Chapter 1

The Redhead

It was Christmas 2008—actually, two days before—and most of the shoppers were desperate men. The Great Recession had already taken its toll on them. Many of them had lost their jobs or their homes, but they still wanted to find that special gift for their wives. Nothing extravagant, but something that spoke from the heart. These men subscribed to the adage, "Happy wife, happy life."

I didn't have a happy life. Neither did my wife. Our gifts to each other weren't meant to say, "I love you," but instead, "Thank you for not leaving me." Twenty years of marriage had left us mired in a morass of pain and half-hearted forgiveness.

That particular Christmas, I was a member of the desperate men's club, but for different reasons. My past, back then, had been a mystery, even to me. Two years earlier, my wife had an affair. It broke my heart several times a day. Dealing with that psychological trauma had sapped all happiness from my life. Then I disappeared from everyone's life, including my own.

Giving my wife only one day's notice, I flew to Los Angeles. Two weeks later, I was found in a Miami hotel suite with a gunshot wound to my head. Rushing me to the hospital saved my life, but, unfortunately, the severity of my wounds left me in a coma. Upon emerging from the coma, I discovered I had lost all memories since the day I learned of my wife's infidelity.

Nobody, including me, had a clue about why I did what I did or who might have done it with me. Desperation takes its toll on a man. My missing memories had buried themselves deep in the dark recesses of my brain. I struggled every day with wanting to know what had happened to me or just leaving it as an unsolved mystery. After two years, everyone had begun to accept that my memories of those lost months of my life would never return.

On that December day, I wandered aimlessly through the streets of downtown Cleveland. I had no destination. I was trying to burn off some of the perpetual anxiety that had infected my life.

Then I saw "her," a block ahead of me. I didn't know who she was or how I knew her, yet every atom of my being went on high alert. Her red hair had caught my attention first, with her ponytail swishing back and forth as she walked. A soft buzzing started deep inside my brain. She spun around in response to something a passerby said to her. She smiled back at him, and I must have read her lips as she replied, "Merry Christmas."

I knew that smile. The buzzing in my brain went full bore, and my body went limp.

*****

I retrieved my flip-flop I had dropped into the surf. She realized I was no longer at her side and looked back over her shoulder at me. "Charlie," she said, "you're falling behind. Are you too old for me?" The sea breeze ruffled her red hair as she flashed a smile that could melt a man's soul. "Here, take my hand." She stood in the sand near the waterline with her hand extended to me.

She was right. I was too old for her, and her smile let me know that she was OK with that. For now. "I was checking out your fine ass," I said. "There's a good view of it from back here."

*****

I don't know if I fell and hit the curb or if I tripped over the curb and then fell. Either way, I tumbled into a disheveled heap on the sidewalk. Sitting upright, my head throbbed, and my right knee hurt. I pressed my hands against the sides of my head until the buzzing in my brain stopped. In the flashback I'd just experienced, the sandy beach, the surf, and the red-haired woman had been as real as the sidewalk now beneath me. I instinctively knew that the woman in the flashback and the woman I had seen walking ahead of me were the same person.

I had to find this woman.

I sprang to my feet, stumbling into a young guy immersed in a cell phone conversation. "Sorry," I said, but I was already tearing myself away from him. I looked up the street to where I had seen her before the flashback, but she was gone. Picking my way through people clogging the sidewalk, I rushed to that spot. There was no sign of her.

I continued to the next intersection, gasping for air as I looked in each direction, all to no avail. Bending at the waist and slowing my breaths, I noticed the tear in the right knee of my Dockers. "Shit," I muttered. It wasn't the pants, and it wasn't even particularly the redhead. It was my reaction to seeing her. My heart raced at the thought of finding her. If I did, what would she say? What would I say? Did she even know I had been walking a short distance behind her?

I needed to find her. I walked in random directions, swiveling my head around in the hope of seeing her again. I walked three more blocks before deciding I was a fool chasing a phantom, a figment of my imagination.

Just as I was about to give up hope, I saw her emerge from a store past the next intersection. I ran in her direction, bounding left and right to avoid other pedestrians. I lost sight of her a couple of times, but the occasional flash of red hair was a beacon calling to my soul. She walked at a brisk pace. I was about to sprint across an intersection when a large man wearing a Browns parka grabbed my arm. He yanked me backward as a passing car horn reduced my internal organs to mush.

