Summary: Drake struggles with the jarring reality that the woman he loves holds no feelings for him now.
‘How is she today Doc?’ Drake asked tentatively. He was standing beside one of the doctors in charge at the foot Elizabeth’s bed, watching as she lay there, almost motionless except for the gentle rise and fall of her chest.
Four weeks had passed since he’d watched the balcony of the Vancoeur mansion give way, plunging his fiancé down to the rocks below. For a terrible moment, Drake had believed that this was it, this was the end. And he would have been right if not for a small outcrop along the cliff face a few feet below the balcony that had interrupted her descent towards the jagged shoreline.
Dr. Jillian Thomas glanced at her notes for a long moment.
‘She’s getting there alright. The broken ribs and shoulder are healing well, they’ll still hurt when she wakes up so she’ll need pain meds for another two or three weeks and physical therapy after that. Same with the pelvis. She’s lucky it was only a fracture or we would have a bigger problem on our hands. In a way its good that she’s been unconscious all this time. Gives her body time to heal.’
Drake nodded seriously as he considered the doctor’s words. ‘What about the brain injury? You guys were pretty worried about that one at first.’
‘The skull fracture was our biggest concern because it caused an minor intracranial haemorrhage – bleeding within skull outside the brain,’ she clarified, seeing that he was confused.
’Due to the way the brain tissue presses against the skull it can cause some impairment but we can’t tell for sure. But they got her to the hospital pretty quickly and she pulled through quicker than normal so I am very optimistic that she will recover well. She’s a tough one.’ The doctor finished nodding at her still figure.
‘Thats my girl.’ Drake couldn’t help but break into a huge smile of relief. If the experts said Elizabeth was going to be fine he trusted them.
Dr Thomas smiled genially. ‘One of our nurses observed that she was conscious for a few seconds yesterday so she should be waking up soon. You were listed as her first point of contact and I thought you should be here so she’d have someone familiar to wake up to.’
The possibility of her waking up soon thrilled him beyond description. In the weeks past, Drake had spent as much time as he could at her bedside, hoping, wishing, praying to every god in the universe that she’d come back to him. He thought back to their last encounter, hating the way he’d raised her voice at her on that balcony. He knew he would have never forgiven himself if those had been the last words they’d ever get to exchange. Now that he was he was willing to put all of it past him if she just gave him the chance.
He’d made countless silent promises to her as he watched her sleep, pledging that he would be a better man, that he would be the best fiancé that ever lived, he’d take care of her and never, ever hurt her like he had. And when Elizabeth woke up, he’d be there. He would fulfil all the things he’d promised, giving her everything he had if she would only let him.
Before Elizabeth, he’d been nothing but a cynic towards love, like he’d been towards most other things in life. Growing up the way he did, in Liam’s shadow, Drake had seen his fair share of women only taking an interest in him to get closer to his best friend. After countless romantic prospects that only ended in failure, he could hardly blame himself when Elizabeth walked into his life, intelligent, engaging and incredibly beautiful, she seemed too good to be true. When he had inevitably found himself attracted to her, that was when the walls came up again, more out of habit than anything else.
He’d almost driven her away too if not for Elizabeth’s stubbornness and sheer strength of will. Drake had thanked his lucky stars every day that she had not given up on him
She had shown him what love really was, what it was like to be wanted, to be needed by another person in a way that he could not possibly have fathomed before. Each touch, each kiss they had shared brought new meaning to the the very gestures themselves. Every whisper of I love you, every act of love had seemed so right as if being with her was the only thing that would ever make sense. After the accident he’d seen a glimpse of what life could have been without her and he never wanted to be without her again.
Eventually Elizabeth began to stir, pulling him out of his thoughts as she lifted her eyelids, blinking a few times to get used to the lights of the hospital room. He watched on with anxious eyes as she glanced around the room, dazed and bewildered. Her confusion only grew as she tried to lift her arms only to be hindered by the sling on one shoulder.
‘Hey,’ Drake began awkwardly as he watched her take in her surroundings. ‘It’s so good to see you.’
‘H-head hurts.’ Elizabeth’s voice was thick and garbled from disuse as she blinked a few more times, still adjusting to the light.
‘The doctor said you’re going to be a bit groggy,’ he told her, fashioning his voice into a gentle tone not wanting to panic her. He had so much to say to her but he pushed it all down for the moment, not wanting to overwhelm her all at once. ‘Can I get you anything?’
She cleared her throat roughly. ‘Water… please.’
Drake readily complied, filling a paper cup from the jug in the room and handing it to her. ‘Do you know your name?’ He ventured hesitantly.
‘Elizabeth Richmond.’ She nodded once after taking a deep draught and immediately winced, the action obviously causing her pain. ‘What happened? Where am I?’
