Chapter 2 - THE THREE MONTHS HE COULD NOT REMEMBER
Julian remembered Maya’s laugh.
That was the cruel part.
Not the dates.
Not the sequence.
Not the exact apartment.
The laugh.
He remembered it without context.
Sometimes while driving.
Sometimes at two in the morning.
A woman laughing because he had tried to fix a leaking faucet and made it worse.
A brunette with paint on her wrist.
A cheap bottle of wine.
A blue sofa.
Fragments.
For four years, doctors had told him fragmented memory was normal after trauma.
He had believed them.
Because there had been a crash.
Not Maya’s.
His.
Four years earlier, Julian had been leaving Chicago for a board retreat in Colorado when the company helicopter made an emergency landing in Wyoming during severe weather.
Nobody died.
Julian fractured two ribs, suffered a concussion, and lost a narrow band of autobiographical memory from roughly twelve weeks before the accident.
Retrograde amnesia.
The doctors said most memories might return.
Some did.
Business meetings.
Names.
Hotel rooms.
A board fight.
But the personal months stayed damaged.
His family filled in what they could.
Victoria filled in more.
At the time, she was not his fiancée.
She was his family’s director of executive affairs and the daughter of one of Lockridge Holdings’ oldest board allies.
She knew his schedule.
His devices.
His doctors.
His mail.
She sat beside his hospital bed when he woke.
Julian had asked:
“Was I seeing anyone?”
Victoria had said:
“No one serious.”
He remembered that now.
The sentence suddenly sounded different.
Maya stood across from him in the library at Lockridge House while Clara slept in the staff room with the house manager.
Victoria had been asked to leave.
She refused.
Julian asked again.
She left.
The door closed.
Silence.
Maya remained standing.
Julian sat because his legs felt unreliable.
“What happened between us?”
Maya looked at him.
“You don’t remember.”
It was not a question.
“Pieces.”
“Which pieces?”
He searched.
“You had a blue couch.”
Her face changed.
“Yes.”
“I ruined your faucet.”
“You flooded the bathroom.”
“I cooked.”
“You attempted to.”
A shadow of something moved between them.
Then vanished.
Julian swallowed.
“How long?”
“Three months.”
His heart tightened.
“Were we…”
Maya laughed once, not kindly.
“In love?”
He looked down.
“I was going to ask.”
“Yes.”
Julian closed his eyes.
The word struck harder than accusation.
“We were?”
“I was.”
He looked up.
Maya’s expression was controlled.
“You said you were.”
Silence.
“What happened before my crash?”
“You left for a board trip.”
“Did we fight?”
“No.”
“Did I end it?”
“No.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
His throat tightened.
“Then?”
“You disappeared.”
Julian frowned.
“My helicopter crashed.”
“I know that now.”
“What did you know then?”
“That your phone stopped working.”
He looked at her.
“I called your office. Nobody put me through. I went to your building twice.”
“Which building?”
“Lockridge Chicago.”
Julian’s expression hardened.
Maya continued.
“The first time security said you were out of the country. The second time they told me personal visitors were not being accepted.”
“I was in a hospital.”
“I didn’t know.”
“Why didn’t anyone tell you?”
Maya laughed bitterly.
“I didn’t know I needed clearance to be informed the man I was sleeping with had nearly died.”
The sentence landed.
Julian looked away.
“What about the pregnancy?”
“I found out ten days after you left.”
He stopped breathing.
“Ten days.”
“Yes.”
“Did you try to tell me?”
Maya stared at him.
Then walked to the library table and took out her phone.
Old screenshots.
Saved because some injuries become evidence even when nobody asks.
She handed him the first.
Email sent to Julian’s executive address.
Subject:
PLEASE CALL ME. THIS IS PERSONAL AND IMPORTANT.
No response.
Second.
A mailed letter receipt.
Returned.
Third.
An email reply.
Mr. Lockridge does not wish to be contacted regarding personal matters from Chicago. Please respect his decision.
Julian read it twice.
Then looked at the sender address.
Executive liaison.
An office Victoria supervised.
His face hardened.
“I never sent this.”
“I know that now.”
“No. I mean I never authorized anyone to send this.”
Maya folded her arms.
“I was twenty-three. Pregnant. You vanished. Your people told me to go away.”
Julian’s voice dropped.
“Why didn’t you contact my family?”
“I didn’t know your family.”
He stopped.
Of course.
They had dated only three months.
Secretly? Not exactly.
Privately.
Julian had spent that year trying to exist without turning every relationship into public information. He had not taken Maya to Lockridge events. Had not introduced her to his father.
He had called that protecting something normal.
In reality, he had left her without a single independent bridge to his life.
Maya continued.
“Then I saw the news about your crash.”
“When?”
“Almost six weeks later.”
Julian frowned.
“The company announced it immediately.”
“Not the details.”
Lockridge Holdings released a statement that Julian had sustained injuries during an aviation incident and was recovering privately.
No location.
No visitor information.
No mention of memory loss.
Maya had read it on a bus.
She cried all the way home.
Then called again.
This time someone named Victoria answered.
