Forgotten First Kiss

She wants me to touch her. I obliged, but I kept my mask of nonchalance fixed firmly in place.

We drove toward the edge of town. “What are we doing tonight for our first official date?”

“How do you know it’s our first date?”

“Well, I don’t, actually.” She turned down the radio. “Be honest. Is this our first date?”

“Since you can’t remember, let’s just say it is. Let’s start everything fresh, okay?”

“You make it sound like something had gone stale in the past.” She pushed my bicep, but then she left her hand resting on it. “Although I can’t imagine how it could have been. Every day with you has been pretty darn good. Maybe it’s better I can’t remember. I like the way things are going.”

I suppressed all the welling emotion that made me want to slam on the brakes and yank her across the seat into my lap and kiss her for all I was worth. “Me, too,” I said casually. “It’s been pretty fun.”

Pretty fun! Understatement of my life! It had been a constant roller coaster ever since I’d come back, always on the exciting downward slope of the track, one long, whizzing thrill fluttering my stomach and floating me through days and nights of elation. Like jumping out of a plane and never having to pull the chute.

I maneuvered off the edge of the road. A few hundred yards across a meadow of late-blooming wildflowers lay the river, banked by the trees, and with the lanterns already lit.

“The full moon was a few days ago, so it should rise in a couple of hours.”

“Will we get to watch it?”

“If we stay that long.”

“Let’s.” She hopped out of the truck and into my waiting arms. “It’s such a beautiful night.” She put her hand in mine and let me guide her to the less bumpy parts of the meadow. “Definitely great first-date material. It’s fun to make a new memory. At least this time, I won’t forget it.”

Was that true? If she got her memories back, would these remain? I hadn’t considered an alternative where they wouldn’t. Nah, not how that stuff worked, right?

We arrived at my setup.

“Jeremy! No wonder you couldn’t get together until eight. You were working on this all day.” She thrust her arms around me. “It’s amazing. You thought of everything.”

The fishing rods leaned against the two sturdy, top-of-the-line lawn chairs, waiting for later. The lanterns glowed in the dimming twilight. Our dinner plates were covered by dome nets. It looked staged by a professional—and it had been. I’d called someone in the city and asked for photos and advice, starting on Wednesday right after Danica had said yes to the date.

Danica hugged me hard, her gymnast’s strength and sinews at work. I liked it. A lot. More of that, please. “These lanterns are so pretty. Romantic. And they’ll help draw the fish, I think, too. Right? I get the sense I’ve done that before.” She gasped. “Do you think I’m getting a memory back?”

“Maybe.” I helped her sit down on the plush blanket. “Right now, I’m more focused on creating new memories than recovering old ones.” I took the dome off her dinner plate and set it aside. “Asparagus, a pork chop, and pasta with red sauce okay for you?”

“And strawberries.” She took a ripe one from a bowl in the center and bit into it. “Mm. I think these are my favorite. Even more than raspberries.” She ate another—a mesmerizing activity. I picked up a third berry and offered it to her.

Instead of taking it from me, she leaned over and ate it from my fingers.

Inside, I died on her altar again.

“Mmm,” she moaned.

Uh-huh. Exactly.

My appetite for food fled. All I hungered for was Danica. “Should we fish a little first?”

I covered the food again. Then, we readied our poles and took the chairs down to the riverbank. There, we baited the hooks and both of us dropped lines in the water. The current gently tugged my line. We sat quietly, like good fishermen, and let the bait sink and the bobbers float. I caught a trout, and she caught two. It was great to see her excitement as she reeled in her catch. She even cleaned her own fish. Awesome. We stuffed the fishes into my tackle basket, wrapping them in plastic.

The fish must have moved on, though, because there were no bites for a while. Danica sat beside me on my upstream side. Her chair was on uneven ground, though, and when she leaned forward, it toppled, landing hard against my side.

“Oh! Jeremy!”

Instead of pushing her backward, I pulled her toward me, tugging her across the arm rest and into my lap. “You need a safer place to be.”

She nestled against me, leaning her back against my chest. “You’re a hundred percent accurate. In every sense.”