Just Add Heat (3 page)

Hmm. I guess it’s been
like five years now. I didn’t want to think about that. I don’t know the person
I’m supposed to be now. On the plus side, I don’t seem to have aged much. I
know because when I went to the bathroom earlier I looked hard at myself. I was
shocked at first; my hair was so dark it was almost black. The last time I
remember dyeing it, it was red. I was happy to see that my bangs, a horrible
error in judgment, had finally grown out. I was also more pale than usual so my
dark eyes stood out, but all in all I was relieved to see I looked pretty much
the same.

But back to Carter. I
didn’t know what to feel. He wasn’t here when I got back to my room and I was
happy for the reprieve. I had no clue what to do there. I don’t love him in a
romantic way. He’s great-he’s Cheryl’s brother. I’ve known him for years and
he’s fun to be around and everything, but we were never
intimate
. Sure, he grew up to be hot as hell and he’s also quite
possibly the most polite and gentlemanly person I’ve ever met next to Cheryl’s
dad, Robert, but he’s still Cheryl’s little brother. I just couldn’t wrap my
head around the fact that we were a couple.
Too
weird
.

This was
all
too strange. I didn’t even know
what’s in my refrigerator right now. A simple thing really, but it’s a big deal
if you can’t remember. At least for me. I don’t like change. I need to know
what’s what all the time. I realize it probably had something to do with the
chaotic way I was raised. I didn’t even need therapy to understand that. But
right now I felt like my world had been turned upside down. That’s why I
couldn’t bring myself to believe I was involved with Carter. How could he go
from being Cheryl’s little brother to my
boyfriend
?
Was that even the right term? Is it live-in lover? No, I don’t like the sound
of that. Anyway, the point is that he’s four years younger than me. He’s only
twenty three; I know because I made the food for his birthday party a few
months back. I’m almost twenty eight. Wait, I was almost twenty eight
two years ago.
I’m twenty nine now. No,
it’s September and my birthday is in August, I’m
thirty
. The big 3-0.

I’ve got to stop thinking.
It’s wasn’t helping, it’s only made my chest tight. I want to go to sleep and
wake up and have everything be normal.

I don’t know how long I
had been staring at the ceiling before the door opened and the nurse from
earlier came back in. She smiled and walked over to the machine at the side of
my bed. She nodded as she jotted down something then turned to me.

“Are you feeling okay?”
Hmm. Physically, I guess I felt all right. My stomach growled. When did I eat
last?

“Yeah. I’m pretty hungry,
though. Can I get something to eat?”

“Yes.” She looked down at
her watch. “The lunch cart should be around shortly,” she answered and went to
a chair over by the door with a newspaper sitting on it. I hadn’t noticed it
before or I would have already looked through it. “It’s from yesterday, but at
least you’ll be able to get some current information from it.” She handed me
the paper and I pored over the headlines.

Nothing good stared back
at me. We’re still in a recession, still in
Afghanistan
. Everything looked
about the same.

I scanned the top of the
paper. Yep, September 28, 2012. I flopped back on the pillow and closed my
eyes. I just wanted to rest my brain. I’m totally not ready to deal with this
yet. A few seconds later I heard the rattle of the lunch cart down the hall and
the click of my door, sleep would have to wait.

“Honey, are you feeling
better?” It was my mother, not my lunch. I braced myself for any possible
surprises before I opened my eyes.

“Yeah Mom, I’m feeling a
lot better. Thanks for coming.” She had added some blonde highlights to her
hair since I had seen her last but I didn’t notice anything drastic.

“Well, Carter called and
told me you had an accident so I just hopped in the car and got on the road.
You look okay, though, besides the bruise on the side of your face.” She
sounded almost disappointed that I wasn’t wrapped in bandages and in traction.

“I
am
having a bit of a problem. Evidently, I’ve got some sort of
amnesia.”

She looked at me like I
was kidding at first. A second later she looked aghast. “Amnesia, what do you
mean? You know who
I
am. What have
you forgotten?”

“The last two years,
apparently. I don’t remember anything after 2010.”

She just sat there with a
strange look on her face as I struggled to find something to say. We didn’t
have some bosom buddy type relationship like some mothers and daughters do. We
pretty much left each other alone until the holidays or some crisis. Well,
here’s a crisis.
Crap
. Unfortunately,
she just didn’t have it in her to make me feel better. Thankfully, I heard the
cart stop outside the door. An orderly (well, I guess he was an orderly, he
didn’t look old enough to have gone through any kind of medical training) poked
his head in.

He smiled at me and he
looked so hilarious in his hairnet that I couldn’t resist grinning back at him.
“You didn’t fill out your lunch card this morning. Do you want meatloaf or the
broiled cod?”

I preferred not to eat
meat, but I wasn’t a strict vegetarian. “Cod, please.” He went to the cart and
brought over a tray that had a dish covered with a plastic dome, a little milk
carton like you get in elementary school, and a pudding cup. Wow, they go all
out at Austin General.

“Thanks.” He left and I
started in on my food so that I didn’t have to speak to my mother. It was
surprisingly good.

“So I guess you don’t
remember that I got divorced from Bill last year, huh?” Oh yeah, my mom was
still sitting in the chair. I looked up at this new revelation.

“You divorced Bill? Why?”
Bill was actually a good guy. This hit me out of left field. I took another
bite of my carrots; they needed seasoning. As I waited for my mother to answer
me I ripped open the tiny salt packet and it spilled over the entire plate.
Dang it.

“I just got tired of all
the boredom. He never wanted to go out and do anything. He wanted to stay home
and work in the yard.” She said it like it was a crime. Poor Bill was on the
road for years as a medical device salesman and finally, when he gets a chance
to be at home, my mother dumps him?

