A Distinct Memory of Alice

            "Did you know that I've liked you ever since we were kids, James?" 

            I sat, shocked. 

            "I did," she said at the look on my face. "I just never knew how dense you were." She smiled at that. "But maybe that's what I like about you."

            That night, Alice was assaulted literally at her doorstep. A man with an ice-pick rushed at her then stabbed her head with it. I wasn't with her on the ride home (I walked home), but the kids she were with saw the whole thing. 

            I remember seeing all the headlines by the newspapers. 

            Teenager stabbed by ice-pick. Not expected to live.

            Alice Aquino, still in critical condition.

            Alice Aquino now in the clear.

            Alice Aquino found to have regressed to a younger self. 

            Yes, she lived, and I thanked God for it the night she was pronounced healed. But it was a sick joke, as her mind never healed. 

            She had regressed to her nine-year-old-self. As we only knew each other before we were in high school, and then in college, she never knew me. She thought she was a nine-year-old girl, still in grade school.

            Alice, you never remembered how you felt about me. 

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            I close the notebook. It was a relatively short memory, but it brought me back to that night a year ago. Alice had been so vibrant and alive back then, not like the way she is now.

            Since it was the last night I saw her as the old Alice, it was the clearest memory I have of her. The most distinct one, you might say. Her very Alice-ness captured, right on paper. 

            She stirs on the bed.

            "Do you remember this, Alice?" I ask her, in a soft voice. Do you remember anything?

            "Stop asking me if I remember, you dope," she says from beneath the covers. Her voice has a strident quality to it. "I don't care about your stupid memory. I don't care about anything." She sounds like a kid. 

             In her mind, she really IS a kid. By coming here, I just wanted to reject the truth of her being like this.

            I sit on the floor, squinting through the darkness at her, waiting for her to speak. Waiting for her to miraculously become the Alice she was back then.

            "You know, I never told you, but I liked you, too."

            She moves on the bed, but doesn't give an indication of replying. 

            As the sky outside begins to darken, and I can no longer see even an outline of her on the bed, I slowly get up from the floor and place the notebook in my bag.

            “I’ll be coming here every day now. And I’ll read all our memories, the good and the bad.” No reply, still.

            She doesn't remember how she felt about me, and that hurts more than I expected. 

            "Goodbye, Alice," I say, and close the door to another of her guttural growls.

            I emerge into the glorious dusk with tears in my eyes. My fears had been confirmed. But I had been released, too. I was always holding on to the hope that she might remember me, in a God-given grace, but she doesn't. My chest feels tight, and there's a golf ball in my throat. 

            She would never be the Alice I had known. Maybe in a few years, but time wouldn't stop, after all, and I would grow up, while her mind would take time to grow.  

            I take a deep breath before getting on the bike. I desperately want to cry, but I don't. I get on the bike, and pedal slowly away. 

            When I get home, Mom's there to greet me. "How was your day, James?" None in my family ever knew how much I missed her, but I think Ma has an inkling. Mothers are that way, after all. They have a kind of sixth sense that lets them know whether their kid is in trouble or is telling a lie. Or when the kid is having a hell of a hard time. 

            "Fine, Ma," I tell her. "How was yours?"

            She doesn't pick up on the obvious lie, on the tears that are threatening to spill out of my eyes.

               She knows.

            She smiles at me. "Good. I had a nice day, too," she says. "Oh, and we're having baked mac tonight, okay?"

            I walk up the stairs, and then pause. "Oh, and Ma?"

            "Yes, James?" 

            "I'm going to visit Alice tomorrow, so don't expect me to get here early."

A/N: Alice's condition is a true condition that I based off a thing that happened to a girl who used to go to the same university I did. I never knew her, but I know about the regression she experienced.