

### Clean Slate

Published by Harley Crowley at Smashwords

Copyright 2012 Harley Crowley

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Chapter 1

Something was wrong. He slowed his jog to a stop and stood on the gravel path, staring at the body of water lapping at the rock riprap a few feet away across the grass.

What the hell?

He didn't recognize this place! Why didn't he know where he was? He blinked a couple of times, to clear his head, but it didn't clear. Or rather, it was completely clear.

He couldn't remember a damn thing!

_Okay, this doesn't make any sense!_ He looked down at himself and saw sweatpants; his shoes were trainers. Thin thermal gloves kept his hands warm in the cold air. He touched his head. Sweatband.

I've been running. Just stay calm, this will clear up in a minute.

His breath was visible in little white puffs that got more frequent as anxiety grew. He didn't know what to ask himself first. Or who he was asking. _What's my damn name!_ He didn't know his own name! It seemed as though it was on the tip of his tongue, but he couldn't catch it. _Sorry, I didn't catch your name._ He knew it was supposed to be a sort of joke, but it didn't warrant a smile. _Not funny! Get a hold of yourself!_

The air had a hint of the dank smell of decomposing seaweed. A pair of seagulls floated offshore, and a few sailboats were moored at the end of a small pier. This was salt water then, a bay.

Other people were walking and running on the path where he stood, and he moved to one side. A woman jogged towards him, raised her hand and panted, "Good morning," with a perfunctory smile. It felt like a routine trail hello. He turned to look at her after she passed. Did he know her? Two girls ran by fast, chatting to each other as if they were hardly exerting themselves. A man on a bicycle swerved around and past them.

Obviously he'd been exercising. He held onto that thought to see where it went. What did he know? He was in a park, on a trail that he could see wound up the hill into the trees, a trail he had been on just moments ago. He was on the edge of salt water. And on the edge of panic.

It seemed like morning, and just then the sun started coming up and sent fingers of light through the trees, tracing their images on the grass. Which meant that was east, and this water must connect to the Pacific. He was on the west coast. It seemed as though he already knew that.

He tried to quiet his anxiety by staying focused on whatever data he could collect. He felt around for a pocket, a wallet, car keys, something to give him a further clue. There was nothing, but that was a clue in itself. He must live around here somewhere because, if he had no keys, his car wouldn't be one of those in the parking lot across the lawn from the water.

_Maybe I'm having some sort of brain episode._ That didn't help his attempt to stay calm, because it made him wonder if he was in physical danger. Maybe he was having a stroke.

But he felt fine. His body felt good, in fact, his muscles warm from running, blood circulating just the way it ought to, legs tingling from the exercise. Emotionally, not so good.

He needed to collect his thoughts. He needed to _locate_ his thoughts, the missing ones. He walked a few feet to a bench along the edge of the trail and sat down, dropped his head in his hands and breathed deeply. His name was gone. The name of this place was gone. It was all a big gaping hole. He didn't know where to go. He didn't know where his home was. He couldn't bring anyone to mind. On top of that he didn't know what he was supposed to do next, or where he had been headed, just moments ago.

Thinking wasn't doing that much good. He was completely lost, cut off from the people somewhere who must know him. People who belonged to him, or that he belonged to. But his memory was unpopulated except for vague shapes with blank faces, and the harder he tried the more amorphous those figures became.

For a moment an unexpected surge of excitement hit him. It raised the hair on his arms and tingled across his shoulders. No encumbrances! _I'm completely free!_ It was an ecstatic feeling, a sense of unlimited possibility.

The flash of euphoria didn't last, and suddenly he was on the verge of whimpering, head still in his hands.

The voice of a woman broke into his thoughts, and he looked up. "Are you all right?" She was an older woman, with grey hair tucked under a baseball cap and a red sweat suit that covered a compact body.

"I'm sorry to disturb you. I just wanted to be sure you were okay."

He gave her a long look, long enough that she seemed to think better of intruding. She stepped back and began to turn away, nodded her head in acknowledgement that she might have overstepped.

"No, wait!" He shook his head, embarrassed. She stood quietly, poised to stay or go.

"May I ask you something?" She nodded.

"Do you know me?"

"Not really. I do see you running here in the early mornings, fairly regularly." She pulled up her sleeve and looked at her watch. "You're right on schedule."

"What time is it?" He needed another fact. He had so few.

"It's 7:20." As she looked at him he suddenly felt naked and vulnerable, and foolish. What a ridiculous predicament to be in!

"There is something the matter, isn't there." She didn't seem alarmed. It was reassuring.

He took a deep breath, and looked for courage, because if he said this out loud it would be real and he'd have to cope with it. He wasn't sure he was ready to involve someone else in this dilemma. He didn't want to admit how helpless he was right now. But he spoke it anyway.

"All of a sudden I can't remember anything. I don't know who I am. I don't know where I am. I don't know where I live." He tried to look calm, he tried to speak matter-of-factly, but he didn't quite make it. There was an embarrassing note of panic in his voice. He could almost feel tears coming, and he fought that back.

"Oh my, that must be frightening." She was distressed for him, but didn't seem disturbed, and he was surprised to feel a sense of relief that he wasn't quite so alone. She could have freaked out and walked away. Thought he was a crazy person. Maybe he _was_ a crazy person.

She took the seat beside him on the bench, not too close, but still a comfort somehow. More comforting actually, than if she'd reached out to touch him.

"I wonder if there's something I can do to help."

He was at a loss as to what that might be. What was next step for a man without of a shred of identity, either on his person or inside his head.

"Maybe someone here knows you." She indicated the park with its sparse population of people moving around the trail that looped through it. "We could ask."

"No!" He hadn't meant to be so abrupt. It was just that he was too embarrassed to let anyone else know what had happened to him. And how inappropriate was that, if he wanted to solve the problem?

"I'm sorry. It was just an idea."

"No, I'm sorry. I'm just a little jumpy here."

She frowned, thought for a moment. "Is there someone I can call? I have my cell." She pulled it out of a pocket of her sweat suit.

"I don't know who to call. I don't know of anyone. God, this is weird." He shook his head. It didn't help.

"How about the police. They should know what to do. You have to start somewhere." She had her phone in her hand.

He sifted through the possibilities. He could continue on the trail, see if he had a sense of where to go, see if anything came back to him. Let his horse-mind take him back to the barn. But he didn't know which direction to go. Back the way he was running when he stopped? Or towards the buildings he could see ahead through the trees? Only one direction led home.

Maybe if he just sat here for a while things would come back. It could be a momentary glitch. Maybe his mind was taking a little vacation, and it was due back any minute. As the occasional runner or walker passed by he looked at them closely, in case they might be someone who knew him, might stop and come over to say hello.

"It seems a little extreme, to call the police. I don't want to make a big deal out of it. There must be something else I can do."

She smiled at him. "It does seem like a bit of a big deal, though. If it were me, I think I would probably ask the police to come. Unless . . ." and her voice trailed off.

Then, "My car is here. I could drive you to the police station. Unless your car is here too."

He laughed. "How would I know?" It felt good to laugh. There was some humor in this, after all. In a way it was a comical predicament.

"Anyway, I don't think it's here because I'm not carrying any keys. Or a driver's license. That would have been a big help."

They sat there for a while, as he used up and rejected his nonexistent alternatives.

"Okay, I guess you could call the police. I can't think of anything else to do. I'd appreciate it."

She popped open her cell phone.

"Maybe they're already looking for me. I could be running away from a crime scene. Which is why it would be better for you not to let me get in your car."

"So now we know something about you. You have a sense of humor in the most difficult of circumstances." She pushed a button on her phone.

"Tell them no siren!"

Chapter 2

They waited for the police to arrive. "Maybe we should introduce ourselves," she said. "My name is Helen. Helen Fisher. What's yours?" He was startled. It felt for a second as if he might answer her, but of course he drew a blank and couldn't.

She chuckled. "I thought maybe that would work," she said. "You never know." She rummaged around in her pocket and pulled out a small wallet. It had a pen attached, and she found a scrap of paper in it. She wrote down her name and phone number.

"I'd like it if you would call me later and let me know how it's going. If you think of it." She handed him the paper. "Unless you'd like me to go to the police station with you?"

"No, I've imposed on you enough. But thanks." He took the piece of paper, a grocery receipt, and looked at her name. He realized it was the only name he knew. He turned it over and studied it.

"Andy's Market. Belmont, Washington. Is that where we are?" It didn't sound familiar, which gave him a sinking sensation. He was lost for sure.

"Yes. I guess you probably feel like a stranger here." She held out her right hand and he put his in hers and they shook hands. "Welcome to Belmont," she said, and gave him an encouraging smile.

They sat in silence for a few moments, and then she touched his arm. "I think they're here." She stood up and waved at the black and white cruiser nosing through the parking lot towards them. The patrolman parked the car and walked in their direction, a small clipboard in his hand. He was short, and thick around the middle. His belt looked strained with its effort, and his black uniform shirt was stressed at the buttons. In spite of that, his walk was cocky. _Too many donuts._ It was a comfort to realize he knew about cops and donuts.

The patrolman looked from one of them to the other. "Are you the woman who called? Mrs. Fisher?"

"Yes, and this is our mystery man. I hope you can help him." The officer looked him up and down, appraising.

"I'm Officer Peck. What's the problem here, sir?"

"The problem is I seem to have lost my memory." It sounded dumb.

"And your name, sir?"

"Well that's one of the things I don't know. I don't know who I am."

"You don't know your own name?" Peck seemed disturbed. Maybe he was irritated because he couldn't fill out his report form.

"I'd tell you if I could, officer. I'm sorry, but I can't. That is the problem. I was hoping the police could help me figure it out." Now he was getting irritated, and wished they hadn't called after all. He didn't need this attitude.

"What are you doing here in the park?" Peck wore dark glasses with a shiny, mirrored surface that hid his eyes.

"Here in the park? Apparently I've been running. I don't remember anything else."

A crackling voice emanated from the policeman's shoulder, and he tipped his head towards the two-way radio clipped to his collar. "I'm on the scene here at Waterside Park. Subject says he doesn't know who he is." The response was unintelligible. "White male . . . " he said into the radio and then turned and asked, "How old are you, sir?"

"I don't know!" That was another shock. He had no idea.

"Mid-thirties, I'd guess. He doesn't know that either." The radio crackled back and he replied.

"Roger that. Heading your way."

"Sir, why don't we go down to the station and see what we can find out." The officer held out a beefy hand to take his arm and he jerked away.

"I'm coming." They walked towards the patrol car with Helen following along. Officer Peck opened the back door and gestured for him to get in. There was a wire screen barrier between the front and back seats.

"Do I have to sit in the back? You're not arresting me, are you?"

"Regulations, sir."

He was embarrassed. He knew he was the center of attention as the people in the park nearby turned to look at the minor excitement. What were they thinking? That Helen reported him for being a pervert in the park or something? They'd probably go home and say, "I saw the cops pick up a guy in the park this morning. I wonder what they were arresting him for."

Helen stood by the car and gave him a little wave before the door was closed on him. "Call me if you can," she said.

"Thanks for your help," he said. "I will."

The police car wound around the parking lot, headed up the hill, and turned left on a main street that bordered the bay. He watched everything out the window as they went, looking for something familiar. There were condominium buildings all along the way. Did he live in one of those? Nothing rang a bell. They reached downtown, in silence. There were people on the street, probably on their way to work. He wondered again where he was supposed to be this morning. He must have a job.

They arrived at the police station. As they approached the big glass doors, just before Officer Peck opened and held the door to usher him into the lobby, he caught a quick glimpse of Peck's reflection. And just behind him, a gangly young man in exercise clothes.

That was me!

It was bare in the lobby except for two chairs on either side of a table that held a little pile of magazines, and a rack of brochures about safety and security. A young redheaded woman in uniform sat in a glassed-in booth, probably bulletproof. She looked up as they approached her position, and Peck leaned his elbow on the counter and inclined his head towards the little microphone attached to the window. He took off his shiny shades. "Good morning, Doll." She twisted her mouth at him in mild contempt, and he straightened up and shrugged.

"Buzz us in, will you?" They crossed the lobby and waited for the sharp rasp that indicated the door was unlocked.

On the other side of the door was a green painted hall with a pair of elevator doors on one side. The hall opened into a room with maybe eight grey metal desks, half of them empty, and a couple of doors on the far wall. There were chairs along another wall, only one occupied, by a disheveled young man muttering to himself. Slow day in cop land. He was escorted to a metal desk manned by an officer who obviously took a little more pride than Peck in his appearance, trim and crisp in his uniform. Silvering hair, aviator glasses. Neat desk too, no errant papers, everything lined up squarely.

The officer at the desk looked up and asked Peck, "This our John Doe?" For a split second he wondered how they already had his name. Officer Peck handed over his report form, which had hardly anything written on it.

"Have a seat, sir. I'm Sergeant Wilcox." He waved Peck off and pulled a pad of paper towards him on the desktop. He asked politely, "How can we help you?"

"I don't know what you can do. I just found myself in the park with no idea who I am. I guess I was out running. I didn't know who else to call." He waved his hand to indicate his sweats, pulled off his sweatband, and double-wrapped it around his wrist. He tucked Helen's phone number, which was still crumpled in his hand, underneath it. He stripped off his thin gloves and set them on the edge of his chair.

With the gloves off he saw there was a plain gold ring on his left hand. He stared at it, then twisted it on his finger, trying to slide it off, but it was too tight to get past his knuckle.

"Do you have any injuries?" Wilcox asked. "Maybe you fell and hit your head on something. Sometimes that causes a temporary memory loss."

He reached up to feel his head, brushed his fingers through his hair, which felt like it was cut short. It was sticky with sweat.

"Nothing hurts. I think I'm intact. Just completely blank."

"When did you get that scar? It looks new."

"What scar?"

When Wilcox pointed at his own eyebrow, he slid his fingers over his left eyebrow and then his right, where he felt a bumpy ridge running vertically over it.

"I don't know. I didn't know I had that."

"How about identification? Anything on you?"

"No, I looked. I don't even have a pocket."

Wilcox shook his head and leaned back in his chair and smiled. "You seem pretty calm. Shouldn't you be a little upset? I would be."

"Do you want me to cry and wave my arms around?"

"No, I'm just saying you seem relaxed under the circumstances."

"You don't believe me? Is that what you mean? I'm making this up?"

"No, I just wondered. We hear a lot of stories in here, some of them true, some not. It just seems unusual."

"Look, I came here for help voluntarily. I haven't committed any crime." He realized he was acting as if he were on the defensive, and paused for a second. "At least that I'm aware of." Joking about it made him feel better.

"Sounds like a potential defense, doesn't it?"

"Oh, I get it. You've discovered a murder, and you think I'm faking amnesia to get away with it."

Wilcox laughed. "Not so far. If we do, you'll be the first to know." The laugh made him feel better because it seemed like he'd established a connection and that he was somebody more than victim. Even if he didn't know who that somebody was.

Wilcox continued. "Let's see if we can find out something about you." He glanced at the wedding band. "We need to get you back to that wife of yours."

"It does look as if I'm married, doesn't it. I don't feel like there's anyone, but there's the ring. Is that a clue?" He tugged at the ring again, still with no success.

"Being married is probably our best bet at identifying you if you don't snap out of it by yourself. Your wife will probably be looking for you before long. And she'll eventually call us."

"So I should just sit around and wait? That's all we can do?" He couldn't stand being helpless. He was so frustrated with sitting here in his smelly sweats and waiting for his imaginary wife to rescue him. _She'll probably be angry._

Why would I think that?

Wilcox started filling in more of the form Peck had given him. "There are a couple of things we can do. First, I'd like to take your fingerprints and run them through the system to see if you pop up."

"See if I have a record? Maybe I'm a fugitive and you'll catch me. Maybe I've just turned myself in."

"Well, we'll find you if you have a record, and also if you've registered with the police department for a gun permit, or if you're a teacher or coach or someone else who works with children. We run background checks for a lot of things, some kinds of licenses, and what-not."

Wilcox pulled another form out of the drawer and filled in the date and checked some boxes. Then he passed it across the desk with a pen on top of it.

"I need to have you sign this to authorize the prints. We're not arresting you, so we need your permission." Then he sat back and smiled. "I guess you don't know what to sign, do you?" He tapped his chin with his knuckles, thinking.

"Just write your 'x' and I'll sign as a witness. I think that'll pass muster."

He picked up the pen, with his left hand. "I guess I'm left-handed," he said. It was so odd, the way he was learning things about himself, in little pieces. He has a wife. He's left-handed. He has a sense of humor. He looked over the paper and said, "You want me to put the 'x' on the line you marked with an 'x'?"

"Yeah, that's right," said Wilcox, missing the irony. He took back the paper and signed his own name on the witness line. "The other thing is, I'm going to call Adult Protective Services and get one of their people over here. They're just across the street."

"I need protection?" He didn't like the sound of it. It made him feel like some sort of helpless charity case. Maybe he was. But isn't Adult Protective Services for confused old people who are being abused or taken advantage of? And wasn't it interesting that he knew things like that, even without any personal knowledge in his head?

"They're the ones that can help you if it takes a while to establish your identity and get you back to your people. Best case is that you have someone who will be wondering about you already." He looked at his watch. "It's already 9:00, and you're probably expected somewhere by now. Adult Services can get you some food vouchers, and a motel room if you need it in the meantime. Probably a change of clothes too. That okay with you?"

"Okay, go ahead." He wanted out of these clothes. He wanted a shower. He was hungry. A motel room and especially food vouchers sounded good.

"I'll call now, and then we'll get those prints." Wilcox punched in some numbers on the phone, and identified himself when the connection was made. He explained the situation and then hung up and led the way through one of the doors and down a hall and they did the fingerprint thing. Having his fingerprints taken made him feel guilty, in a way, even though there was no reason.

By the time they got back, there was a middle-aged black woman seated in one of the chairs in the office with a little briefcase in her lap.

"Hello Evelyn, thanks for coming. This is John Doe, for the moment." She rose and reached out her hand to him, and he shook it.

"Evelyn Emerson. Nice to meet you," she said. "Sounds like you're in a bit of a situation." She looked smilingly competent.

"You could talk in the interrogation room back there," Wilcox said. "But you probably want to go back to your office. That might be more comfortable."

"Let's do that," she said. "Do you have anything you need to bring with you?"

He picked up his gloves from the chair and said, "This is it. My worldly possessions." He felt much calmer now, like something was finally going to happen, and he could begin to feel like somebody instead of a rootless nobody. He had three people he knew now. Well, four, but Officer Peck didn't count.

Chapter 3

Evelyn Emerson's office was definitely more comfortable. And she was efficient. In no time she'd lined up a motel room, and issued him some vouchers for the motel's restaurant. She asked if he knew his clothes sizes, and he shook his head. She rummaged through a cupboard and found him a fleece-lined windbreaker, a pair of jeans that looked like they would fit, a clean pair of grey sweatpants, and a couple of new colored t-shirts still in their plastic packages. Also a three-pack of underwear, which she chose from the shelf after appraising his behind apologetically. Last she pulled out a plastic bag with a disposable razor and deodorant, and a comb. She put all this in a big plastic bag with handles, and then they sat down on either side of her desk. More forms.

"What should I call you, do you think? John Doe is such a cliché. How about Bob?" She smiled. "My son's name is Bob. After Bob Marley." There was something else he knew. He knew who Bob Marley was. Maybe his memory was intact about everything that wasn't related uniquely to himself.

"I don't know. Bob doesn't sound right, but then neither does anything else. But I did have the feeling for a second at first that my name starts with 'B.' "

"Okay, Mr. B then." She thumbed through some papers on her desk, then looked up. "I think it would be a good idea to have a doctor see you."

"What can a doctor do? I don't want to see a doctor." He didn't think he could stand being questioned again right now. He just needed a shower, and to take a nap to get away from all this. Maybe if he slept, he'd remember everything when he woke up. Maybe by dinner time he'd have his life back.

Evelyn was patient. "It doesn't have to be today. You look healthy enough. This may be psychological amnesia. Sometimes our brains just shut off to protect us from a trauma, or a conflict that can't be solved. But there could be an organic reason, and that's what we'll want to rule out."

"You mean like a brain tumor?"

"A brain tumor is only one possibility. Some sort of stroke, or an atypical migraine. Something we wouldn't know without an examination. The brain is a wonderful, complicated thing. But then, I'm not a doctor." She sounded so matter of fact, talking about a potential disaster inside his skull that way.

"I don't want to think about it right now. I'd rather get cleaned up, and I'm tired and hungry." He had fallen into a pleading tone. He had too much to think about already, and at the same time, this frustrating lack of details. He was suddenly exhausted, and desperate to be alone.

"Of course you would. It can wait. Why don't I drive you to the motel now and you can get some rest."

It occurred to him that he didn't have any idea of the time of year, except it wasn't summer. "What day is this?"

"It's the third of November. A Thursday." Of course it was fall. There had been red and yellow leaves on the trees, and brown ones on the grass in the park.

"What year is it?"

She looked at him consolingly. "It's 2011." And she added, "This must be difficult for you."

"No shit. Excuse the language. You're very kind."

She smiled. "Let's go get you settled in." The phone on her desk rang, and she had a brief conversation.

"That was Sergeant Wilcox. They ran your prints, but no match came up. So at least we know you're not a criminal."

"Or I'm a smart one."

Another of her warm smiles. "Yes, I suppose there's always that possibility."

The motel was over a hill and next to the freeway. As they drove, Evelyn pointed out landmarks as if she were a tour guide, which in a way she was. The historic theater. The library. The college. She seemed to understand he needed orientation.

"This is Interstate 5, and the Canadian border is that way. And this direction you can get to Mexico without a stoplight. Does any of this sound familiar?"

"It's vague, but I have the feeling I knew that."

"Good. That's a start."

Just off the freeway she pulled into the motel parking lot and parked under the carport next to the lobby office. The building had two stories, and a wooden exterior. Black streaks of moss or mold clung to the north side, away from the pale sun that was trying to penetrate a thin layer of fog above them. In the lobby the blue carpet was stained and stretched in places so that it rumpled. A coffee urn stood on a shelf at the edge of the room and on a metal tray there were a few miniature sweet rolls, drying out. He realized he was ravenous. Did he have breakfast before he headed out for his run? He didn't think so. He looked up at a clock over the counter. 10:45 a.m. It seemed like it had been days since he had first found himself in the park.

While Evelyn made arrangements with the turbaned Indian desk clerk, he wandered over and took one of the rolls, and poured a cup of the hours-old black and bitter coffee.

His room was down an inside hallway on the ground floor. Evelyn stood outside his door to say goodbye.

"It's not the grandest of accommodations," she said as she peered into the room. The furniture was dark plastic laminate with no discernible style. The double bed was covered in a garish flowered bedspread. He flipped on the light switch and it didn't improve things that much.

"It's fine. All I need is a shower and a bed. And food."

"Believe it or not they have room service from the restaurant next door. You don't have to go out if you don't want to. There should be a menu here somewhere. You can charge your food to your room and pay with the vouchers when you leave. You have enough to last you for a couple of days, and I can give you more if you need them. Hopefully we'll get you home well before then."

He nodded, but home seemed inconceivable. It felt like this was the only home he had. He pushed away a feeling of doom.

"I'll call to check on you before I leave the office for the day, and you can call me any time. If it's after hours the service will contact me. You're sure you want to be alone? I could stay and have lunch with you."

He was more than ready to be alone. After being questioned by others and coming up with so many blanks, he needed some time to question himself, to make his own acquaintance. Maybe he'd know the right questions to ask that would trigger memories. And if they were gone for good, he needed to think about what that would mean. There was a notion growing in the back of his mind that this could be a good thing. No mental baggage. Fresh start. Did he need one?

"No, alone is fine. But thank you for everything. For helping." He gestured with the plastic bag in his hand with its charitable contents.

She handed him her card. "Keep this handy in case you need me. I'm sure everything will come back soon, but I'm here in the meantime."

She waved back towards him as she headed for the light at the end of the dreary dark hall, and he raised his hand goodbye, closed the door and clicked the deadbolt.

Chapter 4

He opened the blackout drapes for more light and turned to the mirror above the dressing table at the foot of the bed. _Who are you?_ He stared at his unfamiliar reflection. How could he not know what he looked like? Was this really him? Of course it was; no one else was here. He saw the rangy guy he'd glimpsed in the police department door, maybe six feet tall and long limbed. The jacket Evelyn had given him was a little short in the sleeves and exposed the bones of his wrists, and an inch or so of his arms. He took it off.

"Hello," he said to himself in the glass. His hair was sticking out in places and he ran his fingers through it to smooth it. It was a sandy blond color, darker at the roots as if it had been sun-bleached over the summer. His shoulders were broad, and there wasn't much fat on him—just a little roundness at the belly.

"Is that a beer belly?" he asked the reflection, and suddenly a beer sounded good. It probably was a beer belly. He flexed his muscles but it wasn't very impressive. He leaned closer to look at his face. His eyebrows were darker than his hair, and there was the scar over his left eye running vertically through his eyebrow. It looked like he'd run into something or been hit by something hard that had split it open. It wasn't an old scar, still had some redness to it. Maybe he did have a head injury that caused him to forget everything, a delayed reaction.

He didn't know how to judge age, but Officer Peck's guess of mid-thirties sounded about right. The only wrinkles were laugh lines around his eyes. He had a good straight nose, not too big, and he rather liked his mouth. He tried a smile but it was more of a grimace. His teeth were straight, and he pulled his lips back with his fingers. Couldn't they identify people by their dental work? He had only a few fillings in his molars. So, pretty good teeth. And a firm, squarish jaw.

All in all he was satisfied with himself. Not a bad looking fellow, someone he might take a liking to at first sight. Come to think of it, he'd just done that. For the first time since his arrival in the park that morning he felt a bit of comfort in his own skin.

The room service menu was on the dressing table and he perused it, but kept glancing back at himself in the mirror. He picked up the phone and pushed the button that was marked "restaurant," and ordered a BLT and a cola. "Pepsi okay?" asked the voice on the other end. "Fine. And could you charge this to the room, please?"

By the time the food came, brought by a pretty teenage girl wearing an orange uniform and a wary look, he'd been back out to the reception office and picked up an outdated summer issue of a local tourist guide, with a cover story about U-Pick berry farms in the area. It seemed appropriate, since he felt like a visitor here. He'd been thinking about a shower, but the bathtub looked deep and comfortable. He ran it full of hot water while he was eating the sandwich and the potato chips that came with it.

