Hesitating and Suffocating

Cally nervously held Pat’s soft hands, her other adjusting the striped fedora on her head and tugging down on the pair of white shorts that were shorter than she remembered, and were much more ripped and worn than she remembered. Her tank top was a little too big after all the weight she had lost, and the stripes were faded from too many washes. Her eyes were hidden by Ray Bans.

She felt like she was trying to be someone she wasn’t.

Pat stopped her suddenly, grabbing her other hand and playing with the rings on her fingers, and quietly looked into her eyes. “Cally, don’t be scared, okay? I’ll stick by you through everything. John won’t be able to touch you.” He gently touched her nose. “And Calls? You know the truth, and that’s the most powerful thing in the entire world.” He gently kissed her forehead, before they joined the rest of the crowd, where Garrett wrapped his arm around Cally’s waist.

She was thinking. It was almost six months after her accident, two months in Arizona. Was she ready to see John again, and remember this time? She was bracing herself for the impossible: the moment John stepped out of his van, her memory would come flooding back.

She steeled herself as the pedophile van came thundering through, and Garrett tightened his grip on Cally as John stepped out, taking one look at Cally and his jaw going slack. “Cally? You’re... you’re alive?” He whispered, and everyone stepped back as Cally boldly stepped forward.

“You must be John,” She said, her voice loud, confident, and more than anything else, tenacious. “Yes, John, I’m alive. No thanks to you. You walked away when I needed you most.”

“I thought you were dead! Why did no one tell me?” John said, his voice quiet, but the anger still present as every emotion possible ran through his veins. Cally steeled herself again, and Garrett audibly winced.

“Gemma called you a thousand times, and so did my doctors. Is your phone broken?” Cally was playing it cool, and Jamie stood beside John, soaking it all in as John rubbed his temples.

“Look, Cally, can we talk about this later?” He said, not meeting her eyes as she cocked her hip out to the side. “In private?” He added in an undertone, and Cally had to admit he looked like hell. But she wasn’t losing ground. It was something that Dr. Tex had prepped her for and also what Dr. Williams had. She had to say what she meant and how she felt or she wasn’t going to get anywhere.

She smirked. “Whatever, John.” She started to walk towards the backseat, but stopped, and turned around. “Oh, and just an FYI, I have no memory of you at all. Karma’s a bitch,” She said, and Jamie smirked deviously.

“Only if you are,” She muttered. This was going to be fun.

“I’m proud of you,” Garrett whispered as they pulled onto the highway, and Cally smiled, looking out the window and looking out into the desert and the cars trudging along, completely unaware of everything that was going on around them.

“I am too.” She shook her head, adjusting her fedora on her black hair, sure that John had yet to notice what she had done to her hair, and how much she had actually changed. He was refusing to speak to anyone, which was understandable. The car was loud with excitement, and Jamie was joining in, continuously glaring at Cally like she was Satan. “I just said what I thought. I’m angry,” She murmured, tucking her bangs behind her ear. Garrett knocked her shoulder with his.

“You should be. You loved him, and he left you. You should be hurt too, but it’s understandable why you aren’t..”

“Because I don’t remember? Yeah, that’s a great excuse, Gare. It’s an excuse I’m sick of. I just want to remember what the fuck I was doing here,” She said quietly, but before Garrett could continue, she shoved her earphones back in her ears and leaned her head against the window.

John watched the road in front of him and tried to piece things together. Cally was alive, but had no memory of her time with him. Gemma’s calls were to place where he was, and Garrett and Pat had been hiding her away for two months while he got over her. He wasn’t over her.

He clenched his fists against the wheel, and made a choice he never would have made if everything hadn’t changed faster than he could adapt. He decided that he was with Jamie now, and that couldn’t be a coincidence. Cally was last year’s news, and he wasn’t mad at his bassist or drummer, though he was peeved at Cally for walking back in his life like she belonged there.

John looked in the rearview mirror at Cally, whose hat was covering most of her face as she watched the side of the highway like she always used to, something that John remember her doing when they were together. She wasn’t as beautiful as John remembered, and it was like watching his idol fall, seeing Cally McGregor again. She wasn’t like he remembered her. And that changed things.

He didn’t care about her.

But if he was being honest with himself, it was like every other day since she disappeared: he was drowning in liquor and feelings he didn’t want to deal with.