Splintered Memory (35 page)

“I was weak Charlie. Without you I was nothing, and I couldn’t get through the days or nights
alone. Everything I did,” he said; “the drugs, the women, Emily. I’ll regret it all forever. What I did was like spitting in the face of everything special we’d ever had. I wanted to forget you. I think I wanted to be a man that you wouldn’t have wanted to know had you recognised me.”

“Matt you don’t have to tell me all of this, I
,” Charlie said before his look silenced her.

“I
’d conned myself into thinking that life had moved on, I’d moved on. My life felt normal again. I wasn’t happy the way that I’d been happy with you, but I was no longer despairing. So when I went to Rich’s wedding, I hoped that I’d see you and not care,” he said pausing again and looking momentarily away from her eyes and face.

“But then I saw you, and for the first time since the day that you’d woken up I felt my heart beat with excitement again. The only thing that kept me from throwing myself at your feet and begging you to take me back, was the thought that you still only remembered the six months that we’d had together after the accident. Why would you ever want to come back to the me that you’d known during that time
?” He asked her, but she knew that it was a rhetorical question.

Matt looked lost in his own train of thoughts for a minute and she could see the pain in his face and eyes. “I’ve always been jealous of Rich, and it isn’t that I do
n’t trust you or him. It’s just,” he said sounding embarrassed again; “he’s always had a part of you that I can never have.”

She looked at him and smiled. Matt may not have been her first she thought, but when she’d had no memory he was. Yet she knew that telling him this now wouldn’t give him any comfort
or solace, especially given what had happened straight after, in fact she knew that telling him this now would only make him feel worse.

“When I saw him hugging you that night, all
of my old jealousies and insecurities from when we were teenagers had my stomach in knots. I wanted to tell him to get away from you. I wanted to tell him that you were my wife not his. But then it hit me. You weren’t. We weren’t together anymore, and I started to panic. I thought about the next time that we might happen to meet. You’d probably have moved on with your life,” he said; “and I’d have to meet the man who you’d moved on with.”

“Matt
,” Charlie said. Yet again his look silenced her.

“You’d be happy. You might even have his children. He’d hold your hand, touch your face, and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to cope. The only thing that stopped me going out and finding a pharmacy that night was the hope that there was still a part of you I knew. I thought that if you were moving on you’d divorce me first. I told myself that until I got papers I didn’t have to worry,
” he said; “and it was that thought that kept me clean at Rich’s wedding.”

He looked at her, and
she saw the shame in his face.

“I was so desperate to keep you in the dark about my memory,
” Charlie said despairingly; “so certain that you were happy with Emily, that I nearly drove you to drugs again?”

“No
,” Matt said firmly. “I nearly drove me to drugs again. It’s my addiction, and they’re my actions, and I take the responsibility for what I do.”

She smiled again
, and then asked him; “did rehab teach you that Mr Grayson?”

Matt returned her smiled and said; “yes actually Mrs Grayson, it did.”

Charlie felt her stomach do a little flip when he called her Mrs Grayson, but settle just as quickly when she saw that his eyes still looked sad.

“When I got the divorce papers I knew
we were over. It was confirming everything that I’d feared. You’d met someone and you were moving on. It seemed to explain why you were so easy going at the wedding; with me, with my parents, and with Emily. I knew I had to sign them, but I wanted to make you wait. I didn’t want to let you go. I didn’t want you to marry someone else,” he said.

“So why did you sign them? You said it was after you knew the truth
?” Charlie asked.

“When Claire told me about your memory. The guilt I felt was so intense that I thought I was going to go crazy. You and Harry had come to find me to tell me this amazing news, but it was too late. I’d moved on
,” he said. “There was another woman in your place, in our home, and in our bed.”

Charlie flinched at his words
, and he said quickly; “I’m sorry. I just meant that if the situation had been reversed I’d have been crushed. I felt worthless and completely undeserving of you.”

“That’s why you signed
?” She asked, and Matt nodded.

Charlie sat thinking
for a minute, and she was starting to feel angry. She didn’t know why, but she could feel it bubbling up inside of her. “Why did you come to London?” She asked him, and it was Matt’s turn to look shocked and hurt. She could also see that he was at a loss for words.

“
Well why? Did you just suddenly decide that you were deserving of me after all?” She asked, and she could hear the anger in her own tone.

“No
,” Matt said defensively. “Charlie,” he said making her look at him. “I just realised that I had to try and get you back. My life isn’t the same without you. I’m not the same without you. I love you.”

“I love you
,” she said feeling her anger subside, and she felt a tear run down her cheek.

“Marry me
?” Matt asked wiping her tear away for her.

“What
?” She asked sounding confused and then adding; “we’re not divorced.”

Matt smiled at her and said; “I know, but I don’t care. Marry me?”

She laughed and said; “we’re already married.”

“Charlie, marry me
?” Matt asked for the third time, and he kissed her.

“Matt,
” Charlie said putting her hands on either side of his face; “listen to me. We’re already married. I’m already your wife, and I have been for a long time.”

“Then let’s get remarried
,” Matt said. “I want everyone to know that you’re my wife.”

“Who doesn’t know
?” She asked laughing again.

“Charlie,
” he said; “my knees are starting to hurt, and you’re not giving me an answer.”

“You’re really proposing
?” She asked, and she looked at him seriously for a minute.