‘You’re in a hospital in Cordonia,’ Dr Jillian chimed in, entering the room. ‘You were in an accident, you fell and hurt your head but you’re okay now.’ Elizabeth’s confused gaze flitted around the room. Drake watched her brow furrow, processing the information, her throat bobbing as she swallowed hard.
‘I’m so glad you’re okay,’ Drake burst out, unable to take the suspense as relief formed thickly in his voice.
Her dark eyes continued to move around the room, taking in her surroundings and when her vague stare rested on him, Drake felt the sudden need to touch her. Moving to sit in the chair beside her, he reached for her hand, craving her warmth but before his fingers could close on hers, Elizabeth jerked her arm away.
‘What are you doing?’ she accused, staring at him in alarm. ‘Please don’t touch me.’
A a pang of pain flitted through his chest. She must remember our last encounter. He dropped his hand to his lap awkwardly. He didn’t blame her though, he shouldn’t have expected her to take him back so easily.
‘That’s right. I’m sorry. You must still be mad at me..’
Elizabeth shook her head once more, confusion written all over her face. She stared at him for a moment with her brow creased. ‘Mad? Why would I be mad at you? I barely know you.’
Drake’s stomach lurched at her words. She didn’t know him? He might have anticipated some resistance on her part to forgive him but this was almost too cruel.
‘Good one Elizabeth. You gotta know who I am right?’ He told her, allowing some humour to enter his voice because she was just playing a joke on him. Right?
‘I-I think so? You’re Drake right? Liam’s best friend.’ A dim light of recognition glowed in her eyes as she said his name, but there was something in her tone that was just… wrong. He couldn’t put his finger on it but he could tell there was something off about the way it came from her lips.
‘Yes. Yes I am,’ Drake confirmed, mind still grappling with the previous thought. She was not wrong though, he rationalised to himself… The doctors said she’d had a major head injury, they wouldn’t know the full effect until she woke up but surely this wasn’t… This couldn’t be happening. Did she really not remember him? His brain raced ahead working out all the possibilities, considering all the options but the more he dwelled on it the more possible it seemed.
Elizabeth had been watching him carefully all this time, as the storm of emotions played out on his face.
‘You don’t look satisfied with that,’ she began, shaking her head as if to clear it before continuing almost hesitantly. ‘A-am I missing something here? Are you not…’
‘No I am,’ he interrupted, wishing to stop her train of thought before it went any further. ‘It’s me… Drake but do you really not know who I am?
Her eyes filled with confusion as she glanced around frantically. ‘Know what? I-Is there more to know?’
The crux of her statement pressed on his chest like a boulder. He drew a shaky breath before trying to find the words but how could he?
‘Elizabeth… I-I don’t know how to tell you this,’ he eventually croaked, unable to dislodge the words from where they clung to his throat. ‘Elizabeth I-I’m your fiancé. We’re supposed to be getting married soon.’
Elizabeth’s eyes widened in alarm as she shifted in bed, legs scrabbling at the mattress as she tried to push herself away from him. Her breathing now came in uneven gasps and in the dimness of his peripheral senses, Drake heard the pace of the heart monitor speed up.
‘Thats-thats not possible. You can’t be my fiancé. I barely know you,’ she burst out, raising one hand to her head, her fingers brushing the bandage wrapped around it. ‘What about the prince? The social season? I was supposed to be competing to marry him n-not you. What about-’
Before she could continue Drake cut her off, almost stupefied at what she was saying. ‘The pr- Elizabeth, Liam is the king now. The social season was months ago. Are you -‘
Dr Jillian, who had been listening to the entire exchange, now interrupted both of them, stepping forward with a pointed look. ‘Mr Walker may I speak to you outside?’
Visibly rattled, Drake complied with her instruction and as soon as they were out of earshot he turned on the shorter woman.
‘You said things were good. You said she was recovering fine. You said she was going to be o-‘
‘Mr Walker,’ she cut him off, her voice taking on a slightly authoritative tone now. ‘I said I was optimistic that she would recover well but brains are not like broken bones. They have a degree of plasticity to them that makes it hard to predict what the outcome will be. We do attempt to gather some idea of how the patient will turn out from the rate of recovery but the best we can give is still only an estimate. It all depends on the way the tissue presses against the skull as this can cause some impairments-‘
Drake had been running his hand through his hair but when she said this he dropped them to his side, almost reflexively balling them into fists. ‘Some impairments?! You mean to tell me that my fiancé not remembering who I am is ‘some impairment?’
The doctor took a cautious step back. ‘I did not mean that at all. What I mean was her brain is still recovering from the trauma. This process takes a while so it is possible that she might be experiencing retrograde amnesia.’
