Page 13 of Townshipped
When I come back from feeding the goats to make breakfast for Em, she’s fallen asleep again. I leave her that way and fix myself a bowl of oatmeal.
Em doesn’t wake until close to noon. I’d be worried, but Hazel said she needed sleep. The internet is back, so I’m sitting at my kitchen counter catching up on work when she pads out in her socks, wearing a pair of sweats and my old OSU T-shirt.
Under any other circumstance I’d welcome the sight of a woman like her walking into my kitchen looking casually beautiful and unassuming. As it is, my mind fills with concern and questions on her behalf.
I try to find something to do with my hands and somewhere to fix my eyes that isn’t on her. I don’t want to make her feel more uncomfortable than she probably already does winding up in a total stranger’s home.
Yesterday, I was so fixated on her well-being, I didn’t think of anything else. This morning I saw her in the dim light of my guest room. Now, the full windows in my kitchen illuminate and highlight her features, so I’m able to truly appreciate her for the first time.
Her red hair cascades in messy waves down her back and over her shoulders. Her sea-glass-green eyes are so light they’re almost translucent with a ring of blue around the edge. Her pale skin contrasts with full peach lips.
I rein in the part of me that notices her as any man would, while I remind myself to be the man she needs.
“Hey there,” I say.
“Hey. I guess I needed the sleep,” Em says, yawning and covering her mouth with the back of her hand.
“Could you eat?”
“A horse!”
I laugh. “I’m fresh out of horses but let me get you a sandwich and some soup. I was just about to grab lunch myself.”
“Thanks. Can I help you make lunch?”
“No need. You should rest anyway.”
Em looks around my kitchen. “This is nice. Do you live here with anyone else?”
“I’m a bachelor, much to the chagrin of my mom and pretty much my whole friend group.”
“And this is your house?”
“I bought the property about five years ago, after … well, anyway, five years ago … I gutted the kitchen and remodeled it with the help of a few craftsmen in town. Most of the rest of the house is original. Not in bad shape for an eighty-year-old structure.”
“I love the subway tile.”
“So does Joanna Gaines,” I joke.
Em’s face scrunches up.
“She’s a home improvement guru.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
Em’s hand absentmindedly touches the spot on her head where she sustained a lump from her accident.
“No. I’m sorry. You won’t know a lot of details like that. I read a little online while you napped. Anterograde amnesia can be normal after a hit to the head. Even a trauma like a car accident where there isn’t any impact to the head can temporarily cause someone to forget the past, but otherwise your brain functions normally.
“The emotional stress alone could temporarily wipe out memory. Everything should come back in the coming days or months. Each case is different, but it’s more likely you’ll regain your memory than not.”
Em’s eyes soften and her eyebrows draw together.
“I wish I could recall something. Anything.”
“Don’t push yourself. They say the stress of trying too hard to remember can wear you out, and it won’t bring the memories back any sooner.”
“Okay, Doc,” she teases me as she walks across the kitchen toward the island and takes a seat on one of the barstools.
