there's just this waiting game

(Yeah, ahahaha. I wanted to get a reply up, so I just gave up on coming up with a name and figured I’d come up with one later. Also, I'll edit this later to include the dog's name once we decide on one)

For a long moment, Cassidy stared at Adam with mild surprise, unsure of how to really react. Him coming around wasn’t really anything new at this point, but his suggestion caught her off guard and she wasn’t sure about it. She hadn’t really bothered to be out much after leaving the hospital. And the thought of leaving now with Adam, a man she was supposed to be with but had absolutely no memory of besides of their few conversations since they were in the hospital, left her a little unnerved.

“Uh, I - um…” she trailed off, shifting a bit uncomfortably as she tried to debate the options. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to spend time with Adam and try to get her memory back; she just… Found it difficult to really let herself agree easily when it always took a while for her to just spend time with anybody in general. But, she didn’t want Adam thinking that she didn’t want to try to get through this, so she offered a small nod in response. “Um, okay, sure. I just, uh… I should probably change.” She was still in pajamas, after all, since she’d been lazy lately.

“Just, ah… Give me a few minutes.” She watched him for a bit before she shifted, putting her hands on his shoulders to push him out of the room gently and closed the door behind him, breathing out. She shouldn’t feel this nervous, but she figured it was because she was still struggling with the fact that she’d apparently been with this guy for a while and she had no memory of it. Shaking her head, she stepped away from the door to change.

---

Dominic smiled slightly as he watched, relieved to hear her laugh, happy to just see her since he hadn’t gotten to see her since the hospital. Moving over, he gently pried the dog away from her. “Sorry, he’s missed you,” he mentioned carefully as he bent down to scratch behind his ear gently and watched Gabriela for a few long moments. “And, he’s really not the only one.” For a moment, he wondered if perhaps that was going too far or crossing a line, but he shrugged it off; he never was one to avoid being blunt.

Dropping his gaze back to the dog, he watched for a few long moments before he smiled slightly to himself. “Just in case you haven’t figured it out, he’s ours. You’ve been his favorite ever since we got him, so he’s been a little down without you around,” he told her before he stood up, offering the leash out to her. “We could take him for a walk or something, if you want?” Her reaction to the dog eased his worried quite a bit. At least she’d want to be around their husky, even if it was difficult for her to be around him. For a long moment, he focused on taking her in.

“I’ve been coming around as often as I can, but you’re never really here,” he told her, eyeing her as he waited for any kind of reaction. Had she known how often he’d been around? He doubted it, since she was never here, but he wanted her to know; he wanted her to know that he hadn’t just completely avoided her after everything that had happened. But, mostly, he was curious about how exactly her parents had been keeping her busy.

@ momentai.

It was immediately obvious that Cassidy was on the fence about his suggestion. Adam was tempted to just stop her before she could answer and and rescind the offer somehow, seeing the hesitancy, but he resisted that temptation and instead watched her quietly as she considered how to answer. For a few moments, he even thought that she would say no to his suggestion, which he'd come prepared to accept, but that didn't stop a little grin from forming when she agreed, all the same. Whatever reasons she had for agreeing, he decided to take it as a good omen. "Okay, awesome. No rush."

Adam was still smiling when Cassidy pushed him out of her room and closed the door so that she could change, and rather than waiting right outside her door like some sort of stalker, he moved back into the living room. Being pretty familiar with the house and the family, he felt comfortable enough to sit down on the couch as he waited and noticed that though the TV had been on when he'd passed by to head to Cassidy's room earlier, it was off now.

Probably Mr. and Mrs. Hunt's way of trying to give them space and not add any awkwardness to the situation. Adam had noticed the past couple of times that he'd come to visit that they had sort of faded to the background and left him and Cassidy to their own devices. As worried as they were about her, it really was great of them to do that, and Adam thought that he would have to thank them the next time he saw them.

