He straddled the sun lounger in the tiny back garden, and tried to make sense of it all. His three notebooks spread out before him, he idly flicked the pages backwards and forwards. Trying to pull it all together. It was like a giant jigsaw, and he only had some of the pieces. There was something there at the back of his mind but weeks of trying to force it out into the light was getting him nowhere. He wondered if he was ever going to get his life back. It was all locked away inside his mind, according to his psycho-therapist. She had tried several techniques to unlock his past, but it remained stubbornly elusive. Scraps and fragments existed and he was starting to put them together, but it was all so slow. And big holes remained. Grey gaps in his mind filled with nothing substantial.
Slowly he pushed the books off the end of the sun lounger. Pulled his knees up and wrapped his arms around his legs. He hunched over and closed his eyes. He wasn't sure how much more he could take.
She watched him from the kitchen window. She'd come home directly after work, at first when she'd opened the front door and realised he wasn't in the house, she had felt a sense of fear. His memory problems meant that he struggled when he went out alone. She had walked into the kitchen, debating with herself whether she would discreetly call Tony or Roger, or perhaps even Smithy. Just in case. Then she'd seen him in the garden. She put her hand on the back door handle, intending to go out and join him. She watched him push the books off the lounger, and curl into himself and she paused for a moment.
She needed that moment. It hurt to see him like this. And truth be told, she had no idea if he would ever recover sufficiently to lead anything like a normal life again. She thought about it as she mulled the reality over in her mind, even though she knew what she was going to do. Everyone else seemed to have abandoned him to his fate, even his sister; she wasn't going to walk out on him now.
She tugged open the back door and went out.
He raised his head as she sat down next to him on the lounger. He looked so different from his usual immaculate groomed self, he was unshaven, the baggy black shorts he was wearing, crumpled and scruffy looking, the vest top old and much washed.
He looked at her. "Is it ever going to get better?" The hopelessness in his tone tugged at her heart.
"Stu. I don't know." she gently patted his back, "you've had a brain injury... it's all going to take a lot of time."
He looked away for a moment. "What if it doesn't get any better?" He looked straight at her "If I don't get my life back? What's going to happen then?"
Her arm slid further around his shoulders, and she tugged him gently towards her. "We're in this together," she rested her head against his shoulder "I'm not going to abandon you."
He slid a hand over hers, and looked down at their entwined fingers for a moment.
"I don't even know how I know that you mean what you say. But I do." He lifted her hand to his lips, and kissed the back of her hand. "I...." he struggled to connect the words in his head, and she leaned against him.
"I know, hun." She turned her head, and they looked at each other. "I know," she breathed.
