Selfless

9

"Why are you asking that?" Kat asked as anger filled her eyes. "I-I'm...im sorry." I said and looked down. "No, I'm not mad at you. How do you know about Stephanie?" She asked and tried to relax her face.

I just held my phone up to her and she clenched her jaw, "okay, we should go home." Kat said and stood up. My heart was racing as I stood up slowly.

By the time I was up Kat was already at the front counter paying for the food. Who was Stephanie and why was she asking about Colby?

My head started stinging as I gasped in pain. "Cora?" Kat asked and turned to face me. "I'm okay." I gasped out as the pain intensified. "Shit..okay let's go. We have to get you home." She said and pushed me lightly out of the restaurant as the pain subsided.

"You didn't answer my question." I said with a sigh as my head throbbed due to the sudden pain. "I can't. I can't answer it without losing my mind Cora, please understand." She said and I nodded.

Stephanie must be an enemy or something.

We got to the house and Kat got out and started walking to the front door. "Is your head still hurting?" She asked and I nodded as we walked to the front door. She nodded and opened the door, "I'm gonna get you some Tylenol or something." She said and walked away quickly. I shrugged and walked into the living room.

"Hey! How was breakfast?" Sam asked as I sat down on the couch. "It was fine. Some girl texted me and Kat got all freaked out about it." I said and he scrunched his brows in confusion. "Who texted you?" He asked and I shrugged, "if I tell you will you tell me who she is?" I asked and he chuckled, "probably not but you can give it a shot." He said and I shrugged.

"Her name is Stephanie. Is she our friend? She was asking how Colby was." I said as he sucked in a breath, "far from a friend. Wait right here, I'll be back." He said and stood up leaving me alone again. I huffed out a breath. How was I supposed to get my memory back if they wouldn't tell me anything?

I stood up to go find Kat but immediately stumbled back onto the couch when a searing pain filled my head. "Honey are you okay?" Colby's mom asked and came into the room.

"Head hurts." I said and closed my eyes against the pain. "Okay, take a big deep breath for me." She said and rubbed my back as I sucked in a long breath.

"You're just getting too overwhelmed, relax for me." She said and pulled me into her in a motherly way. A shock of pain went through my heart when I thought about my mother walking out on me. I still haven't come to terms with that, and having Colby's mom as a motherly support system was a shock to my mind. Especially when it feels like I just met her yesterday.

I leaned into her and let her smooth my hair down feeling an instant sense of comfort, "she okay?" Colby said as he came in. "She's got a headache, I think she's getting too overwhelmed." His mom said and continued smoothing my hair down as Colby sat next to us on the couch.

"Who's Stephanie?" I asked and felt Colby tense up, "don't worry about her right now." He said as his mom pulled away from me and positioned me to be in Colby's arms.

"She was asking about you." I mumbled and closed my eyes and laid my head on his chest as he played with my hair. "Don't worry about her right now, please Cora just relax." He said and I nodded, letting myself melt into him. I was starting to feel really weak the longer we sat there.

"Tell me stories." I whispered as he rubbed circles on my back. "Stories about what?" He asked as someone came into the room. "Anything." I whispered as Colby leaned my head up as the person who walked into the room stopped in front of us.

"Open." He said and I opened my mouth. He put a small tablet on my tongue and held a glass of water my lips. As soon as I swallowed the pill down I rested my head on his chest again.

In the back of my mind I was freaked out, and wanted to push myself away from him but at the same time being in his arms felt like home.

Maybe I did love him.

"I don't want to overwhelm you, can we please just sit here in silence for a couple minutes?" He begged and continued tracing circles on my back. I hummed in approval and melted into him a little more. I heard him sigh with content as we sat there cuddled up together on the couch.

I tried to shut my brain off so I could enjoy this moment of silence, but the reality of it all was that I was absolutely terrified still.

I was technically in a strangers arms, but I trusted him so much already. None of this made sense.

I was starting to get antsy with the idea that I had no idea what happened to me.

I needed answers.

I took a deep breath and leaned away from him, "I'll be right back." I said and stood up shakily.

I slowly made my way out of the room and walked to the room where my dad and Michelle were. "Hey squirt, are you okay?" He asked as I closed the door. "Tell me what happened." I said and he shook his head, "honey I don't thi-" he started but I groaned, "how am I supposed to remember if nobody is going to tell me what's going on?!" I yelled getting frustrated.

"Honey relax. What do you want to know?" He asked and sat up as Michelle looked at me with concern in her eyes. "Why can't I remember? Why did I just wake up one day with an entire year of my life missing?" I asked feeling my head start to ache more. "Honey-" he started but I shook my head, "tell me." I said as he breathed out a sigh. "Okay. You've been through a lot the past year and I'm not going to go through it all because you can't handle that." He said and I stared him down, waiting for him to get to the point.

"Earlier this year you were diagnosed with PTSD and and post partum depression. You have these episodes where you can't pull yourself out of them so your doctor prescribed you a sedative for the episodes you couldn't control." He said and looked down at his hands as I stared at him intently.

"Michelle has a daughter, Stephanie, she came out here with us because we wanted you two to meet. It turned out that she was a huge fan of Colby and she wanted to hurt you to get to him." He said and wrapped his arm around Michelle as she looked at me with sad eyes.

"She threw you up against a wall which caused you to hit your head. You had short term memory loss for a couple days but it came back. Unfortunately you had to take your sedatives a couple times while your memory was so short otherwise you wouldn't have slept. The chemicals in the pills caused the receptors in your brain to be blocked. That's why you can't remember stuff." He said and looked at me as my hands shook.

"Are they going to come back?" I asked and he closed his eyes, "we don't know. It's possible but not gauranteed." He said and I felt tears well up in my eyes, "so your daughter did this to me?" I asked and looked at Michelle, "I didn't know Cora, I didn't know she would act like that." She said guiltily as I started to cry. "WHY DID SHE DO THIS TO ME?" I yelled and sobbed as I covered my face with my hands.

Colby came running into the room, "hey, it's okay." He said and tried to pull me into him but I pushed him away, "stop! Don't touch me." I said and started to leave the room.

I took two steps before the overwhelming pain in my head took over causing me to scream in pain and collapse.