His mind struggled to grasp what she was saying. ‘Amnesia? Retrograde? Lady you better start making some sense real quick. What the hell are you talking about?’
Drake ignored the stares he was getting from other hospital patients, glancing back towards Elizabeth’s room where she watched in terror through the glass window pane. ‘You’re saying she’s permanently forgotten me?’
‘I can’t say for sure but usually our amnesia patients do seem to recover most of their memories but this takes time. We can’t say for certain how much she does remember or how much she will gain back. She might remember everything or she might remember nothing-‘
Drake immediately felt sick to his stomach and, unable to keep listening to the doctor, he stalked off blindly as his feet carried him to the nearest bathroom. Once inside he hunched over the sink, almost hyperventilating as the urge to hurl only grew stronger.
After his breathing had evened out a little, he splashed his face once, twice before exiting the bathroom, reaching into his pocket. His fingers trembled as he shot a quick text off to Liam before dropping onto a nearby seat in the waiting room outside Elizabeth’s ward, fingers carding roughly through his hair.
Had it all really been so easy to forget? The closeness they’d shared, the smiles, the pure and simple unbridled joy that they’d felt when they were together? Their entire relationship, the happiness, the struggles the future they could have had now seemed so far off…
Or perhaps, Drake’s mind suggested, feeling the worm of doubt come burrowing back into his soul, it hadn’t been the same for her, maybe she had not felt as strongly about him as he felt about her… she had been and still was everything to him but was it the same for her?
The thought jarred him to the very core and he gripped the armrest of the chair, knuckles blanching at the pressure. He didn’t even want to entertain the very possibility of it being true. She couldn’t, she just couldn’t…. His brain scrabbled at the threads of hope that perhaps this was all a bad dream, that he’d wake up with Elizabeth in his arms, smiling at him with her memory intact. While it was all to easy to lose himself in the fantasy deep in his heart he knew it wasn’t true. Around and around Drake went in mental circles, picturing the blank look in Elizabeth’s eyes when she said she didn’t know him, trying desperately to figure out what he could do, what he could have done to make things better, to change the past because there was nothing he wouldn’t do, nothing, to have her look at him the way she used to.
But this provides fruitless, only driving him madder as he fought to find a solution by the time he saw Liam’s dark blonde hair headed toward the waiting room, Drake was barely able to string a sentence together. His best friend’s blue eyes were clouded with confusion as he choked out a disjointed explanation of what had happened as they walked back to Elizabeth’s room.
‘Liam,’ she exclaimed softly, immediately recognising him as he stepped across the threshold. As Drake followed behind, he couldn’t help the rush of jealousy that arrived when her face lit up at his best friend’s entrance. Why did she remember Liam and not him? In the interest of finding out how much she did remember, he hung back in the doorway, watching the interaction take place.
‘Elizabeth,’ Liam was saying, having taken a seat in the chair at her bedside. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘Um.. okay I guess…’ She began, shifting a little as tugged her fingers through her dark locks. ‘My head definitely hurts a little… but the doctor said it was normal. I’ve got some pain killers if they get worse…’
Drake couldn’t see it but he could tell that Liam was smiling as he replied, ‘Let me know if there is anything I can do to make you more comfortable.’
‘I… uh thanks…’ The corners of her mouth picked up a little before she cleared her throat again. ‘So they tell me you’re king now?
’Thats right,’ Liam confirmed with a nod of his head. ‘I have been for a few months now…’
Her features fell at his response and her voice was quiet when she spoke.. ‘I guess a lot has happened in that time huh?
Liam nodded again, the pleasant smile turning apologetic. ‘I suppose it has.’
Elizabeth nodded as she digested the information, picking at the threads of the blanket on her lap and when she looked up again, her brown eyes were filling with tears.
‘I’m so scared Liam. I-I don’t know… so much, so much I don’t remember….’ Her shoulders shuddered as she drew in a shaky breath, her tears glistening under the fluorescent lights as they slid down her cheeks. Drake felt his heart break even more when she said this. It pained him almost physically to see the woman he loved like this. He wanted so badly to wrap her up in his arms and protect her. But how was he to protect her from the things inside her head? Her next words, however hit him like an eighteen-wheeler.
‘I just… I don’t even know who I am anymore…’ She whispered, barely audible to him but still visceral nonetheless. Half way through a step towards her, Drake’s progress was halted when he saw Liam reaching for Elizabeth’s hand, wrapping her small one in his, squeezing it lightly while Drake wince inwardly as their hands made contact. The tiny gesture stirred up a tornado of feelings for him. How far back did her memory loss go? How much did she remember? Why did she seem to remember Liam and not him? Why him? What about Hana and Maxwell and everyone else? Had she forgotten them too? And more importantly,he realised with a jarring force, what were they going to do now?
