Holly lay awake in bed and stared at the ceiling. Victoria had fallen asleep during the massage, a sure sign of just how exhausted she was. Luckily, it was only another two days until the issue closed, and then hopefully Victoria’s schedule would ease up.
It had been a difficult journey to get Victoria to take a small step back from her work and spend more time with her family.
Holly knew that Victoria was still plagued with nightmares related to Alexia’s brief but unexpected misadventure, running away from home the previous year. Initially, Victoria had proclaimed that she’d leave Arrival and that her family was far more important than some magazine. She’d quickly climbed down from that view and instead went with the more moderate approach of cutting some of her hours.
Victoria’s methodology to problems came in two flavours: a knee-jerk overreaction, or a complete emotional shutdown, complete with retreating into herself and proclaiming that everything was absolutely fine.
Holly had always been good at identifying and managing Victoria’s mood swings, if her fastidiously kept journals were anything to go by. Holly could see right through her, and although that may have frustrated Victoria when she was Holly’s boss, she seemingly enjoyed reaping the benefits of it now.
Insight into how Victoria worked seemed to be ingrained within her. Even with her memory absent, Holly had quickly been able to identify when Victoria was upset or hiding something. Locating her journals and seeing her past self detailing Victoria’s fascinating, yet frustrating, coping mechanisms had been an eye-opening relief.
Having the journals at all had been a relief.
Holly’s obsessive habit of documenting every single aspect of her life had been fortuitous to say the least. She’d apparently journaled since she was eight, and she had twenty-nine volumes to show for it.
She believed in fate and that things generally happened for a reason, so when she had found her journal collection in the storage locker a year after the accident, she felt like she had been proved absolutely right.
Obviously, she’d never known that her habit of recording every facet of her life was going to be so important when she’d originally written her diaries. She’d kept some scraps of information written down now and then while she stayed in the hospital in Paris, but nothing much happened, and she had little to say.
Nowadays she dedicated a good hour or two every day to chronicling what was happening. The habit of journaling had taken on a new meaning and depth for her. As much as she tried to stay positive about her brain injury, she’d experienced the shocking situation of quite literally forgetting everything, and she didn’t know if it could happen again.
Finding her journals had been a literal lifeline to finding out who she was. Everything had been recorded, often in great detail. Not all of it was easy reading, family deaths, bad breakups, financial strife, and terrible bosses. Well, mainly one terrible boss—Victoria.
Holly still couldn’t believe her luck that Victoria had found her in Paris, brought her home, and helped to get her back on her feet. Things could have been so dramatically different for her.
The thought caused a shudder to race up her spine. She turned over in bed and curled her body around Victoria’s sleeping form, feeling safe and loved as soon as they touched. She tried to be positive and carefree, but there were times, often at night, when the reality scared her.
While Holly remembered no solid facts before waking up in hospital in Paris twenty-two months ago, she did have feelings of memories. She’d famously remembered Izzy’s name, that of Victoria’s dog, much to Victoria’s disappointment. Not a single memory of Victoria, but the name Izzy sprang to her mind like a light being switched on.
Holly was careful to not get her hopes up, but the fact that she had a sensation of recollection made her think that her memories were in there somewhere, just waiting to come out. Now and then she thought she remembered something, but it was always hazy and more like a half-forgotten dream than an actual memory.
Her doctors had told her the chance of her remembering anything was fifty-fifty, but Holly had quickly ascertained that her doctors knew next to nothing about amnesia. The brain was a wild and complicated series of impulses, and no one seemed to know how or why it did what it did.
Victoria had it in her head that Holly would one day remember. Holly hoped she did but really didn’t know if it was possible. Part of Victoria’s certainty was rooted in the fact that she still harboured concerns that, if Holly’s memories flashed back to life, she’d recall what a difficult woman Victoria had been during her year working with her. The worry was fading over time, but Holly knew it lingered in Victoria’s mind. She knew it had been there tonight; she saw it in her eyes.
Not that she could blame her. Holly was keenly aware that her view of their relationship was extremely different from Victoria’s. Holly had only had real, tangible memories since she met Victoria in the Paris hospital, a full year after her accident. Everything else was gathered from her journals, knowledge that she had loved Victoria for some time was something she’d only read about. It was documented by her own hand, true and pure, but still distant in some ways. She’d not travelled the path of a conventional relationship and slowly fallen in love over a period of time. She’d been told, by her past self, that the feelings she couldn’t quite identify were love. After that, the dam broke, and Holly realised the strength of her emotions.
Victoria had a very different experience. Holly had been an assistant, a second assistant at that. Someone who had gotten closer and closer to Victoria, managing her every need and desire with greater success each week. Victoria, angry at being so predictable to a girl she considered her inferior, rebelled. They were stuck in a battle of Holly doing her best to be the perfect assistant and Victoria doing her best to push her away.
Then, to Victoria’s mind, they argued, and Holly walked away. Holly had finally plucked up the courage to admit that she cared for Victoria while in Paris Fashion Week. It was something that Victoria couldn’t believe. She thought it a joke, a prank of some kind. She pushed Holly away with acerbic words and a glare that could melt ice.
And then… something. A mystery. An accident of some kind that ripped her life into two distinct pieces. One before Paris, and one after.
Holly held her partner a little tighter, breathing in Victoria’s lingering perfume. She knew Victoria had suffered at the thought that Holly had walked away from her. At first she’d felt lost, confused, and angry. A year later, when she found out that Holly had been in an accident, trapped in a hospital in France with amnesia, she’d been horrified and felt immense guilt.
Holly knew that she sometimes underestimated how terrible Victoria still felt about events. The guilt she clearly carried around. Victoria didn’t exactly wear her heart on her sleeve. In fact, she did everything she could to hide her feelings most of the time, even from those she loved.
Holly made a mental note to be more considerate of that fact. The truth was, their perception of events was very different. It was a blessing and a curse. Holly didn’t know if she wanted to remember the Victoria who had made her cry so many times, and she damn well knew that Victoria didn’t want her to remember that.
Still, it was unlikely she would remember. Even now, when memories did resurface, they were like a shadow of the memories themselves. A feeling, rather than an actual memory.
The amnesia hung over their relationship like a dark cloud. While love clearly poured from Victoria onto Holly, there was still a sensation that she was holding something back. It was as if she was not quite one hundred percent in the relationship, trying to protect herself in the eventuality that the worst came to pass. One foot out.
Holly let out a small sigh and tucked her body further against Victoria’s, willing herself to succumb to sleep.