“It was a car accident. It happened two years ago and you were behind the wheel,” the doctor says through a demeaning tone. She then checks her watch and gets up from her seat so that she is looking down at me and I feel small. I don’t know if that was her intention but if it was, it worked. “Our time is up. We’ll meet again next week. Bye for now.”

She’s about to leave. She’s about to leave and she has barely given me anything. Some part of me yearns for the truth but another part of me wonders what would happen if she stays. Do I want to hear more? 

The answer is clear: yes.

“No,” I blurt out. “You do not get to leave after what you just told me. You do not!”

“I can’t keep talking about this right now,” the doctor says as she turns and walks toward the door. I can’t let her leave.

It’s all so sudden but I get up, grab her arm, and pull her back without a second thought. 

“What are you doing? Let go. Now,” she yells.

“Will you tell me more tomorrow?”

“I don’t know.”

“Will you?!” I raise my voice.

“Oh please! You have no right to try and make me talk about something so painful! I’ve been grieving the loss of my sister for two years. Two! And I have to be the one to deliver the news of her death to her clueless killer. You’re pathetic!” Her echoing voice calls the two guards that usually sit outside, into the room.

“I’m not pathetic. I may not know who I am but I know that,” I say through a frail voice.

“You don’t know who you are,” the doctor says, as if to mock me.

“Gentlemen, please take Ms. Amara back to her room. She needs to rest,” the doctor says as she paces out the room. “Amara, I’ll see you next week.”

I mumble I’m sorry as she leaves and I’m carried out of the room by the guards, one on each arm. Could I have made this situation any worse?

LATER THAT NIGHT…

Tonight, I feel more lonely and isolated than before. The stillness of the night keeps me awake more than any sound, smell, or feeling ever could. The stench of bleach and flickering lights may contribute to my insomnia but the truth about who I really am is the biggest factor. 

As I toss and turn, and toss and turn again, my mind struggles to come to one conclusion. I took someone’s life. How old was this girl? Did she have any friends? Any dreams? I don’t know. But if she did have dreams, they never had enough time to come to fruition. Why? Because of me. This fact alone is enough to bring me to a silent sob. 

“Amara, are you okay,” asks April, my roommate. I choose to lie.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just go back to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning,” I say with fake enthusiasm.

April and I usually aren’t in the room together at the same time except for when it’s time for “lights out”. She is not the right person to talk about what I’ve just learned. Even if she was, I would still keep to myself; this burden is mine to bear. 

Eventually, I feel myself falling into an uneasy slumber. And then…

…I’m driving. I don’t know how or why, but I’m driving– driving fast. I see stop signs and lights telling me to go. I don’t know what this is but it feels familiar, like a memory.  I try to look around but the body that I’m in moves for itself, like I’m just observing from someone else’s point of view. 

What is happening?

“You’re not listening to me Amara,” a voice yells out of nowhere. A passenger; a man. 

“I am listening to you! It’s you who’s not listening to me,” I yell back. I feel angry for some reason but I feel like it doesn’t belong to me. This anger seems foreign and familiar at the same time.

“Oh I can hear you perfectly fine and you sound absurd. Now, stop the car!”

“No, I’m dropping you off and then going home. We’re done,” I yell as I turn the corner, ignoring the red light. 

“I said stop the car!”

I see a girl crossing the street and my heart skips a beat. She can’t be any more than twenty years old. As my eyes meet the girl’s, the passenger’s hands meet the wheel and the car swerves. She’s gone. I can’t see her. I can’t see anything.

…

I wake up gasping for air. I stumble out of bed in a frantic fashion and run out into the hallway. Light from the windows shines on my face as I run. Tears stream down my face and my chest burns but I still move, my feet stomping the ground. Turning left, turning right, until I reach the garden outside the left wing of the hospital. 

My chest hurts. My head throbs. My thoughts swarm. She was so young. Why?! I can’t breathe. These tears and thoughts are suffocating me. I need to find a way to calm down.

