Prototype – Alex Mercer & Sarabelle Richards – "Forgetting Yourself"
"'Sarabelle'? Now that is very unique."
"Well, I've been told."
"So what do people usually call you? 'Sara' or 'Belle'?"
"'Sara', mostly. No one's actually tried to call me 'Belle'."
"Really? Well, I guess that's about to change, if you'll permit me, Miss Richards."
"Ah, I see. Tell you what: since it's you, Dr. Mercer, and I'm starting to like you, you get to call me that."
I'd like to consider myself lucky: extremely lucky to have met Belle. Was it fate? Maybe. Was it fate for us to end up where we were now? No. That was my fault… I let the growing monster in me overtake me.
Many years ago, a colleague of mine had a picture of his wife and son in his office. The best part was: the picture was actually a painting, done by a lone woman. The details were exquisite, very realistic. He told me he was going to her art show in a few days, and I just had to go and see what else this mysterious painter had in her gallery.
Never was I expecting to see a red-haired beauty, who would eventually be the one who stole my heart.
Her name was Sarabelle Elaine Richards, and she was an independent artist.
Location: Alex Mercer's apartment, Renalia Building, Upper East Side, Manhattan
May 12th, 2007
2:43am
(Before the first outbreak)
"Jesus Christ- Belle! It's almost 3 the morning! What are you doing up so late?"
"I could ask the same thing about you, Alex."
He massaged his forehead. "Yeah… sorry about that. Work kinda distracted me today. You know how it is."
"No, Alex. I'm afraid I don't know anymore," She leaned against the chair, wearing the most disappointed expression on her face. Mercer got a good look at her. She had been crying, as evidenced by the blacken tears down her cheeks caused by her mascara. She was wearing a silky red dress, one to match her fiery hair that had been tied to a bun. "I also don't know if you're you anymore."
Mercer narrowed his eyes at her, slightly confused. "Belle… Are we going at this again? You know I didn't mean to do this to you!"
"I know you didn't! But this has been happening way too many times!" Sarabelle Richards got to her feet in an instant. "Every single time, I forgave you for standing me up or forgetting something because I knew that work has you in this… in this vice grip. I would always tell myself 'hey, it's okay. You know he doesn't mean it'. But now… I'm starting to think you're taking advantage of my forgiving nature."
"What?" Mercer shook his head at her, dumping his briefcase on the coffee table in front of them. "Belle, I'm not! You know I would never take advantage of you! So I missed a dinner we had planned. I'm sorry. You know I didn't mean it."
She faked a smile, and massaged her neck briefly to keep her from spilling her emotions everywhere. "You have no idea what you're doing to me, to you? Let me give you two examples that are leading me to the state that I am in, Alex. One: two months ago, you told me to get ready because you wanted to take me out for our 4 year anniversary of the day we met. I told you, 'no, it's okay, we don't have to, it wasn't necessary' but you were hell-bent on going out. And what'd you do? You stand me up," She said, frustration in her eyes. "Okay. Never mind that," She held up both hands, now making her way to him. "What about today? You told me to get ready to leave at 7:30 because you wanted to take me out for my damned birthday."
It then hit him in that head of his. He slapped himself on the forehead. "Holy-"
She left more tears coming on, but tried her best to conceal them. "Okay, so you had a long day of working. I'm not even asking for a phone call, Alex. It takes less than 30 seconds to send a fucking text…"
"Belle," He reached for her hand, but she quickly pulled away. "I can't tell you how sorry I am-"
"No," She locked her deep green eyes with his silver-blue ones. "You can't. Because you've run out of ways to say sorry to me, and frankly, I'm tired of hearing your sorrys. I knew the nature of your job, Alex. So when you asked me to marry you, I wanted to know if you could really commit to me just like you promised you would. You did commit to me, but that was before you proposed to me! And now? Is this the state you're going to leave me in after we get married?" She was asking all of these questions, but Sarabelle herself didn't know if she wanted answers.
"So what are you saying?" Mercer asked, perhaps waiting for the worst.
She broke away from his gaze and looked at her feet. "I've already dumped my things in my car."
"Belle, no!" He quickly took her hands.
And this time she did not pull away. "I'm sorry, Alex. But this has gone too far. You promised me you'd make me your top priority, and though I didn't think that could happen for sure, I wanted to give you the benefit of doubt because I knew you wanted to try. But you stopped trying. And I'm tired of being the only one who wants to make this relationship work. It takes two, Alex, but you're never here."
His heart was breaking at her words. "I brought this on myself, didn't I?"
Sympathetically, she reached up to run her left hand past his cheek. "I don't mean to do this to you, Alex, but I'm sorry. I can't take the loneliness anymore. I can't take the broken promises anymore either." At that moment, she realized that she was still wearing his engagement ring. Pulling her hand away, she proceeded to remove it from her finger. She pressed it into Mercer's hand, who reluctantly accepted it.
"And you were a saint for putting up with me all this while," He commented, looking at her in the eye once more. "Thanks for giving me the best years of my life. Really."
She smiled at him, although her streaming tears were evidence of her own sorrow. "You're welcome." Leaning in, she gave him a kiss on his cheek, one that Mercer would try his best to hang on for as long as possible. "Good luck to you, Alex. Continue being the genius that you truly are."
He gave her a half-smile. "And you keep on drawing, Belle. You know you're a genius yourself."
She smiled once more, and turned her head to the coffee table, nodding her head at a small sketch book. It was light blue in color, with white outlines. "I was going to give that to you for your birthday, but I guess you should have it now. You can do whatever you want to it; I'll be fine with it." Glancing back at him once more, she said, "See ya."
"Take care, Belle."
And he watched as she walked out of his apartment.
Mercer turned his attention to the sketch book, and decided to flip the pages for the heck of it. What was contained in it? Sketches – both pencil and colored of Alex Mercer himself, with the occasional Sarabelle in there. She even threw in some captions like 'The first time I ever saw your face' or 'Doctor Mercer hard at work' to make sense of some of the drawings.
Memories… that was what this sketch book was all about. There were supposed to be more of these memories - future ones, to be precise… but now, they were all destroyed.