He took off his shoes and then went in the steamy bathroom and stripped off his clothes, dumping them on the floor. He started to step into the tub but there was a tug of curiosity that took him back to the bedroom and the mirror, where he surveyed himself naked. The equipment looked healthy. He turned around to check out his backside, and flexed his buttocks, and then laughed at himself. _I guess I'm a little vain._

The hot water did its work, and he was feeling comfortable and mellow for the first time in recent memory. Very recent memory. After toweling off he got dressed in the new sweat pants and one of the t-shirts, spent some more time communing with his image, and then pulled the pillows out from under the bedspread and flopped on the bed. He stared at the telephone on the bedside table and felt like he should call someone to report in. _I'm here. Come and find me._

He picked up the remote control for the TV and flicked it on, ran through the channels. Soap operas mostly, a giddy talk show host, an old black and white Western series, and the weather channel. He studied the map on the weather channel for a while, and located approximately where he was on the northwest coast. No rain until Sunday. He went around the dial farther and found a movie on HBO. He'd already seen it.

_Wait a minute!_ He sat up, startled. It was a bullfight scene. He remembered the movie was funny. He picked up the little TV guide and found the listing. Matador, 2005. He had no idea how long ago he'd seen it, but it was recent enough to make him feel connected to his own life, and he could actually believe he had a past. He hadn't just spontaneously appeared on the planet.

He clicked off the TV and lay back on the pillow. He closed his eyes and let his mind slide around his memory of the movie, trying to imagine where he'd seen it, and who was with him. And fell asleep.

Chapter 5

When he woke up it all came flooding back. Not his life, not his identity, but the frustrating lack of them. The confusing first day of this existence. Sleep had soothed the shock of it, and it was beginning to feel familiar, and at the same time almost exhilarating. In a way, he was embarking on an exploratory expedition to discover himself.

The light outside was going, and the clock said 4:40. He'd hoped to have been discovered by now. Maybe his wife didn't care enough to call the police when he turned up missing. He turned the wedding ring around on his finger and tugged at it, but still couldn't get it off. He rolled off the bed and went into the bathroom to retrieve the bar of soap from his bath, and worked up some suds in his hands. After a little twisting at the ring he had it off his finger. Back in the bedroom he switched on the bedside light and peered at the inside of the gold circle. There was an inscription.

"Carrie and Brian forever," it said.

Brian. He'd been on the right track with that first impression about his name. Brian didn't sound wrong. He could believe that it was his name. That and the fact that he'd recognized the movie made him feel it could be possible to remember. But it wasn't a robust hope. The gap seemed overwhelmingly large.

His wife, Carrie. For Catherine? Carolyn? This was the first time he'd tried to imagine her. It was the first time he'd believed in her existence, really. Carrie sounded blond, right? He put the ring back on his finger and looked back at the mirror in the dim light, squinting his eyes, trying to picture her on the bed beside him. Why would he forget about a wife? He was full of questions, now that her existence had been made real by the engraving. How long had they been married? Did they have children? Where did they live? Were they happy?

He pulled the phone book out of the drawer in the bedside table and started flipping through the pages. Brian and Carrie who? If he could just come up with the last name he could find the imaginary couple that he was part of. Given enough time, he figured he could read through the whole telephone book, looking at the first names in every listing. There couldn't be that many Brian and Carrie couples.

He tossed the phone book on the bed, frustrated at the immensity of the task. But if something didn't happen soon, it would be something he could try. It made him feel less at the mercy of his circumstances.

He turned on the TV and ran the remote control through its paces again. The local evening news had started. Maybe he could get oriented. The anchors were seated in front of a backdrop of downtown Seattle with the bay behind it, and the Space Needle. A Seattle soldier had been killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq. Of course they interviewed his tearful mother and stoic father, a Vietnam veteran. The young wife declined to be interviewed. The invasiveness of it pissed him off. The broadcast followed up by interviewing local peace activists who announced a candlelight vigil in the fallen soldier's honor.

Canadians were shopping in Washington in bigger numbers, now that the US and Canadian dollars were close to par. A perky brunette with a microphone, bundled up with her coat collar high around her chin as if she were in the far north, was reporting on the scene from Belmont. She strolled through a mall parking lot, pointing out the numerous British Columbia license plates for the camera. With Christmas shopping season on the way, it was good news for the local economy. He strained to see something of the landscape, something familiar, but the camera remained trained on the backs of cars and the parking lot pavement.

He was hungry again. He thought this time he would go out to the restaurant, because he was getting claustrophobic in the cheerless room. He changed to the jeans and put on the jacket. The phone rang, making him jump. He knocked the receiver to the table trying to pick it up.

"Hello."

"Hello Mr. B. It's Evelyn. I was just leaving the office and I wanted to see how you're doing."

"You haven't heard anything?" The disappointment must have been reflected in his voice.

"No, not yet. But you know, I don't think it will take too long. This isn't a big town. Are you holding up all right?" She was a nice woman, reassurance and real concern in her tone.

"Okay, I guess. I slept for a while. But I'm getting stir crazy in here, and I was just about to go out to eat." Then he added, "I'm not complaining. I appreciate everything you've done."

"I could come by on my way home. We could talk a little while you have your dinner."

"You don't have to do that. I'll be fine as soon as I get out in the fresh air." Suddenly he remembered he had something important to tell her. "By the way, I found something out. It seems my name is Brian."

"Did you remember that? That's wonderful!"

"No, actually it's engraved on my wedding ring. And my wife's name is Carrie. We're supposed to be forever. I guess I should call Wilcox and tell him. It's a clue."

"Well, Brian. You have a name. It's a good start. Wilcox is probably off duty by now, but if you like I'll call and have it added to your report. It could help if someone calls in."

"I should have thought of that, but I just discovered it. Thank you."

"You sound as if you're handling this pretty well. I can't imagine what it would be like."

"It's pretty peculiar. But I'm getting used to it a little, I think. In a way it's interesting to be a mystery." He realized this was true. He actually would enjoy having her join him at dinner, but he wasn't going to impose on her outside of her office hours. Which meant that he was beginning to feel competent at coping on his own.

"All right, I'm going to let you go eat. You'll be sure to call my service if you need something tonight? And I'll talk to you in the morning; we'll see where we are."

They said goodbye, and he zipped up his jacket and tucked the meal vouchers in his pocket.

Chapter 6

Brian picked up the last local paper on the rack at the restaurant and spread it out on the table while he waited for his meal. It wasn't much of a paper. It, too, had a feature about the Canadian shopping spree, and reported on the war fatality. He decided to read every article and all the advertising, in case something jogged his memory. And there was a _New York Times_ crossword puzzle in the entertainment section that would keep him busy after that. It could be a memory test, maybe a map of where the holes were and what remained intact in his head. It was interesting that he had knowledge of the war, but the details were fuzzy. The article on the dead Seattle soldier felt like fiction.

By the time his food came he realized he didn't want to be away from the telephone. What if his wife had found out where he was and called, and he wasn't there?

"Could you bring me a container to pack up my food to go? I'm sorry to make it complicated, but I just realized I need to get back to my room for a phone call." The waitress was undismayed.

"Sure Honey, no problem." She was back in a minute with the Styrofoam container and plastic utensils, and a big pile of napkins.

"Do you want to pay up now or charge it to your room?"

"Let's charge it. It's room 124. Thanks." He held up the newspaper. "Don't forget to add this."

Back in the room he checked the message light on the phone, which wasn't blinking. He was relieved and disappointed at the same time.

He spread his meal out on the table in the corner of the room and dawdled over it with the paper. The crossword was difficult and killed an hour, and he still wasn't finished. He was stuck on the upper right hand corner, and the newsprint was wearing out from erasures. It was getting close to 9:00 p.m. and he thought he'd get into bed and watch TV until he could go to sleep.

He'd meant to call Helen Fisher, and report on his progress. The grocery receipt with her phone number was smoothed out and anchored under the phone, but it seemed too late to call. He didn't have that many things to keep track of, and now he'd let that slip by him. He'd call tomorrow, first thing.

Someone knocked on the door. He leaped from the bed and was standing with his hand on the knob in an instant. Then he froze.

Another knock, louder this time. A man's voice was muffled by the door. "Mr. Edwards? Mr. Edwards, are you there?" Wrong room. He was about to open the door and thank the guy for giving him a heart attack, because he could feel it pounding.

Then, a woman's voice. "Brian?"

He yanked open the door. The uniformed policeman had his hand up to knock a third time. Standing behind him was a petite young woman with thick and wavy black hair, cut short with bangs brushing the top of the dark rimmed glasses that looked too big for her face. Her face was delicately formed, heart shaped, pretty. The sort of woman he felt he would be attracted to. She had on a black turtleneck sweater and a pair of blue overalls, with thick-soled black boots. Kind of a bohemian look to her. She looked intelligent. And she was a complete stranger. When she stepped out from behind the policeman he could see, under the baggy overalls, that she was pregnant.

"Mr. Edwards, your wife has been looking for you." Brian didn't even glance at him because his eyes were on her, trying to take her in.

"That's my name? Edwards?" He kept staring at her, looking for something familiar. "Carrie?"

She looked surprised. And then her blue eyes narrowed. "They said you had amnesia. How do you know my name?"

"No. I mean yes, I do. I can't remember anything. But I found your name in my ring." He held his hand up for evidence. This wasn't starting well. She didn't look like the sort of girl you wanted to be on the wrong side of.

"How did you find me? I mean, I'm glad you found me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry if I worried you. I didn't know how to reach you. I didn't even know about you, except for this." And he held up the ring again. He knew was babbling.

"Sir, do you think we could come in?" The cop was stoic and sensible.

"Oh. Of course. Come in." His legs were shaky, and he stumbled back and sank down on the edge of the bed. Then he remembered his manners and stood up again.

"Here, sit down." He pulled a chair out from the dressing table. She put her shoulder bag, which looked too big for her, down on the table and sat. She crossed one leg over the other with her ankle on her knee. The cop stood by the door, looking useless.

"Thank you officer. I think you can go now. I have my car."

"Yes, thank you for bringing her. We'll be okay now." He looked at Carrie for verification, but she was looking at her boot. "Or do I need to sign something?" The policeman wavered, as if he wasn't sure he should go, and then he stepped over and shook Brian's hand.

"Good luck to you. Glad to be of service." He turned to Carrie. "Good luck, ma'am. I'm glad you found your husband." And he left, closing the door behind him.

Chapter 7

There was silence. "Well," Brian started out. "Well." He didn't know where to go from there. "You start." It was all he could think of.

She frowned. He looked at her, this complete stranger who was apparently his wife, and he felt helpless. Where would they go from here? He didn't know her at all. He just barely knew himself. She probably knew everything there was to know about him. And she didn't seem that happy to see him, so maybe it wasn't all good.

She shook her head. Her elbow was on the dressing table and she rested her forehead on her hand. She might have been on the verge of crying, or about to scream at him, but he couldn't tell. It didn't seem that she was preparing to embrace him. He just waited.

"Okay," she finally said. "This is very weird. You really don't remember anything?"

"Nothing. I was running in a park, this morning, and all of a sudden it was like I just sort of arrived, and I couldn't remember. Anything. I didn't know where I was or who I was. I still don't. Well, I know who I am. Edwards? Is that my name? I know I'm Brian. I got that from the ring too. So that's what I know. Our names. And that we're in Belmont, which I don't remember either. Nothing is familiar."

"How did you get here?" She indicated the woeful room, waving her hand.

"I went to the police. A woman in the park called them for me on her cell phone. And they hooked me up with a social worker who got this room for me." He reached in his jacket pocket. "And gave me coupons for food. I didn't have any money. How did you find me?"

"I called the police. At first I thought you were still at work. Or out on one of your mysterious errands."

I have mysterious errands?

"I got home from work late and started dinner. When you didn't show up I checked the voice mail. There were calls from the office all day, wanting to know where you were. Lou sounded upset because you missed some important meetings. But there was no message from you."

"Lou is my boss?"

"No, Andrea is your boss. Lou is her flunky." She looked at him, seeming to be puzzling it through, but still doubting. "You really don't remember? You don't remember work either?"

He spread his hands out in a helpless gesture, apologetically.

"Then I found your wallet and car keys on the dresser in your room, and I went out and looked in the garage and your car was there. That's when I knew you never came back from your run after I left this morning."

Why did she say "your room"? But everything else felt so strange he let the question slide by for the moment.

"I thought maybe you'd had a heart attack. Or got hit by a car. So I called the hospital but they gave me the runaround. Then I called the police. When I said your name was Brian they told me about a guy with amnesia, but at first I couldn't believe it was you. I don't know why. Maybe it was too weird a story to believe."

She looked at him accusingly, as if weird, unbelievable stories were his habit, and her automatic response was doubt. She was frowning through the telling, as if she were angry about his going missing. In spite of the fact he couldn't help it.

"They had your description and knew your name was Brian, and that you'd been running this morning, so I had to believe it. I went down to the police department and they brought me here."

"Did you turn off the stove?"

"What?"

"You said you'd started dinner. Did you turn off the stove?"

She flared up. "You are a crazy man! Of course I turned off the stove."

"Sorry, I was just following the story and it made me wonder. It was a missing piece." Why did he say that? Because missing pieces were all he had? He didn't want to make her mad. Madder.

Then he added, "I'm just trying to make some sense of this whole thing." Words were starting to seem pointless somehow. They sat there, both looking at the same spot on the floor between them.

After a few moments she looked up. "Do you want to go home?" She looked straight into his eyes, and he could see it was a serious question. As if there were any question about it for him. What, he would rather stay here?

"Yes, I want to go home. I want to see my home. Maybe it will help me remember."

"But you don't remember me."

"No, I don't. But can I say something?"

"What do you want to say? Go ahead." She stuck her chin out in a sort of challenge, or as if waiting for a blow.

"You're very beautiful. Really. I think I'm a lucky man, even if I can't remember."

And then she laughed. It was a rueful laugh, but it was real, and he was flooded with relief.

"You are definitely Brian," she said, "Even if you have lost your mind."

Chapter 8

They checked him out at the motel office. The Indian man was still there, and he grinned happily at Brian, lots of white teeth in his dark face, when he saw the lady who had picked him up. Brian wondered what Evelyn had told him earlier. "Short stay," he said.

Carrie's car was a dusty, older, VW bug, with dried rain splatters on its exterior. Not one of the new models, but from a few decades ago. Who could tell which year? It seemed right, though. It fit with the overalls and boots. She lifted a pile of papers from the passenger seat and put them on top of other papers that were already in sloppy, sliding stacks on the back seat. He wondered if she'd be able to find them again.

"Work?" he asked, indicating the floating filing cabinet.

"Yes. And the thesis." She didn't elaborate, and in the dark he had no idea what the papers were about. He put his plastic bag of donated belongings on the floor behind his feet.

His knees were pressed into the dashboard and she pointed out the lever to slide the seat back a little. She drove with her seat as far forward as possible, her breasts almost touching the steering wheel

She zipped the car into the flow of traffic to the nearest intersection and drove up a hill, the car straining as she shifted down to help it along. They wound past the college campus Evelyn had pointed out on the way to the motel. Bundled up students stood talking on the sidewalk. It had turned very chilly, the clouds having dissipated leaving a clear sky. There were still a few runners in t-shirts and shorts along the edge of the road. It made him cold to see them.

At the crest of the hill they descended a few blocks towards the water. In the clear air he could see the lights on the masts of sailboats anchored in the harbor, and more light coming from a big pier at the far side. _I like living where I can see the water_ , he thought. Carrie whipped around a couple more corners in a residential district with a mix of big old homes and smaller ones.

He was sure she was driving above the speed limit, but he admired her aplomb, and tried not to look nervous or grab hold of anything. He did wedge his shoulder against the door to keep from being swung from side to side in the turns.

Finally the car turned into the driveway of one of the less splendid houses, a bungalow with an enclosed front porch. A lamp glowed in an upper dormer window in what must be an attic room. He liked it. That was good, because apparently it was where he lived. Carrie pulled the car halfway up to a detached garage and braked abruptly, throwing him forward a little. He heard the papers in the back seat start to slide, and she reached back to catch them.

"Damn." She pushed the piles back into shape. Did she always drive with such a slapdash air?

"We're here."

"Is that where my car is?" He pointed at the garage in front of them.

"Yes. Your pride and joy." She looked over at him. "Do you remember what it is?"

"No. I don't have any idea. I like my car?"

"You love your car," she said, dragging out the word "love" with a sarcastic edge. She seemed to want to play a game, which involved making fun of him. He didn't mind. He thought about cars, and looked in his mind for one that elicited a feeling of longing. He noticed he knew about cars.

"Is it a Porsche?" She shook her head. "An MG? Thunderbird?" Maybe it was her ancient Bug that had him thinking older cars. She kept her head going back and forth with each guess. For a few seconds there she was acting almost giddy. Or maybe she was as anxious as he was. She must be wondering what she was going to do with him, now that he was mentally crippled.

"No, you're not even close. It's one of the newer ones."

"I give up."

"It's a Lexus. Loaded. You bought it a month ago."

"I guess we have money," he said.

He was disappointed. Why did he buy a car like that? It didn't seem to have any character. He didn't feel connected to it. But then, that had been his experience with everything since he first discovered himself in the park this morning.

Carrie led the way around the front walk while digging her keys out of her bag, and opened the door to the glassed-in porch that served as a protected entryway to the house front door. She flipped a light switch and an overhead bulb illuminated the porch, which was roomy, and had stained glass medallions hanging in the side windows. There was a pot of gerbera daisies in their final effort of the season on a table on one side, with a green painted wicker chair beside it. A clean ashtray was on the table. He didn't think he smoked. He would have had cravings by now. Carrie fumbled and rattled at the front door, which seemed to be sticking.

"Do you smoke?" It felt like an impertinent question as soon as it came out of his mouth, and besides, she hadn't smelled like cigarettes in the car. More like something herbaceous.

"No. That's for Sandra when she visits. You know she can't last for an hour without one."

"Sandra. Who is that?" She gave him a surprised look as she gave the door an extra shove with her knee to get it open.

"Oh god, we'll have to call Sandra in the morning. Sandra is your mother. This is going to push her over the edge! She's been having a hard enough time as it is."

It was funny, he hadn't thought about having parents until now. And now he had a chain-smoking mother named Sandra who was teetering on the brink of something.

Welcome to my world.

He followed her into the living room, the parlor, whatever it was called, and she flopped her bag on the couch and turned to face him. He looked around, at the wall of bookcases and two comfortable looking upholstered chairs flanking the couch, a big square coffee table, and wood floors that were mostly glowing with a good dark finish, and only a little wear in the traffic areas.

"Well? Is anything familiar?" He shook his head. He wished it did. He liked the room, though. It felt like it could be home. Carrie looked a little let down, as if she'd been hoping too.

"I guess you wouldn't remember this, either. This is the house you grew up in. We bought it from your parents three years ago."

It hit him hard. His whole life history was here, really. Not just his householder married life with Carrie, but all of it. And he was just a stranger visiting. How could it be that nothing touched this blank place in his mind? For the first time he felt hopelessness, but it wasn't something he wanted to share if he could help it.

Chapter 9

"Do you want a cup of coffee or a beer? We can sit in the kitchen. I guess there are things we should talk about, things to figure out." She was so businesslike, so in-charge of their situation, he followed her without question. Even in the shapeless overalls, he could see the curve of her nice round behind.

"A beer would be good, if you don't mind."

The kitchen had a cloth-covered table against the back window, overlooking the back yard and a wooden deck that looked new in the glow of the porch light. The lot was deep and there were trees. He looked forward to seeing it in daylight.

Brian sat at the table while Carrie pulled two microbrews from the refrigerator, popped the caps with an opener attached to the side of the cupboard by the sink, and delivered them to the table. They simultaneously lifted their bottles and automatically clinked them together, which felt like an unexpected gift of solidarity. He smiled, but then he frowned a question, and pointed to her belly, a subject they hadn't yet touched on.

"Should you . . . ?"

She didn't seem to resent the intrusion. "Doctor approved," she said, "as long as I limit it. She's past the danger point. And you have to admit this is an unusual occasion."

"She?" At least he had some time to get used to the idea of a daughter.

"Well, I don't really know that. I asked them not to tell me. But that's how I think of her." She rubbed her hand over her middle and gave it a friendly pat, like it was a puppy on her lap.

"This is the strangest situation. It's like being in a movie," Carrie said. "I don't think I believe it yet." She shook her head. "There's so much you don't know!"

"Pretty much everything, actually. You're being very calm. I appreciate it." He held the bottle up in sort of salute. "And hospitable too, to a stranger." He took a long draught from it and set it on the table.

"You mentioned my mother."

"Sandra. Yes." She took the time before going on to pull off her boots and clunk them to the floor in the corner behind her chair. Her socks were orange and purple plaid with green lines in them. He wanted to laugh but her face had gone serious.

"I feel like I'm breaking the news all over again." She paused for a minute and took a breath. "Your father died two months ago. He'd been in hospice for months, with metastasized lung cancer. I'm sorry."

It felt like a story belonging to someone else, but still it jolted him. He couldn't put in words what it meant to him, but it was something final. The end of something that would never be again, whether or not his memory returned.

She went on. "Your mother had a hard time visiting him in hospice. It's my opinion that it was because she still smokes. He desperately wanted her to quit. She would only stay a few minutes at a time. She knew she was leaving before he wanted her to, but I don't think she could help it. She said she didn't want to cry in front of him. She's been crying a lot, and I think she's drinking more than usual."

"Does she live near here?"

"Out in the county. She and your dad sold us this house and built a retirement cabin the other side of Eagle. About three years ago, before he got sick." He looked blank, and she pointed to the northeast. "It's about forty-five miles."

He didn't feel ready to cope with an emotional mother who was also a stranger to him. The idea overwhelmed him. Carrie was different. Even though it felt like something between them had a bitter edge to it, she seemed focused on the practical challenges of care-taking a damaged husband. He was grateful, and for the moment he was comfortable in her hands -- to the extent that he was comfortable.

But the task seemed so large. A whole life to be reconstructed! And what he had learned so far felt as though it was about someone else, a theoretical character that was only his shadow.

"You know," he said to Carrie, "Sitting here with you, I don't feel quite real. I know this is my house, my kitchen, but I don't know it. You're sort of like my tour guide in a country I've never been to. I know you didn't sign up for this."

She sipped at her beer and looked at him with that same piercing, questioning look she'd been wearing from the beginning. He'd made her laugh once. He wished he knew how to make her do it again. How to make this even fun for her, since she was stuck with him. They could play Twenty Questions, the way they had about his car. It was a silly idea. Maybe he was a silly person, but he didn't think she had much silliness in her. She seemed purposeful, composed, responsible.

"There's more beer if you want another one." She inclined her head towards his empty bottle and then towards the refrigerator. He must have finished that one fast. Or maybe he hadn't. Time was a little out of whack. He took her invitation and went to the refrigerator. He paused to see what else was in there. It wasn't that he was hungry; it was more like research. A big container of Greek yogurt. That must be hers, because it didn't call to him. A bag of apples. Several jars of organic sauces: pasta sauce, something Indian, something Thai. Lots of vegetables in the crisper, greens on the left, broccoli and root vegetables on the right. Organic eggs, organic milk, and what was probably organic cheese. And a plastic bag of salami. What were the odds that it was his?

He popped his beer open and returned to the table.

"Maybe we need a system for this." She chewed on her lip. "There are things you'll need to know right away. Like your job, especially. You'll have to do something about work. Let them know what's happened. Do you want to listen to your messages? I saved them."

He knew he wanted to put that off. His job. He scrabbled around in his mind looking for a clue. She'd found his dress shirt waiting for him on his bed, so he was probably a businessman, or a professional. Unless he was a computer or copier repairman. But he had a fancy car, and she had said he missed some meetings today.

"Oh boy, I don't know if I'm ready for that. Where do I work? What do I do? I don't have a clue."

"You're a lawyer, Brian. You work for Halstrom-Pierce. They're importers. You negotiate contracts and handle lawsuits. Or prevent lawsuits. You're very good at it."

"I'm not going to be much good to them this way, am I? Do you know them, the people I work with?"

"I know Andrea and Lou, slightly. You took me to a couple of parties. I was introduced to other people too, but I don't remember much about them. I didn't exactly fit in." She acted like she didn't mind that, maybe that it was her preference in fact. Like she didn't have much interest in his work, and she'd done her duty by showing up at an office party at all. "And I sort of know your secretary, Jenna, but just on the phone." He found that he was attending closely to her words and expressions, looking for clues about her opinion of him, wanting to keep it on the positive side of the ledger if he could. Maybe that was one of his negotiating skills, observing people, looking for leverage, managing relationships.

A question popped into his head. "Did you put me through law school?"

She gave him a curious look. "How did you know that?"

"It just seemed like the sort of thing you'd do. I don't know why. I've only known you for . . ." He looked up at the clock over the refrigerator, "Less than two hours."

"Yes, I did. And now you're putting me through grad school. I work part-time too."

"Grad school for what?"

"Comparative literature. I'm working on my dissertation. And I'm a teaching assistant."

"What did you do to support us when I was in school?"

"Stripper," she said, straight-faced.

He rocked back in his chair and stared at her. "What?"

She laughed. That was the second time he'd seen that mouth fully curved up.

"Just kidding. Sorry. I couldn't help it. You're a pretty easy mark right now, do you realize that? I could tell you anything, couldn't I?"

He was embarrassed by his reaction, but he smiled. Her amusement made him happy. He didn't mind at all that it was at his expense. "So what did you do, really?"

"I was an administrative assistant in the UW English department. A clerk with a fancy title. It paid the bills. You had a scholarship too, and a student loan."

"Is that your school up the hill?"

"That's where I teach, but I'm getting the Ph.D. from UW. I've finished the course work. Just the dissertation left, and I'm closing in on that."

He'd already been sure she was brainy. Brainy and beautiful. And funny too. Why didn't he feel one hundred percent lucky?

Chapter 10

It was the law of diminishing returns. The more they talked, the less he could take in. But she gamely sketched his biography for him. He grew up in this house, and his father had been a highway engineer for the state of Washington. He had a younger sister named Elaine, living now in Arizona. He and Carrie met at the University and lived together until they both graduated, the same year. Then they married and he started law school. He worked for a Seattle firm for a while and when Halstrom-Pierce recruited him, they came back to Belmont and bought this house from his parents. That was three years ago.

He didn't have a third beer, and Carrie had switched to water. He decided to wait until morning to think about work, and how in the world he was going to handle it.

"I'm teaching an early seminar tomorrow," she said, "And I don't think I can get a substitute this late." They both looked at the clock. It was after 11:00. "I'm usually in bed by 10:00. What do you think? Will you be able to sleep now?"

"It's a tossup. My body's exhausted and my mind is still spinning. I might as well try."

She slid her chair back and stood up, pressed her hands to the small of her back, and arched it, stretching. She rolled her head around to loosen the tension in her neck. As her head dropped forward, her thick dark hair fell over her face. He watched her move her body with fascination, and growing desire. Her breasts were larger than you would expect for her small frame. Maybe that was the pregnancy. He felt like a peeping Tom, or a gawky, horny adolescent.

It hit him suddenly that bedtime meant bed. What would it be like to go to their bed together? There was a little thrill of the illicit, mixed in with shy confusion. And yet, this was his wife. A more appealing dilemma than what to do about work, that was for sure.