Julian’s face changed.
Maya watched.
“She told me you were recovering and that pressure would harm you.”
“What else?”
“She asked who I was.”
He went still.
“I told her.”
“And?”
“She asked if I had proof we were together.”
Julian’s jaw clenched.
Maya laughed bitterly.
“I should have hung up.”
“What did you say?”
“I said I was pregnant.”
Silence.
Outside, the blizzard shook the glass.
Julian whispered:
“You told Victoria.”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
Maya looked directly at him.
“She said she would tell you when your doctors cleared you for difficult personal information.”
His face went white.
“Did she?”
“You’re asking me?”
Fair.
Julian stood.
Maya’s voice sharpened.
“Sit down.”
He stopped.
The old impulse to move, confront, solve.
She saw it.
He sat.
Good.
Maya continued.
“Two weeks later she called me back.”
Julian’s hands tightened.
“She said you remembered enough to know there had been someone in Chicago but that you did not want to resume the relationship.”
“No.”
“She said you wanted a clean recovery.”
“No.”
“She said the pregnancy was unfortunate timing.”
Julian looked physically ill.
Maya’s voice broke for the first time.
“She offered me money.”
He closed his eyes.
“How much?”
“Fifty thousand dollars.”
“I never—”
“I know.”
“Did you take it?”
“No.”
“Why didn’t you tell me later?”
Maya stared.
“I had been told twice that you didn’t want me.”
“That was a lie.”
“I know now.”
“You saw me in the news.”
“Yes.”
“Years passed.”
“Yes.”
“Why not contact me directly?”
Her face changed.
“Because by then you were with her.”
Julian stopped.
Victoria.
They began dating almost a year after the crash.
Engaged six months ago.
Maya continued.
“I saw the announcement. I saw her beside you. The same woman who told me you didn’t want contact.”
He looked at her.
“Didn’t that make you suspicious?”
“It made me think she had been telling the truth.”
There.
The cruel logic.
If Victoria later became Julian’s partner, why would Maya assume she had fabricated everything?
It looked like confirmation.
Julian leaned back.
“Clara is three.”
“Three and eight months.”
He closed his eyes.
She was born four months after his crash.
“What did you put on the birth certificate?”
“No father listed.”
His face tightened.
Maya noticed.
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Do not make that face like I erased you.”
He looked at her.
“I didn’t know whether you wanted to be there.”
“You were told I didn’t.”
“Yes.”
“I was told you didn’t.”
“Yes.”
Both sat in silence.
Then Julian asked:
“Why are you here?”
Maya looked toward the storm.
“Because rent is due.”
He frowned.
“The agency?”
“Triple pay.”
“You knew this was Lockridge property.”
“Yes.”
His expression changed.
Maya anticipated accusation.
“I was told you wouldn’t be here.”
“Who told you?”
“Staffing manager.”
Julian took out his phone.
Maya’s face hardened.
“Do not start investigating my employer like they committed treason.”
He stopped.
“Right.”
The correction visibly cost him.
Good.
Maya continued.
“I thought I could work three days, take the money, and leave. I didn’t plan this.”
Julian believed her.
Then another thought arrived.
“Victoria knew your name.”
Maya’s face tightened.
“Yes.”
“She saw you today.”
“Yes.”
“Did she react?”
“She avoided me until Clara came into the hall.”
Julian remembered Victoria’s face when Clara looked up.
Not confusion.
Fear.
He stood again.
This time Maya did not stop him.
“What are you going to do?”
“Ask her what she did.”
Maya looked at the door.
Then at him.
“Ask.”
He turned.
“Not threaten. Not accuse first. Ask.”
Julian nodded.
“Okay.”
He reached the door.
Maya said:
“Julian.”
He looked back.
“The DNA test.”
His face tightened.
“I’m sorry.”
“For asking?”
“For ordering.”
Good.
Maya continued.
“Clara is your daughter.”
The room went silent.
Julian’s expression collapsed.
No test.
No suspense for them anymore.
Just truth.
Maya’s eyes filled.
“I had a private paternity test done when she was six months old.”
He stared.
“How?”
“You left a toothbrush at my apartment.”
Of course.
Julian laughed once through sudden tears.
Maya did not.
“I needed to know I wasn’t building my entire grief around a possibility.”
“And it was me.”
“Yes.”
He looked toward the hallway where Clara slept.
“Can I see the report?”
“Yes.”
“Can I have another test now?”
Maya considered.
“Yes.”
“For legal documentation.”
“Yes.”
“Only if Clara’s pediatrician says the sample collection is appropriate.”
Julian almost smiled through tears.
“Okay.”
He opened the door.
Then stopped.
“Maya.”
“What?”
“I don’t remember loving you.”
Her face went still.
He continued quickly.
“But I believe you.”
That was somehow worse and better at once.
Maya looked away.
“Go talk to Victoria.”
Julian left.
Maya stood alone in the library and pressed both hands against the table until the shaking stopped.
She had spent four years believing Julian chose not to remember her.
The truth was more complicated.
May you like
He had lost part of their life.
And someone else had decided what to put in the empty space.
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