---

As Dominic pulled the husky off her, Gabriela took the opportunity to sit up and used her arm to wipe at the dog slobber clinging to her face. "Me?" She looked up at Dominic in surprise, though she supposed she shouldn't have been. The fact that he'd brought the dog with him meant it must've been his, which meant that if she'd had her memories, she would've known about him. Then the second part was said, and she wasn't quite sure how to respond to that, feeling this twisting in her gut. "I'm so--"

"Gabby! What are you doing on the floor?" Gabriela's apology was cut short as her mom came around the corner. She didn't have any greeting for Dominic apparently, but neither she did accuse him of being the reason her daughter was sitting in the floor just after opening the door, and Gabriela counted it under the victory column, considering how her parents had acted at the hospital.

She also accepted her mom's hand up, motioning to Dominic and the husky. "I was attacked with puppy love as soon as I opened the door and fell over. It's fine."

Gabriela went quiet as Dominic explained what she'd already guessed at, though she'd thought the husky, Hercules apparently, was his, not theirs. That was... She knew they'd apparently been serious enough that she'd moved in with him, had apparently dealt with a lot from her family because she was dating him, but they'd even gotten a pet together? And she couldn't remember a bit of it. Before she could say a word, though, whether it be apology or answer to the offer of going for a walk, he added the last bit, and she gave him a surprised look. "You have?" Despite how adamant he'd seemed at the hospital about being there for her, she'd thought maybe he'd decided to step back and let things take their natural course or maybe had gotten busy or... Well, she didn't really know. She hadn't known or even guessed that he'd been trying though. "I'm sorry. Things have been pretty busy..." She gave him a mildly amused look. "Ever think of calling and finding out when good times might be? I know I still haven't replaced my cellphone, but we do have a landline here. A walk sounds nice though, since nothing's going on now."

Gabriela raised her voice, yelling back to the kitchen, "Elijah! You're finishing the dishes by yourself!" Then she turned to her mom, who looked like she was about to interrupt or argue. "I'm sure I won't be gone too long. But if it makes you feel better, I'm sure Dominic has his phone on him. If you don't already have the number, you can get it while I'm getting my shoes from my room. That way you can get in touch with me if you need to." Then, after a quick, apologetic glance at Dominic, she disappeared around the corner and down the hallway to grab her tennis shoes from her room.

Cassidy stared in her closet for a while, debating on what to wear. When they’d first brought the clothes from her apparent home with Adam, she hadn’t recognized any of the clothes. And, really, even now, she still didn’t feel any familiarity towards them, and that made it a little difficult to really know what to wear. Beyond that, there was also the fact that she didn’t want to overdress or underdress. Adam had said that they’d be going out to eat and possibly taking a walk and that it definitely wasn’t a date, but Cassidy had the tendency to over-analyze even the simple things.

Sighing out, she soon gave up on the overall search and just pulled out a quick outfit, changing into it before she pulled her hair up into a ponytail, but she then ended up scrutinizing the ponytail for a few long moments. Was that too casual? Was there even a way to not seem completely awkward about this entire thing? Shaking her head, she left the ponytail as it was and pulled on a pair of shoes before she walked out of the room, deciding that she should at least attempt to pretend to be normal. With her memory gone, though, she wasn’t sure if she could really ever feel normal at all.

When she got downstairs, she blinked when she saw Adam on the couch, looking fairly natural and comfortable in the house, which never ceased to surprise Cassidy, even when she reminded herself that of course he would be familiar with the house in general. “Ah… I’m ready to leave when you are,” she mentioned with a small, hesitant nod.

---

“Any time I’ve called, there either wasn’t an answer or I’d get hung up on,” Dominic mentioned as casually as he could, because he knew that her parents had probably been the ones to constantly answer the home line any time it rang. They’d done it in the past, so it really wouldn’t surprise him if they were actually doing it again. In fact, it would probably surprise him more if he ended up being wrong about his assumption. Of course, he didn’t outright accuse her parents of hanging up on him, and he wouldn’t dare to do it now with Gabriela’s memory gone, but the look he shot her mom a look when Gabriela had spoken to her said it all, that he knew - or at least that he assumed.

