looked like someone waiting for a verdict.
“Open it,” he said quietly.
I looked up.
“What?””
“The notebook.””
My fingers tightened around the worn leather cover.
“You expect me to believe everything you’re saying because of a few pictures?””
“No.””
His answer surprised me.
“I expect you to believe what you feel.””
I almost laughed.
“What I feel?””
“Yes.””
“You showed up at my hotel with a photograph of a woman who looks like me and a notebook you claim I gave you twelve years ago. Then you tell me I was forced to forget my own life.””
My voice rose.
“And now you’re telling me to trust my feelings?””
Adrian didn’t move.
“Do you remember the first time you saw me?””
I frowned.
“Three months ago.””
“No.””
His eyes stayed on mine.
“The first time.””
A strange chill moved through me.
“I’ve never seen you before.””
“That’s what you told me.””
The way he said it made my stomach tighten.
“Because it’s true.””
Adrian looked down at the notebook.
“Then why did you call me by my name before I introduced myself?””
I froze.
A memory appeared.
Small.
Almost nothing.
Three months ago.
Outside my office.
A man standing across the street.
A feeling.
A name.
Adrian.
I had thought I heard someone say it.
I had thought it was a coincidence.
But now…
“No.””
He saw the hesitation.
“Vivian.””
“No.””
I stepped away.
“You’re confusing me.””
“I know.””
“You’re trying to make me believe something that isn’t real.””
“I know.””
“Then why won’t you stop?””
His expression broke slightly.
“Because I promised you I wouldn’t.””
The answer made no sense.
I looked away.
“Stop saying things like that.””
“Like what?””
“Like you know me.””
The silence between us became heavy.
Then Adrian spoke.
“Your favorite song when you were twenty-one was a piano piece nobody else knew.””
I looked at him.
“What?””
“You used to play it when you couldn’t sleep.””
My heart skipped.
“That’s not special.””
“Yes, it is.””
He stepped closer.
“Because you never told anyone.””
I stared at him.
The thing about Adrian was that he wasn’t giving me random details.
He was giving me pieces of myself.
Pieces I had never offered.
Pieces he shouldn’t have had.
“My favorite song isn’t important.””
“You also hate thunderstorms.””
I said nothing.
“You pretend you don’t.””
My jaw tightened.
“I don’t hate thunderstorms.””
“You close every window in the house before they start.””
My blood went cold.
I had done that my entire life.
Even as a child.
Even when I lived alone.
“Everyone does things like that.””
“No.””
His voice softened.
“Not everyone wakes up from nightmares they don’t remember.””
My breathing stopped.
Because that was true.
For years, I had woken up from the same dream.
A road.
A bright light.
Someone screaming my name.
I never knew who.
I never knew why.
I always forgot the moment I opened my eyes.
“How do you know about that?””
Adrian looked away.
“Because I was the one holding you when you woke up from it.””
The world tilted.
I hated that part of me wanted to believe him.
I hated that part of me was searching his face for familiarity.
Because there was nothing.
No memory.
No recognition.
Just a strange ache.
Like losing someone I had never known.
“Where is my mother’s connection to all of this?”” I asked.
Adrian became quiet.
That silence told me I had finally reached something important.
“She knew.””
My fingers tightened around the notebook.
“Knew what?””
“That you remembered less than you should.””
I swallowed.
“My mother would have told me.””
“Would she?””
The question felt like an insult.
“Yes.””
Adrian looked at me carefully.
“Vivian, your mother spent twelve years protecting a secret.””
“What secret?””
He hesitated.
Then he said:
“You weren’t supposed to survive that night.””
The air left my lungs.
“What?””
“The accident.””
I stared.
“What accident?””
Adrian’s face changed.
The sadness returned.
“The one that took your memories.””
I shook my head.
“I was never in an accident.””
“Yes, you were.””
“No.””
I stepped backward.
“My mother died years later. I never had memory problems. I graduated.
I worked. I built my life.””
“You rebuilt your life.””
The words hit harder than they should have.
“I built it.””
“You built what you were given.””
My anger returned.
“You don’t get to decide who I am.””
“I’m not trying to.””
“Then what are you doing?””
His voice dropped.
“I’m trying to return you to yourself.””
I looked down at the notebook.
The cover was scratched.
The edges were worn.
It looked old enough to have survived years of being held.
Slowly, I opened it.
The first page contained a date.
June 14th, twelve years ago.
Below it was a sentence.
Today Adrian told me he was afraid of losing me.
My fingers trembled.
I turned the page.
More writing.
More of my handwriting.
He thinks I don’t notice when he worries.
Another page.
I wish I could convince him that I’m not going anywhere.
My throat tightened.
I flipped faster.
Every page was impossible.
Every page was me.
My thoughts.
My words.
My private little observations about a person I supposedly never met.
Then I reached a page near the middle.
And stopped.
The handwriting changed.
Not completely.
Just enough.
The letters became messier.
The lines uneven.
Like whoever wrote them was scared.
If someone finds this, please don’t let them tell Adrian I left because I wanted to.
I stopped breathing.
I read the sentence again.
I didn’t leave him.
My hands shook.
They made me leave.
A cold wave moved through me.
“Who wrote this?””
Adrian didn’t answer.
I looked up.
“Adrian.””
He looked like he had been waiting twelve years to hear that question.
“You did.””
“No.””
“Yes.””
“I would remember writing something like this.””
His eyes filled with pain.
“You wouldn’t.””
I closed the notebook.
“Who are ‘they’?””
Adrian didn’t answer immediately.
That scared me more than anything.
“Who are they?”” I repeated.
Before he could speak, a phone rang.
Not mine.
His.
Adrian looked at the screen.
The color disappeared from his face.
“What?””
I watched him answer.
“Hello?””
A pause.
Then his expression changed.
“Where did you get that?””
Another pause.
His hand tightened around the phone.
“No. Don’t touch it.””
I looked at him.
Something was wrong.
“Adrian?””
He turned away from me.
“I said don’t open it.””
His voice became sharper.
“Because if she sees it, everything changes.””
My heart started racing.
He looked back at me.
And for the first time since I met him, I saw real fear.
Not sadness.
Not desperation.
Fear.
He ended the call.
“What happened?””
He didn’t answer.
“Adrian.””
Slowly, he reached into his pocket.
He pulled out another photograph.
But this one wasn’t old.
It was recent.
Very recent.
He handed it to me.
I stared at the image.
My blood ran cold.
It showed me.
Standing outside my apartment.
Three months ago.
The night before Adrian first approached me.
But I wasn’t alone.
A man stood behind me.
His hand rested on my shoulder.
And even though I couldn’t see his face clearly…
I knew him.
Because I had seen him every day for the last five years.
My boss.
The man who had hired me.
The man who had helped me build my career.
The man I trusted completely.
Adrian watched my reaction.
“Vivian…”
I couldn’t speak.
Because written on the back of the photograph were four words.
Four words in my own handwriting.
He knows everything now.
I looked at Adrian.
“What does this mean?””
He took a slow breath.
Then he said something that made my entire body go numb.
“Your boss isn’t the person who found you after you lost your memories.””
May you like
He looked at the photograph.
“He’s the person who took them away.””