He clutched my arm. "Hey, buddy, you got a death wish or something?" he asked. "No! Sorry." I wriggled my arm free and stood on the tips of my toes in hopes of seeing her red hair further down the road. She was still there, moving farther away from me.

When the light changed, I fought my way through another crush of people moving in the opposite direction. Hopping a few times, I kept her in my sights. Finally, the red beacon I had been chasing stopped outside a restaurant. She held the door open so a woman and two children could leave before she entered. I had to wait for a traffic light at one more intersection. It was the longest Don't Walk signal I'd ever experienced. I was aware my agitated mental state distorted the passage of time. A couple of sirens, though, explained the longevity of the Don't Walk signal. Two firetrucks, taking their good old time, rolled through the intersection.

For one last time, I skipped and shuffled my way through the crowd until I reached the restaurant she had entered. I stepped inside and paused to let my eyes adjust to the change in light. I ignored the hostess who had offered to help me, and I made my way to the bar. I didn't see any sign of the redheaded woman there. In the dining area, I went from table to table, gathering worried looks from people who weren't her.

In the back corner, I found her sitting in a booth with her back to me. She was reading or watching something on her cell phone. She was in her mid-twenties with the glowing skin of women of that age. I slid into the seat across the table from her and said, "Hi …" My initial reaction was that I knew her name, but it remained inaccessible from my memory. She jumped as I startled her. I knew immediately I'd made a mistake. She was the woman I'd seen on the sidewalk, but she wasn't the woman in the flashback I'd just experienced.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I thought you were someone else."

She relaxed. I started to leave when she said, "Wait. Don't go yet." I sat back down and looked at her. Her blue eyes were wide open, but not from fear. It was a look of awe.

"Who did you think I was?" she asked.

"Honestly, I don't know," I said. "Someone I must have known once."

"I've got to tell you … what's your name?"

"Charlie."

"I've got to tell you, Charlie, no man has ever looked at me the way you just did."

"Which way?" I asked.

"Like I was the most exciting woman you've ever had in your whole life. I'd give anything to cause that reaction in a man someday." Fog clouded my mind, and I could feel myself drifting away. The buzzing in my brain started again, just soft enough to get my attention. A face or a name my brain had once erased was trying to break out. I strained to retrieve it. Eventually, I grew weary, and it drifted back into the abyss. The doctors had warned me my memories might never return, or some innocuous event could cause them to rush back all at once. Sitting there in the restaurant booth with a woman I didn't know, I knew that process had begun. My heart skipped a few beats, not just out of excitement, but also out of fear.

I steadied myself and looked at the redhead again.

"Are you OK? Do you need some water?" she asked.

Water would have been a wise choice, but I declined. I studied her eyes. She wasn't the woman in the flashback, but I could see how her dazzling blue eyes and red hair suggested that possibility. I wanted to stay with this woman. It might help my brain recall the woman I was aching to remember, but I had to meet Barbara for a late lunch.

"I have to go," I said. "I'm sorry for wasting your time."

"Are you sure you have to go? You've been the most interesting part of my day so far."

"Trust me. It's not a story with a happy ending."

"But you don't know who you thought I might be."

"No, I don't. Really, I must go. My wife is expecting me."

"Oh." She paused. "And she's not the exciting woman you mistook me for?"

"No. She's not." Her eyes lost their shine and were replaced with a look of pity.

"You're right," she said. "It doesn't sound like a story with a happy ending."

As I slid out of the booth and stood, the buzzing intensified. I had to grab the side of the table to steady myself. There was one last question I wanted to ask this young woman, and I could barely say the words. "What's your name?" I asked.

*****

"Charlie, say my name."

Our naked bodies were still wrapped in that post-coital entwinement of our limbs. Her head rested in the crook of my shoulder with her red hair splayed across my chest. I had already started down the foggy tunnel to dreamland, so I took a few seconds to wake. Then I mentally repeated her question to myself. I replied, "Aubrey. With a B."

She raised her head and said, "Thank you."

*****

I lay on the floor of the restaurant with my head in the lap of the redheaded woman whose name I didn't know. "Charlie, are you OK?" she asked.