These questions swirled around in his head blocking out all everything else until he heard Liam’s voice cut through.
‘Drake…. Drake? Are you okay?’
Only then did Drake realise that he has been gripping the doorframe so hard the metal had left an imprint in his hands. His racing heart only sped up when he realised that both of them were staring at him, Liam in concern and Elizabeth in fear. The expression on her face seemed to open new wounds in his heart, he couldn’t stand to have her look at him like this.
‘I.. uh… I’ll be outside,’ he answered lamely. ‘You two… you….’
Unable to bring himself to finish the sentence, he exited the room flopping down limply into a nearby chair, head in his hands. It was only then that the tears began to flow, fat hot tears that dripped off the end of his nose to pool in a puddle on the floor. Fierce deep pain gripped his soul and he could think of nothing else until a soft hand was laid on his shoulder, making him look up.
‘Hey, we came as quickly as we could,’ Hana told him gently with Maxwell in tow. She wrapped him in a brief hug. ‘How is she?’
‘She’s… she’s inside. With him,’ Drake croaked, motioning passively in the direction of Elizabeth’s room. He gave them a brief run down of what had happened watched as their jaws fell in shock before rushing to the room. His limbs screamed in refusal to move but in the interest of seeing how Elizabeth would react to their friends, he trailed behind them, keeping a safe distance.
‘Elizabeth, hi.’ Hana began softly, with a gentle smile on her face.
‘You remember us right?’ Maxwell put in anxiously.
The light of recognition in Elizabeth eyes as they settled on the pair. ‘Hana, Maxwell?’
‘Yep that’s us,’ Maxwell chimed in cheerfully. ‘You remember!’
‘I-I do. At least I think I do,’ Elizabeth tried for a smile. ‘You called me little blossom? Or am I just imagining that?’
‘No no, you’re right!’ he reassured her enthusiastically, coming to sit on the edge of the bed.
‘Maxwell,’ Liam began in a cautionary tone.
‘Its alright,’ Elizabeth told him. ‘It’s nice to see a familiar face.’
‘We were so worried about you,’ Hana told her, coming to stand at her side. ‘We’re just so happy you’re okay.’
Elizabeth’s features creased into a slight frown. ‘I don’t know about that…’
‘We’ll help you get better. Anything you need, we’ll get it for you,’ Maxwell exclaimed perhaps a bit too loudly before leaning in conspiratorially. ‘Between you and me, I tried to sneak Cooper in here but Bastien caught me before I could get him to the limo. He misses you so much.’
‘Cooper?’ Her tone was slightly puzzled.
Maxwell slapped a hand to his forehead. ‘Oh you must have forgotten. You Elizabeth are the owner of the cutest, wiggliest, most adorable corgi in the world Sir Cooper the Valiant of Houses Beaumont and Richmond.’
Elizabeth’s eyes grew round. ‘I have a corgi? They’re adorable!’
‘Thats what I said!’
‘Maxwell’s been taking good care of him while you were under. We’ll find a way to sneak him in here soon,’ Hana promised with a slight wink.
‘I’d like that.’ Elizabeth smiled, a real smile now, the first one Drake has seen on her face in a long time.
As she continued chatting amicably with Maxwell and Hana, he suddenly felt extremely out of place, almost as if he was a stranger interrupting a private family gathering. It seemed like she really did remember everyone except him and that only deepened the hurt in his chest. Unable to take this anymore, he exited the room but was followed by his best friend.
‘Drake?’
‘Liam I can’t. I just can’t be in there…’ He told him, his voice cracking with emotion. ‘It seems like she remembers everyone except me… I can’t tell you how much that hurts. In her mind she’s still pursuing you and I can’t tell you how much it hurts, how much it fucking hurts… Its like everything we ever went through, all the things we said and did, they mean nothing now…’
‘I know what you mean.’
For a moment Drake thought he heard a hint of bitterness in Liam’s words but this evaporated when the king laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. ‘But you should get some rest, you look exhausted. You’ve been here almost every day.’
Drake lifted his head to look at the other man. ‘How can I, Liam? Do you really just expect me to walk out of here and pretend like nothing happened?’
‘Listen man,’ Liam’s blue eyes bored into his. ‘I know you’re upset but is staying here really gonna do anything to help her? Go home, get some sleep and we’ll work on fixing this problem tomorrow.’
Begrudging his friend’s annoying ability to be right, Drake heeded his advice, heading back to his family home. The place always brought back a wave of nostalgia and a yearning for better, simpler times with his family. He hadn’t been back in months, since the start of Engagement Tour and there was tons of repairs to do. Right now he didn’t care. Those could wait. For now, he just wanted to block out the last few hours, hoping that sleep would be able to provide some relief to the agony in his soul.