He hadn't seen anything of the house besides the walk through the living room and dining room on the way to the kitchen. Carrie led him down the hall from the living room. There were four doors. She pointed to the one at the end of the hall.

"That's the master bedroom," she said. She tapped one of the nearest doors and added, "The bathroom is here." She opened another and switched on the light. The room was crowded with a big old desk, bookshelves, a filing cabinet and a reading chair under a lamp.

"This is your study. Mine's upstairs." She pointed to a stairwell that opened off the hall and led to the attic.

She left the study door open and opened the one across the hall. "This is your room. I'm down there." She pointed at the door to the master bedroom. She said it with matter-of-fact firmness. She could have been his landlady. He remembered then that she had said "your room" when they were back at the motel. He'd forgotten that. At least it solved the problem of approaching their bed together when he hardly knew her, but what was going on? He looked at her with the question on his face.

"We're not sleeping together right now." She wasn't exactly apologetic, but she looked flustered. "It's complicated. We can talk about it later." His disappointment was only one of his feelings, and it passed quickly, replaced by the sense of being overwhelmed by all the unanswered questions he had to deal with.

He remembered her wariness when she first came to his motel room door. She had seemed prepared not to believe him. What had he done to cause her to banish him to the guest room?

They hadn't touched each other yet. Was that against the rules now? He wanted to reach out and make some physical contact, but he didn't know how.

"I guess there's a lot I don't know yet." He was drained. All he wanted now was to sleep. He could face the rest of it in the morning.

"I think you'll be able to find everything you need." Then her mouth went into a wry smile and she said, "Make yourself at home." She stood in front of him for a moment, as if she was conflicted about leaving him standing here.

"Thank you," he said.

"Good night. I'll see you in the morning." And then she reached up and quickly brushed his cheek with her fingertips. He stopped himself from grabbing her hand. It was already more than he'd expected. She turned and went to her bedroom door, and closed it behind her.

Alone in his room, he looked around. There were two twin beds, and he pulled back the bedspread on the one where his shirt was still waiting for him from this morning and found there were no sheets. He patted the bedspread and pillow back into shape and drew back the cover on the other one. His keys and wallet were on top of the dresser like Carrie had said. He took the wallet and sat on the bed, unlaced his shoes and pried them off his feet with his heels while he opened it and looked through it. A wad of cash, mostly twenties. His driver's license photo looked back at him blankly. No message for him there, except there was his birth date, May 12, 1977. Evelyn had said it was 2011 now, November. That made him thirty-four years old. Well, that was something he hadn't known before. And it looked like his license would expire on his next birthday.

Two credit cards, an ATM card, and a frequent flyer card. A health plan card. In one slot were a number of business cards, and he thumbed through them, but none of them except a few from Halstrom-Pierce rang a bell. "Brian Edwards, Legal." That was him. Lou Mueller and Andrea Angeli -- Carrie had mentioned them. He turned the stack of cards over and looked at the backs. One had an inked phone number and a smiley face. He looked at the front. It was also from Halstrom-Pierce, with the name "Katherine Wells, Benefits" in the lower right corner. Who was Katherine Wells? In with the currency was an ATM receipt for a $300 withdrawal. It was an efficient wallet, no stray receipts or scraps of paper.

That put him in mind of the grocery receipt with Helen Fisher's number and he felt around in his jacket pocket for it and put it and Evelyn Emerson's card on his bedside table to remind him to call them in the morning. He peeled off his borrowed jeans, tossed them on the bed with his shirt, and rummaged through dresser drawers until he found some flannel pajama bottoms. Across the hall in the bathroom, a lone toothbrush, probably his, was in a holder on the back of the sink. He watched himself in the mirror as he brushed. He wanted to make a connection with the man who had taken this face for granted yesterday, but he was still a stranger. He touched his scarred eyebrow. _Remember to ask Carrie what happened._

He used the toilet and put the seat back down, the way someone must have taught him, and padded back to the bedroom. There was a book lying face down and open on the bedside table, and he picked it up. A mystery. He guessed he'd have to start that over at the beginning. Like everything else in his life.

It could all wait for tomorrow. He turned off the overhead light at the door switch and found his way into bed by the streak of light that crept in under the window shade. He was asleep in five minutes.

Chapter 11

He woke slowly, with a vague sense that something was wrong, which built until he was sitting upright in bed remembering the forgetting. So, it was real, and there was another day to face. There was a clock by the bed that glowed 7:15 and it was getting light in the room. A reconnoitering of the closet netted a terry robe, and he went across the hall to the bathroom and then followed the light from the kitchen. Carrie looked up from the newspaper. A cup of coffee was on the table next to her. She searched his face.

"Anything?"

"No. Sorry."

"You'll need your coffee," she said, and pointed to the stainless steel carafe in the coffeemaker. "Did you sleep?" Her mouth was full of toast, and she licked some jam from her lip.

"Oh yeah, I slept. I was afraid I'd be awake all night thinking. You?"

"I slept okay. I was just about to knock on your door. I have to leave in about twenty minutes. Students waiting. I should be back by 11:00." He poured himself a cup of coffee in a mug she'd left out for him and sat down opposite her.

"There's cereal above the stove when you're ready for breakfast, and bread in the big drawer there," Carrie said, "but I'm sure you can find things on your own. Do you know how to listen to your messages? Come to think of it, you have the cell phone -- they probably called that number too."

"Is there an answering machine?" He hadn't seen one, but there was a telephone on the end of the kitchen counter.

"No, it's voice mail. You dial *98 to access them. I saved them for you. I don't think anyone will be in the office before 9:00 though. Do you know what you are going to say?"

"That's what I've been wondering. I guess just the bald truth. 'Sorry, I don't seem to remember you. Or me.'" His laugh didn't have much humor in it. "Who should I call, do you think? You know them better than I do."

"Probably Lou. Two of the calls were from him, and then Andrea. Lou first, I'd think. Do you have the number?"

"Yes, from the business cards in my wallet."

Carrie was wearing the same sweater and overalls as last night, and she had one foot planted on her chair and an arm wrapped around her knee. She obviously wasn't clumsy pregnant yet, and she looked very young this morning, with her hair still uncombed and no lipstick.

"My driver's license says I'm thirty-four. How about you?" Then he added with a tentative smile, "If that's not too personal."

"I'll be thirty-four too, next month." She put her foot back down on the floor. This morning her socks were red and blue striped. She pulled the boots out from behind her chair, where she'd left them last night, and tugged them on. He didn't want her to go yet.

"You don't look it. I think you lie about your age." She smiled a little.

"I got the photo album out for you," she said. "I thought looking at it might jog some memories. There are a few pictures from your childhood, but your mom has most of those. This album is mostly our pictures. It's on the coffee table in the living room."

"I can't believe how you're handling this," he said. "You're so calm and sensible." She looked at him with surprise.

"What do you think you would do if it was reversed?" She frowned at him. "Exactly the same thing, try to help. Really, Brian, I'm not that special." She seemed almost irritated. Maybe he was laying it on a little thick.

"Okay," he said. "I'll just take you for granted then. But here's another thing. About my mom." He grimaced. "Do you think we need to call her today? Or will she be upset if we wait until after I get the work thing dealt with? Will she call while you're gone? Maybe I shouldn't answer the phone." He felt ashamed as soon as he heard himself, sounding like a panicky kid, making excuses, trying to put off a responsibility. He shook his head ruefully. "Listen to me. What a wuss! Afraid of my own mother."

"No, you're right. Unless she calls, you can talk to her tomorrow." She corrected herself. "We can talk to her. She probably won't call. Sometimes she just comes by if she's in town shopping." Carrie contemplated it. "She's sort of vulnerable right now. Tell you what. I'll call her when I get home and invite her to dinner tomorrow."

This time he kept his mouth shut about how wonderful she was. She looked up at the clock again. "I have to go." She grabbed her bag and took out a hairbrush on her way to the door, and was gone.

He followed her path to the front door and opened it, watching her back the car out of the drive, glad to see she looked both ways before she gunned the motor and tore down the street. He frowned though, when she only slowed at the stop sign before careening around the corner and up the hill towards the college.

Chapter 12

He stepped out onto the porch to look at his neighborhood in the daylight. His bare feet were cold on the painted wooden floor. The houses on either side were on a par with theirs, older, one-storied with attic dormers, but in good condition with nicely landscaped yards. Across the street the places were more impressive, and were set up higher on the hill behind steep, beautifully landscaped front yards that came down to the level of the sidewalk. They too were vintage, each with its own character and style. Being near the college, he suspected some of these homes had been built for faculty administration and bigwigs.

Back in the house he looked at the layout. The front door opened into the living room, and to the right was a good-sized dining room with windows facing the street. The kitchen was behind it and he went back and poured another cup of coffee. A small utility room opened from the kitchen to a back door that led to the deck he'd seen last night. From the deck, the yard sloped down to trees that were almost bare, only a few brown leaves clinging. They looked like fruit trees.

Then he went down the bedroom hall, and stood at the door of the master bedroom. He wanted to go in, but something stopped him. He felt like a guest, and if he snooped, he would feel guilty when Carrie got home. He didn't want any more barrier between them than what was apparently already there.

He'd been putting off listening to his messages, but now he had to face up to it. He forced himself to go to the phone in the kitchen, and he punched in the *98 code without even thinking about it. It was automatic. _Huh! My fingers remember things._ The recorded service ran through his messages.

9:30 a.m. (A man's voice) "Brian, where are you? We're waiting the meeting for you. You better be on your way!"

10:15 a.m. "Brian, it's Lou. What's going on? We did what we could without you, and we've rescheduled for 11:30. Andrea has to catch a plane after lunch. Where the hell are you? Call me. Your cell is switched off. I left a message there too."

12:12 p.m. A pause, a breath, then a click.

2:12 p.m. "OK Brian, obviously something is wrong. Andrea is pissed. I just got back from taking her to the airport. We have to get the contract ready for the Monday meeting with Fitzhugh. Get in touch as soon as you get this message!"

4:23 p.m. "Brian, Andrea. I'm in Portland. You've really left us in the lurch. There better be a damn good reason. Call Lou. If you're dead, I'm sorry as hell. If you're not, you might as well be." The receiver banged down.

Well, Andrea sounded like a lot of fun. There was one more call where no one said anything, a few minutes after 5:00.

He went looking for his cell phone. It was behind the clock on the bedside table in his bedroom. He turned it on and, once he figured out how to access them, listened to essentially the same messages from Lou on that one. There were four other messages, all from yesterday. One was a reminder for a haircut appointment that he had missed. The first of the others was at 12:10.

"Brian, I've been waiting for you at Anthony's for ten minutes. I guess you had a meeting this morning since you weren't at the office. You could have told me. You didn't forget me, did you?" The woman's voice was both playful and accusatory. "Call me if you're held up. I'm going to go ahead and order. Bye."

And the same voice at 12:52. "I don't know what happened to you. Why didn't you at least call? You've got my cell number. I might as well go back to the office. You missed a good lunch." She sounded irritated. Then she switched to a sultry suggestive tone, " . . . And that's not all."

It freaked him out. He looked at the number displayed on the caller ID. His wallet was still on the bed and he opened it to pull out the business cards again. It was the same as the number on the back of Katherine Wells card. In a panic his finger hit the delete button. _Shit!_ He was involved in an office affair!

There was still the last message, at 10:00 p.m., from the same number, Katherine Wells' number. He took a deep breath before he listened to it. The woman's voice was angry this time. "Okay, I've been waiting all evening for you to call and explain why you stood me up at lunch. Where were you today anyway, that you couldn't just pick up the phone? You could have had the decency to let me know you couldn't come! I'm going to bed now, but call me when you get this message, even if it's the middle of the night."

He paced the room, trying to make the messages sound like something innocent, but he couldn't manage any other explanation. Maybe she was just a flirt. Maybe nothing had happened yet. But he didn't believe it. _How could I do that?_ He shuddered.

Was this why he was consigned to the guest room? He thought of Carrie's intense doubting look when she came to the motel. He remembered her comment about his "mysterious errands." Maybe she just suspected something. Last night she'd touched his cheek. He didn't think she hated him. But whatever this was with Katherine Wells needed to be over as of now. He didn't need more complications. And although he couldn't remember how it had happened, he was pretty sure it had been a mistake.

In a way it felt like the forgetting was a gift. At least in his own mind, he could start fresh. Still, in the real world he would have to do some cleaning up after himself, and for now he didn't have the first idea what that was going to entail or where to start.

Chapter 13

It was almost 9:00 and he wanted to call the office before they called him. He took Lou's business card to the kitchen telephone and dialed the main number. An automated menu recording started but immediately a real person answered.

"Halstrom-Pierce. How may I direct your call?"

"Lou Mueller, please."

"I'll connect you." He waited while the phone rang four times, then the line clicked and Lou's recorded voice said, "This is Lou Mueller. I'm out of the office but I'll be back at 9:00 a.m. on Friday, November 4. Leave a message; I'll call you back."

This was better. He could ease into it.

"Hello Lou, this is Brian. I'm really sorry about yesterday. Something complicated has come up. Call me at home."

He'd been thinking about what to say, how to tell them. He wanted to sound normal, even though he wasn't. Since they were waiting for him and then rescheduling meetings to accommodate him, it sounded as if his role was critical and he hated the idea of letting people down. But on the other hand, right now there was nothing he could do.

He poured another cup of coffee and put a piece of whole wheat bread in the toaster. Before it popped up the phone rang. He took a deep breath and then he picked it up and said hello.

"What the fuck, Brian, what's going on there? We tried to find you all day yesterday! Andrea is having a fit. We need that Fitzhugh contract finished for the Monday meeting. You know that."

"I heard that on your messages. I'm really sorry to have just disappeared. Listen, Lou, this is going to be hard for you to believe." He took a breath and plunged. "I've lost my memory."

"What? What does that mean?" He sounded furious. "You forgot we had a meeting?"

"I've forgotten everything. The meeting. My job. My wife. I've forgotten who I am, Lou. My whole life." It sounded crazy to him too.

"Are you saying you have amnesia? You woke up in the morning and you didn't know who you were? Like in the movies? You can't expect me to believe that! Did you get hit on the head or something? Did you take some drug?"

"No, I actually woke up in the park. I was running. I already told you it would be hard to believe. Listen, I don't even know you, Lou. You're just a name on a card and a voice on the telephone. I know your name, and I know Andrea's name." He almost said Katherine too, but caught himself in time. How would he explain that?

"I know I'm a lawyer, and that I work there. Carrie told me that. All I know right now is what Carrie has told me."

Lou was silent on the other end of the phone.

"I don't know what to do next, Lou. About work, I mean. It's all gone. I have no idea when it's going to come back, or if it is."

Lou had found his voice. "If you're shitting me, man, you're dead."

"I'm not shitting you. Those are the true facts. I came to in the park, I had to go to the police and get fingerprinted, and then I got taken to a crummy motel, and finally last night Carrie realized I was missing and called the police and tracked me down. Now I'm home, and it's all strange. I don't even remember Carrie. Do you know Carrie?"

Lou was coming around. "Yeah, I know Carrie, and if you've forgotten her you really are in trouble. This is the most fucking bizarre story I've ever heard. Jesus, what are we going to do now?"

"I wish I could help with that. I really do. But I don't have a clue."

"Have you been to the doctor? Maybe they can fix it."

"I didn't get home until last night. I guess I have to do that next. Find out if I have a brain tumor or something that caused it. Find out if it's temporary, for one thing."

"How are we going to explain this to Corporate? You're the one who's been handling the Fitzhugh thing, and you don't remember it?"

"No. Maybe you should tell them I died suddenly. It's close to the truth. Did I leave papers behind?"

"Right, the files. I'll go to your office and collect them. After I call Andrea in Portland. Oh God, I hate to call Andrea and tell her this. At least I won't have to see her face when she hears. Listen buddy, I'm going to hang up now and try to salvage this thing. You call me after you go to the doctor. I can't fucking believe this."

When Brian hung up he was somewhat relieved. Until he'd found out about Katherine, it was the biggest problem he'd had to face. He shoved aside that thought as far back as he could for the time being and buttered his toast.

He wanted to spend time with the album Carrie got out for him, but first he needed to call Helen Fisher, his rescuer, to tell her he was found. She answered on the first ring and he thanked her again for her help and told her about his last twenty-four hours. It had been only twenty-four hours? It already felt like a month.

"I hope to see you in the park again soon," she said, after he'd filled her in.

"Me too. You're my oldest friend right now." And he laughed, because that was true. "I just want to make sure I know the way home before I go out running again."

"What is your wife like?"

"She's very nice, very smart, very pretty. And pregnant."

"How lovely. What a nice thing to come home to."

Chapter 14

For a man with no history, it seemed he had a lot of things to do. His final call for now was to Evelyn Emerson, who had already heard from Wilcox that he'd been found. He thanked her again and promised to drop by sometime soon to return her C.A.R.E. package so that someone else could make use of the things he hadn't needed.

Then he opened the blinds of the front window in the living room for the morning light, and turned on the lamp by the couch. He opened the album to the first pages of photos. These must be his family when he was young. There was a handsome young blond woman in a shirtwaist dress smiling for the camera and holding up a fat baby who was squinting in the sunlight. Another picture of the same woman with a towheaded toddler on her lap and a tall, serious-faced man with glasses and a shock of dark hair, sitting on a couch, his arm around her. They could have been anyone's family, but of course they had to be his, and that baby was himself. In the next picture he had sprouted up and was holding the hand of a chubby blond girl with her finger up her nose. This would be his sister Elaine. He wondered if she knew this picture existed. A few photos traced his childhood and teen years, including a prom night snapshot of him with a grinning blond girl, a corsage at her shoulder, the two of them wearing matching braces on their teeth. His gawky awkwardness and those braces probably meant some time earlier than the senior prom.

There were only a few more pictures here. The last was a picture of his parents, not so young now, his father's hairline receded, sitting at a table in a restaurant with highball glasses in front of them, both smiling with their heads tipped towards each other for the camera, and a banner behind them that said "Happy Twenty-Fifth Anniversary!" There were cigarettes in an ashtray on the table with smoke curling up between them.

He studied all the faces, looking for a hint of familiarity, but he struck out.

Carrie hadn't mentioned there were pictures from her childhood as well, but when he turned the page the first thing he saw was a studio photograph of a serious-faced little girl with plump knees and elbows in a pink pinafore, a mop of dark curls around her delicate face, and two older boys who were probably her brothers. In a snapshot, she was slouched, crossways, in an upholstered chair, her legs dangling over one arm and her feet twisted together, her head inclined to a book.

The rest of the album was a record of Brian and Carrie, often along with people who were no doubt their friends, but strangers to him now. There were parties, ski trips, and gatherings around campfires among sleeping bags and duffels. In the pictures they were all young, carefree and laughing. He had a pang of longing to have been part of it. He was there in the pictures, but now it seemed as if he had missed the best part of his life.

The pictures dwindled after college life. There were only a few pages of photos after one of him and Carrie standing side by side, posed in their caps and gowns in front of a campus fountain. There was one snapshot of the two of from their wedding. Carrie's hair was piled on top of her head with a crown of flowers and ribbons, and her dress was soft and clung to her curves. He was grinning, his hand at her waist pulling her close to him. There was probably a wedding album somewhere devoted to the occasion.

Some of the photos were from the years he was in law school, judging from the length of his hair. Later it was neatly trimmed, the haircut of a professional man. There was a shot of Carrie sitting hunched over a book open on a kitchen table, in shorts and bare feet, a pencil in her teeth; another of him lounging in a chair, intent on the pages of a book in his lap. It looked as if the serious life had begun. Had the fun ended by then?

There were two of the earlier pictures he kept coming back to. One was among a series at a party in someone's living room, people drinking and mugging for the camera. In this one, Carrie was stretched out on a couch, laughing, with a bottle of beer balanced on her stomach, her hands poised to catch if it fell. He was sitting at the other end of the couch, raising a bottle to her, holding her feet in his lap with his other hand, and their eyes were on each other. His broad smile was for her, hers for him. Her socks were bright pink with green polka dots.

The other photo was outdoors, on a rocky ridge overlooking a wooded valley, big trees standing tall around them. The younger version of her already familiar face was grinning. She stood with her hands on her hips, feet planted wide and one hip cocked to the side, wearing low riding cargo pants that exposed her smooth flat stomach and belly button; above that a cropped t-shirt. Her dark hair curled out around a backwards baseball cap. He stood behind her grinning, with both of his hands in front of her full breasts, as if hiding them from the camera. You could tell she wasn't wearing a bra. _Oh Carrie, look at you._

One thing was coming clear to him. It could be purely lust, but he was probably falling in love, for the second time, with Carrie Edwards.

Nothing in any of the pictures had looked familiar beyond recognizing his and Carrie's faces, none had twanged at the place his missing memory was hiding. But they had told him something. They told him that their beginning had been full of joy.

He felt his chin and remembered he hadn't shaved yet. Probably not since two days ago, judging from the stubble. In front of the bathroom mirror he lathered up and while he shaved, noticed that he was no longer surprised to discover his own face. He had a little conversation with his reflection. _Hello stranger. What kind of man are you? Can I trust you? What's important to you? What are you going to do now?_

If Carrie didn't already know about Katherine, if he was sleeping in the guest room for some other reason, what would she do if the truth came out? That's what he wanted to plan for. How could he explain that woman? He didn't understand himself. How did it happen? Did he start it? He'd already guessed he was a ladies' man. Carrie had implied it, acknowledging his charm when he told her she was beautiful, back in the motel room. It could have been her, Katherine, who initiated it and he just followed her invitation. But he loved Carrie. His life was with Carrie, he was sure of it. It was hard to imagine not loving her. Why would he stray? He wondered what she looked like, Katherine. The name was regal, but she'd sounded almost coarse in the message. "And other things," she'd said. Her tone of voice didn't leave much doubt about her meaning.

He decided the best thing to do was wait and see if she would give up on him if he didn't call back right away. Maybe when the word got out at the office about his condition, she would back off. And he would need to know more than he knew now before he spoke to her.

Chapter 15

When Carrie came home he was in the kitchen again, the kitchen that was looking familiar now that he'd spent some hours there. Aside from an empty cookie jar on the counter there was only the white toaster and the sleek coffee maker, and their used cups. Her first words, coming through the door with a sheaf of papers under her arm, had been, "Anything new?" The only thing new was the love/lust feeling he had discovered, and Katherine's messages. He didn't think it was the right time to talk about either of those, and he shook his head.

He refilled the cups and carried them to the table where she sat waiting, serious-faced, lips parted to say something to him. He waited and she closed her mouth again, until he said, "What? What are you thinking?"

"Now I don't know what to do," she said, with her hands out, palms up in helplessness. Help was what he didn't have for her.

She took a sip of her coffee. "How did it go when you called the office?"

"Oh boy." He shook his head. "Lou wasn't happy. He seems like an excitable guy. And he sounds like he's afraid of Andrea."

"Everyone is afraid of Andrea. She's the Red Queen. You know, 'Off with his head!' You seem to get along with her better than most. That's because she knows how indispensable you are."

"I'm not much use to her this way, am I? I wish I could remember something about work. Have I talked about a Fitzhugh contract? That seems to be the crisis right now."

"You don't talk about work much."

"What do we talk about?"

Her eyes shifted to her fingers, which had been tapping out a rhythm on the tabletop. Her hand stilled. "Our schedules. What's for dinner. The weather."

She looked out the window and said, " _Fa bello_."

He followed her eyes, ignoring her implication for the moment. The sun was high and the sky sparkling blue, and the surface of the bay was whipped up in whitecaps, like dabs of frosting on the blue. A tugboat lunged through the water. There wasn't as much wind up here on the hill.

" _Fa bello molto_ ," he replied. That was a shock.

"I know Italian?" He tried to think of other words. He pointed at his chair. " _Sedia_." He waved his arms around in an imitation of an enthusiastic Italian. " _Pranza. Tassi_." He looked at Carrie. " _Moglie_." It was exhilarating at first, but then he couldn't put together any sentences out of the words.

She looked amused. "I wouldn't exactly say you 'know' Italian. We learned some words before we went to Italy last year." She turned thoughtful. "But it's something, isn't it? Something you remember. Maybe your memory hasn't gone too far. Maybe it's on its way back."

"I remembered '*98' for the messages. Or my fingers did."

He went on, trying to put the unreality of his experience into words. "I feel perfectly normal. I know how to do everyday things. I even remember those Italian words. But I'm a stranger to myself. Everything about me is a mystery. My only personal memories are the ones from yesterday. My history is gone, my job is gone. I remember you now, but it's just from when I met you last night."

He smiled at her. "That's one of my good memories."

She was listening intently, and she ignored the editorial comment. "What about the law. I know you don't remember anything about Halstrom-Pierce, but do you remember the law? All the things you learned? Because you remembered the Italian words."

He tried not to let his mind go there yet. His study was full of books, and some of them were probably law books. He was afraid to find out that it was all gone, everything he had probably almost killed himself to learn. Or that what he knew was so rudimentary as to be useless. _*98. Fa bello. Big deal._ It didn't make a life.

"I think it's time for me to go to a doctor." He'd been avoiding the idea, but maybe there was something going on in his head that would explain this, something they could find, get a picture of. Something they could fix, and he could be cured of this damn thing.

"I do too. I was thinking about that on the way home," Carrie said. She looked at the clock.

"Dr. Richardson's office closes at 2:00 on Fridays. Maybe we can catch her before lunch. If we wait too long we're in the weekend." She looked at him for confirmation. "What do you think?"

"That's my regular doctor?" Carrie nodded.

"Yes, we both go to her."

"Okay. Would you mind doing the calling?"

She went to the phone and pulled a little address book out of the drawer under it, dialed a number. While she talked to someone at the doctor's office, he sat there feeling like the makings of a scientific experiment. Or like a freak. See the amazing man with the blank mind. He talks. He walks. And he doesn't know a damn thing.

Carrie turned to him with the phone at her ear.

"Have you had a headache at all?"

"No."

"Blurry vision?" He shook his head. "Weakness in your arms or legs?"

"Nope. Except when you came to the door at the motel," he remembered. "But that was just momentary. I think it was anxiety."

She went back to the phone. Then to him again, "Dr. Richardson can see you after regular hours, about 2:30. That okay with you?"

He nodded. "That's fine. It's not like I have anything else scheduled. That I know of."

Chapter 16

His stomach rumbled the announcement that all he'd had to eat was a piece of toast. And too many cups of coffee.

"Who usually does the cooking around here?"

"Mostly me. Are you getting hungry?"

She'd been doing so much to take care of him, he decided it was definitely his turn.

"Why don't I fix us something?" He went to the refrigerator. "I could make an omelet." There was a jar of salsa on the shelf, and a package of cheddar in the compartment on the door.

She'd started to get up, but she sat back in her chair at the table. "That sounds good." He got the eggs and butter out and looked for a bowl and Carrie pointed at the cupboard above the stove. He found the gadget drawer without help and grated some cheese and took a pan off the rack on the wall, putting in a slice of butter, turning on the burner. There were green onions in the vegetable bin and he chopped some. He felt good, competent, like he was in charge of something.

