“Nolie, honey, what year is it?” Babs asks, and Alice doesn’t need to hear his wrong answer to know what’s going on.
Nolan is missing almost five years of his life. He thinks he still lives in L.A. He doesn’t remember moving back to Portland. Doesn’t remember Marie graduating from high school.
Doesn’t remember ever seeing Alice before, not even the four times he saidhi,the three times he saidhey,and the two times he saidhow’s it going.
The men and Aunt Sheila try to play it cool while the doctors and nurses spring back into action, but Babs has to step outside to wail, Marie tucked under her arm.
Van looks like a statue. A sweaty, terrified, squeezing statue. “Van,” Alice says softly. “Van, honey, look at me.”
Van does, slowly, but as soon as her eyes hit Alice, something crumbles in her face. “Oh no, Alice,” she breathes, her free hand coming up to grip Alice’s arm as hard as she’s squeezing her hand. “Oh god. He doesn’t remember you. Oh my god.”
“No,” Alice says quickly. “No, no, I don’t care about that. Don’t worry about that. I just—are you okay? Do you need tosit down or something?” She looks desperately around the room. Aunt Sheila has pushed both Steve and Uncle Joe down into the chairs the nursing staff have shoved aside, and the room is humid and loud and claustrophobic.
“Let’s go outside for a breath,” Alice says, and Van wordlessly follows her out of the room. Alice takes her to their balcony, and Van doesn’t even let her close the door behind them before she’s folded herself into Alice’s arms.
Alice takes her weight with a little grunt, adjusting her feet and wrapping her arms low around Van’s waist, holding her up the best she can. She tries not to think about how Van had done the same thing to her fifteen minutes ago in the bathroom—shifted her feet to hold Alice up, pressed her hands tight to Alice’s back.
Van huffs out loud, harsh breaths into Alice’s neck, her fingers digging into Alice’s shoulders. She doesn’t say anything, and Alice doesn’t either, but her mind is racing in panicked circles, back on her hamster wheel of doom.
He’s awake, yes, but they’re not elated. Van is crying into her shoulder, and Babs is sobbing all over Marie a few feet away. Steve looks like he might have a heart attack, and even Aunt Sheila is in a stunned sort of silence.
Alice has to tell them now, but now is turning out to be worse than ever.
—
“Amnesia?” Isabella’s voice is louder and higher pitched than Alice has heard it since they were in kindergarten. “Are you mucking kidding me? He woke up but he hasamnesia?”
Alice shakes her head, picking at the plate in front of her. She’d texted Isabella something garbled that must have seemed distressing, because Bella had strapped both kids in the car anddriven down toward Portland Grace without hesitation, leaving Henry to finish his afternoon mushroom forage alone. They’re at a burger restaurant nearby, between the highway and the river, both kids suitably distracted by the unfailing combination of screen time and pre-dinner French fries.
“Girl,” Isabella says, her eyes wide. “I’m sorry, but what is your life?”
Alice almost laughs. “I don’t know,” she admits, picking up a fry and then dropping it back down again. “I can honestly say I didn’t see this coming.”
Bella shakes her head, like she didn’t either. “This is some soap opera shiitake,” she says, taking a bite of her burger. “Honestly, I feel like I’m letting you down right now. I should have been prepared for this. I don’t think my mom has ever missed an episode ofGeneral Hospitaland those idiots are constantly getting amnesia.”
Alice had forgotten about her aunt’s soap obsession. Her own mom had said it was stupid, but if they’d all been over at Bella’s house whenGeneral Hospitalwas on, Alice’s mom would end up glued to the TV, enraptured, until the end of the episode, just like her sister.
“Any advice?”
Isabella tilts her head, considering. “Depends. How appealing is killing yourself off and then coming back as your own evil twin?”
Alice does laugh this time. “Honestly, sounds better than some of my other options.” But considering those options has her groaning and dropping her head onto her arms, folded on top of the table. “I can’t believe this is happening,” she moans. “I can’t believe I have to come clean while they’re dealing with fucking amnesia.”
“Do the doctors think it’s permanent?”
Alice doesn’t pick her head up but she does roll it to the side so she can look at Isabella. “They don’t know. I’m starting to think they kind of don’t know shit, actually. Or—sorry! Ships. They don’t…they are totally ignorant about ships.”
“Landlubbers,” Isabella agrees, nodding seriously, and Alice kicks her under the table but doesn’t bother to hide her smile.
God, she likes her.
“Well, okay,” Isabella says slowly. “Hear me out. Obviously, if his memories come back, you’re mucked and there’s no way around it.” She squints, though, like she’s thinking it through. “I mean, I guess not any more mucked than you were before. The level of mucked you’d planned for, really.” She shrugs, almost smiling, like Alice is ridiculous, and Alice can’t help but agree. This plan was freaking terrible from the start. Absolutely the worst-thought-out plan in the history of humanity.
Bella keeps going. “But if it’s permanent, then does it…really matter? If you tell the truth or not?”
Alice picks her head up, indignant. “Yes! Of course it does! I can’t keep, you know…pretending that we…”
“I guess I don’t see how it’s different from what you were doing yesterday,” Isabella says when it’s clear that Alice never intended to finish her sentence.
