“It’s impossible to know,” Dr. Harley said. “I couldn’t even venture a guess.”

Justin ran a hand through his hair and looked through the window on the closed hospital room door, finding Brenna looking out at them. She looked away when his eyes connected with hers. “But-but what do you do then? Can you give her something?”

“There isn’t any medication for amnesia.”

“Then what should I do? She doesn’t even know who I am.”

“This will hopefully be short term amnesia. Sometimes all it takes is being around familiar people or things and the memories come back.”

“But I’m a familiar person.”

Dr. Harley nodded slowly. “And sometimes it takes time.”

Justin brought up his hand and rubbed it over his face, squeezing his eyes shut briefly.

“I realize this is hard, but it’s important for you to be as normal as possible around her.”

He nodded and dropped his hand. “Okay.”

Dr. Harley looked at her chart. “I’d like to keep her here for at least twenty four hours for observation.”

“Okay.”

“I need to go check on another patient but I’ll come back once I’m done. I’m sure you and Brenna will have some more questions by then.”

Justin nodded and stood still as the doctor left. He stayed in the hallway for a few moments before turning to the door. Forcing a smile onto his face, he pushed it open and went inside.

“How’s your headache?” he asked, going over to the bed.

“The medicine’s helping,” she said softly.

He sat down on the chair by the bed. It was silent for a moment before he found something to say. “I’m sure your memory is going to come back in no time. Once we’re home you’ll remember everything.”

She nodded silently.

“So, um, is there anything you want to ask me? Anything you want to know?”

She fiddled with the edge of the blanket over her. “How long have we been married?” she finally asked.

“Eight months. We got married on June twentieth.”

“How long have we known each other?”

“We grew up together and then when I left for Orlando when I was like thirteen we kind of grew apart and then a few years ago I came back and then you moved to LA with me to be my PA.”

“Your what?”

“Personal Assistant.”

“Why do you need a personal assistant?”

Justin realized how difficult everything was going to be to explain. He tried to tell her about his career as simply as he could without confusing her more. When he finished, she was silent.

“Where’s my family?” she asked after a bit. “Why is no one else here?”

He bit his lip. “Uh…you don’t have any brothers or sisters and, um, your dad died when you were eighteen.”

Her expression was unreadable. “My mom?”

“She lives in Australia. When you and I got married there really wasn’t anything holding her to Shelby Forest anymore and her company has a firm in Australia so she moved there.”

“Why isn’t she here?”

“Uh…well I kind of asked her and my mom not to come. I thought it would be too much. I’m sure they’ll come out now that you’re awake and okay…” he trailed off. “Well, kind of okay.”

She turned her face away from him and was silent.

It was quiet for a minute before he sighed. “I’m, uh, going to call Trace and Kate just so they know you’re awake.”

She looked back over at him. “Who?” she asked softly.

“Trace is my best friend. Kate’s my stylist and PA and your best friend.”

She looked away again. “Oh.”

He stood up. “I’m, uh, going to use the phone in the hall.” After seeing her nod, he walked across the room and out the door. Instead of going right to the phone, he leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes.

This cannot be happening.

Later that night, Brenna looked up as there was a knock on the partially closed door and saw an older nurse there with a cart.

“Hi, Sweetie,” she said, coming in. “It’s about time you woke up. I’ve gotten tired of just seeing you laying there. I’m Marge. I’ve been looking after you for the past week.”

“Hi.”

“Now where is that handsome husband of yours? I thought he’d be in here.”

“He went down to the cafeteria.”

“I see.”

Brenna eyed the cart. “What is that?”

Marge smiled. “I decided that it would probably make you feel a whole lot better if you got your hair washed and clean.”

Brenna smiled slightly. “Yeah, it feels kind of gross.”

“And since a shower would be too much effort, I brought this so I could just do it for you. Scoot up further on the bed, Sweetie,” Marge said as she moved the hospital bed so it was no longer against the wall. Brenna moved carefully up the bed until her head was resting in the sink built into the cart.

“Let’s get this bandage off your head,” Marge said, placing a rolled up towel under Brenna’s neck.

“Dr. Harley said I got stitches,” Brenna said as the bandage was removed. “Does that mean they shaved some of my hair?”

“A little bit but it can be covered. It will hardly be noticeable. You’re going to have to be careful when you’re showering though.”

Brenna closed her eyes as a gentle stream of warm water hit her head. Marge wet her hair and then carefully began massaging in shampoo.

“So how are you feeling, Sweetie?” Marge asked. “A little overwhelmed?”

Brenna opened her eyes to look up at the ceiling. “A bit.”

“I know it can be frightening at this point but you’re going to be okay. There’s a very good chance your memory will come back to you in no time.”

Brenna bit her lip. “Yeah.”

“And until then, you have a wonderfully supportive husband to help you.” Marge began to rinse out the shampoo. “He’s a pretty special man, Brenna. The entire time you were in a coma he was here as long as he could be. He even talked us nurses into letting him stay the night a few times even though that’s against hospital policy. He really loves you and he must be ecstatic that you’re awake.”