"How about some salami?" She made a face. He chopped a few pieces up for himself and set them aside.

Carrie was watching him, a half-smile on her face. "You used to do this all the time. When you were in law school. I'd get home from work and you'd have all the ingredients ready to go. Omelets were your specialty. This is nice."

He was amazed at how much pleasure spread through him, to hear her talk about the times that had looked so happy in the album; that she hadn't forgotten, even if he couldn't remember being there. But in a way he _was_ remembering, his hands and body moving efficiently at his task. When the omelets were cooked he slid them onto plates and sprinkled some field greens from a bag in the refrigerator on the side, and brought them to the table along with the jar of salsa and a bottle of salad dressing.

She took a bite and smiled at him. "You haven't lost your touch." She got up to get napkins, and the phone rang. She picked up the receiver and tucked it between her ear and shoulder while she dipped her knees to reach a drawer.

"Oh, hi Sandra." She shot him a wary glance. His stomach lurched. He hadn't been thinking about Sandra. Carrie stretched the cord and reached out to hand him the napkins and then went back to the counter.

"Fine, we're fine. How about you?"

"Brian?" She was replying to Sandra. His mother was asking to talk to him. Carrie questioned him with her eyebrows, and he was chagrined to show his cowardice, but he cringed a little and held up his hands, palms out, and shook his head.

"He's not handy right now. I could ask him to call you back. Or give him a message?" She grimaced and looked at him apologetically. "Oh, that's good. Why don't you come over for dinner when you finish there, since you'll be close." She shrugged in Brian's direction, telegraphing her helplessness.

"What about 5:30? We have to be somewhere this afternoon and I'm sure we'll be back by then. But you know where the key is if we're late. Yes, I know it's Friday. He has the day off. Yes, a personal holiday. Okay then, we'll see you tonight. Good. Bye now."

She came back to the table shaking her head. "That was stupid. I'm sure she was just confused when she asked for you. All I had to say was that it's Friday, and she would have realized it was a workday. I didn't have to lie to her. And then pile on another lie. Personal holiday." She seemed disgusted with herself, even though it was a small lie for a good reason, to make things easier for his mother.

"I'm sorry," he said. "It's my fault." He didn't know why he said that, except he felt like everything was his fault. "She's coming tonight?"

"She's already going to be in town. She has an appointment with her hairdresser here. She's never found someone she likes out there. She usually drops by once she's made the drive."

"Maybe Dr. Richardson will fix me this afternoon, and we'll never have to worry her at all." He hit the side of his head with the flat of his hand, as if he were adjusting an old television set. And he'd made her laugh again.

He looked at her with appreciation. "You're very compassionate with my mother. I get the idea she can be a difficult person."

"She was fine until your dad got sick. Well, she had her moments, but nothing serious. She hasn't been one of those problem mothers-in-law you hear about. But now she's sort of spacey. She isn't adjusting very well. You've been good to her too, even though you've been so busy lately."

Well, I'm not busy now.

Carrie cleared the table and put their dishes in the sink.

"I looked through the photo album this morning while you were gone. I didn't ask you about your family last night. Where are your folks? Are they still alive? And you have two brothers?" She leaned a hip against the counter, facing him.

"I forgot you wouldn't know that either. Mom and Dad live in Sacramento. That's where I grew up. They're alive and kicking, and still working. Mom's a landscape architect and Dad's got a construction business. Sometimes she works on his projects."

"What about your brothers?"

"Colin is in the Bay Area, Cupertino. Computer engineer geek. And Sean teaches philosophy at BYU. I'm the slow kid, still going to school."

"Do your brothers have kids? Cousins for this one?" He gestured towards her belly. "Come to think it, does my sister have children?"

She turned back to the sink and started running water for the dishes. "Yes, Elaine has two boys. I guess you wouldn't remember, but she's divorced. My brother Colin has three kids. And Sean is gay, no partner, no kids."

"He's gay and he teaches at BYU? How does that work out?"

"I don't think it is a real problem there at the university. The real problem is with my folks. He's never come out to them. They just keep ragging on him about getting married. I wish he'd tell them and get it over with. Family get-togethers are tense. Secrets ruin everything. Even if sometimes the truth is harder." She kept her back to him until she'd finished with the dishes.

Chapter 17

Carrie drove, since she knew the way. This time it was a cardboard file box she had to move to the back seat. The papers back there were getting more precarious.

"Is that your dissertation?"

"Some of it. And student papers."

"You could take over my study. I don't even know what it's for."

"Let's don't jump to conclusions, okay? Don't be a pessimist. Anyway, I have a great space upstairs in the attic."

Dr. Richardson's office was in an old building downtown. When they came in the reception area was deserted, and there was no one at the desk behind the glass. They sat for a minute and then a ginger-haired girl with big hoop earrings and bright red lipstick poked her head around the corner.

"Hi Carrie. Hi Brian. It'll be just a second. She's on the phone."

Brian leaned over to Carrie. "It's so strange to have someone I've never seen before say my name. I guess I'd better get used to it."

Dr. Richardson was a pretty, slender young woman, probably about their age, with straight blond hair tucked behind her ears. She appeared in the doorway and waved them in.

Carrie hesitated. "Do you want me to come with you?"

"Yes, of course. You need to know what's going on as much as I do. Besides, you can answer the questions I can't."

"Let's go to my office," Dr. Richardson said. As they entered the hallway, she put both hands on Carrie's belly and smiled at her. "Looking good," she said. "Everything going all right?"

"Seems to be."

The doctor patted her shoulder and led them to her office.

"Okay, Brian, tell me about yourself."

He laughed a little, embarrassed. "That's what I'm having trouble with. Carrie told you I've lost track of me? Yesterday morning I just suddenly realized I didn't remember anything."

"Was this when you first woke up?"

"No, I was out running on a trail in a park."

"What's the first thing you remember?"

"Looking at the water, trying to figure out where I was."

"How did you get home? Did you have a wallet or something?"

"No, nothing at all. Not a clue. I went to the police, and then a social worker set me up in a motel. And then Carrie tracked me down."

"Have you had any other symptoms, besides the memory loss?"

"No, I feel fine. Just confused and stupid."

"When you say confused, do you mean that you're having trouble thinking clearly?"

"No, my mind seems clear. I just meant the confusion of trying to put all the pieces together." He turned to Carrie. "What do you think? Is the brain working?"

"As far as I can tell."

"Let's see how I can ask this to help me understand. When you say you've forgotten everything, what does that include? Are there any personal memories at all? Childhood? Flashes of remembering?"

"I haven't remembered anything about myself. That seems to be what's missing. There are some automatic things that I seem to remember how to do. Like the code for getting the phone messages." And then he added, "I can get dressed by myself."

"He still knows how to make a good omelet," Carrie said.

The doctor paged through Brian's medical records folder. "How about medications -- anything new?"

Brian shrugged helplessly. He realized he hadn't noticed any prescription bottles in his bathroom medicine cabinet. "I have no idea. Carrie?" Carrie shook her head.

"Of course. I guess you wouldn't know, would you? All I have down here is a daily vitamin and some prophylactic aspirin."

Dr. Richardson made a few notes on a clipboard and got up from her desk. "Let's go check you out." She led them to an examining room and had him sit on the table and take off his shoes.

"When did you get this?" She touched the scar on his eyebrow and peered at it closely. He looked at Carrie for information.

"It was a month or so ago."

"How did it happen?" Brian realized he had stopped wondering about it, hadn't even remembered to ask. It was just one of the features he was getting used to seeing in the mirror.

"Racquet ball," Carrie said.

"Really," he said. "Did I do it to myself?"

"No, it was Andrea. She likes to have meetings on the court. And she likes to win. We decided you were getting too far ahead of her and she had to do something drastic. She claimed she didn't realize you were behind her when she swung." It was obviously a joke between them. He liked that.

"Did he have any symptoms right after the injury? Dizziness? Nausea?"

"No, he just said it hurt like a son of a bitch. It did give him a headache for a few hours."

"Well, it probably doesn't have anything to do with this, but we'll check it out." She tapped with her little hammer, checking his reflexes, and he responded normally. She proceeded to run him through his paces with balance tests, and looked into his eyes with a bright light. She kept running notes on her clipboard as they went.

"Well, I don't see any outward signs of neurological problems. But I'm going to want you to go to the hospital for some testing. I think it can be done on an outpatient basis unless they find something that needs to be looked at further. I'd like you to do that as soon as possible. Okay?" They both nodded. "There could be something going on we don't know about without some pictures of the inside of your head."

"Are you talking about a brain tumor?" He realized that was his biggest fear, another thing he'd been ignoring, besides Katherine Wells.

"There are lots of possibilities. A circulation problem, some slow bleeding from the blow on the head, a brain episode like a little stroke. Some deterioration of brain cells that we wouldn't expect at your age, so don't worry about it. I'm not a neurologist. We'll turn you over to the experts for this. I'm inclined to think it's none of those, but we still have to rule them out."

"And if it's none of those things?"

"Well, then it will be something psychological. There is something called a fugue state. Some experts don't believe it exists, the ones who tend to be narrowly focused on organic causes for everything. It's not very well understood. But we'll get around to that. We'll order a psych consult, if nothing obviously organic shows up. And of course the memory might come back spontaneously."

Back in her office, the doctor called to make arrangements. As luck would have it, there had been a cancellation and the neurology department could take him on Monday. Dr. Richardson handed Brian a checklist with details for the hospital from her notepad. Carrie had an early class on Monday, and she could drive him to the hospital after that. He was supposed to check in at 11:00 in the morning, and he'd probably be there all afternoon, but unless they found something drastic he wouldn't have to stay overnight. It felt like progress.

Chapter 18

On the way home Carrie swung the car into a grocery parking lot.

"Any ideas about dinner? We're running low on groceries."

"What does my mother like that's easy?"

"Roast beef. We don't serve it very often though, and there isn't time. We could pick up a roast chicken."

In the grocery store they rolled a cart through the aisles, and Carrie picked a few things from the shelves.

"Why don't you tell me if you see something that appeals to you and we'll see if it's something you've picked before." They were in the snack aisle. He was overwhelmed by the choices. He picked up a random box of crackers and held it out to her. She frowned and narrowed her eyes, checked the nutrition information.

"Trans fat. We don't eat trans fat. Try again."

"But have I bought those before?"

"Not since we found out about trans fat."

"So is this an experiment or is this an educational project?"

"I don't know," she laughed. "It was just an idea."

On a lower shelf he spotted a box that looked familiar, and checked the label. Whole wheat crackers, sesame, no trans fats either. He held it up to show Carrie.

"Yep, we're out of them. That was a hit."

From there he chose peanut butter, the natural stuff, with the oil floating above the solids. Carrie nodded again.

They wheeled through the aisles, and once in a while his hand reached automatically for something. Sometimes it matched his choices in the past. Sometimes, like the jar of English mustard pickle, it looked interesting. Carrie looked at the growing basket of goods.

"We'd better stop this before we get ourselves in debt. We don't know if you're still employed." That was a jolt. There might be a real financial blow in this dilemma. He might have to give up his Lexus, which he hadn't even seen yet. Apparently the non-recalling Brian wasn't as in love with the car as Carrie had implied the old Brian was.

A girl stopped her cart in front of theirs, blocking their progress. "Hi Mrs. Edwards. Hey, is this your husband?" She said it with enthusiasm in her voice. She wore tight jeans and a bomber jacket open over an even tighter t-shirt, and a beret on top of long straight blond hair. She stuck out her chest and looked him up and down, as if she were considering buying him. Or making some other kind of offer.

"Hello Kelli," Carrie said calmly. "Yes, it is." And to Brian she added, "Kelli is in my Composition I class."

"He's cute," the girl announced to Carrie, as if he wasn't there. Then she added, "I'm not one of her best students." She tilted her head and looked up at him with a smirk from behind her eyelashes, as if to say _big deal, right?_ As if it were some sort of accomplishment.

"That's too bad. Maybe you could try harder." He didn't know where that came from, but this little vixen wasn't going to use him to challenge Carrie. Kelli quit with the aggressive breasts and said "Yeah, I guess so," and flipped her hair back as she maneuvered her cart around them. "Gotta go. See you in class Mrs. Edwards."

Carrie was smothering a smile. "That happens all the time. I can't figure out what it is about you that's so appealing." He was pretty sure it was a joke.

"You deflated her nicely, though." She chuckled in appreciation.

When they got home they unloaded the groceries together, and since it was already 4:30, Carrie went to change clothes.

Brian checked the messages on the kitchen phone. There were two from Lou, one he'd just missed, asking him to call as soon as he could, to tell him what the doctor said. He dialed the number from the business card again and got the office.

"I saw the doctor. I go in for tests on Monday. Did you get what you needed in my office?"

"We've moved into your office, buddy, and Jason has been at it all day, trying to get on top of it. Your fucked-up brain has put us in a real bind here."

"I wish there was something I could do. Jason is who?"

"Your assistant. We're still going to try to make the Tuesday meeting with Fitzhugh. We'll probably be working through the weekend. You sure you can't remember? What did the doctor say?"

"She didn't find anything physical, but the tests Monday will find out more."

"Well, Andrea is still in San Diego and flies back tomorrow. She's pretty grim."

"I know, I got a message from her. I understand she hit me in the head a while back."

"Oh, yeah. That was quite a deal. She said you got in her way. She had to drive you to the emergency room. You fucking bled all over her front seat. I guess you don't remember that either?"

When Carrie came back to the kitchen she'd changed into a big, bulky sweater, over tights. She started trimming broccoli and making a salad.

"I've been thinking about how to tell her," Carrie said. She scraped the vegetable waste into the trash container. "But I realized I don't have to worry about it. I think you will just know how to do it."

He went to the living room to look again at the pictures of his mother in the album. The most recent one was the anniversary picture. He counted up. Twenty-five years of marriage, he couldn't have been over twenty-four. So it was ten years or more ago. In the photo she was smiling happily, and was turned towards his father, her hand on his lapel, as if she was petting him.

Chapter 19

Brian heard the slam of a car door out front, and put the album aside. He opened the front door and then the door to the porch, holding it for his mother as she came through to the living room. She had her coat collar up around her lower face and a scarf covering her hair against the wind, which was whipping up the icy air and falling leaves outside.

"It's getting so cold! I swear, it's getting colder earlier every year! This is not global warming."

"Hi Mom," he said, and took her wool coat as she pulled the scarf from her head and patted her blond hair to make sure it was in place. She dropped her purse in the chair nearest the door.

She was taller than he had pictured, maybe 5'8" to his six feet. She hadn't changed that much from the picture he'd been looking at, features a little heavier, and her hair had a more fixed look and was thinning at the hairline.

She looked up at him brightly. He caught a whiff of gin on her breath.

"Hello, Baby. My darling Brian." and then her smile crumpled and her tears flooded over. She flung her arms up and embraced him tightly around the neck, almost desperately.

He didn't try to say anything, but put his arms around her firmly and held her until her quiet sobs slowed down. Carrie came into the dining room and paused when she saw them. He loosened his hold and stroked his mother's back until she stopped crying and pulled away. He kept his hands lightly on her shoulders. He felt full, somehow, full of feeling. Impulsively, he kissed her wet cheek.

"I'm all right now." She reached for the napkin Carrie brought from the dining room table and dabbed at her face. "Thank you Carrie. I keep doing that. I just burst into tears at the drop of a hat." She shook her head as if it was inexplicable to her. "Yesterday in the supermarket I saw that the Hubbard squash was in. I always bought it to fix for your father. He liked it baked with sausage and apples and onions. He would have eaten that every night of his life if he could have. I started crying right there in the produce department. I should have made it for him more often."

Carrie touched her arm gently. "It's going to take time, Mom."

"All right, I've had my cry. How are you two?" Like quicksilver she had changed to a gracious woman in control of herself. She admired Carrie's stomach, but didn't touch her. "How is my grandbaby?"

They sat down to dinner and visited about this and that. Brian found that he could hold his own with the small talk. There weren't any questions asked that he couldn't answer with a generality, or turn back to her. It was beginning to seem to him that telling her now, and adding to her upset, would be an unnecessary burden for her. She seemed so happy to be with them. She and Carrie talked about Carrie's pregnancy, and she announced she'd had a letter from Brian's sister, Elaine, who had decided to bring the children for Thanksgiving. She was a little tearful about that, because it reminded her it would be the first holiday without Ed, but she recovered her equilibrium and went on about looking forward to seeing the children.

Brian collected up some dishes from the table and took them to the kitchen, catching Carrie's eye from the doorway and motioning with his head to come with him.

"I'll be right back, Sandra," she said, picking up the serving dishes. "I'll go get the dessert."

"Take your time, honey. I think I'll step out front for a minute." She slid back her chair and collected her purse from the chair by the door.

"What do you think?" Brian asked Carrie in sotto voice as she set the dishes on the counter. "I'd like to wait until after the hospital tests, when I know more. Then she wouldn't have to worry about the results until we have them. If there's even anything to worry about."

"I know. She's on an even keel now. Besides that, you could remember any time, maybe before she even has to know. It's up to you, Brian. She's your mother."

Sandra came back in and the smell of her cigarette with her. "I'm going to the ladies room," she said, and went down the hall. Carrie served up the fruit and sorbet they'd bought at the store and put the dishes around the table.

"Do you have company staying with you?" Sandra asked as she came back to the dining room.

"Company? No." Carrie looked puzzled.

"The door was open to your guest room and it looked as if someone was staying there. I just wondered."

Brian hadn't thought about explaining this, since he didn't even know the reason himself, so he improvised.

"Oh, that's just me in there. Carrie's been having trouble sleeping, and so I get out of her way sometimes. Some nights it wakes her up if I even turn over in bed and then she can't get back to sleep. And she has early classes some mornings." Carrie looked at him appraisingly. He wished it hadn't slid out so effortlessly. It wasn't his proudest moment. On top of keeping his amnesia from his mother, now he'd initiated lying to her. He could have waited to see if Carrie fielded the question. He might even have learned something.

"Oh I remember those nights. That's very thoughtful of you, darling."

As they sat back down for dessert, Sandra said, "Do you think I might have a small drink?" Brian wondered if Carrie had noticed that his mother had already had something before she arrived. Whether or not she did, Carrie was straightforward. She smiled at Sandra and shook her head slightly.

"I'd feel much better if you didn't, Sandra. You have that long drive home in the dark. I don't want to worry about you on the way home. You don't mind too much, do you?"

"Well, that's all right then. I was just thinking of a small one, but you're probably right. You're the sensible one in the family." There was the slightest edge in her voice that matched a tight little smile.

Chapter 20

Brian walked Sandra out to her car and kissed her goodnight. He tried to see this woman he'd just spent an evening with as his mother, the person who had bandaged his knees and made cookies for him, reminded him to do his homework. It didn't track, but she hadn't seemed to find anything off kilter in his behavior. Maybe later, after he told her what had happened to him, he could talk to her about his growing up, find out more about the Brian that she knew. Her hand was on his arm to keep him for a moment and her eyes overflowed again briefly as she looked up into his face.

"You do look like your father sometimes. You're all I have left of him now."

"And memories," he answered, thinking that his own loss of memories was probably why he didn't feel any of the pain she did. He wondered about his relationship with his father. Would he miss him when he remembered? If he remembered. Or would he feel released from something. He thought about the photograph album, and the briefness of the tour through his earlier life.

"I'd like to look at the family pictures some time, if you'd feel up to it." He had the idea that somewhere among the photographic record of his life there would be a trigger that would crack open the past for him, or at least connect him with it. The pictures of his life with Carrie had brought feelings, if not the factual details.

"I haven't looked at them since your father got ill. I don't know if I can. I think they're still all in a box in the hall closet. He stored them there when we moved into the house. We've been saying ever since that we should get them out and sort them."

"Maybe later, when you're ready." He helped her into the car and watched her drive away before going back in to help Carrie finish up the dishes. She was already done, and sitting at the table with her feet up on a chair, stretching her toes and leaning forward, massaging her ankles. He thought of the picture with her feet in his lap. He had the urge to massage her feet for her, to press his thumbs into the balls of her feet and slide them down her instep, to squeeze them firmly in his hands and watch her sit back with her eyes closed in pleasure. But it felt as if it would be too personal, an invasion of her space.

"That wasn't as hard as I expected," he said.

"No. And there was no point in telling her now. You were very natural with her. I'm worried about her drinking though. She seemed a little high when she first got here."

"I noticed that."

It was already 9:30. Carrie looked drained, and tired. "I think I'd better go to bed early. I have papers to grade and a new chapter to start on tomorrow. I'll probably be working all day." She took off her glasses and rubbed her forehead. "Will you be all right on your own?"

"Don't worry about me. I already owe you for being such an anchor for me right now. You have enough responsibility, without having to entertain an idiot husband."

She gave him a wan smile. "I'll let you know if it's too much, okay?" She got up and put her glasses back on. "I'm fading fast. I'll see you in the morning." She picked up her shoes and padded out of the kitchen.

Brian was still tense from the evening with his mother, the not knowing how or what to tell her. It had worked out. They were managing things at the office without him, and he knew he didn't have anything to offer in the way of help anyway. Katherine was the biggest worry.

He went to the refrigerator and there was a beer left, so he opened it and took it back to the kitchen table, flipping off the overhead light so that the only illumination came from soft lighting under the cabinet that shone down over the sink, leaving the rest of the room in shadow. He rotated his shoulders to loosen them up, and sat quietly, letting his mind run free. A lethargy crept over him. He sipped at the beer until it was gone, and dozed a little in his chair with his head dropped forward.

He jerked awake as Carrie came through the doorway and started to walk past him. She turned her head at his movement and saw him. "Oh, I thought you'd already gone to bed."

"I'm almost there."

"I forgot my vitamins."

She went to the sink and opened the upper cupboard. She was wearing a silky blue nightgown that clung to her body and stretched across her round behind as she reached up for a glass and the pills. The light from the cabinet shone through the gown and highlighted all her curves, turning her into a blue nude. She seemed unaware that he was transfixed, that he was staring at her with his heart speeding up and a surge of desire. She must have forgotten that he wouldn't be taking this vision for granted; that for him it was the first time he'd seen her like this. She left her glass on the counter and slipped past him again on her way back to bed.

"Good night again," she said. "Sleep tight."

He thought what he'd probably be doing was sleeping hard.

Chapter 21

He woke uneasy. Some action needed to be taken, but the prospects were a blank. He turned over on his opposite side, plumped the pillow, and tried to get back to sleep but it didn't work. The clock glowed 7:15. He rolled out of bed and went to the bathroom, peered at himself in the mirror.

"What now, fella?" No answer. He brushed his teeth and shaved, combed his hair and checked the medicine cabinet to see if he had any pills he was supposed to take. There was only aspirin in there, and a prescription bottle of Vicodin. It was out of date.

Footsteps creaked overhead, and he looked up at the ceiling. Carrie had said her study was in the attic, so she was already at work. Unless they had mice. He got dressed and went to the kitchen and poured a cup of coffee. There was a cereal bowl and spoon in the sink.

The stairs to the attic ran up from the hall, and he took his coffee and stood at the foot. He decided to say good morning, but not stay to get in her way. Mounting the stairs, he called out, "Carrie, okay if I come up for just a minute?"

Her head peeked over the banister at the top. "Come ahead. I'm just getting started." At the top of the stairs he looked around the room. The peaked ceiling sloped down so that the walls were less than five feet high at the perimeter, except for two dormer windows. Carrie's desk was in the window that overlooked the back yard. A laptop computer with a document open on the screen, and a folder of papers, sat on its surface. Low bookcases lined one outside wall, and a folding table was set up against the partial wall that ran next to the stairwell, with papers lined up in neat piles along its length. More papers were stacked on the floor along another wall. There was a rocking chair in the opposite dormer, facing the front of the house, and next to that, a little table piled with precariously stacked books, and a gooseneck lamp. A dark blue meditation pillow atop a square pad covered in black fabric was in one of the corners, and a graceful white Asian statue of a woman in flowing garb sat on a tiny red enameled table next to it. The figure was seated cross-legged, one hand palm up in front of her chest and the other reaching down to touch a finger to the ground. There was an incense burner too, holding a stick with the end glowing, and its heady, spicy scent hung in the air. In spite of the plethora of papers, there was a sense of steadiness and calm in the room. It was the same sense that he'd felt in Carrie.

She cocked her head. "Anything new? I keep thinking you might wake up with all of it back."

"No, afraid not. Well, this is nice up here. It looks like you, sort of peaceful and quiet, but organized. Not at all like the back seat of your car."

"Oh, I was up early. Everything from the back seat office is here now." She waved to indicate the neat stacks of paper on the floor along a wall.

"I could have helped you. I'm sorry I wasn't up."

Carrie waved at the upstairs space. "Does this room look familiar at all? It was your playroom when you and Elaine were kids."

Brian looked around again, with a different eye, trying to bring it back. He shook his head ruefully. "I wish it did. It looks like it would be a fun place for a kid."

Carrie shot him a sympathetic smile. "What are you going to do today? I'm afraid I'm tied up here until the afternoon, at least. Maybe we should do something later. Go out to dinner or something."

"Well, I'm not company that you have to entertain and you have things you have to do. I'll figure something out. Maybe I'll go for a run around the neighborhood, try to get my bearings."

"Take our address with you. I don't want to have to track you down again!" She picked up a file card from the table and scribbled the address on it, and looked a little embarrassed as she handed it to him. "I'm acting like an overprotective mother."

He looked her up and down. She was wearing an oversized man's shirt that hung to just above her knees, over black leggings. The shirt sleeves were rolled up, and the first buttons of the shirt open to reveal the lace of her bra.

"You're definitely not my mother." God, he was such a lecher; he shouldn't be pushing this way. He remembered the vision of her last night.

She looked surprised, or maybe confused, for just a second and then recovered. "Go," she said, "I've got work to do."

A run was what he needed. He was physically antsy and felt the need to pace. Part of it was that there was something he was putting off. He had to check his cell for messages. He didn't want to. He dreaded hearing Katherine's voice again, and he knew it had to be there, waiting for him, like a ghost in the closet, ready to go "Boo!" This was the part of his missing life that he didn't want to recover. He wanted it to disappear.

He got dressed in his workout clothes and put on his running shoes, then he went to the kitchen and refilled the coffee cup to postpone listening to the messages. He sipped his coffee, staring out the window. The sky was blue again this morning, with clouds in the distance over the land the other side of the bay. Most of the leaves were gone from the trees at the bottom of the yard, and there was a garden patch, finished for the year, with collapsed brown and yellow foliage in neat rows, soggy and melting in place. He could dig it up and turn the soil if the weather held. He wondered whether he was the gardener or Carrie was. Maybe it was something they did together. That would be nice.

Then he made himself go back to the bedroom. He clicked the door shut behind him, then flipped open the cell phone, turned it on and pressed the button for messages. The computerized voice told him he had seven. Tightened jaw, deep breath. He accessed them one by one.