The air outside stings my lungs and I realize how early it is. It’s probably around six o’clock, judging by the sunrise. I need to head back to my room before the morning bell rings. They’ll sound the alarm if they can’t find me in my bed. 

I head back inside the hospital and immediately, I see Doctor Beth standing in the hall. An awkward silence follows as my eyes meet hers.

“You’re not supposed to be out this early,” she calls out as she walks towards my direction.

“I know. I was about to head back to bed. I just needed some air.”

“Come here,” she says curiously. 

I don’t want her to see my tears so I walk with my head down, even though she probably knows that I was crying through my voice.
“You’ve been crying,” she says in a disconnected tone.

“It’s nothing. I’m just gonna go back to bed.”

“I’m still human, you know. And a psychiatrist. You can tell me what’s wrong.”

“It’s really nothing. Seriously-”

“Talk,” the doctor commands.

“I’m sorry to bring this up but I had a dream about the accident last night. It was random but I think you telling me triggered my memory somehow,” I say as I wipe my tears. 

Her lips turn upward into a sinister grin and holds its position as she processes the information. 

“Well,” she says after a while. “It’s about time.”

“You might want to hold the applause. You see, I remembered something else–I wasn’t the only person in the car.”

“Oh, really? Tell me more,” the doctor says enthusiastically. She’s keeping something else from me, I know it.

“What aren’t you telling me? Do you know who the passenger is?”

“This isn’t a session Amara.”

“Exactly. Which means no more nice patients and no more pretty lies. Tell me the truth; for real this time.”

“Alright fine,” she clears her throat. “He’s here Amara. The passenger is here. We recovered him from the site of the crash and he’s here. You may know who he is, considering how close you guys have been since you’ve arrived. He goes by the name of Dylan Ronroe.”

I know Dylan. He was the first person I met here, another patient who lost his memory. Has he known the entire time? I decide to take a risk and assume he does.

“How long has he known about the accident,” I ask, hoping to get confirmation.

The doctor puts on a smug smile and says, “Oh, he doesn’t. I just told you because you were the one most responsible for what happened, and you’re the one who’s going to jail. Dylan, on the other hand, is getting a chance to start anew.”

I don’t know how to feel. I can see her logic (somehow) but I can’t help but feel cheated out of freedom. On the other hand, however, I know freedom isn’t what I deserve. I was the one behind the wheel- he wasn’t. I was the one who ran the red light- he wasn’t.

“Thank you for not telling him.”

“That wasn’t the reply I was expecting,” the doctor says, shocked. 

“I wouldn’t want anyone else to experience this guilt. So, thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. Just face the consequences of your actions.”

“Will you ever forgive me,” I ask. I know the answer but some part of me hopes she will find it in her heart to forgive me. I know I’ll never find it within myself to forgive what I’ve done, but maybe she will.

“I don’t know. I believe in forgiveness, but only because my job tells me I should. This, however, is a personal matter. So, the answer, I don’t know.”

“Good enough.”

The doctor looks at her watch and then looks down the hall. “You should get back to your room. The bell rings in five minutes. I’ll see you around Amara.”

“Next week?” I ask. 

“Maybe.”

“Before I go, may I ask another question,” I say, unsure of her reply.

“Sure.”

“What was her name?”

The doctor smiles, “Sarah. Sarah Cadell.”

TWO YEARS LATER…

That was the last time I saw the doctor. She quit working at the hospital the next day and I never heard from her again. She never pressed charges, and she never contacted me again. I don’t know if she will ever forgive me, and perhaps I will never know. If she does, I am thankful because I sometimes struggle to forgive myself. 

 When I look back at that time of my life, I realize that there is a reason why I never got any of my memories back. It was because the crash was the event that severed my ties to my old life. When I got out of the hospital, I found out more about myself and discovered that the memory loss was probably for the best. Pain and suffering was the only thing that awaited me back in my old life. 

I still talk to Dylan, though I still haven’t told him the truth of that day. I probably never will but I don’t feel guilty about it. As for my life, I have yet to figure out much, but when I do, I will always keep in mind the life of Sarah Cadell.