“His name is Hercules, by the way,” Dominic mentioned to Gabriela as she went up the stairs, mostly because their dog was following her up, and Dominic looked mildly amused with the sight. He knew Gabriela had always been Hercules’s favorite so the fact that Gabriela hadn’t been around lately had put the husky in a bit of a funk. But, he was sure that getting to see her now after everything that had happened and after such a long time, for Hercules, had passed, it likely meant wonders to the dog.

Once Gabriela was out of sight, his gaze went to her mom and he stared at her for a long moment. She already had his number, mostly likely on a “Do Not Answer” list, so he refrained from speaking to her during Gabriela’s absence.

@ momentai.

Adam ended up waiting out in the living room on his own for a good while, though not too terribly long, and by the time Cassidy came out into the open, his attention had wandered around the familiar, trying to find anything that might be different from what he was used to seeing. Though he tried not to show it, he was actually pretty nervous.

He didn't really know what had made Cassidy give him a chance in the first place, he remembered how long it had taken for her to open up to him, and he was worried about having to possibly go through that again... or messing up somehow and ruining everything. He was worried her memories might just be gone and this situation they were left in was just going to be too much. He couldn't imagine her not being in his life, and he just didn't know what to do. Really, Adam was just taking a shot in the dark and hoping for the best with all of this.

Then she was in the room, and Adam was already in the process of standing when she spoke. "Yeah, I'm good to go," he offered with a little smile as he stepped towards her. "What are we doing? Going with my suggestion, or was there something you wanted to do?" Honestly, he was just glad that she'd agreed to go out and do something with him. He couldn't care less what it turned out to be.

---

Dominic's casual mention of the reception he'd gotten from trying to call gave Gabriela pause. She opened her mouth, as if she would say something, then closed it again with a little shake of her head. No, no, she wasn't going to say anything. Not when it would just start another fight. She did mentally raise getting a replacement phone on her list of priorities though. If she stood any chance of surviving this mess, she needed a phone. And her memories, if they'd just come back already. And if she couldn't have her memories, then a job and a place of her own. Or to move in with a friend. Really, she'd just love to feel like her life was together.

Halfway up the stairs, Gabriela gave Dominic one more apologetic look even as she nodded, having also noticed that the husky--their husky--was following her. "Okay, I'll be right back," she promised, then climbed the rest of the way up and headed into her room. She grabbed her tennis shoes and sat on the bed to put them on, but as soon as she bent down, Hercules was already there, pushing his face up towards hers with his tail wagging. Gabriela couldn't help but smile, and she rubbed behind both his ears. "You really like me, don't you, boy?" she asked as she petted him, but she soon paused. "He wasn't lying when he said that you're ours, was he? Things must've been going good, before I lost my memories. Aside from my family anyway..."

Gabriela shook off the ill feelings swirling around her stomach and finished petting Hercules before pushing him away and pulling her shoes on. With that finished, she headed back downstairs, trailed by her eager companion, to find Dominic and her mom still standing where she'd left them, both silent as they watched the other. The air was thick with tension, which she attempted to dispel, at least a little, as she joined them, clearing her throat. "Umm, Mom, I'll be back later."

"Before it gets dark," Frances said to her daughter.

The sun was already cresting the tops of the trees. There was half an hour of daylight left, tops, which Gabriela knew because she glanced out the window. "I'm not making that promise," she said and before an argument could follow, added, "I know I'm living with you guys right now, but I am an adult. The walk might only be half an hour, but it could take longer. I promise I won't be out too late." She turned to look up at Dominic then. "Lead the way."

Cassidy straightened her clothes one last time as she shifted a bit nervously, trying to figure out how to handle the situation. “I think your plan is fine,” she decided eventually, offering a small nod, because she wasn’t sure she could really handle coming up with any ideas of her own. She didn’t know what Adam liked and she didn’t want to suggestion something that he might not be up for.

Looking over at him, she watched him for a few moments. “Um, but, maybe we could get ice cream, too?” she suggested a little hesitantly, worried about whether that’d be too much to ask for. But, ice cream tended to be her go-to treat if her mind was straining or she was stressing about anything and that had been true for as long as Cassidy could remember. Although, she supposed, that wasn’t much to go on, since she’d lost a good portion of her memory.

