The Fall

by Tal Bauer

But something is wrong. The thought hits me, clear and sharp and undeniable. I don’t understand it, don’t want to understand it, but something is wrong. With me. With everything. But what?

Thought: what if this whole perfect life that Torey is living right now - the one he so desperately wants to keep - is all in his head and he's really in a coma back in Vancouver? And that's why he can't remember the last year - because it never actually happened... Oh that would be so sad. I hope I'm wrong.

“The Mutineers are back in Tampa. I’m sure he’s with his team.” He pauses, studying me. “I believe they flew back right after the game.”

I knew it!

The date leers at me. Understanding seeps in, slow and merciless. I woke up in Blair’s bed with a year ripped from my memory, but that was a year that, apparently, never happened.

I knew it, I knew it, I knew it. Tragic, though. He was so happy. Now he has to go get Blair for realsies!

I had everything, and now I have nothing. Less than nothing, because it was never real. There was no great love story, no epic, timeless romance between me and Blair. There’s only me, shattered and alone and clutching these fragments of a life I never lived and a love I never had. He’s gone, and he was never mine to lose. The sobs come and come. There’s no escaping it. There’s no end. I am acutely, devastatingly alone. There are no palm trees here.

*sob*

My hand hovers over the Nerf gun. These flashes keep happening, moments so real I could swear they happened, but they didn’t. They didn’t.

Now I'm starting to wonder if this life is the coma dream and his life with Blair really was real... too many of these details that he remembers from his "dream" are real.

The unspoken choreography we used to write without words from a life we’ve never lived fills me.

I still think this is the dream and the life a year from nw was real. All of Torey's memories from that time are too real and specific to be fantasy.

It’s all a dream, a beautiful dream.

And pulls out my stick, the broken one, the one that shattered last night when I scored. I know that stick, every nick in the blade. The black composite fiber fractured when I put everything I had into that shot.

The broken stick! How could he have dreamt of something that hadn't happened yet? This has to be the dream. Or really just an extended, detailed memory that he's reliving. Hopefully when he finally wakes up he'll remember everything...

The memories shatter. I drop into the nearest chaise and dig the heel of my palm against my ribs. It couldn’t have happened, but it feels so real.

It did happen! This is the dream!

Dr. Lin

Dr. Lin. More evidence that he's actually lived this before. How could he have known that the team doctor's name was Dr. Lin?

You’re the only person I’ve ever wanted. Everything I think I know about love starts and ends with you.

I say, softer than a secret, “Fall in love with me the way I’ve fallen in love with you.”

This is the truth: he is my first, my only, my always. He is teaching my body a language I’ve only ever dreamed of speaking.

This is beautiful.

The dark is absolute, a choking black that soaks me, seeps through blood and bone.

Ooh, are we back to the car accident now? The last chapter ended after the hit thst likely caused Torey's concussion that triggered the memory episode in the first place, so now we get to go back to where ee left off, right?

I’ve been to the Mutineers’ medical rooms dozens of times for the thousand little injuries that come with playing professional hockey. Stitches and ice packs and wraps; the routine of injury assessment has become second nature.

Ok i was wrong - we're not back to the car crash. We're re-living the experience we already had. Weird! Unexpected! I love it.

When I opened my eyes in that Vancouver hospital, my heart beat for a man I’d only loved in… What? What was that other life? Where are these feelings and instincts and shards of memories from? Dreams don’t leave scars this deep.

That's what I'm saying! I'm just as confused as you, Torey. In the best way.

I should tell Blair.

Yes! You should tell Blair! He loves you! You can figure it out together!

I may have existed before I met Blair, but I never lived until I loved him.

That's romantic.

This is not déjà vu. This is a film reel clicking through the same sprockets, frame by agonizing frame, and I am inside a moment I have already lived. I have been here, lived this, experienced this, before.

Is this a dream or a memory? I'm still so intrigued by this whole situation.

Or am I hooked up to some hospital bed, living out a fantasy life over and over and over again?

Asking the same questions I am!

What would it mean if déjà vu was a warning?

If Torey is reliving a memory, can he change what happens? Can he change the memory/future?

What else could I tell him? I want to grab him and hold him so tight that whatever is trying to tear us apart can’t take him, but that’s not how this works. You can’t outmuscle fate. You can’t check destiny into the boards.

I realize that he's afraid of losing Blair. But I think their love is strong enough that they would be better off talking about it. Blair would be able to help and Torey wouldn't have to be so worried. I don't think he would lose Blair.

“Whatever it is,” he says, voice low and steady, “we’ll handle it together.”

Together,Torey. Tell him!

I pull myself from Blair’s arms and cross the room. It feels like I’m wading through deep water. “No limo. Cancel the car.”

Yes! Do it, change it, close the loop!

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Ok, I'm pretty sure Torey is waking up in a hospital again. But did he break the loop? Is Blair there y his side? Or is he back in Vancouver again?

Laughter, the guys, the locker room. Gatorade showers. The Escalade. Tires screaming. Shattering glass. The fall.

He definitely remembers more this time...

Blair.

Yes!

Promise me you’ll never leave me behind. Not like that.”

After Cody, this makes sense. Losing Torey would destroy Blair completely.

“What I’m about to tell you is going to sound crazy,”

Omg he's finally going to tell him

Every thread of fear dissolves. The truth is between us now, and Blair believes me. All those months of carrying this alone and thinking madness lived behind my eyes, and now Blair knows.

I knew telling Blair about everything would be good. He loves you, Torey.