The Forget Me Nots

Chapter One

Forget me nots.

That's all Amelia had left of her.

She had left them all behind, every last person she ever cared about with nothing but an empty house and a million memories to paint the walls with.

She left a hole in their hearts that wouldn't ever heal.

Out of the corner of her eye, Amelia saw Henry look over at her, taking in her silence before staring back out at the road. She noticed his eyes didn't light up the way they used to, and it made her wonder in an absent way who was taking it harder out of the two of them. Her parents had always been a team. They had always had a way to balance the other out, one soft when the other was harsh. Maybe that's why it sometimes hurt to see him walk into a room, because she knew that he mother wasn't going to walk in right behind him.

Cassie had left Amelia, and that was fine. Not better, but she still had her dad. But Henry... he had lost his soul mate, his companion for life, the woman he had dedicated his days and nights and laughter and tears and all of his years.

She still couldn't quite believe that she was gone. She remembered the day she'd woken up, remembered expecting to see Cassie in bed with the daily newspaper in one hand and a hot cup of tea in the other. And she remembered the cold feeling that consumed her when she opened the door.

"Don't look so sad, kid." Henry said, breaking her out of her thoughts. Reaching over the console, he brushed her hair back over her shoulder and she did her best to smile, but it felt wrong, her lips too tight and the gesture too uneven. He gave her a look of understanding, and instead of returning the almost-grimace, Henry gave her hand a gentle squeeze, overlapping her fingers with his. She looked down at them, tracing the lines on his hands and welcoming the warmth in them and sighed. She always felt cold nowadays.

"We'll be home soon." she told him, her eyes back on the passing scenery. The sky was clear and so blue, the fields already turning gold with the later months. It was her mother's favorite kind of day, and if she closed her eyes, she could see her again, could see her wide smile and her big eyes.

She sighed again, and tried to will her heart into breaking just a little bit less.

"Home." he echoed, a hitch in his voice, and she knew he was thinking the same thing she was. They were finally coming back. One piece of the puzzle shorter – more weathered and beaten than before – but they were finally coming back to the one place that guarded their hearts.

The houses were still the same - some paints fresh while others were fading - but each with their huge oak trees and wooden porches that provided the perfect amount of shade from the sun. The same abandoned lawns were still filled with the same wildflowers that cropped up in all manner of places, the petals swaying in the breeze. They passed a beat up truck parked by the side of the road, the red paint chipped and rusted, and she glanced inside the cab as they passed. Only a handful of years had passed since they'd driven down these lanes, but it felt like a another era already, a happier one.

They drove in silence, his hand tightening on hers with every mile they passed. It wasn't long until they turned on a dirt road that was as familiar to them as their own names, the movement of the truck jostling them in their seats. Here, the trees started growing closer together, the branches overlapping and creating a canopy that extended from the county road they came from to the house at the end. Sunlight filtered down between the opening of the leaves, and Amelia rolled down her window, letting the breeze in. She had grown up here, with all the fields and dirt roads; she remembered being small and sticky with homemade jams, and waking up to tickle fights with her parents.