Chapter 3 : The Past Is The Past

Chapter 3 : The Past Is The Past

Scene 5 : High-school, sweet high-school

We walk down the street, barely talking to each other, my hand brushing hers, as an unvoluntary gesture towards her, to show her I actually have nothing against her. She ends up noticing it and she takes my hand, not talking much more, but at the very least, it felt more comfortable to see that she was willing to go back in a relationship with me.

After all, if she saw that amnesia as a second chance in life, even if she didn't know what to do, and that it was also a reason for healing herself, maybe I should do the same and heal myself, too. I can't keep living in a past where she doesn't live anymore. I'm in a front of a new Cassie, and I had to accept it, whether I wanted it or not.

We arrive in front of the place that I wanted to show her : our high-school, the place where we grew apart, the place where we said goodbye, not even having a party after the graduation, just me, moving already, into Detroit.

It wasn't my fault, I gotta admit : my parents could only stay for the rest of the week-end before they started their new job in California, so they had to be there before so they didn't miss their first day of work. But since they had promised me to help me move before they'd take the plane to sunnier places, away from this swampy Michigan, they had to do it fast, so on the Friday, the day of graduation, I barely said goodbye before I hopped in the car that would make the distance between the two of us.

What a fucking irony it is that this car is now the one that I own, the very old car they'd had for at the very least a decade, but they have two bright new shiny cars now, I've seen them while I was visiting them during my studies at university.

I tell Cassie the story of how we grew apart ; on the last day, as we had been doing for the past couple of years – if not since our earliest childhood together – we gave to each other a promise, that no matter what, we'd leave this town, together. We had been crying the whole week before and we would spend all our time together – more in the Millers' apartment than in mine, since my parents had started moving out. And we really, really didn't want the seperation to happen.

« It's okay, she had said while stroking my hair gently, I mean, it at the very least one of us can make it out there, you gotta take your chance... and have a better life than here... I mean, I can't hold you down because of our relationship.

• But I can't do it without you, I had replied, but she hadn't said anything. I don't even know if I'll survive through the distance and not seeing you everyday, like right now, since our first days together...
• I'm pretty sure you can make it, don't feel bad for me... I mean, I'm going to college, too, I'm just staying here, that's all... »

And that's how she had convinced me to leave. After all, living in this very poor city had convinced us to be the best people we could be in order to find studies somewhere else, and then a job, no matter what, that would pay us well and guarantee us financial stability. That's how I had ended up choosing law when I actually hate it. It was just because of Cassie, because I knew how much money this kind of people – my kind of people, should I say – earn with all the bonuses and priviledges taken away from the masses who can't even defend themselves as they have lawyers – me, in a nutshell – to defend the big bankers against the poor clients who keep losing the economies of a lifetime, forcing them to work past the retirement age, even when they are already fragile and uncapable of doing anything remotely physical.

Basically, the injustice in this country had made us bitter, and we wanted to take revenge on the world for putting us in such an awful place, just left to nothingness and a dull future that we had to change if we wanted a better life than our parents.

The high-school is closed for now, so we just jump over the gate, since there is no alarm system anyways. They don't have the money for it since the funds have been cut in half for the last ten years or so, but the officials had never told us why. We roam among the corridors and the classrooms, as I remember our life, years ago, when nothing really mattered and everything was about us, just about us, before shit happened and we were separated by the circumstances.

« Here's the art room, it was your favourite, I say while entering another classroom. I prefered drama and litterature, and you, art and music. When I tell you that you were the one introducing me to music and your favourite bands, which are now also my favourite bands, I'm not joking.

• Why didn't you study something in those fields, if you liked them so much ? Cassie asks while staring at a wall covered in old paintings that were never claimed by their creators.
• I guess it was because I was scared, and I wanted a job that was convenient, I briefly replied, trying to find a drawing she had left for the teacher in senior year, right before leaving. Besides, I was kinda good at law, so I thought it would be easy. I had intended to work as a lawyer for a publishing house or a music company or something lile that, but this bank... well, offered me more money than anyone else, so I took the job. And now, guess what ? I'm stuck with it.
• You could have taken a job you prefer with less money rather than a job you hate just because the pay is bigger. », she proclaims while looking back at me, but I don't know what to say anymore. « I guess that's the reason for which I stayed here, right ? To study something I actually liked, even if I was taking a risk to be poorer than you in the future ?
• Yeah, let's say it like that. That you were banking on a future job opportunity that would take you away from Glendam... and maybe, even, back to me. »

Or more like, she failed because she couldn't make it and I succeeded because of dumb sheer luck during the exams, and she couldn't go where she wanted, whereas I went to Detroit, when I didn't want to go either. In the end, I sacrificied my studies and my future career to save up money for her. And now, she doesn't even know it anymore.