Yesterday, 9:05 a.m. "I'm at work and you're not here yet. Where _are_ you? You haven't returned my calls. There must be something the matter. _Call me!_ "

Yesterday, 9:45 a.m. "What is going on? I went by your door and Lou and Jason are in there tearing your office apart. Call me right away. Did something happen? Have you been in an accident? Is it Carrie? Is it the baby? Are you all right? I'm going to call the hospital. Call me as soon as you get this message, okay?"

Yesterday, 11:45 a.m. "Brian, I'm really worried now. You could at least call to tell me what's happening. Oh God, maybe you've been hurt or something. It's making me crazy not to know. I can't get any work done, I'm so upset. Lou has been stomping around like a lunatic. He's got Jenna in with him in his office now. Jason's been working at your desk all morning. I'm going home to my apartment for lunch. Meet me there if you get this message."

Yesterday, 1:30 p.m. "Brian, I called the hospital and they don't have anyone named Edwards there. I followed Jenna to the restroom but she wouldn't tell me anything. I know I'm not supposed to talk about you to anyone, but I couldn't help it. She said you were fine and not to worry about it, because it wasn't any of my business. She's such a bitch. I almost told her how much it's my business. Don't worry—I didn't say anything. I was very polite. But if you're fine, why don't you call? Don't leave me out of your life, Brian. I love you!"

Yesterday, 4:30 p.m. "This has been the worst day of my life. I don't know whether to be angry or scared. My boyfriend disappears off the face of the earth and no one will tell me anything and he won't call me. Don't I mean anything to you at all?"

Her voice was dull and grim. Then the next to last message:

Yesterday, 7:00 p.m. "I drove by your house on the way home. Everything looked normal from the outside. The lights were on, and Carrie's clunker was in the driveway. I didn't see your car. Maybe it was in the garage. I swear, I'm going to find out what's happening if I have to come to the door and ask. How would you like that? If you're not unconscious or something you'd better call me."

And finally:

Yesterday, 10:00 p.m. "I'm sitting in my car across the street from your house. All the lights are off. I don't know if you're in there. I want so much to come and ring the doorbell. But don't worry, I won't. I'm sorry about how I sounded earlier. I was just upset. I'll be good. Just please _call_ me."

Brian sat frozen on the edge of the bed, his hand gripping the cell phone as if he could kill it that way. He had almost deleted the messages, but something told him to wait. He would have to listen again to be sure he understood what he was dealing with. He threw the phone across the bed and sank his head in his hands, level with his knees. _Keep breathing._ She had been out there in the dark, just across the street, when he'd said goodnight to Carrie the second time, the time when she was in her nightgown.

A creepy, jittery feeling had spread down his spine, starting from his neck, and now even his hands tingled. He thought about the progression of the messages, the way they had escalated. The way they shifted in mood, tone of voice. She wasn't an imaginary problem any more. He had definitely stepped in something.

Chapter 23

He still wanted to run. He had to run. He put the cell phone in his jacket pocket. Of course he knew Carrie wouldn't come in and listen to his messages, but he didn't want to leave it behind. It just made him feel better. This time he put his wallet in the other jacket pocket. It wasn't very likely that he would lose his memory again, but now he felt naked without it. If he got hit by a car or something it would come in handy.

He called up the stairs that he was going out, and heard her "Okay, see you," float back down. In the entry porch he stopped to stretch, while he searched up and down the street. She could be out there now. But there were no cars parked on the street on their block.

He stayed to the sidewalk and headed north for a block and then turned up the hill. It was steep, and though he was pleased to realize he wasn't exactly winded, he set a zigzag path, one block up, one block level, one block up and so on. He paid attention to the street names, memorizing them so he wouldn't embarrass himself by getting lost on the way home. Soon the curbs were filled with more parked cars, and he knew he was close to the college. He followed the trickle of students with backpacks as they trudged uphill and entered the campus. He slowed to a walk and wandered through a mixture of old and new buildings, and big old Douglas firs and hemlocks surrounded by lawns and bricked paving and paths. Large outdoor sculptures dotted the open spaces.

The campus bookstore was already open. He wandered in, looking at the shelves for familiar titles. What sort of things did he read? Or did he read at all? Maybe he was all work and no play. Among the shelves of literature classics he recognized Austen and Dickens, Fielding and Joyce. He didn't remember which ones he'd read, if any, but it seemed to confirm his hypothesis that the missing pieces were the personal ones, and his general knowledge was more or less intact. There was a display of books about the Iraq war, and he was aware that it was disastrous. His mind didn't seem to want to go exploring there.

On impulse he made his way to the textbook stacks, and followed the plastic covered cardboard signs strung above them until he reached psychology. Abnormal psychology, that's what he was looking for. The textbook was a formidable size, and even more so the huge paperback entitled DSM-IV, The Diagnostic and Statistics Manual. But he was intrigued. Dr. Richardson had said "fugue state." He didn't see it in table of contents of the paperback manual, although that was full of other horrors. He checked the index and found several listings under "amnesia." There were boxed lists of symptoms under each diagnosis. He laid the book out open on the shelf in front of him and looked through the pages to see what he could find out about himself.

What he found was that he was a fairly rare case. The closest he came was something called dissociative amnesia. It was more common to have only a partial memory loss, for certain events or brief stretches of time. There was such a thing as biographical amnesia, which sounded like him, but those people typically set off on a trip and started a new identity someplace else. He knew he'd heard of lost people found who had established a new life with no memory of the old one. But he had no impulse to leave. He wanted to reconnect with this life, the one with Carrie in it.

There was the fear of what could happen with the unknown Katherine hanging over him. She sounded like a loose cannon. Just knowing that she had been outside in the dark, peering at his house, that he was the center of her attention, made him feel exposed and under threat. He didn't know what she looked like, wouldn't recognize her if she walked up to him right that minute. He looked around the bookstore nervously, but no one was paying him any attention.

He thought about her erratic, emotional messages. After the first ones he had hoped that he could ignore her and she would just give up and go away. Write him off as a lost cause. That she would find out at work what had happened and he wouldn't have to explain. Maybe it could be as if whatever had happened between them was erased. That was unrealistic now. He'd started something that was rolling along of its own dangerous momentum, and he knew from the sinking sensation in his gut that he was going to have to confront it, look it in the face. Look her in the face. It was time to call her. But not quite yet. _Think about something else._

He left the bookstore and wandered around the campus. He wondered where Carrie's office was, or if she had one of her own. There was an English department building and he stepped into the hallway and looked at the directory, but her name wasn't listed.

Part of his awareness was on his surroundings, enjoying the bright morning air and the straggle of weekend students, some walking alone with intense expressions, others gathered jabbering in small groups, waving their arms around in enthusiasm. It struck him that they were still finding their way to who they would be.

He wondered what sort of man he had become. What was his character? Carrie could probably tell him something about that, but he was afraid to ask her. Sometimes she looked at him the way she had in the motel room, wary and suspicious. Wondering whether or not to believe him. Was he a liar, then? Well of course he was a liar, if he was carrying on a clandestine love affair. Had he been unfaithful before? Was this a pattern with him? He felt a huge revulsion at the idea. He wanted a fresh start, to sweep away whatever ugliness had gone on before. When it came down to it, did he really want to remember? Consciously he wanted his life back. But the real one? The one with all of his possible errors?

He speeded his pace to a jog. On the far side of the campus he found a trail heading steeply up into the woods. He chugged his way up, winding through the trees, gasping for breath by the time he reached the ridge. A sign pointed to a lookout and he took the fork in the trail that led there. A wooden tower supported on massive posts poked up above the treetops on the hillside. He climbed the several flights of wide stairs that took him to the platform, passing empty beer bottles left behind at the edge of the treads, and one large puddle of drying vomit. Friday night's excesses, come to grief. Or maybe the guy, or the girl, who left it there still thought it was fun to go the whole way to oblivion and barf. _I was so hammered last night! I don't remember a thing!_

From the platform at the top the town spread out around him. Much of it was flat, but at the eastern edge there were hills whose slopes were plastered with houses, and behind them larger hills sprinkled with more houses, sparser, and in some places clear-cut scars from lumber harvest. On the far horizon to the north were craggy peaks, and to the east, more peaks and one towering snow covered mountain that looked half again the size of the ones around it.

The run had cleared his head so that he felt as ready as he would ever be to call Katherine. There was no point in waiting. He had the lookout platform to himself. He sat on a bench and took out the phone. There were already two more messages from Katherine. She must have called while he was in the bookstore. The first was angry and demanding, and minutes later a second one, pleading and apologetic, and begging him to tell her if she had done something to make him angry.

He sat for a minute with his eyes closed, breathing deeply to prepare. Then he dialed. It rang four times and the recorded message came on.

"You've reached Katherine Wells. Please leave a message and I'll call you back."

Reprieve! More than he could have hoped for. He had expected to have to talk to her directly. This was so much better. He measured his words.

"Katherine, this is Brian. I can't tell you how sorry I am that I haven't returned your calls until now. Something . . . " He searched for the right words. "Something unusual has happened. I'm sure it's going to sound unbelievable to you. You'll probably hear about it at work eventually, but from your messages I think you have a right to know now." He thought about the best words to use, how to say it.

"I . . . I have amnesia. I know it sounds crazy. But I can't remember anything. I don't remember anything about my life, and I only know who I am because the police helped me, and my wife came to get me. I didn't remember her, and I'm afraid I don't even remember you. I don't know what else to say." He paused to think if there was something else he should add, but he drew a blank.

"I'm sorry." Then he repeated. "I don't know what else to say." He held the phone in his hand, looking at it, for a few seconds and then thought of one thing to add, something that might give him some time. "Katherine, I'll try to reach you again tomorrow morning. I know that we will need to talk." Then he turned off the phone.

His heart was pounding. He'd done it. Taken a step towards fixing things.

It had been almost forty-eight hours since he stood her up for lunch, and she'd had all this time to build up a head of steam. That's why he knew it was just the first step. Nobody could be completely mollified with that message. Every word of it had been the truth, although the meaning of "sorry" could be argued. It wasn't so much an apology as it was regret.

She would call again. He didn't think she would be satisfied until she heard it from him in person. And he would have to make her understand that it was over. If she hadn't told him she'd driven by the house, and then parked in front of it in the night, he wouldn't be as unsettled. But there was some satisfaction in knowing he'd done what he could for now.

He looked at his watch to see that it was nearing 9:30. He headed for home, retracing his steps through the campus and back through the residential neighborhood. It was easy to find his way; his current memory was working fine. He felt more relaxed after his workout, but he carried that niggling bit of anxiety that kept him watching the cars that passed him to see if the drivers were watching him. One woman waved at him in recognition, but she couldn't have been Katherine, because she was grey-haired and plump. Maybe she was a neighbor.

Carrie was back at the kitchen table with a cup of tea, reading from a sheaf of papers in front of her, a pencil in her hand. She looked up at him above her glasses and seemed unsurprised to see him. He thought he might have liked it if she'd been worried.

"I see you didn't get lost." Well, maybe she was a tiny bit worried, to have thought of that.

"I went up to the campus. Hey, do you have an office of your own? I looked for you on the English department directory."

She laughed. "I don't rate an office. That's why I carry so much around in the car. Some day, though."

He poured the still-hot water from the kettle over a teabag for himself and came back to sit at the table. "Am I interrupting you? I can be quiet."

"No," she said, and worked out the tension in her back and shoulders with a series of stretching exercises. "I'm taking a breather, really."

"Are you planning to teach when you get the PhD?"

"I've always thought so, but now I'm not sure. These seminars are discouraging. Most of the students just seem interested in the bottom line, even when they're far along in the program. I'm so tired of hearing 'What do I have to do for an A?' Like that's the only payoff. It's rare to see a student who's in love with literature for its own sake." She shook her head. "Don't get me going."

"What would you do if you didn't teach? What else can you do with a PhD in literature?"

"Ah, see, that's that bottom line thing. I think I've always planned on teaching because it would be a justification for all this time and work. But really, it's just an excuse to spend my days in books and pretend to the world that I'm accomplishing something economically sane. I think about writing. The dissertation could turn into a book. And I had one criticism article published last year in an obscure journal."

"Do we need the money? I mean, if you didn't have a regular job would we be okay?"

"Your income covers everything now. My pittance covers school expenses, and what's left I put in savings." She raised her eyebrows. "But we'll have to wait and see what happens with you and work, won't we? I hadn't thought about that." She was mulling it over. Brian had already thought about it, about what would happen if he couldn't work as a lawyer any more because it was all gone from his head. Burger King?

"We don't have to worry about it now, though. You have time. You haven't taken a vacation in ages, and then there's sick leave. Amnesia should get you sick leave."

"More hot water for your tea?" He scraped his chair back.

"No, it's back to work for me."

"Are there some chores that need doing around here? I was looking at the vegetable garden. I could dig that up for the winter. I think I need to keep busy."

"Sure, if you want to. In fact, you already said you were going to do it. Last week." On her way out the kitchen door she added, "The garden tools are in the shed off the garage."

Chapter 23

Next to the tool shed was the side door to the garage, with a window in it. Brian peered through the locked door at his Lexus. It was golden colored. He still wondered what possessed him to buy it. But Carrie had suggested going out to dinner, so maybe he'd drive them. He was pretty sure he remembered how to drive.

Before he went out to what looked to be a muddy project, he had taken off his running shoes and found some old shoes on the floor of his closet that were probably the ones he used for outdoor chores. He found a shovel, rake and a hoe in the shed, and a green trash bin. He stood with his hands on his hips, surveying the garden plot. The foliage was finished, yellow brown and soggy, and slumped over on the ground, which was still muddy from some recent rain. He identified the beets, and discovered there were still some left, protected by the soil. Those he dug up and set to one side. There had been tomatoes, and a few small fruits remained, long since rotted by the rain. He pulled out the plants and tossed them into the bin. Along one side were corn stalks, and he pulled those by hand as well. Then he hoed out the rest, including the broad dead leaves of summer squash plants. The bin was overflowing and he tamped it down with the hoe. Such a simple thing, gardening; he felt alive doing this work. Down at the bottom of the garden he had spied a compost pile, so he hauled the bin down to it and upended it on top of some grapefruit rinds and eggshells, and what looked like carrot tops. Then he took the shovel to the garden plot, turning the muddy soil in sections. Fat red earthworms wriggled away from the chunks of earth he upended.

While he worked he tried to imagine his life with Carrie, before this thing happened to him. Their conversations since they first met on Thursday night had mostly been to orient him to his missing life. It was only today that Carrie had talked about herself. He felt good that she had shared some of her feelings with him, the personal things that were important to her. Up until then it had been mostly facts. He hoped he wasn't imagining that she had seemed more at ease with him.

What was it that was wrong between them? Why weren't they sleeping in the same bed? Could he make amends for whatever it was, start over? He had the feeling that he should wait to see if she would tell him, and not press for answers.

In the meantime, there was Katherine to deal with. It was hard to be honest with himself, but he knew he had as much blame as Katherine did. Maybe thinking that way would help him to show some compassion instead of just building a protective barrier. There was risk in that. But there was risk any way he turned. He just knew he had to find a way to defuse her explosive attachment to him, calm her down. Mitigation. He needed to mitigate the damage she could do him, and this life he was discovering with Carrie.

He'd known Carrie for less than two days. And it seemed crazy, but no matter what was wrong with their relationship, he knew that what he was feeling about her was love. It might be the old love, still available just under his surface, or it might be fresh and new. What he didn't know was whether she had any love left for him.

It was noon by the time he finished. He scraped the mud from his shoes and the tools, and stored the tools back in the shed. He left the shoes inside the back door and in his stocking feet walked through the house. Carrie was still upstairs. Back in the kitchen he rummaged the refrigerator and cupboards for lunch ideas. In the back of his mind he knew needed to continue monitoring the messages on the cell phone. He dreaded it. It felt as if there was a bomb ticking there. But at least he had made up his mind now to respond to Katherine in person, and had told her that he would. Otherwise this situation would be left dangling in the breeze, her emotions gaining strength like a wind that could blow the roof off of his house, the life he was barely beginning to repair. There were missing shingles that needed to be nailed down. There was probably structural damage.

It was just a matter of when he could arrange to see her. He had to admit, now that he'd made that decision, he was curious, wondering what it was about her that had attracted him. And what if he was still attracted? The nagging guilt about deceiving Carrie until he could get things sorted out kept him anxious. It felt as if he might have a fresh start, but he was already polluting it.

He mounted the stairs and paused on the top step. Carrie was in her chair by the window, pen in hand, her ankle crossed over her knee, head bent to a stapled packet of paper.

"Knock, knock," he said, rapping his knuckles on the wall. "Are you getting hungry? I could fix us some lunch." She looked up. "How do grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup sound?" He'd found a carton of soup in the cupboard.

"I could eat. Give me about fifteen minutes to get to a stopping place."

"It'll be ready when you are. Take your time." He'd just had a hunger to get a glimpse of her again, like a snack before lunch.

Brian sliced up some crumbly cheddar and buttered slices of bread ready to go on the griddle in the middle of the stovetop, and poured and stirred the soup in a pan over a low flame. While the soup began to warm he wandered around the downstairs of the house, thinking about growing up here, and missing the childhood he couldn't remember. He stood in the bedroom hallway and held his hands against the unfamiliar walls, listening for echoes from the past that might remain there. Silence. He sighed.

At lunch, Carrie looked out the window into the back yard. "You got a lot done," she said, pleased. "You found the compost pit?" He nodded, mouth full.

"I need to put in another couple of hours after lunch," she said, "And then I was thinking we could take a drive around to get you oriented. Maybe something familiar will spark your memory. At least you'll know your way around."

"I went up to the top of the hill above the campus this morning. That tower up there?"

"That was one of our favorite walks, before . . ." She trailed off. _Before something happened to us?_ She finished, " . . . before we both got so busy."

"What's the name of the big mountain with all the snow? It feels like it's on the tip of my tongue."

"Mt. Baker. One of the volcanoes. It has glaciers. Like Mt. Rainier."

"That's right, Now that you say it I think I knew that."

"You know," Carrie said, "we climbed Mt. Rainier once. The summer before you started law school." She patted her round belly. "I couldn't do it now. We trained for months." The memory made her smile, and her smile made him warm.

"You said we went to Italy. When was that?"

"Just before you took the job up here. You had two weeks of vacation to use. We went to Tuscany, and Sicily. And Rome, of course, just for a couple of days."

"I wish I could remember," he said. "It's like I was never there."

"Mostly we stayed in monastery guesthouses." She looked thoughtful. "Have you looked on the bookshelf in the living room at all? We still have the travel book we used that lists them. I think there's one about Baja too, from when we took the nature cruise down to see the whales. It was a wedding present from your mom and dad."

"Did we take pictures?"

"I forgot about that. Of course. They're on your laptop, from the digital camera."

That meant there was more research he could do. With the bookshelves, and the photos, it was beginning to feel he could piece together at least an illustration of the life he couldn't remember. For some reason he wasn't drawn to exploring his study. He hadn't even sat in his own chair. His career was probably there. It might be because he was afraid it was gone, and he would be unemployable.

Chapter 24

In mid-afternoon, Carrie finished her work for the day, and went out to back the VW out of the driveway and park it in the street. Brian opened the garage door and looked at his car. It was a beautiful piece of machinery, but it looked like it belonged on a showroom floor or in a slick magazine ad, not in his own garage.

"I love this car?" he asked. "It's nice, but is it me?"

Carrie stood back and folded her arms, looking back and forth, first at Brian and then the Lexus. She shook her head.

"I wouldn't have thought so. But there it is."

"Hmmm. Well, do you want to drive?"

She seemed surprised. "You don't want to?"

"Later, maybe, after I know my way around more. Have you driven it before?" And then he had second thoughts. This car had a lot more power than hers. He pictured her speeding around corners and gunning the engine, maybe scraping the side of its faultless surface against something solid and stationary.

"No. I'm a little in awe of it. But I will if you don't want to. Or we could go in my car."

"Let's do that then." He closed the garage door. Maybe they didn't even need a second car. Maybe he could save it in pristine condition and sell it years from now as a classic car. Make a fortune.

"I guess we have a big payment on this?"

"No, you paid cash."

"I did?" He was shocked. "I must make really big bucks."

"I told you that, didn't I? That you do very well?"

"I didn't realize you meant this well." He shook his head. "No wonder you married me. You recognized my financial potential." He peered into her face with a question, a clue about how she felt about him. But she just laughed.

"Sure. Right. When we got married your plan was public interest law."

So, he'd lost his idealistic young fervor.

"Are you disappointed in me? Did I sell out?" He said it lightly, but really wanted to know. He was looking for clues about where he'd gone wrong and landed in the guest bedroom. They got into her car.

"No, not really. We talked it over when you were deciding which offer to take, about the advantage of having enough money for me to finish school, and for us to travel while we're still young. And getting something socked away for college for kids." She strapped on her seat belt and caressed her stomach before starting the car.

"We thought of it as a stage in your career. That there's time later for something more beneficial to the world."

Brian flinched. "So I bought a luxury car for cash. That doesn't exactly sound like I'm on track."

She looked at him curiously as she pulled out into the street. "I guess that was my point when we argued about it."

She took him back over the hill past the college and over the freeway to the onramp. The hills were covered with evergreens, punctuated with the stark, mostly denuded branches of deciduous trees

"Do you want to see town or countryside?" She moved from the onramp, with minimal space available to merge, onto the right lane of the freeway. The engine chugged along in spite of the fact that she was flooring it, only gradually building enough speed to keep pace with the traffic. The cars coming up behind her were moving into the lane on their left. Drivers turned their heads to glare at her, but she was oblivious.

"Anything will do. It's just nice to be out."

They drove for an hour, out into the emerald green farmland with its dairy cattle and brick silos, through an outlying small town, and back through suburban strip mall sprawl. New subdivisions were popping up around the city. The downtown itself was a mixture of turn of the century brick buildings and less elegant structures, with a few sleek new multistory buildings interspersed, and more under construction. Mostly they talked about what was outside the car window.

They were idling at a red light downtown when Carrie asked, "Do you want to go out for an early dinner?"

"Sure, if you do."

"Okay, we're going to one of our favorites." She whipped around a couple of corners and parked in front of a funky looking storefront place in the middle of a block of older buildings. There were neon Corona and DosXX signs in the window.

"It's not so much Mexican as Southwest," she said.

It was barely five o'clock but there were only a few tables still free. The walls were painted in bright warm colors, hung with even brighter paintings featuring otherworldly folk-creatures as well as the more mundane cacti and howling coyotes wearing kerchiefs around their necks. The hostess greeted them with familiarity and showed them to a booth in the back.

The hostess asked, "Would you like something to drink to start? The usual?" Brian nodded, curious to see what his usual was. It turned out to be the dark Dos XX beer, which was good. The beers arrived with chilled, salt-rimmed glasses and cut limes, and a basket of chips with a wooden bowl of salsa. He almost choked on the salsa.

"There's another thing you've forgotten," Carrie smiled at him. "Hot stuff. You have to sneak up on it."

He wiped his watering eyes and looked over the menu. Not the same old combo plates with refried beans and rice. Side dishes like hominy and nopalitos, and imaginative entrees with blue corn tortillas. The waitress, in an off-the-shoulder Mexican peasant blouse with bright embroidery around the ruffle, brought them a basket of sopapillas, little pillows of golden-fried dough all puffed up, with a squeeze bottle of honey and pats of butter.

"Are you ready to order?"

He had his eye on a couple of possibilities.

"Carrie? What do I usually have?" The waitress looked at him, puzzled. He guessed it did sound strange. "I'm trying to decide between the carnitas and the chile rellenos with shrimp."

Carrie ordered a pork stew with posole.

"Okay, I'll take the rellenos." He handed back the menu.

It had been, how long? Not even two full days since Carrie had rescued him at the motel. He relaxed back in the booth and watched her tip her beer bottle up and sip from it, ignoring the glass. He watched her neck muscles move as she swallowed. Her neck was delicate and her hands were delicate, almost everything about her was petite, elfin. Well, not everything. She was a voluptuous elf, maybe. And at the same time she had such a solid presence, she had weight. What was the word? _Gravitas_. She was real, a person you should take seriously. He had already noticed that he frequently had the impulse to speak lightly, to joke his way away from difficulties. Carrie had humor, and a sense of fun, but she didn't seem to use it to cover up anything. He had to remind himself it wasn't possible that she was perfect. Common sense told him that.

Her wariness at their first meeting -- to him it felt like the first meeting -- had softened, and their initial tentative, self-conscious way of conversing had segued into something more natural. If it weren't for the thoughts of Katherine that couldn't be resolved and put away for very long at a time, he felt almost as though he could just sink back into their relationship like a warm bath. But that idea made him think of her naked, and he put it away, for the time being.

While they ate, Brian asked her questions, mostly about her childhood. It kept them talking in a casual, first date sort of way. She answered him easily, thoughtfully, smiling at some of the memories she unearthed. He found out that she had always read books voraciously from kindergarten on, and spent her free time in the summers reading in the library, or on the way home from the library as she walked, or in her bedroom with the door closed. Sometimes she read in a big tree in her back yard, invisible and quiet behind the leaves so that her brothers wouldn't find her to pester her. She tried writing stories but they never sounded any good to her compared to the books she was reading. She was beginning to think she might try again now.

"If you want dessert, they have homemade flan."

"Not for me. I'm full. But you go ahead." They ordered coffee and she ordered the flan, and dug into it as if she hadn't already had a full meal. He watched her eat until she looked up and caught him staring at her.

"I was still hungry," she said. "Do you want a bite?" He dipped his coffee spoon in to taste it. It was creamy and delicious, but he left the rest for her.

"It must be the eating-for-two thing," he said, shaking his head as she pushed away the empty bowl and sat back against the seat, smiling in satisfaction.

Were they having a good time together? It seemed so to Brian. The beer and the food and the intimacy of her stories of childhood mellowed him. As they walked back to the car, on impulse he moved closer to her and put his arm around her waist, but she slipped away gracefully to look in a store window. When she looked at him next it seemed as though she had a question in her eyes, but he had no clue about what the question was.

Chapter 25

At home Brian thought to check for messages on the kitchen phone, in case Lou or someone from work had called. He didn't expect a call from Katherine on this phone, and maybe the sighing breath and hang-up was just a wrong number. He needed to check his cell phone again because no doubt she'd responded to his message by now. He didn't like the idea of her calling the house phone.

Carrie had opened the cabinet in the living room to reveal a TV monitor, and held up a couple of envelopes with DVD disks when he came back in.

"Would you like to watch a movie? I try to give myself a Sabbath from dinner time Saturday evening through Sunday night. No work until Monday, if I can help it."

"What movies do we have?" he asked.

She peered at the envelopes and then handed them to him. "You chose them. Do either of them sound familiar?"

"Totally mysterious," he said.

"Do you want to watch one?"

