The Song

Part Seventy-Three

I couldn’t sleep.

No matter what I thought about, or how I shifted around, I could not sleep.

I even counted over 250 sheep.

Getting memories back so suddenly had seriously thrown me off. At first it was awesome and exciting, but now I was a little bit freaked out. It had all come on too fast and had caught me off guard, and once I’d thought a little bit about it I began to realize just what exactly was happening. The human brain wasn’t supposed to work like this!

I shifted again, Aston’s hand stroking down my back gently. I knew he was awake, but he was leaving me to my thoughts, which I appreciated.

Maybe I was scared to go to sleep because I didn’t know what were dreams and what was reality? This world I’d built with Aston seemed far too perfect, and I was afraid I was going to wake up and it would all be gone. Or at least I wouldn’t remember it. Again.

“Hey Jess,” Aston mumbled after another half hour had passed.

“Hmmm…”

“You wanna talk about it?”

“About what?” I asked.

“What’s keeping you up.”

“You know what’s keeping me up,” I sighed, “The memory thing.”

“Why though? Isn’t it a good thing? You seem troubled more than anything.”

“It is a good thing,” I insisted, “It’s just freaked me out.”

“Why?”

“I wasn’t ready for this,” I said.

“But it’s what you’ve wanted all along.”

“I know, but I guess I didn’t really think of what was going to happen.”

“Everything is going to be ok,” Aston said, rubbing my back gently as he held me tight against his chest, “Don’t worry!”

“I’m just scared that I’m going to wake up and forget everything,” I admitted, “Or that it will all be a dream.”

“You’re going to wake up and I’m still going to be right here,” Aston said, “No matter what you remember. Like that one movie…”

“The Adam Sandler one?” I giggled.

“Yes! That! Even if you wake up every morning like Drew Barrymore did, and you have no clue who the hell I am… I’m still going to be here and I’m still going to make you fall in love with me, over and over and over.”

I grinned, twisting around in his grip so I could press a kiss against his lips. I knew I was going to struggle with all of this, but with his reinforcement that everything was going to be ok… I relaxed a bit.

“So you can sleep now?” Aston asked.

“Yeah.”

“Good, we’ve got a busy few days ahead of us yet.”

“Why, what’s going on?”

“You’ll see,” he replied, pulling me back into that comfy place on his chest.

I closed my eyes and tried to sleep again, letting go of the thoughts I’d been having about my memory. It took a while, but soon I was asleep, out for most of the night like Aston, in dream world…

--

…And then I was in the en suite of the house… staring at my flat stomach in the mirror as I thought things through. I’d really wanted that pregnancy test to be positive.

…And then Aston was pounding on the door, yelling to let him in. He needed to get ready for work but I’d locked him out because I didn’t want him to know what I was thinking.

…And then we were fighting about nothing, the tension rising between us. I stomped in and out of the en suite as Aston put on cologne and I got ready for the day, hurling angry words at him all the while.

…And then his phone was buzzing, his ride arriving early. “I hate you!!” I yelled, slamming the en suite door as he left for work.

…And then I was riding my bike down the high street, mad at myself for saying such a thing. I wanted to fix it, I wanted to apologize and make things better.

…And then everything was black.

--

I shot up in bed, sweating even though it was rather chilly in the bedroom.

“Babe!”

“Oh my god,” I whispered. My breathing was heavy and labored, my mind trying to piece together the hazy dream I’d had. But I knew… despite my fears that I wouldn’t be able to tell dreams from reality, I knew this was real.

“Jess, what’s wrong?”

“I can’t believe I said that,” I said, looking at the wall in front of me as huge tears streaked down my face. I threw the bed covers off of me and practically ran downstairs to the main room, pacing back and forth as I replayed the memory in my head again and again.

“Jess, you’re scaring me,” Aston said, standing on the bottom step as I stalked around the room like a wild animal.

I could feel myself hyperventilating as it all set in. My last words to Aston before the crash were ‘I hate you.’ I could have died and that would have been his last memory of me. I was such a cow, he didn’t deserve that.

“Baby you gotta calm down,” Aston said, finally coming over and grabbing my arms. He held them tight against my sides as he stared down into my eyes, the tears still amassing in big messy pools as the memory span in my head again and again, “You gotta talk to me.”

“You shouldn’t be with me,” I whispered, “I don’t deserve you.”

“Jess, we’ve talked about this…”

“I told you I hated you and then nearly died,” I said, “I’m a horrible, horrible wife.”