Maybe I should tell her. That my life has always revolved around her, and now, she doesn't know how much she means to me, how her life and mine were entertwined. I can tell her and tell her, all of our stories, that won't help her remember them. Either her brain fixes itself and some memories come back, or it doesn't and this situation we're now in will stay the same forever.

I mean, it's not gonna change the facts anyways.

I keep talking about the little things that made us special ; our first « I love you », when we were twelve, followed by our first pinkie-promise ; some playground moments where we'd spend our afternoons on the swings, or running all over the place, imagining we were on adventures, away from here, always away from here. We would be the saviours of the galaxy, killing a deadly alien form who would want to kill the human race, and we obviously would work incognito.

There were also those lazy afternoons spent watching the X-Files, before we would try to set up a club in our local neighbourhood, cosplaying as Mulder and Scully (Mulder being Cassie and Scully being me, seen the physical similarities between us and the FBI agents). We had friends telling us that we can't cosplay as a hetero couple since we were not a boy and a girl, that a lesbian version of their favourite TV show was disgusting, and that they should leave the roles to an actual hetero couple, but we didn't care. After all, we had created this club and we were the leaders, so we could cosplay as the main characters if we so wished.

We had left the high-school by now, and found ourselves in various parts of the city, I'm showing her what her life was before the accident. I'm not trying to force her memories back, I'm just giving her details about who she was and what she was doing before the accident, so she can, at the very least, try and go back to her job as an artist who's recieving commissions client by client. Which makes her job very hard, since she had pratically no visibility in this little town in the middle of fucking nowhere.

Because unless you're pretty big in the art industry, you never get what you deserve as an artist, since the big ones rule everything and the little are just left to die. In this industry more than in any other one.

In conclusion, I told Cassie our entire story, from the beginning until the end, before reminding her that, whether she would remember all that stuff later or not, I would still love her no matter what, and that I would give her all the time she needs to be reajusted to her former life, or maybe, to start a new one, since she considered this amnesia to be a second chance in life and in our relationship. She just smiles at me and thanks me for that.

I feel a knot in my stomach as the lies keep going. This isn't how it went in reality. In reality, Cassie yelled at me for leaving her, she would kick me out everytime I would see her, the jealousy in her eyes was omni-present, I could feel it, she was just envious. She had put the blame on me, me who wanted to save enough money for her, and she hadn't even let myself explain to her. I couldn't take it anymore. I kept saving money for her even after we had broken up, even when I was still visiting the Millers, because of courtesy, and because Cassie's parents were like my own since mine were in California and I would barely see them once a year for Christmas.

I had taken the decision to break up with her. I couldn't be let down, and at the same time, I felt like I still owed her something. We were inseperable since birth and I felt guilty of leaving her for a better future than her. Even if I actually hated this said future.

In the end, we went back home, as Cassie kept talking. I really didn't want to talk, and I was just nodding all along, not saying anything. I don't even know why I'm doing this, why I'm still lying, why I still see the enemy inside Cassie, when after all, I could just be bitchy and use the fact that she's amnesiac to make her fall in love with me all over again and just replace the old memories with some new ones. Like a puppet you'd buy in a store. Except that this puppet, would be human.

See, Annie ? In the end, even with her amnesia, you're not telling her the truth you wanted to tell her. You keep lying and nothing's ever gonna change if you don't make a move. But after all, I guess you're just a crybaby. You won't do anything anyways, you coward.

Coward.

That was the only thing that could describe me for now.

2036 words (Total : 11295).

Scene 6 : Talking to Martha

During the next couple of days, I tried to hold everything in.

I tried.

Cassie was trying to talk to me as much as possible, giving me more recommendations as we would talk about various things going on in our lives. I believe she has good intentions, but sometimes, she asks a question about my past that I don't really want to answer, and I just become mute, unable of saying anything.