"I'd like that. Do you have a preference? Or we can flip a coin. "

He felt an urgency to at least listen to his messages, and maybe call Katherine if absolutely necessary. The pleasure of the evening was sliding out of his reach. Carrie was inviting him to watch a movie with her, and he was trying to figure out how to sneak off and call his girlfriend. He imagined himself hiding in the closet in his room, mumbling into the phone, muffled by the clothes. It was an ugly, shameful picture.

"A couple of minutes?" he asked. "I need to, uh . . . " and he inclined his head towards the hall and the bathroom.

"Sure. I'll go make some decaf."

He went to the bedroom and took the cell phone with him to the bathroom and locked the door. He turned on the overhead fan.

1:00 p.m.: "Brian, I listened to your message and I don't know what to think. I have to see you in person. Please don't cut me out of your life! You mean everything to me. We love each other! You said you don't remember me, but I can make you remember, I know I can. Call me as soon as you can."

She didn't sound hysterical, just determined. It was the only message. His promise to call again seemed to have calmed her down. In the morning he would go for a run and take the phone with him, arrange to meet with her early on Monday, while Carrie was teaching. He went back to the living room.

Carrie sat cross-legged in one of the two big chairs, a bowl of popcorn on the table between them. He sat down in the other chair. He was having trouble shaking off the feeling of self-contempt, and it made it hard for him to relax with Carrie. He felt so obviously fraudulent, it seemed unbelievable that she couldn't feel it too, see right into him, read his thoughts and divine his subterfuges. And hate him for it.

He thought of something he'd meant to ask her, tearing himself away from his obsessive thoughts. "Did we watch the movie, 'Matador?' It was a comedy, about a guy who meets a hit man in Mexico."

"That sounds familiar. Greg Kinnear, I think?" She thought for a second or two. "We did see that, a few months ago."

"I remembered that movie. When I was in the motel. It was on TV. I knew I'd seen it, but I didn't remember anything else, just the movie. Did I like it especially? I wonder why I would have that one really clear memory and nothing else? Doesn't that seem strange?"

"Maybe that's how it's going to come back, in little pieces. I think it means that it's going to happen. I think it's good news." She rearranged her legs on her chair, turned to look at him intently. "We could watch it again. It might be a trigger or something." She took a handful of popcorn and settled back. "We'll find out more on Monday when you talk to the doctors at the hospital." Her equanimity kept amazing him. Maybe she didn't care that much; had already written him off anyway, and was just a helpful stranger, doing what she'd do for anyone.

But she'd touched his cheek that first night.

"I'll be glad to get the hospital tests over with," he said. Of course it was much more important to extricate himself from the problem with Katherine, get that over with. A brain tumor seemed like a secondary issue. "Okay, I'm ready for a movie. You choose."

"I thought the spy story." She handed him the disc and he inserted it in the player. Carrie pointed the remote, and the logos and credits started on the screen.

Brian glanced up at the big windows, which faced the street. He felt a clutch of vulnerability. The blinds were open half way, and through the slits between them he could see the lights from the house across the street, and the shapes of a few cars parked along the curb. That meant he and Carrie were visible from the outside too.

Katherine could come back. She could even be watching them now. It gave him the creeps and a shudder ran up his spine. He got up from his chair abruptly and went from window to window, rotating the plastic rods until all the blinds were closed tight.

Chapter 26

The skies outside were grey and black when Brian got up, the clouds racing and a whippy little wind rattling a few raindrops against the windowpanes. He dressed in his sweats and went to the kitchen where Carrie was making coffee. She was wearing oversize watch plaid flannel pajamas, with the pant legs rolled up to reveal bright red socks. She saw him looking at her. She didn't know he was thinking how different she looked from the vision of the blue nightgown of Friday night. This was a warm and cuddly version of Carrie, which was nice too.

"These are my Sabbath vestments."

"You wear them all day?" he asked.

She nodded. "Yep. It keeps me from being tempted to run errands." Carrie wasn't kidding about her Sabbath.

Brian went back to his bedroom for his hat and rain jacket. He put the cell phone and Katherine's card in his pocket.

He poked his head in the kitchen doorway. "I'm heading out for a run now, before the rain cuts loose." Carrie nodded.

He retraced yesterday's route up to the college, and found a covered pergola with barriers against the wind. It was still early, and since it was Sunday, only a few people were out. He thought about postponing the phone call, in case he would be waking her, but he knew it was just a flimsy excuse. Besides, Katherine was the one who was desperate to talk to him. He figured he could have called her at three a.m. and she wouldn't have minded.

There was one more message, from late last night. "Brian, if you don't call me soon, I don't know what I'll do. Something." And she clicked off abruptly.

He sat for a minute with his phone in his lap, following his breath until it was regular and he could stay with it. Then he dialed her number.

She picked up immediately, in the middle of the first ring.

Breathlessly, "Hello?"

"Is this Katherine?" He knew her voice by now, but he wanted to be sure, and any slowing down of the conversation would help him negotiate his way through it.

"Brian! Oh thank God! I've been going nuts!"

"Yes, I'm sorry. It's been difficult to call."

"Three days, Brian. It's been three days since you left me waiting at lunch! Did you think at all about how I felt?" There was no question about the anger.

"You got my message? About what's happened?"

Now her voice took on a cool, scolding note, like an elementary teacher chastising a child with no homework to deliver. "It's hard to believe that story, Brian. Really hard to believe."

"It's hard for me to believe too. But it's true. It's the reason I wasn't at work on Thursday or Friday. I don't remember anything. I'm going for hospital tests tomorrow, to see if it's something physical, in my brain."

"I have to see you Brian. I have to look at your eyes. I cannot believe you don't remember us. We belong together, and you'll remember that when you see me."

He had to turn her away from that idea. He was prepared to see her, but on his own terms, not hers. He didn't want to encourage her.

"Katherine. I don't even remember my own mother. I don't think you should count on anything." He kept his voice cool, but tried to avoid cold and rejecting. It was a fine line to walk, trying to handle her emotional volatility.

"When can I see you? Can you come over now?"

"I'm sorry, there isn't any way I can get away today. Could we meet before you go to work tomorrow morning, around 7:45 or 8:00? What time does the office open?" Carrie would be leaving by 7:30. "I could meet you for coffee or breakfast. Do you know a good place to go?"

"You could come here."

"I think the first time would be better someplace else." Why did he say, "First time," as if there would be a second? He was just feeling his way by intuition, and his intuition told him not to be too abrupt. _I'm a manipulative bastard._

"I know it sounds odd, but this is a strange situation for me. I'd just feel better." Meeting in public could make it easier to avoid an emotional scene. She wasn't replying.

"There's a Starbucks downtown. How about there? Please, Katherine, work with me on this."

"It sounds like you're not giving me any choice, doesn't it?" She sounded bitter.

"I'm really sorry. I know this is hard for you too."

"I don't know if I can wait until tomorrow." It was a little whiney, pitiful sounding. He waited.

The line was silent for a moment, and finally she sighed. "All right, if that's the way it has to be. I'm supposed to be at the office by 9:00. I'll meet you at 7:45."

"Thank you. And Katherine?"

"What?"

"You'll have to find me. Don't be hurt if I don't recognize you."

After they hung up he sat with his hands in his lap, staring out at the rain dripping off the ends of the cedar branches that surrounded and overhung the shelter. It pattered on the roof above him, a steady beat now. He tried to feel relieved that this part was over. She hadn't made any more implied threats to come to his house. All he had to do now is convince her that it was impossible to continue the relationship.

All he had to do? That's why he wasn't relieved, but instead was overwhelmed with dread. Now that he'd talked to her it was real, and it would be glaringly real tomorrow morning. He didn't know how he was going to do it.

By the time he got back to the house the rain was dripping down around the inside of his collar, and had blown sideways into his ears. He felt like a beaver, heading for his den. He shook the water off his rain jacket under the roof covering the front step, and hung it along with his hat on a hook in the entry porch. His shoes and socks were soaked and he sat down in the wicker chair and took them off too, and carried them inside.

Carrie was at the kitchen counter, beating up batter and overseeing sausages sizzling on the griddle.

"I'm home. Smells good!"

"How was your run, besides wet?"

"Brrrr. Cold. I need a hot shower. Do I do this every day?"

"Every last one. You're very dedicated. Go get warm."

After he'd showered and dressed in a wool shirt and jeans he went back to the kitchen in stocking feet. The waffle iron was plugged in and heating on the kitchen table, alongside a jug of maple syrup and the butter dish.

"Can you get the blueberries out of the refrigerator? I put them in a bowl to defrost last night. See if they need a shot from the microwave, will you?" He took them out and gave them a stir with a spoon and tipped a sip of the sweet and tart purple juice onto his tongue.

"I think they're ready." He put the bowl on the table for serving over the waffles. He was ravenous, and the sharp sage and crisp sausage smells that filled the kitchen were stimulating his appetite even more.

Between them they set the table, and when the first waffle was done they divided it and Carrie spooned a second one onto the grid of the waffle iron. There was enough batter for an army, and Brian took advantage until he was satisfied. No wonder he had to run every day, if this is how he ate all the time.

Chapter 27

Carrie's Sabbath had its own personal rules and rituals to observe. They boiled down to a big breakfast, reading for pleasure, avoiding anything to do with work, and a big pot of soup so no one went hungry for the rest of the day.

"It sounds nice," he said.

"I have to do it to keep me sane. Even when I'm caught up on student papers the dissertation is always there, hanging over my head. This way I'm supposed to feel sacrilegious if I even pick it up to look at it. It works."

"I guess I could think that I'm taking a Sabbath myself, now. I'm completely free from work for the time being. That part of this being crazy thing feels good. It's an enforced extended Sabbath. Maybe I'm taking a sabbatical."

He had a second thought. "I do feel sorry for the people at the office though, working all weekend to rescue the contract I was in the middle of. I feel guilty, even though there's nothing I can do." Of course it was hard not to feel guilty, though not about work. Right now he couldn't care less about work.

After they finished breakfast, Brian cleared the table and rinsed the dishes and Carrie started chopping up potatoes and onions and whatever she could find in the refrigerator and cupboards to put in the Sunday soup.

Brian wandered through the house aimlessly, into his bedroom and then his study. He turned on the laptop computer on his desk. The image on the screen was a photograph that looked like the Italian countryside, a rolling yellow landscape complete with a flock of sheep, and an ancient looking walled city on a hill in the distance. It must have been from their trip they took together. _Fa bello._ Some time soon he would explore the other pieces of his life that resided on this machine.

Back in the living room, Carrie was curled up in one of the big chairs under the light of the lamp, with a book open on the arm. The house was warm and he could smell the soup from the kitchen. He realized it felt like his house now, with his wife in it. Warmth filled him inside too. This was worth protecting. This was what he wanted, the life he wanted.

She looked up and smiled absently, then dropped her head back to her book, and was lost in it again before he stopped looking at her.

Having a day with nothing he had to do was just what he needed, since there really was nothing he knew to do. The past three days had been so full of confusion. First lost, then found but still lost to himself. Trying to get his bearings with work and his marriage. And most problematic, the thing with Katherine. The thing. The feeling of something, someone out of control and capable of blowing up the life he was trying to reconstruct before it could be fully formed and made solid somehow. He'd come to a quiet spot, a reprieve, for the day at least.

He began looking at the bookshelf to see what appealed to him. There was trade paperback fiction and memoir, biography, essay collections, politics and history. Also poetry.

"We have a lot of books," he said, rather pointlessly. He turned and looked over his shoulder at Carrie. "Did you say this is where the travel books are?"

She held up a finger and made a little grunting noise, and then placed the finger on her page to mark her place and looked up. "Huh?"

"The travel guides you said we had. I thought I'd look at them." She pointed at a lower shelf and was immediately back in her book. Well, she'd warned him about the way she read.

"I'll be quiet," he said, "Starting right now." There was a little assenting "Hmmph" from her direction. Brian grinned to himself. So this was marriage.

He found and pulled out the slim guide to Italian monasteries, and then ran a finger along the spines of the other books, looking for inspiration. He brought several books to the coffee table. He realized the big compendium of American poetry was meant more to impress her than anything else, in the event she ever looked up from her own book. Had he been insecure with girls when he was young, taking postures he thought might catch their attention? There was a Bill Bryson book about hiking the Appalachian Trail that looked entertaining, and a history book about the _Mayflower_. Not quite ready to settle down, he went to the kitchen and started the fire under the kettle for tea. He went back to get Carrie's cup, sitting cold next to her, to make her a refill. She looked up with a vague smile and nodded thanks. While he was in the kitchen he took the lid off the soup pot and sniffed its steamy savor. It was bubbling along at a slow simmer. He gave it a stir with the wooden spoon on the counter, and replaced the lid.

Once he had his tea on the table in front of him, he tried to concentrate on his choices. He thumbed through the poetry volume first, thinking it was not at all what he wanted, but he kept getting caught by the first lines, reading further only a few lines until compulsively moving on to another page.

_I'll come back to this_ , he thought, and then wondered if he really would. He looked briefly at the history book and didn't feel like starting from the beginning, and the middle parts seemed to require information from the first parts so he gave that up. He started the Bryson book and read for a while, then set it aside for his bedside table. He got back up and returned the poetry book and the history book to the shelf and scanned again. Maybe if he read all these books he could fill his empty mind back up. Maybe it would be more valuable content than what he had lost. Maybe he didn't need those lost things any more. Finally he chose a fiction book at random and began reading. A few pages in he was caught up in the story and the morning slid by.

Carrie stirred, and closed her book. Ah, she was back. She returned the book to the shelf. "The soup should be ready. Are you?"

"Did you finish? What were you reading?"

" _The Turn of the Screw_. Henry James. Remember we saw the old movie with Deborah Kerr. I like to re-read it every few years. It's a ghost story."

He didn't remember the movie, and didn't remember reading the book either. But then that wasn't a surprise anymore.

They ate at the kitchen table again, which he liked, because it felt friendly. The dining room seemed to be reserved for company. In the kitchen he could believe he was in his own home. In the rest of the house he still felt like a visitor. Maybe it was because he had helped cook, claimed the territory of householder. He smiled, remembering the easy familiarity he felt cooking the omelets for them, Carrie's appreciation and reference to "you used to . . ." providing some continuity between then and now, before and after. Carrie had another book with her, not reading yet, but thumbing through it in preparation.

The soup was rich and savory, mostly vegetables, onions and greens and potatoes, with a bit of spicy chicken sausage added. Brian grated more Parmesan on top from the chunk that sat on a plate with a little grater. For a while he ate silently, simply indulged himself in the taste, the smell and the heat of it. When Carrie put her book aside and got serious about her soup, he looked up from his meal.

"What do I usually do on your Sabbath? I'm guessing I'm not a voracious reader. Do I take an afternoon nap? I feel a little at loose ends." He didn't want her to think he was complaining, expecting her to provide something for him to do or entertain him, that she should be paying attention to him. He added, "Not that it's your problem!"

"Mostly you go in your study and fool around on your computer, unless you've brought work home, and then you work on your computer."

He grimaced. "You mean I stay out of your way. Am I distracting you by staying in the living room?"

"No, of course not. It doesn't bother me at all."

Brian thought that could mean that she was comfortable with him, or that she was indifferent to his presence, that he was part of the furniture. It was funny how closely he was following every nuance of her response to him. He guessed he was trying to find out where he stood with her. To see if they stood together on solid ground, in spite of the separate bedrooms. If their relationship was still moving, or if it was at a standstill, or worse, finished.

Carrie looked up at him over her spoon. "Have you found anything interesting on the bookshelf? Do the books seem familiar to you?"

"There are a lot of choices, I found it hard to settle on one. Nothing has sparked a memory, though. Are they yours, mine or ours?"

"Well, we combined our libraries when we first moved in together. I've probably bought most of the newer ones, but I think most of the history and political books are your contribution. We've talked about thinning it out and seeing what we can sell back to the bookstore for credit. Make room for more."

"I guess I will go look at my study. It's a whole other category of life to get familiar with. Career. Why am I so uninterested in that?"

"I don't know. Maybe you're just not ready to deal with it." That's the way it felt to him, too.

After lunch Carrie settled herself back in her chair and dove into her next book. Brian went to his study. So far he'd only walked into the middle of the room and stood there blankly, and turned on the computer. Now he surveyed the room, hoping to be inspired.

The desk was a modern one, blond wood top, with darker walnut stained drawer fronts, one of them a big file drawer. The laptop sat in the center, with a tidy little printer next to it. There was a file box sitting on a back corner, with a few unpaid bills and a checkbook. Besides the desk chair, there was a leather recliner and footstool and a modern gooseneck reading lamp. One wall was filled with waist-high bookcases, and the bottom shelves had magazine cases all along them, mostly with law journals, some with little Post-it Note bookmarks sticking out the top. The larger books were on the law, probably texts from law school. There was also a shelf devoted to paperbacks, and a couple of stacks of magazines.

He pulled a few books from the textbook section and stood at the desk thumbing through them. Much of what he read looked familiar. Perhaps he would be able to get this back. Maybe it wasn't even gone at all, just not germane right now. Soon he would have to try to find out where he stood in relation to his job.

He thought again about the peculiar state of his memory. The biggest gaps were the parts where people should be, and his own identity and biography. And yet he could get along socially, look normal, understand how things worked. This knowledge, the theoretical knowledge in these books, seemed dusty but part of him still. But the application of it in real life? He didn't know that yet. It would be interesting to find out if he could just drop back into the current and swim.

It was the missing people that bothered him the most, especially at work. Andrea and Lou, his assistant Jason, his secretary—what was her name? Jenna. And Katherine. All blank faces. That would be the case with clients as well, he assumed. They wouldn't have much confidence in the firm if they had to be introduced to him all over again. He wondered how much he actually dealt with individuals in his job, or if he was a behind-the-scenes guy.

He pulled open the center desk drawer. It was as neat as the desktop, pencils and pens and paperclips in their own slots in the drawer organizer. Stapler, staple remover, everything was in easy reach. A neat desk is the sign of a sick mind. Where did that come from? It was a messy person's humorous self-justification, but in his case it seemed to play out like a version of the truth.

He didn't feel sick so much as having the sense of bobbing in the middle of a vast sea in a very small boat, checking regularly to identify the leaks in his craft.

He returned the heavy books to the bookcase and looked at the paperbacks. Most of them were detective fiction, and some John Grisham thrillers, almost all with "New York Times Bestseller" banners on their covers. There were a few sea adventure stories too. No wonder he felt like a stranger when he was standing at the living room bookshelves. Here was his natural bent, throwaway books that were continually replaceable as new titles came out. This is more likely what he read on a Sunday afternoon while Carrie covered the literary scene.

He opened the file drawer of the desk and found neatly labeled files that looked like household finances and records. This and the checkbook and bills made it obvious that he was the family accountant and record keeper. That made sense, considering what looked like his systematic nature, and the potential for chaos in Carrie's study upstairs. It wasn't that it was messy, because it wasn't, but it was crammed full of stacks of loose paper. Too much chance of things being lost in the shuffle.

Deserting the room he took two of the paperbacks back to the living room. Carrie actually looked up and focused her eyes on him. He thought she must be at a stopping place in the book, for him to be so lucky. It felt lucky, to have her looking at him, her hair in its natural tousled state and her blue eyes framed by the dark lashes and brows. She looked like a beautiful child in her oversize pajamas. He could see that she was already a quarter of the way into her book. He held up his find, the books from the study.

"I just discovered how shallow I am," he joked, although he wondered if it was really such a joke. "I have treasure trove of escapism in there."

"You know," she said, half-seriously. "You're really not shallow. You're just a smart guy who rests his mind reading shallow stuff."

"That's a relief. I think I'll take your word for it." It made him feel good that she didn't seem to look down on his choices. The paperbacks were probably relegated to the study because they weren't that attractive on the handsome living room shelves, not because she was embarrassed by their content.

He went back to his previous spot on the couch and plumped up a pillow for his head, and lay down so that the light from the front windows illuminated his page. He opened one of the mysteries that looked brand new, and adjusted his body so comfortably that he fell asleep with the book on his chest within five minutes.

Chapter 28

On Monday morning he was in the coffee shop, staring into the glass mug with his shoulders hunched over it, focused on staying calm. It was 7:38 a.m., seven minutes before Katherine was due. He hadn't wanted to be the one to come in the door looking for her, since he didn't know what to look for. He'd found a table a little apart from the others, but still in view of both doors. His eyes shifted back and forth from one entrance to the other, trying to guess. In just the few minutes he'd been here, numerous women who looked to be dressed for work had come in to pick up coffee, but only a few gave him even a passing glance, and they each went directly to the counter, didn't double-take. The tension was almost unbearable.

Carrie had left before 7:30, and he'd gone directly to the garage and backed out his car as soon as her VW putted around the corner. Even though he needed to move fast, he had an uncomfortable thought. What if she'd forgotten something and came back to get it? He knew his guilt was making him irrational. He left the car idling in the driveway and closed the garage door behind him so it wouldn't be obvious that he was gone. If she did come back she would think he was out running.

He remembered the route downtown from the drive they had taken Saturday. It was just minutes from their door. His pulse raced, and his chest felt constricted. He seemed unable to get a full breath.

Rehearsal was useless. Katherine's moods on the phone had shifted every which way, and he didn't know what this morning's attitude would be. He would have to play it by ear. The thing that he wondered about the most, last night when he tried to sleep, and this morning when he woke at 5:30 with a feeling of dread, was her statement that they loved each other. He didn't believe that. He was sure it was wishful thinking on her part. Which would mean he was the sort of man who took advantage of a woman who cared for him when he didn't return the feeling. That man would be a jerk. But the possibility of being in love with someone besides Carrie didn't ring true.

Through the window Brian saw her coming. It wasn't that he knew her, but the young woman he was watching turned and seemed to recognize his Lexus in the parking strip across the street and then hurried her steps towards the entrance. She wore a tight black skirt, short, with very high heels, shapely legs. Her black fitted jacket had a fur collar buttoned up high around her neck.

She came through the door scanning the tables and then her face lit up with recognition as she came directly to him, looking anxious. Stylish spiky blond hair with highlights, delicate gold bangles on her wrist. He stood, almost held out his hand to shake but instead put both hands on the table. What was the protocol in this situation? He was at a loss.

"Brian! I've been half mad with worry!" She tossed her black bag onto the table and moved forward to embrace him but he stepped back and she stopped short. A quick flash of disappointment, maybe frustration, crossed her face but she banished it and smiled.

"Katherine?" he asked, unnecessarily, but it emphasized the distance he wanted to keep between them, suggested a certain formality.

She searched his face with a frown, and he consciously kept it impassive, except for the slight smile you would wear when being tentatively friendly with a stranger.

"I guess that's obvious," he said. "I'm sorry. But I'm glad you came. I need to talk to you." She adjusted her own welcoming smile to something tighter, and pulled out the chair next to his, sat down and leaned toward him.

In a low insistent voice she asked, "Brian, what's going on?"

"Can I get you a latte or something?" He looked towards the counter and saw a long line waiting to be served. She shrugged the suggestion off impatiently and drilled into him with her eyes.

"You do remember me, don't you? Why are you pretending like this?"

"Katherine, I'm not pretending. I have no reason to pretend to have forgotten my whole life." He'd touched the calm and sensible part of himself. He could handle this.

She was quite pretty, and there was a whiff of spicy perfume. Her face was close to his as she leaned towards him at the table. Her makeup was expertly applied, although it couldn't cover completely the pebbled texture of her skin from what were probably adolescent acne scars. From more than a few feet away you would never notice. She was much closer than that.

"I know this must be hard to believe. It's pretty bizarre." There had been no way to plan how he would handle this thing that should never have happened in the first place. But the important thing was to convince her that it was over.

"I feel so much better, now that I can see you." She reached out and put her hand on his, grasping it tightly. "I've been through hell, calling and calling and not hearing from you! And then your message was so cold, I felt like my heart had been ripped out!" He resisted pulling his hand free for a few moments, because he didn't want to jerk it loose and upset her.

He patted her hand with his other hand and then gradually withdrew them both. "You do understand, don't you? That it's all disappeared for me? Whatever relationship we've had in the past, right now for me it's like we've never met before. There's nothing I can do to help that."

"Why do you say, 'relationship?' It's not just a 'relationship,' Brian. It's love. We were meant to be together. We can't just shut that off. It's not possible! It's not right!" She seemed panicky, reaching for his hand again. He searched inside himself for some feeling, a glimmer of how he had felt about her, some semblance of desire. Had this really been a serious relationship? Or just a casual office romance, a fling? Had he taken advantage of her availability, or had she seduced him? He wondered again what sort of man he was. It gave him a sick feeling.

"Come home with me," She was pleading. "I'll call the office and tell them I'm sick or something. When we make love you'll remember. I promise you will." He didn't want to think about making love to her. It was the last thing he wanted.

"Katherine, I don't know what to say. I can't do that. I can't continue this." He shook his head and tried to be gentle. She wasn't hearing what he was telling her. He had said it was over, hadn't he?

Her eyes narrowed with suspicion and he watched her tense up. Her voice was tight. "Stop calling me Katherine. It's Kate. You call me Kate." And then, like ice, "Are you sleeping with Carrie again? Is that what this is about?"

He hadn't expected that. First, that she would ask such a question. And then, that she knew such a personal thing, that he wasn't in the same bedroom with Carrie. That he'd told her that. He could just hear himself, that old line, though how he knew it was an old line was beyond him. Maybe he was practiced at this. _There's nothing between my wife and me anymore. We're just housemates._

Had he promised this woman something? Because if he had, now he had to get out of it.

"Katherine," he said, using the more formal name again. He measured his words, tried to cover his confusion, and his resentment at the way she was invading something he wanted to keep separate. "I don't have any memory of my wife any more than I remember you." He didn't want to be specific with her, certainly didn't want to answer her question directly.

"You're in that house with her, and away from me. That's what I know. How do I know you're not being unfaithful to me? "

He found himself exasperated. This was getting away from him. How could he answer a question like that? Just answering her, because of the way she framed it, carried the implication that he owed her fidelity. Instead he changed the subject.

"You have the advantage over me, Katherine. You know the history between us, and I don't." If he could keep the conversation factual, he could keep his balance with her.

"Your business card was in my wallet. We both work for Halstrom-Pierce, right? That's where we met?"

"Yes." She was impatient to get back to the core of things.

"And how long have we been . . . involved?" It was something he needed to know, to help him understand the situation. As much as he didn't want to go into it.

With exaggerated patience, as if he were a child, she said, "We've been together for a month. Finally. Lunch on Thursday was supposed to be our anniversary. But I knew it was coming a long time before that." Her smile flickered and then she began to tear up, and took his napkin to dab at her eyes. "It's been the best month of my life. I've never been so happy! And we don't even get to see each other that much, because of your wife. Because you won't tell her." There was a bitter twist to her mouth.

"Do people at work know about it?" Only a month. It couldn't be that serious.

"No, we've been careful. It's against the rules or something. I think that's a stupid rule."

"How did it happen? I mean, how did we happen to start seeing each other?"

