For All You Have Left

Chapter Thirty-Four Name

I don’t even bother changing out of the clothes I wore yesterday — the same clothes I fell asleep in. I charge to my door, push past it and plant my feet on Jorgen’s welcome mat.

I take a second to rally my courage. Then, I knock three times on the hard wood. A few moments disappear before I hear rustling on the other side. And all of a sudden, the knob turns and the door opens. He’s still wearing his jeans from yesterday, but his shirt is gone. I notice his abs and the muscles in his chest right before I charge into his apartment.

“What time is it?” he asks, rubbing his eyes.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say. “We’re talking about this.”

I hear him suck in a breath.

“Okay,” he concedes softly, turning away.

I watch him close the door and take a seat on one of his barstools, but I don’t sit down. I just stand.

“Jorgen.”

I wait until his eyes meet mine. And when they do, I continue.

“I was married. I was eighteen. It was right after graduation.”

I stop and try to gather some more courage to say the words that I’ve needed to say for a long time now.

“We had known each other since we were kids,” I go on. “He asked, and I said yes. I had dreamed about it since I was nine. I didn’t even have to think about it. Our parents didn’t know — until they found the marriage license after…”

Jorgen’s voice stops me.

“Ada, why don’t you go by your first name?”

I think my eyebrows instinctively collide. He sounds so calm now — as if he’s not mad anymore. But I don’t understand his question or maybe I just don’t understand why he’s asking it.

There’s dead silence for a long, agonizing minute. Then, I look into his eyes.

“I couldn’t…,” I start. “The last thing he — Andrew, my husband — said to me was my name and the words: I love you and forever. I couldn’t hear my name and not think of those words anymore.”

I try my hardest to fight back the tears.

“See,” I go on slowly, “we were on his bike, on our way home from getting married, and we didn’t make it home…he didn’t make it home.”

I watch Jorgen’s face grow pale, and it breaks my heart. I wish I knew what he was thinking.

“But Jorgen, that was a long time ago, and I…”

“Ada,” he says softly, stopping me again.

There’s a word on his lips, but nothing comes out. He finds my eyes, stays in them only a moment and then quickly sends his gaze to the floor.

“Ada, I was there that day.”

I think I stop breathing for a second.

“I couldn’t find an ID on you. You said your name was Mrs. Amsel.” His eyes lock in mine. “And you were looking at my pin of St. Michael, so I took it off, and I gave it to you. You still have the pin. It’s on your shelf.”

My heart is racing now. I’m trying with everything in me to calm it and to think — to just think, to put it all in order.

He looks down at the floor and then back up at me.

I don’t believe it. It can’t be. I would have known. I would have remembered. I would have remembered…

His eyes…

I look into Jorgen’s blue eyes, and then it hits me. Why didn’t I see it before?

Tears start to blurry my vision. I’m shaking my head. Images from that day, images of Andrew, images of the paramedic — Jorgen — are racing through my mind, and I feel as if I can’t breathe again. I feel as if my two lives are colliding and they shouldn’t be.

“I started to put it all together last night.” He shakes his head. “I mean I should have figured it all out before. Hell, I might have known it all along and just didn’t want to believe it — didn’t want to believe that you had suffered that much or that I had seen you suffer that much. I don’t know.”

There’s silence then. He doesn’t break it and neither do I for long, sad moments. I’m aware of every heartbeat in my chest. I’m conscious of every breath that passes over my lips and every blink of my eye. I’m consumed by the acts of purely living. I barely notice him get up and walk toward me. And suddenly, I feel his arms surrounding me, drawing me closer to him.

“Ada,” I hear him say, “I’m sorry. I should have listened to you yesterday.”

The tears are flooding my cheeks now. I try to respond, but the words just come out only as sobby resemblances of words instead.

“Ada, it’s okay,” he says, gently stroking my hair.

He was there. He was there. I repeat the little sentence over and over in my mind.

“Ada, I remembered your face, but I couldn’t, didn’t want to place it,” he whispers in a shaky voice.

I feel a gasp instinctively escape my lips.

He was there. He knows everything. He knew everything this whole time. Only until now, I guess, everything he had known was connected to some other life — some other face that wasn’t mine.

“Kevin was working with me that afternoon,” he continues, as if he’s remembering it all for the first time.

I take a second and swallow the lump in my throat.

“He remembered me,” I say, through my tears.

I feel his head nod above me.

“I never talked to him about it, but that must have been what he wanted to tell me,” he says.

I try to control the sobs and wipe away the tears.

“Jorgen,” I manage to get out. I pull away from him and find his eyes. “You have to know that I love you. I don’t want to live in my past anymore. I want to live in my present — with you. I don’t want to lose you.”

I lay my head against his chest again, and then I feel his arms squeeze tightly around me.

“I love you too, Ada,” I hear him whisper. “I’m yours. I’m not going anywhere, sweetheart.”

Sweetheart. At his last word, the world falls away, and I feel my heart exploding — exploding with not only love for this man but appreciation for giving this tortured soul a second chance — a second life.

“I love you,” I say again, with everything I have left in me. “I love you so much.”