Small Town (Sweet Magnolias)

2

After explaining who they were to Alex, Howie took her back for some scans and tests and the results come back.

"As we expected her hippocampus was severely damaged which ended up causing memory loss." Howie confirmed as he looked at the results.

"Do you know long it will last?" Maddie asks Howie.

"It could last for a few days or it could last forever and she will never remember." Howie answered which worried both Tyler and Maddie.

"What do we do now?" Maddie asked him.

"At this point there is nothing we can do. All we can do is send her home with you guys, surround her with things that are familiar and hope for the best." Howie answered.

"Hope for the best? That's the best you got?" Tyler asked frustrated.

"Look, Tyler, there is nothing we can do personally but be there for her. It's all up to her now. Like I said surround her with things that are familiar and just go on about your life's like she does remember and hope that deep down inside that she is still in there. As I said it's all up to her to remember and if she really wants to remember she will." Howie says before he leaves.

~~~~~~~~~~
Tyler walks her up to her room and opens the door and sets her stuff down for her.

"Home sweet home." He says as she walks in.

"This is my room?" She asks him.

"Yeah it is." He said as she looks at all the pictures before she stops in-front of one of two young kids in their T-Ball uniforms.

"That's us." Tyler said as he walks up her. "We were on the same T-Ball team."

"That's cool, I guess." She said as she continues to look at the photos in her room. She noticed that a lot of them were of her and Tyler.

"So, are you like my brother or something?" She asked Tyler which made him upset and a little grossed out knowing that they are dating.

"Uh no we aren't." He replied.

"So, what are we then?" She asked confused as she looked to him.

"Uh for the longest time we were best friends but just recently we started dating."

"Oh." And that was all she had to say about that before stopping in front of a picture of two adults and her smiling.

"Those are your parents. That picture was taken your first day of freshman year." He explained as he noticed her staring at the picture.

"So if they are my parents then where are they and why aren't I living with them instead of here?" She asked him.

"Uhh...this is kinda hard to explain. Your parents died at the beginning of the year in a car accident." He explained to her.

"Oh...well that sucks." She said not really knowing what to say.

"Well, I'm gonna give you space to settle in and relax." He said before walking out.

~~~~~~~~~

It was Saturday morning and everyone was going on about their day. Alex had been hanging out in her room trying to figure out what she was going to do about the whole memory lost thing. A knock on her bedroom door brought her out of her thoughts.

"Come in!" She yelled as the person walked in revealing Tyler.

"Hey, wanna take a walk?" He asked as he walked in.

"Sure." She smiled as she nodded.

They ended up at this beautiful lake where they had their first date. They just walked along the side of the lake in silence.

"This is where we had our first date you know?" He said hoping it would jog her memory.

"No, I didn't know. But that's cool." She said and automatically felt bad when she saw his face drop.

"Look, I'm sorry I can't remember and I appreciate you trying to help me but I just can't remember and I'm sorry about that. I know that this changes everything and that I'm not the same girl you love." She says which makes Tyler stop.

"You're wrong." He says as she looks at him confused.

"About what?" She asked confused.

"You're wrong about not being the same girl that I love. You are that girl." She smiles. "It doesn't matter if you have your memories or not. Does it suck that you don't remember everything we have been through? Yeah it does because we made one hell of a team all these years and were there bad times? Yeah but I think you are who you are because of them and I'm just hoping that you remember soon."

"And what if I don't want to remember?" She asked him.

"That would be your choice but I really hope that it's not because it would suck if all the good times we had were gone from that beautiful brain of yours." She smiled at this. "Why wouldn't you want to remember though?"

"Because of what you said the other night. You told me about how my parents died and I'm assuming that I don't have any other family or I wouldn't be living with you guys or I do have other family and they are so bad that they didn't want me and that right there tells me that I'm better off not remembering. I just feel like if I remember all that bad stuff then it'll just hurt cause then I'll remember everything about them and it'll be like I'm feeling it all over again like when it first happened and I don't know if I'm strong enough for that." She explained.

"Alexandria Penelope Jones, you are one of the strongest people I have ever met. You can handle anything. And all those bad moments? They led you to pretty, amazing and strong woman that is standing here in front of me today. Those moments, the good and the bad, made you who you are. They made you the woman that I love with everything I have. Those bad moments made some good moments too because without those bad moments you would have never come lived at my house and we would have never started dating. Bad things happen so you can enjoy the good things. The good outweighs the bad and you know that better than anyone." Tyler said and this made Alex stare at him lovingly. Now she understood why she fell in love with him.

"Alex? Alex? Alex are you okay?" He asked as he saw her freeze. She then looked at him and she just smiled.

"What?" He asked confused.

"I may not remember but I do understand why I fell in love with you." She said and this made him smile and believe that for the first time in a long time that everything was gonna be okay.