Why did you study law when you could study whatever you wanted ?

Wasn't I good enough to follow you in Detroit, in an art school, for example ?

Why do you keep saying it's entirely your fault and not mine ?

I basically don't want to talk about my past, her past, our past, with her, the fights that seperated us. I quickly tell her that yes, she wasn't « good enough » to follow me in Detroit where she was supposed to study with me. But I don't say anything else. I mean, that won't change the currents facts : she's broke, still living in her parents' apartment, and she has an undecised future and she doesn't know what to do with her life, even less since the accident.

Let's say that for now, she only knows the facts, but she doesn't remember the feelings that got with them.

Sometimes, she would stop me and ask me what she liked and disliked before the accident ; I just shrug off that kind of questions, reminding her that after the accident, she was a new person, and she could changer herself as much as she wanted to. That wouldn't change my feelings for her, and obviously, the undeniable love I have towards her.

I spent the last couple of days googling about her type of amnesia – retrograde amnesia – and found out – which wasn't that surprising – that the oldest memories, those who are more implemented in the brain, are more easily recollectable than the more recent ones, as they didn't have that much of an imprint in the brain.

Thank God, that means she'll be more likely to remember the good stuff when we were in a relationship rather than the bad stuff where we broke up and shit.

I keep going on with my life, sending daily e-mails to my bank back in Detroit, reminding them of the urgence of the situation and the fact that my presence was really needed here, in Glendam, to help Cassie recover and go back with her normal life.

Speaking of which, I've been talking to Martha about this recently, and as she was making dinner one night, I suddenly find myself in front of her, emotionally naked – and ready to spill the whole truth about my most recent feelings towards the situation.

« What's wrong ? she asks me, tilting her head a little while stirring the pot of vegetables we'll eat tonight. Is it about Cassie, dear ?

• Yup, you guessed it, I answer, looking at how she was doing. I mean, this is all I'm thinking about since the accident... well, I was thinking... you know, about how she couldn't leave Glendam. All the negative stuff that happened to us and created a sort of rift between the two of us... »

What Cassie doesn't remember, and what I do, is all about our high-school life. Since we first promised and declared our undying love at the age of twelve, we never made a fuss about our relationship, and never tried to hide it from the world. We never thought that our love would be seen as gross and disgusting by many people around us ; we had first come out to our parents and other members of our families, and they had accepted this with a great smile. As they were very acceptant of our situation as girlfriends, we thought, or at the very least hoped, that the rest of the world would agree with this stance and accept us as much as we accept ourselves.

We were wrong. Oh, we were so wrong.

By the age of fourteen, we went to Disney World in Florida for our two-year anniversary as a couple, with our parents. When we came back and started high-school, everything started to go down.

The insults, the bullying, the constant harassement from douchebag straight guys who were probably just frustrated to see that two magnificent ladies were out of their reach now, because we were gay. They actually hated that. I don't even understand where this fixation comes from, this idea that straight guys are trying to sleep with lesbians to « turn them straight ». I mean, there are plenty of straight girls (or just girls who are into boys for that matter) who would gladly accept to be your girlfriend, guys.

Wait, I actually retract what I've just said. In reality, NO ONE wants to date a douchebag like you. And everyone, no exception made, should be aware of your disgusting ways and should run away from you and never talk to you ever again, since it's all you actually deserve in life.

But it wasn't only the straight guys who were disgusted by our ways, it was also straight girls themselves ; I won't even talk about how many times I've been told by a supposed friend or anyone in our classes about how disgusting I was for being gay and that I would probably should never stay next to them as I could « possibly » have a crush on them, which would be, obviously, disgusting and gross.

Do you really believe I have time for petty stupid straight girls like you when I have the most amazing and perfect girlfriend out there who loves me as much as I love her ?

In the end, I wasn't that affected by all the negative comments and snarky remarks made not only by the students but also by the teachers, trying to make the LGBTQ+ debates « fun » with some supposed funny videos to entertain the straight audience who couldn't care less about issues and struggles that weren't not their own.

It was only then that we realised that two girls loving each other wasn't common, that we were a part of a minority and repressed group that didn't have equal rights to the straights, and that we had to fight for equality, because otherwise, nothing would change, whether the law or the mentality of the straight population.