It was still a struggle, trying to acclimate to all of this. With the fact that Adam was supposed to be her boyfriend, that they’d apparently been together for a while, and that she’d even been living with him, she wanted to try to avoid making things awkward or to avoid bothering or upsetting Adam. But, she had no clue how to handle any of it. She felt lost and worried and scared, even now, but she couldn’t really help it.

Shaking her head to try to rid herself of her thoughts and worries, she moved over to the door, opening it as she headed out first. “Where are we going to get lunch at?” she asked eventually, peering over her shoulder at him once she stepped outside.

---

Dominic waited as patiently as he could for Gabriela to return and, when she did, he saw that Hercules was right at her feet, as was usual. But, hearing her mother’s words made him roll his eyes a bit, scowling to himself. Of course her mother would try to lay down rules and decrease the amount of time they could spend together. It didn’t even surprise him anymore; it’s what her parents had always done.

But, hearing Gabriela’s words put him at ease slightly and he nodded. “Yeah, let’s go,” he decided, casting a look to her mother with a frown before he led the way out, motioning for her to follow. “I’m assuming we can just let Hercules lead the way during the walk. He tends to like adventuring around.” It was mostly a joke. He knew that Hercules would probably just stick at Gabriela’s side the whole time with how long it’d been since he’d last seen her.

Looking over at her, he watched her for a few moments. “Have things been going alright for you at home?” he asked carefully. He knew it probably wasn’t the best subject matter, but, when he couldn’t see her or talk to her, he couldn’t help but to worry about her, so he couldn’t really help but to ask.

@ momentai.

Adam didn't say anything about it, but he noticed Cassidy's nervousness. It was hard not to. She was fidgeting with her clothes, hesitating before speaking, and despite the fact that he'd tried to come around and at least talk to her frequently, overall still acting as if he were a stranger. He knew none of her memories had returned, but some part of him hoped she wouldn't be so nervous each time he came over.

Rather than focus on it and make her even more uncomfortable than she already was though, he instead gave her a small grin as she suggested an idea of her own to add onto the plan he'd offered. "Ice cream sounds perfect," he replied. "We can head to Baskin Robins after lunch." It was a place they both loved and had gone to on many dates in the place, though he kept that to himself. He was hoping she would relax around him, not get even more jumpy.

As they exited the house, Adam held the door open for Cass and then stepped out after her, closing it behind them, pausing with his hand still on the door handle when she asked where they were going. "I... actually didn't get that far in planning," he admitted sheepishly. "I didn't know if you'd agree or not. Anything you're craving?" He'd have suggested her favorite place, except he'd noticed that with Cassidy, there wasn't really a set favorite place to eat. It all just depended on her mood.

---

Though Gabriela was glad to be outside, away from the nasty situation that'd started brewing in the house the moment Dominic had shown up, she didn't relax any as they began their walk. Being alone with him felt like its own beast. She hadn't seen or heard from him in a couple of weeks, since she'd gotten out of the hospital, though apparently it wasn't for lack of trying on his part. But more than that, it seemed like the more she found out, the more she realized how serious their relationship had been, and she just didn't know what to do with that information. It wasn't as if she could just avoid him when she strongly suspected that she'd probably loved him.

Trying to focus on the conversation at hand though, Gabriela flashed Dominic a sardonic look at his words. "He doesn't seem like he's too interested in adventuring ot me," she said and looked down at the husky that was basically running circles around them. Watching Hercules though, she couldn't help but smile and added, "Since I know the area, how about I just lead us around the neighborhood?"

Gabriela looked back up at Dominic at his question, and she found him watching her, almost as if he were trying to figure out if something was wrong--or what. "It's been... busy," she admitted slowly. "What about you? I know this situation can't be easy on you." She remembered Dominic delivering her clothes and toiletries to her parents' house the day she'd been released from the hospital. She wasn't even sure if it was everything or what sort of impact the loss of her things had on his place. Honestly, Gabriela wasn't sure which one of them had it harder.

@ momentai.
(Hey! I was wondering if maybe you wanted to continue this?)