Do you swear you wont forget me? By Crunch

Thank you so so so much to everyone who reviewed! Yipee!

To Sparkles, again I'm sorry about the fic title, I promise I didn't know. So attention everyone, I'm not Sparkles! Ok?

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I'd started talking to myself a lot lately. It wasn't because I was crazy, it's just that for the most part there was noone else to talk to. But who can say; maybe that's the same reason crazy people talk to themselves. I sure don't know. I've never met anyone crazy, before myself ofcourse.

"Calm down. Just calm down, Race." I still thought of myself as Racetrack, after all this time. Even though I may have been countless years and miles away from the dusty cobblestone streets of Manhatten, and I'd traded in the bunk in Kloppmen's lodging house for an army cot in my private, refridgerated suite, I still knew who I was. They could take everything else, but not my identity. Not my soul. "Maybe if youse would jus' relax, and think about it, you could remembah." See the thing that had been bothering me since that anonymous day, when the subject of Irish had come up, was that after a while my memories dropped off into space, cut off like water from a faucet. While a part of me just accepted that she had left the burrough, never to be seen again, I still had those feelings constantly tugging on my arm and hissing in my ear.

"Anthony. Nice to see you're awake this early in the morning." I started as Doc strolled into my cell unannounced, leaving the heavy iron door to swing shut behind him. Before it sealed itself into place, I caught a glimpse of the barren tile hallways outside, filled with Doctors and syringes and silence.

"Is it mornin'?" The skies today, like most days, loomed overcast and dreary; the kind of skies that gave no clues as to whether they were hiding the sun of the moon.

He sank down into the hard plastic surface of his chair with a soft groan. "My my, these old joints aren't what they used to be, are they? You've no idea how lucky you are, Anthony." I snorted, thinking that I'd gladly jump from this 5 foot 4, 120 lb, lithe 19 year old frame into any body, old or young, strolling freely through life at his very moment, with out a straitjacket in sight.

He chuckled, interpreting my silence. "Ah well, youth is always wasted on the young.

*.*.*

"I'm only 17, Racetrack! I'se too young, I can't be pregnant!"

"Irish, calm down!" I tried to soothe her, while feeling my world crumble around me like a house of cards. "We'll figuah somethin' out."

"Me fadder will kill me." Her voice had switched from it's frantic high pitch to a deathly, flat whisper. She wasn't exagerating, either, I had seen her father from a distance. An enormous bear of a man with a beer gut and a beer bottle constantly glued to his hand, he wasn't a forgiving soul even when he was sober. And he rarely was. I had also seen the welts lining Irish's smooth skin as I gently removed her dress, all while she was sobbing about her father's recent acts of violence.

"You can run away! Come live with me in Manhatten!" I cried.

"No. No, he'll find me!"

"He won't. I'll protect you, You and your.. our baby." Sniffing, she leaned in and kissed me through the tears glimmering in her frightened eyes.

"Do you love me, Race? Tell me you love me." I licked my lips nervously.

"Sure, Irish. You knows I do." Why did I always have such a hard time saying those words? I wasn't exactly honesty's very soul; I had manufactured countless headlines and maladies in the interest of selling enough papes to make it through supper. So why was uttering this one simple lie like pulling teeth, especially at a moment like this? "I love you." She nodded, consoled for the time being. "Youse'll see, Irish. We'll be ok, an' we'll be togethah." I threw my arms around her heaving shoulders and pressed my lipe against hers, something that always seemed to comfort her.

"Yeah. We'll be ok."

*.*.*

"She was pregnant!" I cried, as I looked around to find that the moonlit street,the chill of the breeze against my face, and the spectre of Irish had all vanished, replaced by Doc looming two inches away from me.

"Anthony, you had me worried. Now what did you say?"

"Irish. She was pregnant. Wid' my baby." I whispered, letting the weight of the memory sink in. I clutched at my bed sheets with sweaty palms, fearing that if I didn't keep myself rooted to the earth I would go flying off into the past again. "She was 17, an' I was a year oldah. I remembah, it was wintah when she told me. We was so scared. Why did I forget dat, Doc?"

He settled himself back into his chair, surprisingly, with an encouraged grin on his face. I could have leaped up right then and wiped that smile off the bum. "What you keep describing are repressed memories, trying to force there way out. Do not fight them, Anthony. This may be the only way you can be healthy again." I rapped my arms around my malnourished frame, trying to fend off the sudden icy cold that rapped around me like a suffocating blanket. So Irish and I had had a baby together. What was it's name? I had always wanted to name a baby after my father, Giovanni. But then, maybe it had been a girl. Maybe, when the Doctors finally realized I didn't belong here, when they finally let me out, I could find them. I could live in a house with my beautiful wife, Irish Higgins, and my daughter, named Marietta after my mother; a little girl with thick, Italian black hair and sparkling green Irish eyes. And We would live happily and sanely ever after.

* * * * * * * * * * So whaddya think? Hope I didn't dissapoint! Stay tuned for chapter 3.. coming soon! And don't forget to review!