Matt nodded, but before he could say anything else she got up and ran over to her handbag. She o
pened it and took out her purse. She smiled to herself, and then walked back over to the bed and sat down in front of him again. She saw Matt looking at her confusedly, and she smiled at him before opening her purse and pulling out her engagement ring that she’d been keeping in there since having taken it off. She handed the ring to Matt, and she saw him look at it and smile.

He looked up at her, and still smiling he said; “Mrs Grayson, will you marry me?”

Matt

It
had been a long day and he felt dead on his feet. What he ideally wanted to do right now was to go home, cuddle up with Charlie, and go to sleep. The problem was he knew was that there was no chance of this happening. Today was his birthday, and Rich and Bex were throwing him a dinner party to celebrate the occasion. Ben and Rach were driving up from Bristol, Claire and Adam were coming up from London, and Nick was coming up from Bath with his new girlfriend.

H
e’d already thought about bailing, but he knew that he couldn’t do that. Yet as he tried to stifle a yawn he felt his phone vibrating in his back pocket. It was Charlie, and he assumed that she was calling to say that she, Claire, and Adam, were stuck in traffic on their way up from London.

“Hey you
,” he said into his phone.

“Happy birthday
, did you get my messages? I tried to call before you went on shift,” Charlie said.

“Ye
ah I got them, thank you. I can’t wait to see you. Are you already here?” He asked.

“Not exactly
,” Charlie said hesitantly.

“You
’re in traffic,” he said.

“No
. Please don’t be mad, but I’m still at work. I went in this morning and I was supposed to leave at twelve on a half day, but then I got called onto a conference call that ran on for two hours and after that things kind of went a bit crazy. In the end I had to tell Claire and Adam to go without me so that they could at least be at Rich and Bex’s on time. I’m going to get a train now though. I’m sorry,” Charlie said.

“You chose work
,” he said knowing that hurt was emanating in his words.

“No,
” she said; “and please don’t think that.”

He didn’t
say anything, and there was an awkward silence between them.

“Look, I’m leaving right now so I can be up in Birmingham for tenish. I’ll still be in time for your birthday. It’s just that I’m going to miss most of your birthday dinner
,” she said apologetically.

“Okay
,” he said.

“Please don’t be mad with me? I’ll see you in a couple of hours,
” she said; “and I promise that I’ll make it up to you as soon as we get home.”

H
e could tell that she was smiling, and he said; “I’m not mad, just a bit disappointed. But I’ll see you later. Do you want me to come and get you from the station?” He asked knowing that he was still sounding despondent.

“No I’ll get a taxi. You have a drink
,” she said a little flatly.

“Okay. Speak to you later then
,” he said.

“
See
you later,” she replied.

Matt hung up
and realised that he now felt even more tired than he had done just five minutes earlier. Charlie had been the only thing that had gotten him through the day, and now she wasn’t even going to be at his birthday dinner and wouldn’t be in Birmingham till at least ten.

After their first few days back together, cooped up in Charlie’s room in London, he’d had to come back to Birmingham to work and Charlie had had to stay in London for her job. Since then they’d been having a long distance relationship, but it wasn’t easy and he missed her.

Matt tried to get his days off and times when he wasn’t on call together so that he could go to London to see her, and Charlie tried to come home most weekends. The problem was though that when Charlie came home he was at work and barely got to see her, and when he went down to London it was usually in the week and Charlie was at work. By the time she got home on a night they hardly got to have any time together.

He knew that there was nothing that either of them could do about it, and incidents like tonight were just part and parcel of them living and working in two separate cities from each other. He a
lso knew that he shouldn’t moan as Charlie was already the one making all of the compromises in their relationship. She’d handed in her notice at work, and she was coming back to Birmingham. He’d just been disappointed when he’d discovered that her notice period was three months.

Matt felt guilty that he couldn’t go and join her in London, but he knew that he was well placed career wise where he was. He also knew that in reality, after everything that had happened in the past year, he needed to stay put for a while. A stint in rehab wasn’t great on the CV.

Charlie understood and he knew that. It’s just that he hated the fact that she knew that he still had to work with Emily, and that he saw her most days. He also wasn’t all that comfortable with the fact that she was aware that he worked with a lot of the nurses that he’d had one night stands with, but what could he do? She hadn’t said anything, and he knew that she wouldn’t, but he was sure that she must’ve thought about it. She had to have he thought, because he felt certain that he’d have obsessed over it had their situations been reversed.

When she’d agreed to come back to Birmingham he’d asked her if she’d wanted to sell their house and find somewhere new, but she’d said that she was happy to stay where they were. He
was aware however that she’d only said this because she knew, more than anyone else, just how hard it was to find houses in their price range as close to the hospital as theirs was.

He’d felt guilty about this though
, as he was the one who’d tainted their home and relied upon its location. Yet he couldn’t have felt any worse about this, than when Charlie had innocently suggested – on one of the weekends that she’d been home, that they could instead re-decorate and maybe invest in a new bed. He’d said that they could do whatever she wanted, and she’d smiled cheekily and had told him she might hold him to that.

His mind ran through everything that he’d done when Charlie had left him, and all the sacrifices that she was making for them to be together again
now, and he knew that he’d been out order to her on the phone. He’d apologise to her later he thought as he approached Rich’s front door, but for now he knew that it was time to put a smile on his tired face.

“Birthday boy,”
Claire said smiling; “still looking gorgeous even at what, thirty six?”