We then started a LGBTQ+ club in our neighbourhood, but it never took off, with barely a couple of people visiting, sometimes, when we weren't harassed by some stupid homophobic bastards and bitches complaining about how our pride of being queer was disrupting their quite peace and that we shouldn't shove our gay down their throats.

Well, Straight Sally and Hetero Henry, maybe if we had equal rights and perfectly acceptant mentalities all across the world, maybe we wouldn't have anything to complain about. We're just asking for our queerness to be seen by EVERYONE as normal, and not just by us. Is that too much to ask for ?

But the fights didn't stop there. The homophobes didn't stop at verbal harassement, at mental, psychological and emotional abuse everyday, as soon as we would leave our building. They stopped using the words and just started throwing punches at us. Violently kicking us down the stairs at school, punching our faces, taking us apart everytime we would try to show affection to each other, telling us how disgusting we were, repeatedly, until the words would sink in our brains, like ghosts keeping us at night.

By the age of sixteen, we had been both diagnosed with depression and heavy anxiety, coupled with some panic attacks when it comes to studies, and our parents tried, in vain, to take us from the public system to have us homeschooled. They sent letters to the principal to make things stop. They never did. We never got homeschooled. Was that it ? The price of being gay ? The price of being who we were ?

I had tried, at the time, to stay strong, not only for myself but also for Cassie. Out of the two of us, she was the most vulnerable, and the most affected by the general homophobia around us. We would be lying in bed, cuddling, and all of a sudden, she would ask me, once again, if what we were doing was right, if it was natural, and if we were even allowed to do it. I would hold her in my arms once again and repeat her the same sentence, about how normal it is to be gay and about how we shouldn't be ashamed of who we were, because there was nothing to change.

« After all, I love you, and you love me. That is all that matters. And no one can take that away from us. Even if they don't understand, it doesn't mean that it's not normal, because it is, normal. They don't have the rights to control our lives. We are the only ones who can control our own lives, and I'm just saying, I love you, and you love me. And if that was meant to be, then let it be. Don't you love being my girlfriend as much as I love being yours, in the end ? »

Cassie would smile again, and we'd go back to cuddles before falling asleep. And then, the question Is it okay to be with you ? became more and more frequent. By the age of eighteen, as we were finishing high-school, it was a daily question, as we'd go back and forth to the other person's apartment to sleep when we felt lonely.

Cassie's grades started dropping as she didn't really care about her life anymore. I would barely maintain my own, hoping that I would be the one saving both of us. I had already made the plan with the promise in my head multiple times, hoping that she'd understand and that I would have a second chance with her, that it would give me more time to fiw the broken things between the two of us.

It never happened.

Instead, I left Glendam in a hurry, not caring at all about what would happen to me, as long as I could keep Cassie safe. I would call her everyday, reminding that it was okay to be with me, that our relationship was normal, and that no one should judge it but ourselves. And that's where the rift started to appear between the two of us.

Cassie started seeing my departure as a betrayal, about the promise we had made to each other about leaving this town together, she felt like I wasn't helping her anymore when in reality, I was starving for her, and we started going away, more and more, just like our relationship had started to feel weird with all the homophobia around us in high-school.

When we'd be in the same bed, trying to collect the pieces of our broken hearts, when we'd have pity sex in the middle of the night, when we'd be tugging at each other's sleeve, to see how we had become broken shells of human beings, we realised that maybe, we weren't meant to be.

We called a break.

And that's how our relationship had supposedly ended, on a stupid phone call, with all our feelings going out of our mouth like vomit, and we were just left empty, numb and worthless, because despite the brief relief I had felt right after finishing the call, I had realised that without her, I was nothing, my life, my entire existence, would mean nothing, my studies meant nothing, my job was nothing, my lonely life in a dump with already expired food was nothing, and for the first time in my life, I felt lonely, so deeply lonely, and there was nothing that could cure this feeling.

And now, I don't want to hide anymore, I don't want to run anymore, I don't want this disgusting and gross feeling everytime I lie about my relationship status. I'm tired, so tired of pretending I'm a single and straight woman when I'm gay and taken.

I don't want to work for this bank anymore.

I don't want to go back to Detroit.

I want to tell Cassie the truth and I want to run away with her.

The problem is, I still don't have the courage to face her.

2097 words (Total : 13392).