I threw my arm over my
eyes. I really couldn’t deal with this right now. Why had Carter called her?
Things must have seemed pretty dire this morning.

“Hi there, Carter. It’s
nice to see you again.” Mom’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts. I moved my
arm so that I could see him. The door was still open from the lunch delivery so
I hadn’t heard him come in. My stomach flipped over. Wow, I hadn’t felt the
butterflies since high school.

“Hello Gloria. How was
your drive?” He leaned down and gave her a kiss on the cheek. He was only being
polite but it grated on my nerves. I didn’t even realize they knew each other.

“It was long. They’re
working on the highway again. I just want to relax and get something to eat.”
She looked over at my lunch and scrunched up her nose. Uh, I’m lying over here
in a
hospital
bed suffering from some
kind of head trauma. I hated the way she tried to make everything about
herself.

Carter walked past her
and up to me. “Any change?” he asked me hopefully.

“No.” His face fell and I
felt a little guilty for not remembering what he obviously wanted me to. It
still felt strange, but I felt more comfortable with Carter than with my own
mother.
How screwed up is that?

“It’ll come.” He squeezed
my hand and I looked down. I didn’t want to see the disappointment that I
couldn’t do anything about.

“Carter, what have you
been up to?” my mother asked. I must have made some kind of face because he
squeezed my hand again.

“I’m sorry,” he mouthed
silently before he turned to my mother. “Work’s been busy and Justine’s
cookbook is coming along great.” He looked over at me.

I shook my head. Sorry,
still don’t recall anything about it. I wanted to ask him questions about us,
about me, but I didn’t want to do that in front of my mother. I was about to
suggest she go down to the cafeteria when Cheryl’s dad walked in.

“Justine, how are you
feeling this morning? Dr. Turner filled me in on your problem.” He walked
around to the other side of my bed so I turned my attention to him.

I didn’t know how to
answer him. I was feeling lost. I was feeling scared. Did he want the truth?
“Fine,” I lied.

He looked into my eyes.
“You’re looking better than last night. Give it time.” My throat felt thick and
my eyes started to tear up. Robert patted my hand and exchanged a look with
Carter, before turning to Mom.

“Gloria, it’s a pleasure
to see you again. I was going to have a cup of coffee, would you care to join
me?” It was like Robert could read my mind.

“That would be great. I
was just telling Carter I could use a bite to eat.” She got up and grabbed her
huge purse which was on the floor beside her. “I’ll be back in a little while,
Justine.”

I smiled and lifted my
hand in a weak wave and she and Robert left the room.

“I’m sorry about that. I
was so worried about you this morning that I felt I had to call her. She
is
your mother.”

“It’s okay; you couldn’t
know how she would be.”

“Well, yes, I did, but I
called her anyway.” He shook his head ruefully. “Maybe Dad will keep her busy.”
He stood there in silence for a moment and I forced myself to speak.

“Can I ask you
something?” He nodded. “Do I have a cat?”

“No.” He didn’t say
anything else; he just looked at me like I had a head injury.

“Carter, I need to ask you
something else.” I gathered up my courage.

“Anything.”

“Do I love you?” He
looked as if I slapped him.

“Yes.” It was barely a
whisper. My throat constricted. I knew he would say that, but it seemed like it
was physically hurting him. I wanted to comfort him, and apologize for not
loving him now, but I couldn’t say anything. I felt frozen. I was terrified. I
swallowed around the lump in my throat.

“Yes, you love me, and I
love you. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me.” I could hear
the conviction in his voice, so I knew that he was telling me the truth, but I
wasn’t feeling it in my heart.

Chapter Three

Carter left when my
mother came back. I was conflicted. On the one hand I needed time to myself to
come to terms with my situation, to try to remember something. On the other
hand, I felt like asking him to stay with me. Of course I didn’t because, in
truth, I didn’t have much to say to him. I wanted to ask him questions, but
Cheryl was the better choice to fill me in.

Anyway, he left me with
my mother and she didn’t have anything helpful to offer me. She knew nothing
about my day to day life. She did know that I live with Carter, though, and
that didn’t seem fair. She hardly knows anything about me but she still knows
more than I do.

She sat with me for about
an hour; until I told her I was okay, and that she should go on home, back to
Waco
. I felt a little bad
that she had driven all this way, but I got over it when she started talking
about her vacation to
Orlando
last summer. Really, I just didn’t care, especially right now. She wasn’t
giving me anything to work with concerning
my
life. It wasn’t like I was at
Disneyworld
with
her and would remember something.

Shortly after she left,
Dr. Turner came in and told me that I could go home tomorrow as long as I
wasn’t getting dizzy or anything. I was happy and petrified in equal measure.
Sure, I wanted to leave the hospital, who wants to be here? Alas, I wasn’t
ready to go home and face—I don’t know what.

After my freakishly early
dinner tray was finished, Cheryl showed up. I felt like it had been forever
since I had seen her, but it was really just this morning. I needed to be
around someone familiar, someone who I recognized as being a part of my life.

“Hey girl,” she sang as
she strolled in with a purple duffle bag over her shoulder. “I brought you some
pajamas and your toothbrush and stuff.”

Ah, wonderful Cheryl,
thinking about things I hadn’t even given a thought to. Now I could brush my
teeth and get out of this super thin hospital gown. I smiled as I opened the
bag but it quickly faded as I stared at the contents in confusion. I didn’t
recognize any of the items in there. I pulled out the toiletry bag and unzipped
it. I didn’t even recognize my toothbrush. I was pretty sure that my toothbrush
was one of those spin brushes from the grocery store, but this one was some
kind of high tech device that I couldn’t see myself buying. There was also a
lotion I wasn’t familiar with. I was happy to see that I still used Colgate and
Secret, but that was pretty much it.