“Probably not because I don’t even remember him.”

“I’m sure he’s still glad you’re awake. I think that he was more worried about you having brain damage that he didn’t even consider the possibility of amnesia. It will just take some time on both your parts to adjust. But you will adjust.”

Brenna was silent. She didn’t even know what to think at this point. It was all too much to take in and she was just feeling scared and lonely.

“There we go. All done. Lift your head up a bit.”

Brenna lifted her head and Marge wrapped a towel loosely around her head. Brenna moved back fully onto the bed and Marge readjusted the pillows she was leaning back against.

“Doesn’t that feel better?”

“Yeah, I feel a lot better. Thank you.”

“It was no problem. That’s what I’m here for. Now, you’ve eaten something for dinner, right?”

“They brought a dinner tray a while ago. I tried to eat some of it.”

Marge smiled. “Well that’s good enough. I know the food here isn’t anything to write home about.”

Brenna smiled too. “Yeah.”

“Even the cafeteria food isn’t that great. I’m not quite sure how Justin’s been living off it for a week.”

“Are you talking about me again, Marge?”

Brenna looked towards the doorway and saw Justin coming into the room.

Marge smiled. “Oh, I was just speculating on how you’ve managed to be eating cafeteria food day after day.”

He shrugged and sat down in a chair by the bed. “I’ve had worse. What are you guys doing?”

“I was just helping Brenna get her hair washed.” Marge went back to the cart. “I should be making my rounds though. I’ll come back after I’m finished.”

Brenna nodded and watched her leave.

“Marge has been really great,” Justin said once she was gone. “All the nurses have been pretty great actually. Marge kind of reminds me of your mom. Oh, speaking of your mom, I called her and got her answering machine but I left her a message and let her know what’s going on.”

Nodding again, she fiddled with the wedding ring on her finger.

“So, uh, I was thinking that Marge would probably let me spend the night here if you want. They usually just bring in another bed that I can sleep on.”

“That’s okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I’ll be fine.”

“Okay.” He was silent for a moment. “So when I talked to Dr. Harley, he said that he’d discharge you at like four or something in the afternoon tomorrow. So you only have to stay in this place for a bit longer. Then you can come home.”

She stifled a sigh and nodded. Was ‘home’ really going to be any better than the hospital? It’s not like it was going to be familiar to her.

Justin stayed until close to nine o’clock and soon after he was gone, she went to bed. She ended up not getting a lot of sleep. Too much new information from the day was going through her head. And how did Justin expect her to just be comfortable with going to a strange new place? At this point, the hospital was the most familiar place and she wasn’t that anxious to leave it.

She had been awake for two hours when Justin arrived at the hospital at eight the next morning. She was reading a book when he came into the room.

“Okay, so I brought you some real food,” he said, handing her a large steaming paper cup from a coffee shop and a bakery bag. “Tall latte and a blueberry muffin. Your favorites.”

“Thank you,” she said. She took a small sip and grimaced a bit. This was her favorite drink?

Justin sat down in a chair. “I got this disapproving look from Marge on my way in but, hey, you’re being released today and it’s not like a little caffeine’s going to hurt anything, right?”

She nodded as she chewed a bite of her muffin. Well this isn’t half bad. Almost makes up for the coffee.

“So Trace and Kate were going to come over later tonight after you’re settled. Just for dinner.” He laughed. “Kate said she’d cook but who knows how that’ll turn out. You’re the only one of the four of us who knows how to cook anything good.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah. You’re a great cook. Before you came to LA, you worked in a bakery for like three years or something.”

“Oh.”

“Oh, and I brought some photo albums from home,” he said, reaching into the bag he had brought. “I figured they might help jog your memory.” He got up and came over to the bed with the photo albums and sat down on the edge of the mattress by her. She placed her half eaten muffin on the table by the bed and moved over slightly as he opened the first album.

She wasn’t even able to concentrate on what he was saying about the pictures because she was too distracted by him sitting there.

Does he really have to sit so close to me? she asked silently.

You’re married, another voice responded. I’m pretty sure you’ve done a lot more than sit next to each other.

Brenna felt her heart drop a bit. What if he expects me to have SEX with him? I don’t even know him. What if he expects me to do certain things or-

“Bren?”

Her thoughts were broken off abruptly as Justin said her name. She looked over to find him staring at her. She felt her cheeks heat up as she wondered if he knew what she had been thinking about.

“What?”

“You just look like you’re off in your own world. Do you not want to look at pictures? We don’t have to.”

She shook her head. “No, that’s okay.”

“Okay. Cool.” He swung his legs on the bed so he was sitting right beside her and she quickly took a drink of the latte simply to get rid of her dry mouth. She tried to concentrate on the pictures all the while desperately willing her memory to come back to save her from the horrible feelings inside of her.