"You mean sleeping together, don't you? We saw each other every day for three years." She was being sarcastic.

"I suppose so. That's what we've been doing?"

"Of course. It was only a matter of time. I knew that the first day you came to work there. I thought, 'That's the man for me.' I think I've been very patient. This thing, this business with your mind, it's not going to stop me. Us. Because we belong together."

Carrie said he'd worked there for three years. And she'd been focused on him for all that time? He must have known. And why, if he was going to have an affair, did it only start a month ago? Was that when he'd been booted out of the connubial bedroom, for a reason he didn't understand? Was it revenge on his part?

"How did it begin, Katherine? Kate."

"We went out for drinks after work one night. You looked unhappy, and I knew I could cheer you up. And then we went to my place, and I did. I did cheer you up." She gave him a look full of sexual innuendo and he felt threatened. Not by desire, but by fear. Fear of what his own impulses had brought about. And fear that this was going to be harder than he thought. She wasn't going to give up easily. On the other hand he was relieved to know that their relationship had been brief. A short affair was better than a long one, wasn't it? He didn't believe he would have made her any promises in that length of time. But how she saw things in her own mind, that could be another matter.

Brian looked at his watch. It was after 8:00. Carrie would be back by 9:15 and he'd told her he was going to run while she was gone. And they would be due at the hospital later for his tests. Another unpleasant task to get over with. At this moment he didn't really care if he had a brain tumor. It would mean he had an escape route. And no matter how the tests came out, maybe he could just tell Katherine he was dying!

"Do you want some coffee?" He needed a breather before he tried again to change Katherine's conviction that they would be continuing their affair.

She shook her head vigorously. "I don't need anything except for you to tell me when we can see each other again. If you really have forgotten, I can help you. We can get it back, Brian."

He took a deep breath and plunged.

"Katherine, listen to me." She stiffened, but he had her attention. "I can't do that. I just can't be with you again. That's why I met you here today, to tell you that. I'm terribly, terribly sorry to hurt you. It's not your fault—it just can't be helped. It has to be over."

Her perfect little face turned slack, blank, expressionless. She was rigid in her chair. She kept her eyes on his and he couldn't look away. Gradually she came out of what looked like a trance. Her lip curled, and her eyes narrowed, and when she spoke her voice was low and threatening.

"That's what you think."

"Katherine, please. Try to understand." He felt helpless.

"No, you're the one who has to understand. This will never be over. I waited too long for you to let you go now. Just when we have this chance to be happy."

She was immovable. Nothing he had said had touched her belief in them as a couple. What had he done? He shook his head, sorrowfully, because he really was sorry. Her self-delusion was pitiful, in spite of the threat in her voice. "I'm so sorry. This is hard for you. I can see that. If it helps, it's hard for me too. But I can't make things be different than they are."

"Yes, you can. You will."

There was no point in going on, because Brian could see that it was going to take time for her to accept it. More words now weren't going to make a difference. He could hear the echo of a song in his head, reversed. _No I can't. Yes you can. No I can't. Yes you can._

He stood up. He had to get away from her, now.

"Brian!" A young man was approaching their table, a to-go cup of coffee in his hand.

"Katherine?" He looked surprised to see her there.

Brian stared at him, nonplussed.

"I'm sorry, do I know you?"

Like magic, Katherine switched to a casual, friendly expression. "Hi, Jason."

"What are you two doing here? Brian, I thought you were ill." He looked back and forth at each of them, puzzled.

This must be his assistant, the one who had been working all weekend to rescue the project he'd deserted when his memory deserted him. He wondered what Jason had been told. How was he going to explain finding him with Katherine? He held out his hand.

"You must be Jason, from the office?"

Jason looked at him oddly, questioning. He shook Brian's hand.

"Lou told you what's happened? About my memory?" He laughed, embarrassed. "This is the most bizarre experience. I go out for coffee and two people I work with recognize me, and here I am drawing a complete blank. I understand I've caused you a lot of extra work, a lot of trouble." He hoped he had succeeded in glossing over his presence at the same table with Katherine. An accidental meeting. Unless Jason knew something about them. He hoped nobody did. He didn't need any more complications.

Jason still looked puzzled, and then nodded. "Oh, yes, well we think we have it under control. You mean the Fitzhugh contract. We're almost ready for the meeting this afternoon." He frowned and looked into Brian's face. "You really lost your memory? I thought that was just in stories."

"I wish it were. I'm telling you, it's not much fun."

"When do you think you'll be back at work?"

"I don't know. I'm not much good to you at the moment. Things are pretty much up in the air. But I'm going for some tests at the hospital today, in a little while. Maybe I'll find out more about what to expect."

He looked at his watch, only 8:15, but it was a good time to get out of here and away from the implacable Katherine. "I'd better get going, in fact." Katherine glared at him. He knew she wasn't through with him.

"Would you tell Lou that I'll get in touch as soon as I know something? I'll call him this afternoon if I'm through with the tests. Or tomorrow morning, if it's too late in the day." He said this to Jason, ignoring Katherine's steady gaze.

"Sure. I can do that. We could sure use you. This is temporary, right?" He had the idea that Jason was a bit insincere. Maybe he was giving the young upstart the chance he was looking for to get ahead. If he couldn't remember soon, his own job could be up for grabs. And what would he do instead?

"Keep your fingers crossed. I'd better go." He shook hands with Jason again. "It was nice to meet you. In a manner of speaking. And you too, Katherine." He took his cup to the counter and got the hell out of there, forcing himself not to look back at her. The hair on the back of his neck prickled, knowing he was watched.

Chapter 29

By the time Carrie got back from school he had taken a short run, pushing as hard as he could to rid himself of the overwhelming tension from the encounter with Katherine. Even if she wouldn't accept what he said, there wasn't much she could do, was there? It takes two to tango. He shoved the thought from his mind that he could be wrong about that.

At the hospital they'd put him in one of those ridiculous gowns with a gap in back. He didn't know why he had to be half naked if they were just going to look at his head. But the first thing they did was give him a complete physical, banged at his knees with their little hammer again, drew blood, and then hooked him up to an electroencephalograph and for the grand finale, ran him through an imaging machine where he had to lie completely still as the padded bed inched its way through a whirring donut. It felt like hours in there. Finally they let him get dressed again. He sat in the waiting room with Carrie, both of them flipping nervously through the magazines. Carrie had brought a folder of student papers with her, but she was long through with them by the time he had been released from the torture chamber. During all that time no one told him anything.

It was almost four by the time the neurologist came to the door of the waiting room. Until now Brian had only seen technicians. The doctor was tall and spare, and even though he looked to be younger than fifty, he walked with a decided stoop. He carried a clipboard, and since they were the only people left in the waiting room, he came straight to them.

"Mr. Edwards, Mrs. Edwards? I'm Dr. Ellsworth, your neurologist. Let's go down to my office." Carrie looked at Brian with a question and he nodded.

"Please, yes." He wanted her with him, wanted her to hear first hand whatever the doctor had to tell them. Now for the first time he was anxious about the outcome. What if he did have a brain tumor? What if he was dying, just when he was hoping he had something to live for?

Dr. Ellsworth motioned them to chairs in front of his desk and sat down behind it. He took a pair of wire-rimmed glasses from the pocket of his white coat and examined the papers on his clipboard, sliding his glasses down his nose to peer at Brian from time to time as he did so. Finally he sat back in his chair and removed the glasses.

"So far I don't see anything here that indicates a brain abnormality. If there were a tumor, for example, we almost certainly would have spotted it. There are further tests we can do to be sure, and I'll need to consult with the radiologist. But for now, I think you can be optimistic."

Brian let his stiff shoulders fall. He looked at Carrie and saw her wipe a finger at the corner of her eye. So she had been afraid too. She had behaved so matter-of-factly all day. Maybe that was just how Carrie managed herself.

"Thank you. I felt like I was okay, but it's a relief to have it in writing."

"We will want to check a little further, and I can schedule a few more tests for later in the week." He consulted the computer screen on his desk. "I'll have my nurse call you after I've had a chance to speak with the radiologist. But this looks good." He nodded in the direction of the clipboard. "Looks good."

He leaned back in his chair, which squeaked as he did so, and studied Brian.

"Now, if you can answer a few questions for me? So we can get an idea of where to go from here?" Dr. Ellsworth took him through the past few days, beginning with Brian's first memory of finding himself in the park, nodding his head and watching Brian intently.

"How about your current memory? Have you had any problem with memory lapses since Thursday morning?"

Brian looked at Carrie, and said, "Not that I've noticed. Carrie?"

"No, I don't think so."

Dr. Ellsworth pulled a pad of paper and a pen towards him on the desk and scribbled something, and ripped the sheet free, slid it across the desk.

"I'd like you to see someone else." Brian picked up the paper and read, or could almost read, a name and phone number.

"Is this Barnes? Dr. Barnes?"

"Yes, Patricia Barnes. She's the psychiatrist I'd recommend. If there's nothing organic, then she might be able to help you. She has a specialty in hypnosis as well. I'll give her a call and tell her I'm sending you, and you can call her to make an appointment. I'll ask her to try to fit you in as soon as possible."

A psychiatrist. Of course, that made sense. For some reason he'd been thinking that he was on his own. Now he realized how helpless and alone he'd been feeling. He was in such a pickle, really, not understanding what had been happening between him and Carrie, afraid to ask her about his home in the guest room, the why of it, and the complication of the relationship with Katherine. The guilt and the loneliness of it, with no one to talk to. A psychiatrist was supposed to be non-judgmental. He could let his hair down. And he needed to understand what to expect. Maybe she could tell him that. Could this forgetting be permanent? He looked at Carrie, her hand on the bulge of their baby. He hadn't even been able to ask her anything about it, not even when it was due. Why was that? He felt so tentative with her, and it seemed that the baby was hers alone, and her own private business. That it would be an invasion somehow to talk about it.

The doctor looked at his watch. "Her office hours might be over by now. Why don't you call her first thing in the morning?"

"I will. Thank you. Thank you for everything." Carrie thanked him too, and the doctor saw them to the door.

As they walked down the hospital corridor, Brian said, "I'd better call the office. I told Lou I'd report back after the tests, and it's late." He didn't have his cell phone with him—that stayed hidden in his underwear drawer. He went to a pay phone and pulled his card from his wallet.

"Lou, this is Brian. I'm just leaving the hospital now." He didn't feel like asking how the contract discussions had gone, because he didn't want to hear that his amnesia had botched them.

"So how did it go?" Lou sounded genuinely concerned.

"So far so good. They didn't find anything out of order in my head."

"Good. Good. So can you come in, in the morning? Andrea's back and she wants to see you. Pronto. I told her you were having tests today."

"Of course. About 9:00?"

"Nine is good. Prepare yourself. Andrea is not pleased. And you know Andrea when she's upset. Or do you? Maybe you have that to look forward to." He chuckled as if he couldn't wait.

"I guess I'll find out. Is she going to fire me?"

"That depends, buddy. That depends on whether or not you've forgotten your legendary charm. I'll see you tomorrow."

When Brian hung up, he realized he was looking forward to the encounter. He wanted to meet the woman who had hit him in the head. He wanted to meet Lou, too, because he sounded like an entertaining fellow. Now that he knew his brain was probably intact, he was ready for more challenges, at least the ones that didn't involve Katherine.

On the way home, Carrie let out a big sigh. "That's a relief. I guess I was afraid that brain surgery was next."

"I wasn't afraid until it was over. I think maybe that's what they call denial. You didn't act worried. You've been so calm."

She smiled over at him. "I'm a liar. I haven't been calm at all."

Brian felt a warmth spread over him. Carrie's apparent equanimity had been reassuring, had anchored him in his sea of confusion, but he was elated to know that underneath she'd been worrying about him. It must mean she still felt something to match the way he felt about her. Something to build on. And something to protect from Katherine, and maybe his own flawed character.

Chapter 30

Tuesday morning. Carrie had given him directions to get to the office. It was only three blocks from the Starbucks where he'd met Katherine the morning before, and he barely stopped himself from saying that out loud. There was such a fine line, this truth vs. modified truth. Carrie moved her car to the street so he could get his car out, and once downtown he'd driven around the block twice before he found a convenient parking place. The car was nice; he had to give himself that at least. Even if it seemed a sterile choice.

Halstrom-Pierce was in an older building, the date 1903 chiseled into a block in the center of the entry arch, and the lobby was refurbished with polished marble floors and tall palms in large white pots positioned at each of the impressive fluted columns that flanked the wide stairs to the elevator level. A glassed-in directory was attached to the wall next to the two elevators, the kind with a dial above them showing what floor they were on. Halstrom-Pierce was on the third floor. He studied the rest of the names. There was only one other company listing for that floor.

A ping announced his ride. This was it. His livelihood might be at stake this morning. He straightened his tie, checked the collar on his tan dress shirt, and shot the cuffs. Then he opened the door to the completely unfamiliar reception area of the place he'd worked for the last three years.

"Mr. Edwards, good morning." A plump middle-aged woman in a tailored red suit was sitting at a desk. The room was small, only three plush chairs along the wall opposite her. More palms. On the receptionist's desk there was a name plaque, Gloria Stevens.

Brian didn't know who in the office was aware of his plight, beyond Andrea, Lou and Jason. And Katherine. But he thought he shouldn't risk the possibility that this wasn't Gloria, so he just smiled and returned her greeting, without using her name. Luckily there was only one door leading into the offices from the reception area, so he didn't have to risk bungling his entrance.

"Oh, Mr. Edwards," said the woman who was probably Gloria. "Ms. Angeli asked that you come to her office first thing when you got in." She sounded apologetic.

"Thanks." Andrea Angeli, an attractive name to be sure. Until this moment he hadn't tried to imagine her appearance, but the name called up a dark-haired brown-eyed woman with soft curves. Couldn't be. A woman like that wouldn't be an attack dog on the racquetball court.

The door opened onto a large space with half a dozen roomy cubicles on each side and a wide central aisle. On the far side, opposite the door, four offices with large windows and glass doors overlooked the rest of the room. The cubicles in the main room had low partitions that provided wall space for desks, cabinets, tables, what have you. The color scheme was a soothing lavender, blue and cream, starting with a rich carpet with muted wide diagonal stripes. Some decorator must have spent a lot of time and received a lot of company money for this.

He headed for the enclosed offices. On the far left, the corner one with windows to the out-of-doors, Angela Angeli's name was embossed in gold on the door. The tops of some maple trees that still held onto their red and orange leaves were in view. Lou Mueller's door was next to Angela's, and next to that was a door marked Brian Edwards. So, he was one of the upper echelon.

It looked like everyone was already busy at his or her desk. He scanned the faces for someone familiar, but Katherine was the only one he recognized. She sat in the cubicle closest to Andrea's door. When she looked up and saw him he couldn't identify her expression. There was something sly and satisfied in it, something a little unpleasant. It could have been a smile, but it didn't have the effect of a smile. He gave her a quick nod as he passed by, and realized he was trembling a little. He took a deep breath before he rapped on the glass of Andrea's door.

A graying man with a bulky midsection was leaning on his hands at the end of Andrea's desk, his shirtsleeves rolled up and his tie loosened, looking at some papers she had in front of her. Andrea had the dark hair, all right, but the soft round curves were absent. She was all angles, a sharp narrow face with chiseled cheekbones, and thin, deep red lips. But very attractive in an ascetic way. Her glasses were the kind with points on the sides, and the frames were black. She wore a tailored grey-blue suit jacket over a white round-necked blouse. When he knocked she stood and he saw the matching narrow skirt. No jewelry except for an oversized ring with a blazing blue stone.

When she stood up, the man at her desk turned and saw him. It had to be Lou, and he strode to the door and opened it.

"Brian! Glad to see you!" Then he hesitated and looked uncertainly back at Andrea, who seemed to disapprove of his enthusiasm. He clamped his mouth shut and stepped back a few steps.

"Lou, right?" Brian extended his hand, bypassing Andrea for a few seconds, and Lou shook his hand and nodded. The he turned to face her.

Andrea didn't ask him to sit down, and she remained standing as well. In fact there were no chairs in her office besides hers. It made sense to Brian. No one would be able to waste her time if they couldn't settle down comfortably in her territory.

"Well, Brian. At last." Her eyebrows arched up and she gave him a scornful smile. "Where were you when we needed you?"

"Andrea." He nodded, and smiled back politely. He wasn't going to answer a rhetorical question. And he was going to use as few words as possible until she broke her own ice. If she was going to be angry about something he had no control over, that was fine, but he wasn't going on the defensive.

She looked at him as if considering her next move, and then made up her mind. She picked up a file folder and the Blackberry from her desk and came out from behind it, waving the folder at both men in a signal to follow her.

"Conference room," she said. She ignored the people in the larger office and led the way to the fourth door, the one on the other side of Brian's own office, where he could see Jason was poring over papers at the desk.

They sat at one end of a long table. Brian waited. Andrea had a severe look that went well with her features. She looked hungry to him. He had the passing thought, _you catch more flies with honey_. He felt a little sorry for her, and her apparent need to keep people in line and keep the upper hand.

"I don't know if you realize what an impossible situation you put us in." She glared at him.

He waited for her to continue. Apparently she needed to get this off her skinny chest.

"Lou and Jason, spent the whole weekend putting the presentation in order. I had to come in on Sunday as well. You know how important this is. The Fitzhugh contract is going to be our bread and butter for the next six months."

She was waiting for an apology. He could afford a version of that. These were the people that allowed him to buy a Lexus for cash, and he ought show a little gratitude.

"I wish it could have been helped. You pulled it off without me? We got the contract?" He hadn't wanted to ask Lou on the phone yesterday, but it was germane now.

"Yes, we got the contract. Thanks to Jason."

What about Lou, he wondered. Does he get any credit for his part? Lou sat there as if he were furniture. Carrie had said Lou was a flunky. What a thankless job.

"Good. I'd hate to have been the cause of a disaster. It sounds like you've got an exceptional team." He wanted to emphasize that there was no permanent damage done.

There wasn't much more she could say, unless she was going to fire him. And he knew she had no grounds for that. He was pretty sure that technically he qualified for sick leave. Just because he was ambulatory didn't mean he was fit for work. She waited.

"I assume you'd like to be brought up to date on what's going on with me. I think you already know I have a complete loss of memory. Identity, personal life, work—the whole thing. It happened suddenly, on Thursday morning. Nobody knows why yet, or how long it's going to last."

"What does the doctor say?"

"So far they haven't found a physical cause." This was going to be the hard part. "I have some more tests, and I have a consultation coming up with a medical psychiatrist." As far as he knew, all psychiatrists were physicians, but he wanted to emphasize the medical aspect of his situation.

Andrea sat back and frowned. "You're going to a shrink? You're telling me you're _non compos mentis_?"

"It's autobiographical amnesia." The doctor hadn't said that, but Brian almost fit the description in the text at the college bookstore. He didn't think Andrea would question it. "It might not last long. Everything could come back at any time, or it could come back in pieces. Apparently it happens. It's happened to me." Brian felt pretty relaxed, because there were just these facts, and it wasn't as though he could voluntarily change them. And Andrea was going to have to accept it. Or not, but in any event it was out of his hands.

"And in the meantime we cool our heels while you lie around on a couch telling someone your dreams?"

"I assume I have some sick leave?"

She looked irritated to have to do it, but she nodded.

"It's possible that will give me time to get over this. I'll find out more when I meet with the psychiatrist. I doubt if she'll have me lie on a couch, though."

At this point there was no way she could punish him, which he was pretty clear she'd enjoy. He wondered if she kept a little black whip, maybe with sharp bits of metal tied into its thongs, in a desk drawer. She'd be well suited to the profession. Come to think of it, he'd had some of her punishment on the racquetball court. He put his hand to his eyebrow.

Andrea pushed her chair back from the conference table and Lou followed suit. He hadn't said a word. But he gave Brian a straight-faced wink. _Good job, buddy_. That's what it looked like anyway.

"Check with Katherine about your sick leave. And keep me posted. I want to know immediately of any changes in your situation." She started for the door, taking with her the folder she'd never opened. Apparently it had been a prop. Lou waited until she was out of the room and then patted Brian on the shoulder.

"You survived. I was pretty sure you would. Andrea has never been able to make you grovel." He looked appreciative and at the same time envious. And Brian found himself wondering why either of them worked for her.

"Just so you know, putting the proposal together was a piece of cake. It just took time. You had everything handled except the organizing of the presentation. By the time Andrea got here it was all but finished."

"Thanks for telling me. I hate it that I left you in the lurch." He followed Lou to the door into the big office.

Check with Katherine. Damn!

"She said to check with Katherine. I think she's the one I met at the coffee shop yesterday morning. The one at the last desk there? Is that who handles benefits?" This wasn't going to be much fun.

"Yeah, your girlfriend."

"What?" Brian jerked his head around, and his stomach tightened. "My girlfriend?"

Lou laughed. "Don't worry. You've been a gentleman. I just said that because I'm pretty sure she has the hots for you. But hey, you have the luscious Carrie at home."

"Jesus, don't scare me like that. I think my life is complicated enough right now." _If you only knew._

"She was pretty upset when Jenna wouldn't tell her anything about why you weren't at work. Which reminds me, I guess you don't remember Jenna either?" Lou led him to a desk near his office door. He felt like it was his first day on the job, being shown around the office. He supposed it could be his last day, if his brain didn't cooperate.

"This is Jenna, your good right hand." She had a broad, pleasant face, and long straight hair tucked behind her ears.

"Mr. Edwards, you're back? We've been worried about you."

"Not yet. I hope soon, but I don't know. I'm taking a little time off."

"Well, Jason will keep me busy while you're gone." She glanced through the glass where Jason was shuffling through some papers, and he looked up just then and gave Brian a cross between a salute and a wave.

Lou accompanied Brian into Katherine's cubicle. She came up with a pasted-on fake smile and folded her hands together on the desk in front of her.

"Our missing man is here," she said. "Can I do something for you?" She cocked her head, the picture of willingness to be helpful.

Thankfully, Lou was taking charge. "Katherine, would you check to see how much sick leave Brian has coming? He's going to take a little time off."

"Sure thing." She swung her chair around to a low filing cabinet, making a display of her legs in today's short skirt, red this time instead of black, and leaned over a file drawer far enough that her silky blouse bowed open to give them a glimpse of her cleavage and the top of a lacy bra. She thumbed through some files and pulled out a folder, ran her red fingernail down a page and then looked up at Brian.

"You don't get sick very much, do you? It looks like you have 188 hours built up. That would give you twenty days, plus a few hours, if we charge the three days you've been gone. Counting today." She flashed the professional smile again. "I'm sorry you're sick," she said, for Lou's benefit.

"Thanks Katherine." Lou wheeled around out of the cubicle and out of hearing. Before Brian could follow, she grabbed his wrist. In a whispered voice she said, "I'll go home for lunch at noon. Meet me there, okay?"

He pulled his arm free and shook his head. "I'm sorry, you already know I can't do that." He turned away from her, not willing to see her expression, but he heard the venom in her low voice, so low no one else would hear it.

"Say hello to your little pregnant wife, you bastard."

Chapter 31

Now he was at loose ends. Early in the morning he'd called to line up the psychiatry appointment. No one had been in the office yet, and he'd left a message, asking for the earliest possible slot and mentioning the neurologist's referral. He wanted to get started, get something moving, and he had his cell phone with him in case they called back.

He sat in his car and listened through his messages before deleting them. There had been another call from Katherine since he'd seen her yesterday, in the afternoon. He'd forgotten to check them, or maybe he hadn't wanted to.

"I don't know why you're doing this to me. I'm the one who loves you, not Carrie. Is Carrie making you do it? She's a selfish bitch. She just wants to keep you for herself, and she doesn't even love you. I wish she'd just disappear so we can be together." The phone clicked off abruptly.

She was escalating. The memory of her tone of voice when he turned his back on her in the office gave him a chill. Her refusal to accept that the relationship was over was unnerving, and he didn't like these references to Carrie, either. It was so obvious now that Katherine was disturbed, unbalanced. God, if only he hadn't gotten mixed up with her! He must have been in an unbalanced state himself to let it happen. Okay, she said they'd been drinking, but why had he let it continue after that first time? Getting even with Carrie for banishing him? Because from what Katherine said, it sounded like the separate bedrooms came before the beginning of the affair. If it was an affair.

It might be time for him to ask Carrie to tell him what had gone wrong between them. He'd like to believe he was just being considerate of her, the way he'd explained staying in the guest room to his mother. But if that explanation had been true, Carrie would have told him from the beginning. How serious was it, and could the rift be mended? She seemed to have become easier with him since that first meeting, not resentful. How bad could it be? Of course now he'd given her a real reason to reject him. And he would have to tell her eventually, clear out the deception. From what he knew of her by now, truth was a primary value. She'd been upset about deceiving his mother, for example, even though it was for her own good. So if he asked, she would tell him the truth now. And he would have to get up the courage to tell her about Katherine.

He should spend some time with his mother, now that the dust had settled and his way forward was a little clearer. Forward to what destination, though, he wasn't sure. He thought maybe he could get the family photographs down for her and they could look at them together. It could do them both good. And if it turned out his memory never came back, he needed to construct a new mother-son relationship. With his father gone, she probably needed him.

This was an interesting thing, to be needed by people who were strangers to him. He had such lopsided relationships. He was the dummy hand, and his partner had to do all the work, while he sat by passively and watched it play out. Except in the case of Katherine, where he refused to play. But his mother needed her son, and the office needed its lawyer. The irony was that he needed Carrie, increasingly, and she didn't seem to need him. She was so self-contained. There was something, though, something tentative tinged with sadness. It was in her eyes when he found her looking at him—those few moments when she wasn't reading something. He could be imagining it. It could be wishful thinking on his part, and anyway, if it was really there it was probably just pity.

He needed to do something to satisfy this aimlessness. He needed something on his calendar, a full schedule to distract him from an emptiness that was starting to swallow him up. Carrie was tied up for the day. She'd said she was almost through with writing up the first draft that would be then be edited into her dissertation.

He could go home and fix them some lunch. Or he could drive around and explore his town for a while. He put the car in gear and backed out of his parking place, uncertain what to do. When he saw the natural foods coop it decided him. Food was what he needed. Concentrate on the essentials. He waited for a parking spot in the crowded lot and went into the store. The produce department beckoned and he shopped for ingredients for a stir-fry, ginger and garlic and bok choy, onions, carrots, a bright yellow pepper, broccoli and cilantro. He filled a plastic bag with noodles. He thought he must shop here regularly, because it was easy to find things, so he checked in his wallet and found the coop membership card. In the fresh meat department he asked for a chicken breast. He could make them a feast.

The conviction was growing in him that he had no choice but to tell Carrie about Katherine, that he couldn't keep it to himself any longer. If he lost her for good over it, it wouldn't be so different from having the secret barring his way to her. It was ugly, but it would be uglier if Katherine got to her first. And he wouldn't be surprised if that's she would do next.

