Chapter 6

Aubree's Pov

The next day when I woke up, I was welcomed with the sweet smell of pancakes.

Do you wake up as I do, having forgotten what it is that hurts or where, until you move? There is a second of consciousness that is clean again. A second that is you, without memory or experience, the animal warm and waking into a brand new world. There is the sun dissolving the dark, and light as clear as music, filling the room where you sleep and the other rooms behind your eyes. 

Waking up begins with saying am and now. That which has awoken then lies for a while staring up at the ceiling and down into itself until it has recognized I, and therefrom deduced I am, I am now. Here comes next, and is at least negatively reassuring; because here, this morning, is where it has expected to find itself: what’s called at home.

We awaken by asking the right questions. We awaken when we see knowledge being spread that goes against our own personal experiences. We awaken when we see popular opinion being wrong but accepted as being right, and what is right being pushed as being wrong. We awaken by seeking answers in corners that are not popular. And we awaken by turning on the light inside when everything outside feels dark.

I opened my eyes and saw Jaden walking in the room and placing the food on a small table next to me.

Every girl pretends she is a princess at one point, no matter how little her life is like that, and this was my moment.

Most kids don't believe in fairy tales very long. Once they hit six or seven they put away "Cinderella" and her shoe fetish, "The Three Little Pigs" with their violation of building codes, "Miss Muffet" and her well-shaped tuffet—all forgotten or discounted. And maybe that's the way it has to be. To survive in the world, you have to give up the fantasies, the make-believe. The only trouble is that it's not all make-believe. Some parts of the fairy tales are all too real, all too true. There might not be a Red Riding Hood, but there is a Big Bad Wolf. No Snow White, but definitely an Evil Queen. No obnoxiously cute blond tots, but a child-eating witch… yeah. Oh yeah.

You thought if you were good. If you gave up the things that made you different. The world you know. That it would be enough. But sacrifice is often so invisible. People do not look for it in others. They know their own. They list them out like titles at a ball. I've done for you. I've done for you. I've done. And it is always your turn now. To hurt, to long. To be a broken thing. A thing that differs. Before, you always thought you were a person.

Once in a while, right in the middle of an ordinary life love knocks our doors, enters our lives & changes it forever. You start believing in dreams, you start making wishes & you start to trust your heart even more! That love holds your hands & makes you feel you are safer than ever; that love makes you believe that nothing can go wrong now; and oh that warm hug, which makes you want to spend your entire life then & there!

That’s when you realise you are not living an ordinary life, but it’s a fairytale!

I can wake up late and get food in bed, so far married life looked life a fairy tale, everything that I ever wished for.

"Good morning Aubree." He greeted me with a smile on his face and then helped me to get up.

"Good morning Jaden." I grumbled in my sleep.

I sat on the bed, while he sat next to me with the tray of the food in his hand.

"Here, I've brought apple juice for you today, I hope you like it." he said and made me laugh.

"Yes I love every juice except orange." I told him while I took a big sip of the delicious juice. Then I eyed the plate and saw pancakes with blueberry sauce.

I began to drool while looking at those. This is what you act like when you are forced to eat porridge for ten days. I felt like a queen, getting such good food, while sitting on my king sized bed, in a room full of my pics and several scented roses, with the person I had a crush on as my husband.

I began to eat the food and then stared at him, he wasn't eating anything.

"Why are you not eating?" I asked him.

"I have already eaten." He told and I nodded my head.

"Aubree, since when did you have a crush on me?" He asked me and I felt a smile creep on my face.

I could forget everything about the past ten years, but I had not forgotten about how I got a crush on him.

"Tell me everything. I want to know the things that you remember, and then I will tell you about the things that you missed." He said and held my hands and stared into my eyes. I don't think I could say no to that look on his face. Also it was a wise gamble, I would tell him all I remembered and in return he would tell me everything that I missed out on.

"Okay, so do you remember that day when I sat with you in the cafeteria for the first time?" I asked him.

