Love Heals

I Remember Now...

The saying goes "curiosity killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back." It seemed the more I uncovered of the past, the more I realized I shouldn't run from it. In fact, I should be proud of my experiences.
However, it remained that I didn't remember any of what I had found out from my diaries, even when I read the covered bits. It was like I was reading someone else's story, someone else's struggle.
It wasn't until I came across a page that was ripped out that a tinge of my old memories returned.

It had been a month since my first day of work and everyday was relatively the same: go to work then come home and learn about my past with Austin. Tonight was no different.
"Austin!" I called him from the living room.
"I'm coming, hold on!" He replied as he entered the living room shirtless with only a pair of sweats on. He was still trying to dry his hair with a towel.
I laughed, "you didn't have to rush that much. But I do admit it'd be a good ploy to capture my attention."
"Maybe I should just walk around shirtless from now on then," he teased.
"Maybe you should. It would be a good use for those abs of yours," I replied without missing a beat.
Austin stepped towards me with a smirk, "Do you want me to?"
I stepped closer so that we were practically chest to chest, "What do you think?"
Then what was teasing became a passionate kiss that was unexpected but perfect in all the ridiculousness that was my life.
When we finally stopped for air Austin whispered, "Is it possible to fall for the same person twice?"
"Sure, we found each other twice, didn't we?" I answered.
"I know you're atheist but it almost seems as if God has given me a second chance. I never thought I'd be able to see you again, much less fix things. I hope you still feel the same as you do now even if you one day remember who I once was."
"I don't judge people by their pasts..." I trailed off, feeling deja vu. "I only focus on who people are in their present state."
Memories flooded back from such a simple statement. A torrent of thought crossed my mind: Mack, Christian, Teagen, Andy, Jake    , Sterling, Winnie.
"Rose?" Austin asked after a minute.
"I think I remember some things now. I used to say that a lot, right?"
"What, the thing about not judging? Yeah," he answered.
"Before I met you I was the outcast that dated the school shooter, wasn't I?" I asked quietly. "I smoked and drank and cut. I used to get so drunk after Mack shot himself that Christian had to let me spend the night in his car..."
Austin scoffed bitterly, "I purposely tore that page out of your diary and it's still the first thing you remember." He sat me down on the couch, afraid that I would keel over and pass out or die.
"Damn, I was a mess," I said, laughing.
Austin raised an eyebrow, "Rose breathe. Please don't go into hysteria. Do you want some water?"
I smiled at him almost deliriously. I wished profoundly that I hadn't remembered any of this and yet I was also completely at peace with these thoughts.
"Can I have a day off tomorrow?" I asked quietly.
"Yeah, just don't do anything stupid..." he replied, awkwardly.
The wave of emotions had rolled past and now I only nodded at him, exhausted. Then I leaned towards him and gave him a hug, "Not everything is bad about getting my memory back. Why don't we start over?"
Austin sighed in relief as he patted my back, "you're still as random as ever. Yes, let's try this again."
He kissed my forehead, then brought me to my room bridal style.
"Can you stay?" I asked before he could leave.
He smiled, "yeah, let me turn out the lights in the living room and I'll be right back."
I nodded and pulled the sheets around me as he returned to my room. Awkwardly, Austin got into bed next to me.
That was when I realized that although I had just remembered all of our times together as if it were yesterday, for him it had been five or six years. I wrapped an arm around his waist and placed my head on his chest. Although he was tense at first, he soon relaxed and fell asleep.
I layed there in his chest for a long time just thinking. I remembered how when I had first met Austin, he had been going through a rough time.
For most of his life his family was stable and normal with his dad being a priest and his mom being an aid for disabled children at school. However, his senior year of high school he found out his dad was having an affair with a prostitute and of course Austin told his mother. It tore the family apart: his mom kicked his dad out of the house which drove his dad basically to insanity.
His dad would get drunk and show up at all sorts of odd hours in the night swearing his bloody head off. Other times he would break into the house even after his mom changed the locks and try to kill Austin for snitching.
Austin had never known true pain or chaos in the manner that he was experiencing up until that point in his life. He went from a pretty normal student to someone people talked about behind his back. He had good friends who stuck by him but most guys avoided him.
It wasn't that we lived in some awesome town where bad things never happened, it was just that his situation was so specific and unique. We had shootings and stabbings but not crazy stalker priests who were into prostitutes.
I suppose this was why Christian had been so protective of me that day when I was trying to stop Teagen and Austin had held me back. Austin wasn't a bad guy but his life story was simply too foreign to everyone else.
In fact it was so absurd that I often compared him to myself. Junior year I had dated a guy named Mackinaw Reeves, better known as Mack. We had a ride or die sort of relationship but it wasn't as toxic as it sounded. We offered each other support in the midst of our depression and bad habits. We fell in love quickly and deeply but both of us knew that it would end in tragedy.
Mack ended up shooting up the school and then taking his own life. He died in my arms apologizing the whole time for leaving me alone in this shitty world. Mack believed that I could make a better life for myself but he just couldn't stand it anymore and had no intention of pulling me down with him.
Mack had no intention of killing and only shot a few bullets for show. At worst he shot someone in the leg and the person made a full recovery.
I stood by Mack's actions because I knew he just wanted to show the world the hell he was in all the time. He wanted people to see just a fraction of what he felt everyday without dragging them all down with him in death. In this way I became an outcast, the girl who dated and still loved a school shooter.
Few people talked to me besides Christian, Teagen, and a few other close friends. My social life was dwindling but I suppose I gave up on caring.
As I got to know Austin better and better it was like the world was opening up for me again. At first knowing him felt like an adventure: his mom hated me, his brother and Teagen were dead set enemies, and his dad began to have it out for me as much as he had it out for Austin. Slowly knowing him became hell.
I had been atheist since ninth grade when I decided God could do nothing for my depression and I had to help myself. Upon meeting his mom, she tried to force religion down my throat at every bend. She yelled at Austin, she yelled at me. I wanted to ignore her because I genuinely liked Austin and wanted a relationship beyond friendship with him.
In the end, however, I had to stay true to myself and I bid Austin farewell. It was bittersweet in many ways. For one we were all off to college and leaving our horrid lives behind but at the same time we were leaving each other. Furthermore, we were on our paths to finding ourselves but that came at the sacrifice of losing one another.
I never thought I'd see him again. I never thought in any way that I'd be lying on his chest, listening to his breathing. I smiled and closed my eyes as I drifted off to sleep.