Say You'll Remember Me

by Abby Jimenez

Well-intentioned stupidity is still stupidity.

“What did he look like?” she asked. “Like if Rhysand from the ACOTAR series were a real person,”

Xavier was dry. He spoke in matter-of-fact tones. Sort of brooding. Extremely, alarmingly handsome.

“You don’t drink?” I asked, leaning on the bar. “No.” “Why? Are you sober?” “I don’t like the feeling of being out of control. Also, I’m driving you.”

You know how when someone dies, all anyone cares about is how? Somehow the moment that takes them out is more interesting than decades worth of life and accomplishments and living. I hated it.

She looked at Xavier a moment too long. He ignored it. He didn’t ignore her, just the flirting. All his attention was on me.

For the most part I liked to think my upbringing had made me a stronger person. It taught me independence and self-reliance. I was someone who would never raise a hand to my own children, someone who knew the power of encouragement and compliments—even if it was too late for me to be the kind of man who could accept them myself.

I didn’t know how or in what way, I just knew something important was happening and that knowing it in real time was a gift.

The hand thing made my heart do somersaults, but the protective thing—this was my currency. I didn’t get to shut my brain off very often. Most women don’t.

I felt courted. It was weird, but there was no other word to describe it. I had obviously never been properly courted before because now that I was, I was giving those other guys some serious side eye.

Memories were like that, sometimes they bent reality.

He made me feel like kissing me wasn’t about him, it was about me. Like he wouldn’t like it if I didn’t like it.

A small part of me hoped the chemistry would be terrible. Something to give me a reason to fall out of like. There were no reasons. Only reasons to fall in love.

“That there is nothing more beautiful than being a witness to someone’s life. To know them inside and out and be with them through everything, share the same memories. Memories are everything.

And I needed his steadiness. He was level and capable. Someone you could always depend on, someone who would make you feel safe and loved and taken care of,

He was very worth knowing. He deserved a proper witness.

I loved the way he kissed. I missed it. I wished we’d done more of it back when kissing was a thing we were doing.

I nodded, looking anywhere but at him, like looking at him would be a language all its own and a conversation I wasn’t supposed to be having.

I’d been trapped between being so happy it was happening and dreading that as soon as it started, it already had an end.

“How is this going to work?” “I will make it work.”

“I thought about you every minute,” I said. “Even when I wasn’t thinking about you, I was.”

My heart swelled just looking at him. All worry and doubt I had fell away. And then I realized. None of the fear and worry I had was because I didn’t think it would work. The fear and worry was because I knew it would.

My heart melted. He hadn’t known I was coming. He just had this in a secret show of loyalty. Honoring all my tiny allegiances and petty vendettas. This was my love language.

A core memory. The best moments don’t have to be big to be forever.

It’s weird knowing what’s going to be in your end-of-life montage, as it’s happening. But I already knew when my life flashed before my eyes, the best parts of it were going to be about her.

I already felt the loss of her leaving and she only just got here.

I wished memory was selective and you got to pick and choose what to forget.

My life felt like it was on pause. I didn’t see movies I wanted to watch so he could see them with me when he got here. I held off on going places because I’d rather go with him so we could experience it together.

I wanted to keep him.

“Because if you were my wife you would be my world. Everything starts with you and ends with you. Anything else is just the stuff that happens in the middle.”

I liked this day. Napping and eating burgers and just going to the grocery store together. It was so mundane, but I wanted the mundane. I craved it.

I was calm. Pissed off, but calm. I was always calm in a crisis. I had a lot of experience with it, my whole childhood had been a crisis.

“Would you still want me if I was a worm?”

I couldn’t see him. It was dark in the room and I was buried in his chest, but even with my eyes closed I knew him. I’d know him anywhere. I felt rescued, like help had finally arrived. I didn’t have to be strong anymore, I could be a worm and he’d be a worm expert and I could just wiggle down in the dirt and rest my brain. I wanted him to hold me so tight I couldn’t breathe.

It was so natural being with her, I wondered if loving her was a contract that I’d signed in a former life. Because it had never been like this for me with anyone else.

“Some things are worth remembering, Samantha. No matter how much they hurt.”

“They’ll be happier together,” he said. “Less stressed, better outcomes. Bonded pairs suffer apart.” I nodded slowly. Yes. Yes, they do.

Sometimes the challenges we face either break us or they make us stronger. And sometimes they do both.

“The people who raise us have a hold on us. I still think about the things my parents did and didn’t do—we’re built that way, you know. We’re supposed to care what they think, it’s a survival instinct. But parents are human and not all humans should have children. Sometimes you just get bad ones.