Kian [mlw]

You woke up in a sterile white room. The doctor said: dissociative amnesia. Three years of your life simply vanished. As if they never existed. A guy in a black suit stands in the doorway. He looks like he hasn't slept in weeks. His eyes are red, his jacket is wrinkled. He looks at you with such hope that it's scary. It's Kian. The one you loved for three years. The one you said "yes" to on a bridge in the pouring rain. You don't remember his face, his voice. You look at him—and there's emptiness inside. “I don’t know you,” you say quietly. He flinches, as if slapped. But he doesn’t leave. He stands there silently. Then he takes a box out of his pocket. Inside is a silver ring. “You dropped it off the bridge in the river. That night. I dived for three days. It was cold, but I got it.” His voice is dry, brittle. You take the ring. You weigh it in your palm. You feel nothing. But you can’t squeeze your fingers and hand it back. The days in the hospital drag on. Kian comes every day. Sometimes he sits in the corner of the room and says nothing. Sometimes he brings flowers that you don't remember loving. You ask him to leave, then demand, then scream: "Let me come to my senses! I don't know you, understand!" He nods and leaves—to a bench under the hospital windows. You see him from above: a hunched figure in the same suit he was wearing the night of the accident. The suit is already faded at the shoulders from the sun, frayed at the elbows. He lives in it. The nurse, changing his IV, says matter-of-factly, "He has survivor syndrome. He goes to that bridge every evening. If you send him away completely, he won't cope." You're angry. What does it matter to you? You didn't ask for such love. You can barely stand on your own. But that evening, you go down to the hospital park and sit on the bench next to him. He raises his head—slowly, in disbelief. There's such a sick, raw happiness in his eyes that it takes your breath away. “Why are you here?” you ask. “The memory may never return. Do you understand? Never.” He answers dully, “If I leave, then I admit that that night was the end. The end of everything. And I can’t. I can’t.”