"I do remember it, yet not that clearly." He said and I nodded, understanding that he was lying. He did not remember it. He was a player back then, how could I even expect for him to remember in detail all the thoughts that I had of him. The things that I dreamt all night about him, all the fantasies that I had about him, how could his love compare to the love that I had for him. Maybe he did not love me the way I wanted him to love me, but maybe, in his own way he did love me, in some wretched way, maybe. But it hurt in every part of my heart to know that all the memories that meant the world to me, meant nothing to him.

Obviously, why would he remember those moments? It was too surprising to acknowledge that the moments which meant the world to me, were not present in his memory. The moments that I used to look back upon, again and again, meant nothing to him. Strange right?

It was too sad to acknowledge that Jaden had completely forgotten that how we even met back at the university. We used to be pretty cool friends back then, but him not remembering about certain things made me feel sad.

Tonight I can smell the season the way it's usually only possible to at the very first moments of its return, before you're used to it, when you've forgotten its smell, then there it is back in the air and the flow of things shifting and resettling again.

It is as though some old part of yourself wakes up in you, terrified, useless in the life you have, its skills and habits destructive but intact, and what is left of the present you, the person you have become, wilts and shrivels in sadness or despair: the person you have become is only a thin shell over this other, more electric and endangered self. The strongest, the least digested parts of your experience can rise up and put you back where you were when they occurred; all the rest of you stands back and weeps.

At some juncture in our life, we become an entirely different person than what we started as. Different dreams, different thoughts, different style, different life. When we look at our old photographs, it feels like we are looking at a stranger. Then, it makes us wonder when we stopped being that person in the photograph.

You cannot make yourself have a flashback, nor will you have one unless you are emotionally ready to remember something. Once remembered, the memory can help you to face more of the truth. You can then express your pent-up feelings about the memory and continue on your path to recovery. Think of the flashback as a clue to the next piece of work. No matter how painful, try to view it as a positive indication that you are now ready and willing to remember.

He saw me frowning at his comments and said, "I may have forgotten them, but I'm trying to set everything right, eh?"

I tried to smile at his comment and then began to remember that day, when we first met each other. It wasn't perfect but the best way to meet someone, and I could not even imagine that this is how I actually met my husband.

*Then*

I walked into the cafeteria and saw that my friends were not here. They had a lunch detention, since they were caught cheating in a test. This meant that I had to stay alone all throughout the lunch.

But it wasn't a problem. I was fine with that, but the problem I faced next was that the entire place was full. There was not a single seat empty. And going out in the sun wasn't an option since it was summer, and the sun was on it's full blaze.

I had a tray of food in my hands, with burger and a coke, and I was scanning the entire place, trying to find an empty seat.

Then finally, I saw an empty seat next to a guy, who was wearing a blue shirt. He was sitting all alone, while eating his food. And without even noticing, my feet began to move towards him.

"Hey can I sit here? This is the only empty seat." I said while he glanced over at me, and his hazel eyes met mine. And all I could do at that moment was to stare into his eyes, and though I tried to act calmly, but I could not. I had never in my life seen such a bright light in someone's eyes, and I instantly knew that I had fallen for him.

He had a strong jawline, which would clearly attract any woman's attention, and his hair was messily styled, which made him look even more handsome.

"Yes sure." He smiled at me and I sat next to him, but due to his nearness, my clumsiness increased and I stumbled, as I began to sit next to him, and my coke fell on his arm and I got so  embarrassed that my cheeks turned a deep shade of red.

"Oh shit! I'm extremely sorry! I did not mean to.." I began saying things that appeared in my mind. Thanks to being a verbose.

"It's fine, it was just an accident." He said and smiled at me, though he had a full right to shout at me, He was so calm, and cute and sexy. He just took out a handkerchief and wiped the coke off his arms.

While, I sat next to him, saying sorry again and again, while he just smiled and said that it was okay, and wiped the coke off his arm, while I was literally drooling over him. Even chewing my burger made me feel self conscious while I sat next to him. Soon, he finished his lunch and went away, while I wondered why I did not ask him his name?

But more than that, I knew, that I had fallen for a person on whom I had spilt my coke. Such a good way for the first impression. But I thought that I would never be able to talk with him ever again, I thought that the guy on whom I spilled the coke would just disappear into thin air and never come back in my life. Little did I know, that he would become my best friend, and husband as I grow up.