It was past noon by the time he got home. Carrie's car wasn't in the driveway. He called to her up the stairs but she didn't answer, so he went to the kitchen and unloaded the groceries. He pulled out the big frying pan and the cutting board and started slicing and chopping. He put the vegetables in a plastic bag in the refrigerator for later. Then he settled on the couch and tried to lose himself in the mystery novel he'd started on Sunday.

It was almost 5:00 when he heard the distinctive put-put-put and the little backfire of the VW on the driveway. Brian went out to meet her and she already had the car door open, and was stretching clumsily to reach into the back seat for a cardboard file box. She stood back and let him get it for her.

"Thanks, it's awkward. I'll be glad when I have my real body back."

She had her back to the street and he was facing her, the box full of papers in his arms, when he saw a car move slowly past their house, a shiny little yellow Mazda. The young blond woman driving was looking straight at them. When she saw that he'd recognized her, she pointed a finger at them and accelerated down the block. Carrie turned at the sound of the car, and maybe at the look on Brian's face as he stared after her. He didn't know if his anger showed or not.

"Who was that? Someone you recognize?"

Brian managed to shrug, in spite of having gone rigid when he saw Katherine. This was moving way out of his control. Had he really imagined it was going to be that simple; that the woman who had left those emotional messages would just let go of him because he said so?

"This is really heavy! How did you get it to the car? I don't think you should be lifting something like this."

"Don't worry, a student hauled it for me. Pregnant women can always count on the few remnants of chivalry left in this society. I think it's instinctual. Look how quickly you got out here."

"And if I hadn't, you would have carried it yourself, right? Don't do that, okay? It's all right to be a little helpless right now. Even if it's not your nature."

Carrie opened the porch door for him. "How would you know what my nature is? You hardly know me." She was smiling. The way she could joke about his mental state amazed him.

"It's intuition. I still have my intuition. You know how the blind develop more acute hearing? Well, without my memory my intuition is getting very robust. So don't think you can put anything over on me."

He thought he saw the sunshine go out of her face, just for a second, but it was so fast he wasn't sure.

He lugged the box upstairs and set it on her worktable, and announced he was fixing dinner.

"Lots of vegetables and a little chicken. Do we have any sesame oil? I didn't buy any. I found the Coop, by the way."

"It's in the spice cupboard. Are you using a recipe, or do you just remember how to cook? Maybe that can be your new career if you can't remember your old one." Then she suddenly remembered. "Oh! How did it go this morning with Andrea? What happened?"

"It was fine. I'm officially on sick leave. I'll tell you about it at dinner. Half an hour from now okay with you?"

Chapter 32

Clouds were boiling in the sky and a storm raced toward them. It was pitch dark by 5:30. The kitchen felt like a warm cave. He'd turned on the lamps in the living room and found a Beethoven CD in the rack next to the sound system and slid it into the slot. The music drifted in through the kitchen door and he let himself sink into it as he prepared a sauce for the stir fry and boiled the water for noodles, tore up greens for a salad, mixed a vinegar and oil dressing. He noticed again how automatic and efficient his motions were while he worked. It was good to feel competent, and to be doing something for Carrie. Maybe he would volunteer to cook all their meals while he was on sick leave.

He was setting the kitchen table when Carrie came in, holding her hands behind her back and stretching. He tamped down the fear of losing her, and moved towards her, kissed her lightly on the cheek. She didn't flinch. He resisted the urge to grab her and hold her to him. It might be his last chance.

They ate mostly in silence, but Brian felt that they were together in the silence, a pair, a couple. He could have gone on like this forever. The wind pounded the rain against the window in sharp gusts, and the branches of the trees at the bottom of the garden whipped back and forth violently.

He cleared the table while Carrie sat back in her chair, her hand moving in circles around her stomach, looking at it with a tender little smile. It was a picture he wanted to hold on to forever.

"Another glass of wine?"

"Just a few sips."

He brought the bottle to the table and poured for them, re-corked it and put it back on the counter. He sat down and realized he was shaking. He held his glass in both hands to keep them calm.

"Carrie, I have to tell you something. Something I've found out. It's not a good thing." He watched her face as she looked at him with curiosity. "Maybe you already know."

She shook her head. "No, I don't think so." Her eyebrows knit together in a little frown. She was waiting.

He'd been holding his breath, hoping that it wouldn't be necessary to tell the whole thing, that she had at least part of the story already, or suspected it. The deep breath he took was ragged, and he could feel his pulse racing in anxiety.

"There is a woman at work. Her name is Katherine. Do you know her?"

Carrie still looked puzzled, but a wariness was there too. "No." She was preparing for the next thing he would say.

"According to Katherine," and he grabbed another breath and started over. "According to Katherine, we've been involved."

Carrie sat upright. She was totally concentrated on him now.

"You're having an affair." Her tone was level, emotionless.

"If she's not lying. Yes, that's what she said. I mean, I was. I'm not now!" He dropped his face away from her to look at his hands on the stem of his glass, then looked up again with a plea for time.

"Why would she lie?"

He couldn't read her face. "I think she's that kind of person. But no, I don't really think she's lying. I just wish she was."

"But you don't remember it. Do you remember her? You've talked to her?"

"I don't remember her at all. Yes, I've seen her. She kept leaving messages on my cell phone and I met her yesterday morning at a coffee shop. I told her I didn't remember her and that whatever had happened between us was finished. She's not easy to convince. I think she's a little off."

Carrie slumped her shoulders back against her chair and spread her fingertips to her forehead, her hand covering her face. He couldn't see her expression. That was probably the point.

"How long?"

"I'm not sure. I think less than a month. I can't imagine why it happened. She . . . she's not the sort of woman I . . . I'd be attracted to." What sort of woman might he be attracted to, he wondered, if he had Carrie. And if he didn't have Carrie any more, maybe he didn't care what sort of woman it was. Any woman would do. Or no woman at all.

She was silent. Her fingers were still on her forehead, her face obscured.

"Carrie? Carrie, say something."

She dropped her hand from her face and he could see that her eyes were damp, but her face was still impassive.

"Carrie, is this what I do? Do I have affairs? Is that the sort of man I am? Because I can't stand knowing that I did this to us."

"No, I don't think you ever have." She looked out the window, and he caught her eyes looking at him in their reflections. She turned back to him.

"You've had plenty of chances. Women like you. They put on displays when you're around. They go a little nuts." She didn't seem to be sarcastic. There was even a little flicker of a smile that came and went. Maybe it was a joke between them. Like with Carrie's student at the grocery store, her obvious come-on.

But this wasn't funny, and her face had resolved into sadness.

"I'm worried about this woman, Carrie. She's not being rational."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean she acts as if I haven't told her it's over. I mean she drives by the house. I saw her today when we were unloading your car. She's been here before. She said that in a phone message. I don't know what she might do."

This was the worst of all, that his stupid mistake might now be a threat to Carrie's safety. Because Katherine was focused on Carrie now. Why hadn't he suspected there was something wrong with her? That she was unbalanced?

There was something puzzling him.

"Carrie, you said you didn't think I've done this before. Been unfaithful. And that you didn't know about this. Then what is it that's been wrong between us? Why do I sleep in the other room?"

Carrie closed her eyes and breathed a deep sigh. Her breath was ragged and now there were actual tears spilling. He watched as her face contorted in pain.

"You moved out of our bedroom. I know you probably thought it was my idea. But it wasn't. It was your choice."

"What? You didn't want me to?" He was startled, shocked. It was a completely new idea. "I moved out?" He stared at her, in wonderment. "Why?"

Another long pause went by as Carrie collected herself. She blotted her tears with a napkin. He waited.

"I didn't blame you. There was something . . . " Her voice trailed off. Then, "Something happened. I did something. You're not the only one who has done something stupid."

"What did you do, Carrie? I can't imagine wanting to leave our bed." Our bed. He wanted their bed, he wanted to be as close to her as possible. He leaned forward and reached his hand across the table to touch her hand. She let it lay still under his. His fingers encircled her wrist to keep it there. He could feel her pulse beating fast against his fingertips.

"It's so hard to tell you this over again."

"It's all right. Tell me."

Her voice was tight. "It was last June. There was an end of the semester faculty party at Dr. Jacobsen's house. He's the head of the department. You didn't want to go, and I was pissed at you. We hadn't been doing that much together because we were both so busy, and I was looking forward to it. But you'd brought work home, again." She shook her head. "That doesn't mean it was your fault. I'm the one to blame."

"To blame for what?" He thought he knew where this was going. She started to pull her hand free but he held onto it and put his other hand on hers, and stroked it.

"I got very drunk. I don't usually do that, but before I knew it I was way over the line. There was a band. I was dancing with this guy, a visiting professor in the department. He's gone now. I knew he liked me. I was feeling no pain, and I just let it happen."

She stopped and looked into his eyes. More tears welled up and she wiped at the corners of her eyes with her free hand. She let her other hand stay in his.

"Tell me, Carrie." His voice was gentle. It was strange to feel so close to her when she was telling him this. It was because she was so vulnerable, looked so sad and defeated. And he knew it was also because he had already forgiven her. It didn't even need forgiveness. It was as if this was just something that happened before he knew her. In a way it was none of his business, what she'd done before they met, only a few nights ago. And there was also what he had done.

"We went upstairs. I don't remember it very well. I remember being alone in the bedroom afterwards, looking at myself in the mirror, and not recognizing myself. And then I walked home, because I was too drunk to drive. You had fallen asleep on the couch and I didn't wake you up."

"When did I find out about it?"

"Later that night. You came to bed and wanted to make love, and I was so ashamed. I couldn't. You didn't understand, and I was still drunk, so I told you. I don't know if I would have told you if I'd been sober."

"Is that when I moved out?"

"No, that was later." Her face crumpled. "There's more."

"What? Did you see him again? Did you sleep with him again?" He didn't know if he could handle that, even though he'd done the same.

"No." She shook her head as if that was a ridiculous idea. "No. He went back to Minneapolis or wherever. I never heard from him again. I never wanted to." She was adamant. So what "more" was there?

"Then what, Carrie? I couldn't forgive you?"

"You forgave me, I think. You said so, anyway. You acted like it was behind us. But it wasn't."

"What do you mean?"

"The baby."

"The baby?" He frowned, trying to understand, what about the baby? And then it connected and took hold. "This is his baby? You got pregnant from a one night stand?" There was a thunk in his chest; it felt like his heart had shifted.

"No! I don't believe that! But it's not that simple. I'd quit taking birth control pills; we wanted a baby. We were making love a lot. And the next month I knew I was pregnant. It's just that there was a chance it could have been him. The timing."

"Was that my idea or yours?"

"You wanted to know. And I didn't. I didn't want to have them test the baby. I was sure it was yours. I know she's ours. If you want to have tests done after she's born, then I won't stop you. But not while she's still here, inside me." She pulled her hand free of his and wrapped her arms around her belly, protectively. "And not until you see her. You'll know then."

Brian looked at her for a long time, and she was silent, looking straight back at him. He could see the determination, her chin jutted out a little, stubborn. He saw her conviction. He tried to imagine coming up against this force, and doing anything but losing the battle. Obviously it had mattered to him, a lot. He'd cared enough to move out of their room and into the lonely single bed in the guest room. To punish her. But he looked inside himself for some vestige of that insistence on knowing, and couldn't find it.

She said they'd been making love, a lot. What were the odds? Why would he want to spoil everything, force her to find out who the biological father was? He must have been crazy.

Her face had softened as he watched, and her expression changed to something more peaceful, something solid and confident. It was faith. She had so much faith, there was no reason to argue with it, if he had even wanted to argue. He couldn't imagine not believing her. And he thought he understood. One mistaken night, something that was nothing to her except maybe a shameful, foggy memory, didn't count, couldn't change the course of their lives. It didn't matter.

He said it out loud.

"It doesn't matter. You're sure. And I believe you. I do. I love you."

And then there were tears in his eyes too, on the verge of falling.

"But when your memory comes back. Maybe you'll feel different then."

"I'll feel the same way. I know I will. Can you forgive me for being such a jerk?"

She smiled a little at that.

"You know, since you came home without your memory, you've been more like yourself than you've been in years. I think this is the real Brian. The so-called jerk you're talking about is gone."

"Carrie, I've done so much to hurt you. And now there's this Katherine thing. I don't remember why I did it. I can't imagine doing it. And that's no excuse, I know that. I'm not saying that."

Carrie looked at him intently, as if puzzling something out. "It's funny, but it seems like you're talking about someone else. Like someone else had the affair, not you."

"That's what it feels like. That some stupid egomaniac trying to prove something took over. But that's too easy. It's like saying I'm not responsible for my own behavior because I don't remember."

"You're a lawyer. You could argue that case."

"I don't want to argue it. I don't want to be exonerated. I'll understand if you can't let it go. But Carrie, I want so much to be forgiven. I want you to love me again. Like in the pictures."

"The pictures?"

"The photos in the album. The pictures of us together. The way you looked at me. The way I looked at you."

She shook her head vigorously. "I didn't stop loving you. I haven't stopped."

He put his head down on his arms on the table.

"Oh thank God." He started to cry. It caught him by surprise. And the surprise made him laugh. He looked up at Carrie sheepishly and then hid his face in his arms again and wiped the tears on his sleeve.

"I'm such a baby."

"Brian," she said.

He looked up again. "What?"

"Let's go to bed, okay?"

Chapter 33

Carrie had another early seminar, and by the time Brian woke she was up and dressed in the turtleneck sweater and overalls, and the sturdy boots over who-knew-which wild socks. She sat down next to him on the bed and leaned across his body to kiss him and run her fingers over the stubble on his chin. He wrapped his arms around her waist and held her tight against him.

"Do you have to go? Can't you stay?"

"Have to make a living. You don't have a job. You do remember that, don't you?"

"I remember you. You're the one who made my dreams come true." He squeezed her and then let her go because she was trying to push herself back up. She looked amused.

"Did you know you used to sing that song to me when we were first together? When we woke up in the morning?"

"No, it just seemed like the right song. For the occasion."

"It means you're closer to remembering everything. It can't be a coincidence."

He wondered if he really wanted to remember everything. He felt as if he could just start from here. Here was such a good place.

"Is there coffee yet?" He stretched and then swung his legs to the floor and stood up. Carrie looked him up and down, smiling.

"First put something on, okay? You're not exactly presentable." He looked down and watched himself rise. Carrie zipped out of the room before he could grab her.

He went to the guest room, smiling at the thought that it had returned to its original purpose, and put on his sweats and running shoes. _Goodbye lonely room._ He felt like running. Running and leaping, and maybe even shouting.

In the kitchen Carrie was sitting on the edge of her chair at the table sipping at her coffee and looking poised for flight. She glanced at the clock every few seconds. Brian leaned across the table and looked out the window. The storm was past. The sun was just coming up and there were only a few clouds against the brightening blue sky. The water on the bay was flat and shining silver in the early light. He poured his cup of coffee and joined her at the table but she was up and moving immediately. She put on a navy wool jacket that was hanging over the back of her chair, and pulled a scarf out of the pocket.

"Gotta go," she said and came over to kiss him on the forehead. He left his coffee steaming at the table and followed her out into the entry porch, where he hugged her one more time and then let her free. He watched her as she climbed into the car and backed it out of the driveway, braking abruptly just in time to look for traffic before backing into the street and shifting into forward gear. The little VW engine roared and then she was at the corner with her usual rolling stop, and around it in a flash.

Brian was just starting to turn back to the living room door when he heard another engine start up. He glanced up the street and saw the yellow Mazda ease out from the curb and pass the house in the direction Carrie had gone. The spiky blond-haired woman driving didn't even look in his direction. It was if she had no more interest in him, and now was only intent on Carrie. She turned up the street at the corner, the way Carrie had gone.

"Oh Jesus!" Brian dashed through the house and careened into the guest room where he'd left his wallet and keys on the dresser top. Except he hadn't. They were on the floor in the master bedroom, in the pocket of the pants he was wearing yesterday. He raced to get them and dug frantically in the pockets, took the keys and headed out the front door. It seemed to take forever to get the garage door open and the car started.

"Come on, come on!" He backed out and took his chances on street traffic, ran the stop sign at the corner and wound up the hill. Where to go? Carrie would be heading for the English building, and he knew she had a reserved parking space. But he didn't know where it was, so he didn't know what her route would be.

All the parking places along the curb near the main entrance to the campus were filled. Students were walking here and there and he had to brake for some jaywalkers chatting to each other and ignoring the traffic. There was a yellow strip of curb at the bus stop shelter, and no bus in sight. He pulled in there and leaped from the car, banging his leg on the back fender in his hurry to get around it.

"Hey! Hey buddy, you can't park there!" It was a uniformed security guard, standing in his way, flat-footed, on the sidewalk. Brian veered around him and raced across the wet grass towards the central quad that he remembered from his run a few days ago. The English building faced it. At the edge of the brick-paved quadrangle he stopped and looked around frantically. There was a fountain in the middle and on the other side he saw Carrie, talking to a young man with unruly curly blond hair and a backpack slung over one shoulder. Relief flooded him and he slowed to a fast walk, breathing deeply to calm himself. He scanned the open space, looking for Katherine.

And she was there. She approached Carrie from behind, holding her purse against her chest. She had on the same fur collared jacket, short skirt and high heels that she was wearing when he first met her the other morning.

She reached her hand out to touch Carrie's shoulder and Carrie turned with a tentative questioning smile. Brian was still twenty yards away, and he broke into a run just as Katherine reached into her purse. Her hand came out holding a gun, which she pointed at Carrie's midsection. Carrie's eyes widened in shock and her hands flew to her belly, as if she could protect the baby. The boy she'd been talking to hadn't seen the gun, and started to turn away.

Brian was almost there, and he kept moving forward. He was almost too late.

"Katherine! Katherine! No!" It tore out of his throat in a scream.

Katherine turned her head in his direction. Her face was implacable until she saw him, and then it twisted into a scowl, and she swung around to face him. He skidded to a stop. Her attention was off of Carrie and onto him. That was good. That was necessary.

"Come on, Katherine. This isn't what you want. Put that away." He tried to keep his voice calm. It sounded like cop showdowns in the movies. He glanced from Katherine to Carrie. Carrie was staring, bewildered, back and forth between him and Katherine.

He started to step forward, reaching out his hand. Katherine was thirty feet or so away from him now. If he could keep her attention on him he could get to her and get the gun. At first she held it slack in her hand, but then her face tightened in fury and she swung the gun up and pointed it directly at his chest, gripping it in both hands. She started towards him with quick steps. She was a little unsteady in her high heels on the uneven brick paving. He stopped short and held up his hands. She raised the gun a little higher and sighted down the barrel. He froze, waiting for the shot.

Now Carrie was on the move, a step behind Katherine. She reached an arm over her shoulder and across her neck, and slammed her knees into the back of Katherine's, just as the gun went off. Brian felt the pain tear into him just below his left shoulder. He staggered for a few steps and went down. He lay on the brick paving but twisted his head around towards the two women. It hurt like a son of a bitch, and his blood was draining away from his head, making him woozy. Some of that blood was pooling under his shoulder. He could see that Katherine was down on her hands and knees, and was scrambling towards the gun that had flown out of her hand when she fell.

She reached out her arm, fingers just short of the gun, and Carrie's boot came slamming down on her elbow. He could hear the snap of bone from where he was. Katherine screamed and rolled over on her back, holding her shattered arm and spinning around flailing her legs and feet at Carrie, who stepped back out of reach. Then Carrie moved neatly around and in close with a fierce kick to Katherine's ribs.

The security guy had apparently been right behind Brian when he was shot, ready to collar him for his parking violation. He stood stupidly for a moment, looking from Brian to Katherine to Carrie, until Carrie shouted at him.

"Get her gun!"

Katherine was in no shape to use it now, but it galvanized him enough to allow him to take in what was happening. He put a foot on the gun and kept an eye on Katherine, while he got on his walkie-talkie. Her shrieks had turned to sobs, and between sobs she was moaning, "You bitch! You fucking bitch!"

Brian had been fading in and out, but now he was aware of Carrie, sitting on the pavement cradling his head in her lap. She had jammed her scarf under his sweatshirt and held it tight with both hands against the flow of blood.

He opened his eyes and looked up at her face. He was dizzy and it seemed that Carrie and the crowd of people who had gathered around were spinning.

"Nice girl," she said grimly.

Then, "I can hear the ambulance. They'll be here in a minute. Don't move."

And he faded out again.

Chapter 34

He knew he was in an ambulance. A paramedic hovered over him, holding a bag of clear liquid up high, attaching it to a rack. A tube from the bag snaked down to his arm. Then he was on a gurney, with white curtains pulled around it and what seemed to be a crowd of busy people attending him, and then he was in a room with bright lights shining on him and a masked nurse put a cone over his nose and mouth.

And then he was dreaming. The clear plastic cone was over his father's drawn face, feeding him oxygen. Brian stood over the bed and held his father's hand, and watched his bright and anxious eyes above the mask, heard his shuddering breathing, squeezed his hand and felt him squeeze back weakly.

Then he was outdoors, bouncing a basketball over and over, shooting baskets into the hoop above the garage door of the house where he and Carrie lived now. And then he was warm, in a sleeping bag next to a fire pit with embers glowing and sparks snapping. He looked up at the stars bright and thick overhead, framed by the tops of a ring of huge cedars that surrounded the campsite. Carrie was in his arms, her back snuggled up against him, and he fell asleep in deep contentment.

It was dark outside when he woke up next. Fluorescent lights flickered behind soffits, softly lighting the hospital room. The bars of his bed were raised. Groggily he looked around. There was a white curtain between him and someone in another bed whose soft snoring was punctuated every few breaths with quick snorts. He could hear quiet voices in the hallway, and the rustling of someone coming through the door. Carrie came around the end of the curtain, with a Styrofoam cup in her hands.

"Oh. You're awake. I wanted to be here when you woke up. I just left for a minute." She set the cup on his bedside table and leaned over to kiss him. He tried to rise towards her but flinched at the pain in his shoulder and fell back against the pillow.

"S'okay. You're back now." His mouth was dry, his head foggy. Then the sight of Katherine pointing the gun at Carrie, Carrie with her hands protecting the baby, was back in his head. and he felt a flash of fear. "Are you all right?" "The baby? Is the baby all right?" He tried to rise up again, panicky, and she shushed him.

"Brian. Brian. We're fine. We're both fine. It's you we were worried about. You lost a lot of blood. They wouldn't let me give you any, because of her." She put a hand to her belly. He reached out his hand and put it on top of hers. And fell asleep again.

The next time he woke up it was already light. Someone bustled around his roommate on the other side of the curtain, asking him to turn over, and getting a grumbling response. He lay there remembering yesterday, the shock of seeing Katherine in her car following Carrie, the race across the campus, the fury on Katherine's face when he confronted her, and the gun, pointing at Carrie and then at him.

He could see it clearly: Carrie's deliberate, efficient maneuvers as she took Katherine to the ground, and disabled her when she tried to get the gun back, and then delivered a final kick to the ribs. That last blow wasn't actually necessary. That was Carrie's personal statement. That was revenge.

And it wasn't what they taught her in the self-defense class either. He remembered watching her demonstrating the exercises at the graduation. He'd been both impressed and amused at her fierceness, the way she attacked the instructor in his padded protective gear. Flipping him to the ground, kicking at his groin with a hoarse shout of "No!"

It took him a minute of puzzling to understand that the self-defense class was when they were in college, and that he also remembered sitting at the bar in Smiley's, drinking a celebratory beer with Carrie after the graduation. He probed further, testing for gaps, as a flood of memories poured in. Tonsillectomy at seven. Milking a cow at Grandma Edwards' in Ohio when he was ten. His cute and bubbly date with braces, from the prom picture in the album, whose name was Sandy. His wedding.

Now he remembered sitting late in the night by the bed, listening to his father's tortured, gasping breathing, wondering how long it could go on; then dozing off for a while and awakening to silence.

As if it were a movie, he saw himself angrily snatching up his clothes from the dresser in their room and taking them to the guest room, while Carrie sat on their bed watching him, pain so evident in her eyes. That anger, and the desire to hurt her, was now drained away.

And Katherine, after that first boozy night together, standing behind him at his desk with trumped-up paperwork for him to review, sliding her fingers possessively through the hair at the back of his head where no one could see from the outer office. Her perseverance and his depressed passivity, which brought them together several more times. He should have known better. She should never have imagined that there was something there.

Dr. Richardson appeared from behind the curtain and stopped at the foot of the bed to read his chart. She looked like she just woke up.

"Well. Gunshot victim. I don't get many of those in my practice."

"I try not to be boring."

"How are you feeling?" She took his pulse and checked his IV.

"Sort of stupid in the head. And my shoulder hurts."

"Has anyone filled you in on your condition?"

"No, this is the first time I've really been awake. Carrie was here, last night I think, but I guess I fell asleep on her."

"Well, no vital organs were hit, and the surgeon removed the bullet. You did lose a lot of blood, because it nicked an artery. But it was more of a leaker than a gusher. You were lucky. They gave you a few pints of blood to plump you back up again. You're going to be pretty sore for a while, but essentially you're just fine."

"Guess what," he said.

"What?"

"It's back. My memory. I realized it just now, when I was waking up."

"That's great." She perched on the chair next to the bed. "I'm not surprised. This trauma probably nudged things back into the groove." She smiled. "That's the technical scientific explanation. Do you want it in laymen's terms?"

He grinned. "What time is it?" He was eager to see Carrie.

She looked at her watch. "It's 6:45. Your breakfast should be on the way any minute. Anything else I can do for you?" He shook his head and she stood. She waved goodbye as she disappeared behind the curtain again.

He watched that curtain impatiently. Around it came his food, and he played with it a bit with his unaccustomed right hand, and then shoved it aside. He drank the coffee. A nurse came to take his blood pressure and temperature. An early morning volunteer came in with a book cart.

And finally, the footsteps coming through the door were Carrie's, the sound of her boots. First her face appeared as she peeked around the curtain and saw he was awake, and she came into the room. Her cheeks and nose were red from the crisp morning. She pulled off her knit hat and her dark hair tumbled loose. When she leaned over to kiss him good morning it tickled his nose.

"Guess what," he said.

###

About the author

Harley Crowley is a native of Southern California and has lived most of her life within 100 miles of the Pacific Ocean. Most recently she lived in Bellingham, Washington, where she encountered a roving band of writers who encouraged her to get on with it. Now she has come back home to the climate she was imprinted with, and lives in Escondido, where she is editing and consolidating her stories. Her husband is an artist, and paints while she writes. Or she writes while he paints. Or something. Anyway, it works out.

Gratitude to the faithful friends and family who read this manuscript and made brilliant suggestions: Lenora, Mike, Rae Ellen, Jim, and Kathy; and to the Y Writing Group in Escondido who listened week after week as the story unfolded, contributing ideas and reactions that helped so much in the final editing.

My Smashwords author page: <http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/HarleyBarbCrowley>

My previous e-book, the first of a planned series of flash fiction and prose poetry, can be found at <http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/94712>

