What Alice Forgot

Roger! What could have possessed her sweet, cautious mother to “fall madly in love” (Mum never said extravagant things like “madly in love”) with someone like Roger? Roger with his overpowering aftershave, his radio-announcer voice, and his habit of saying “methinks” and “mayhaps”? Roger, who after a few drinks at family parties would pin Alice in a corner and treat her to a monologue all about himself and his eternal fascination with the intricacies of his own personality. “Am I an athletic person? Yes, definitely. Am I an intellectual? Okay, maybe not in the strictest la-di-da Ph.D. sense of the word. But put it another way, am I an intelligent person? The answer would have to be yes; I’ve got a Ph.D. from the University of Real Life, Alice. You may well ask, am I a spiritual person? Methinks the answer would have to be yes, most certainly.”

Alice would be nodding helplessly, taking shallow breaths so she didn’t feel sick from the scent of his aftershave, until Nick would appear, saying, “Methinks the lady needs a drink, Dad.”

And what about Nick? What would he think about this development? He had such a weird, fragile relationship with his father. He imitated him mercilessly behind his back and there was something close to hatred in his voice when Nick spoke about the way his dad had treated his mother during their divorce, but at the same time Alice noticed that whenever he was in Roger’s company, his voice would become deeper, his shoulders squarer, and he would often casually bring up some big deal he’d negotiated at work, or some other accomplishment that Alice didn’t even know about, as if deep down he still wanted his dad’s approval, even though he would have denied this vehemently, angrily even.

Alice couldn’t think what his reaction would be to this news. And didn’t it mean she and Nick were related? He was her stepbrother! Her first thought was that she and Nick would have laughed themselves silly over that, turned it into a stupid game, made lecherous remarks about incest, and pretended they were Greg and Marcia Brady. But maybe it hadn’t been funny at all. He might have been angry on behalf of his mother, even though his mother seemed to treat her ex-husband like a bumbling distant uncle.

And what about Nick’s sisters, the Flakes? Oh God, the Flakes. Nick’s nutty sisters were now her stepsisters. There was no way they would have reacted calmly to this news; they didn’t react calmly to anything—they fainted, they sobbed, they stopped talking to each other, they were offended by the most innocuous comments. There was always at least one sister in the middle of a crisis. Alice had never realized family life could be so dramatic until she met Nick’s family, with all those sisters, in-laws, boyfriends, aunties, and cousins by the dozen. Her own quiet, polite, mini-sized family had seemed boring and sedate in comparison.

Alice said, “Is this why Nick and I are . . . ? Because he’s upset about his dad marrying Mum?”

“Of course not!” Her mother was reenergized. “This divorce is a terrible mystery to all of us, but it’s certainly got nothing to do with Roger and me! Roger would be devastated to hear you even thought about such a thing. Of course Roger does have his own theories about the divorce—”

Elisabeth cut in. “Mum and Roger got together years ago. You and Nick were a bit funny about it at the time, and the Flakes were all in hysterics of course, but it settled down and nobody thinks twice about it now. I promise you, Alice, all these things that seem so shocking aren’t really that shocking. When you get your memory back, you’ll be laughing at yourself.”

Alice did not want to get back a self who thought there was nothing shocking about the fact that she and Nick were divorcing; she couldn’t believe how casually her mother had referred to “the divorce,” as if it were something solid and real, as if it were a thing.

“Well, I’m not getting a divorce anymore, actually,” said Alice. “There is no divorce.”

“Oh!” Her mother clasped her hands together rapturously, as if in prayer. “Oh, but that’s wonderful—”

“Mum!” Elisabeth said. “You must promise not to say one word about that to Roger or anybody else. She doesn’t know what she’s saying.”

“I do so,” said Alice. She felt a bit drunk. “You can tell the whole world, Mum. Tell Roger. Tell the Flakes. Tell our three children. There is no divorce. Nick and I will work out whatever this thing is.”

“Wonderful!” cried Barb. “I’m so happy!”

“You will not think this is wonderful when you get your memory back,” said Elisabeth. “You’ve got legal proceedings going on. Jane Turner will have heart failure if you start doing this.”

“Jane Turner?” said Alice. “What’s Jane Turner got to do with the price of fish?”

“Jane is your lawyer,” said Elisabeth.

“A lawyer? She’s not a lawyer.” A memory flitted into Alice’s head of some guy losing an argument with Jane at work and saying, “You should have been a lawyer,” and Jane had said, “Yes, I’m perfectly aware of that.”

“She got her law degree years ago and now she specializes in divorce,” said Elisabeth. “She’s helping you—ah, divorce Nick.”

“Oh.” How ridiculous, how stupid, that Jane Turner was helping her “divorce Nick.” “A little Jane goes a very long way,” Nick once said, and Alice agreed. How could Jane Turner have anything to do with their lives?

“You and Nick are in the middle of a custody battle,” said Elisabeth. “It’s really serious.”

Custody battle. It sounded like “custardy” battle. Alice imagined herself and Nick flinging spoonfuls of sweet yellow custard at each other, laughing and shrieking and licking it off afterward.

Presumably a custody battle wasn’t as much fun as a custardy battle.

“Well, that’s off, too,” pronounced Alice. (Why in the world would she want “custody” of three children she’d never met! She wanted Nick.) “We don’t need a custody battle because we’re not getting a divorce, and that’s final.”

“Hooray!” said her mother. “I’m so glad you’ve lost your memory. This accident is going to turn out to be a blessing in disguise.”

“Well, there’s only one tiny problem with all that, isn’t there?” said Elisabeth.