#sam malinski x reader

[mendeshoney]

let it once be me - s. malinski (colorado avalanche)

A/N: hello! long time no see. this was written for the "the eras tour hockeyblr fic challenge" hosted by the lovely @comphy-and-cozy and @wyattjohnston, and is inspired by the song "the prophecy" by taylor swift. thank you both for hosting this challenge and I adore y'all very much.

word count: 18,965

warnings/tags: very light and vague-ish soulmate!au, lots of angst, strangers to lovers to strangers to lovers, memory loss (random, non-illness related, part of the soulmates condition), angst with a happy ending

~

It’s almost exactly like how it happens in the movies.

And you hate it.

Time seems to slow down, your heart seems to beat slower, louder, heavier in your chest behind your ribcage. You can feel your skin getting warmer, can feel a hint of a shiver on your arms, and the way your mouth opens slightly in shock at seeing him.

It’s been two years at least since you’d seen him last. He’s still the same in so many ways.

Confident, determined, yet somehow, more free spirited.

You’re at Valley Tavern, the newest bar downtown that had just opened a month ago. You’d been there with your friends who’d been curious to know what it was like, and it seems he and his friends were the same.

There's a smile that threatens to form on your lips when you see the familiar way his friends welcome him into the bar, the excited way that they envelope him into their circle again like he never left it. You force the smile away, force your mouth shut, and school your body into neutrality as you turn back to your friends, tuning back into the conversation.

As the night progresses, there's this distinct feeling of electricity that pricks across your skin every time he gets near, when he’s just within reach but still too far away. It’s annoying, and you hate it, but the familiarity of it is something you welcome, even if you know it’ll be brief.

There's a couple of times where you make eye contact, but you only allow it for the briefest of seconds before you tear your eyes away, as if you were scanning the room for someone else. Otherwise, he lingers in your peripheral vision the entire time, but you make no effort to interact with him in any way.

It won’t matter, after all. 

After all this time, he still has no idea who you are.

A couple of hours after he’s walked through the door, you're sitting with your friends at a corner booth of the bar, chatting and finishing the last of your soda when he’s the closest he’s been all night. You're sitting at one of the ends of the booth, and he and one of his buddies are chatting about a foot away from you. His friend’s back is facing you, and you can semi-hear their conversation as they catch up. 

His voice is smooth, cool and unwavering as he chatters away, his friend laughing at a few things said here and there. None of what they’re saying registers to you, all of it drowned out by the conversation in the booth.

A few minutes later, when your glass is finally empty, you can feel how your social battery begins to deplete down to zero. You double check that your crossbody is still secure around you and remains unzipped, that your phone is in your pocket, before turning to your friends. You wait for a pause in the conversation, and when it comes, the very second you open your mouth to say goodbye to your friends, another voice cuts in.

His.

“Hi there.”

Your friends all blink at him, and then their heads collectively swivel to your with expectant eyes.

You turn, and to your surprise, finds that he’s looking at you with the same expectant look, only standing a couple of inches away. 

“Hi,” you return, all too aware of how your voice came out much quieter than intended.

It doesn’t seem to bother him in the slightest. He gives an easy smile, sticking his hand out.

He introduces himself, saying “Hi, I’m Sam,” all that boyish charm and manly confidence etched into the smile carved out on that handsome face of his, and it would have flustered anyone else for sure, probably sent their heart racing.

But not you.

Not when you know all of his tricks by now.

The familiarity of his game eases the tension in your body, erases all the little pinpricks and lingering electricity you felt when you first saw him tonight, quickly being replaced by a calm that must seep into your features when you smile back at him. It makes him blink a bit, clearly a little stunned - by what, you aren't sure - as you take his hand and shake it, introducing yourself to him in return.

You ignore the goosebumps his touch sends up your arm.

Belatedly, you can feel the way your friends eye him, how some of them want to remind him that he’s met you before, but you know they won’t say a thing - too excited at the prospect of seeing your soulmate introduce himself to you yet again far too tempting. They’d rather see how this will play out than butt in with the facts of reality.

“It looked like you were about to head out and I didn’t want you to go without saying hello to you first.” Sam says, dropping his hand from yours and sticking it in his pocket.

The corner of your mouth threatens to quirk up in a smile as your own hand falls back into your lap. 

That’s new.

“Usually people say hello at the beginning of the night, you know.” You point out, keeping your tone playful. 

“True,” he nods. “I meant to, but I kept getting distracted.”

Your head tilts curiously. “By?”

“The thought about whether or not I deserved to say hello to someone as pretty as you.”

You can’t control it, the smile that creeps across your lips, and you laugh a little while your friends giggle at your side.

“Ah,” you say, nodding. “I see. So you decided that you deserved to?”

He shakes his head seriously. “No way, but I figured I’d give it a shot anyway.”

“Bold of you,” you commend. “I appreciate the confidence.”

“Do you appreciate it enough to at least let me walk you out? If you were in fact leaving, that is.”

You shrug, “Sure, why not.”

You pretend to ignore his slightly stunned expression as you stand, saying goodbye to your friends as they each climb out of the booth to give you a hug. Two of them whisper that they’ll be following behind you as he escorts you out, to which you nod and whisper a quiet ‘thank you’ in return.

You understand their concern, but you also know they’re doing it more because they’re worried for you than they are suspicious of him.

When you turn back to Sam, he’s got an excited smile on his face. He takes a step back to allow you to lead the way, and he follows close enough behind that he can help you navigate through the crowd, but he remains far enough out of your space that he’s barely touching you. His friends and teammates jest and whistle at him as he goes, some of them quietly observing, considering they definitely recognize you, but can’t do a thing about it.

Once you’re out on the street, the night breeze takes you by surprise a little, a small chill running through your body. 

“Oh,” he says, then he’s shrugging off his jacket and placing it around your shoulders gently. It smells a little woody, but not overpowering.

“Thank you,” you say, “That’s kind of you.” 

From behind him, you can see the way your friends linger at the entrance of the club. 

“Did you need to call an Uber? Or-”

“I’m sober, I’m parked over there.” You gesture down the street with your chin at where you’d expertly parallel parked earlier in the night.

“Can I walk you to your car?” Sam offers, and you raise a brow at him playfully. He shrugs with a wolfish smile. “Just trying to earn the right to have said hello and taken up all this time of yours so far.”

You pretend to consider it, then nod. “Sure, I’ll let you walk me to my car.”

He holds his arm out for you to take, saying “This way, pretty girl.”

You loop your arm through his and try to squash down the butterflies in your stomach. This may be new territory for you, but his charm is still the same. By tomorrow, this will be another “first meeting” added to the list.

As you both get closer to your car, he hums a little, and you glance at him. “Something on your mind?”

“Would it be overstepping if I asked you out for coffee tomorrow? Or maybe brunch, if you like that sort of thing?”

You blink.

That’s…new too.

“Well. I guess that depends.” You say, digging into your purse for your keys and unlocking your car as you approach it. He reaches for your door, opening it for you, and you spin to look at him.

Huh. You think. He actually looks hopeful. 

Too bad.

“Depends on?”

You smile, a slight edge to it as you shrug off his jacket, holding it in your hand. 

“What’s my name?”

Sam blinks, and then he laughs a little, “Really? Is that it?”

“Part of it.” You say, holding his jacket out to him. 

“What’s the other part?” He asks, then pushes his jacket back to you. “Keep it,” he insists. 

You smirk, draping the jacket over one of his shoulders. “Nope, you can’t use your jacket as an excuse to see me either.”

“So it’s just your name?” He puts the jacket on, sticking his hands in the pockets. “Your name and you’ll come with me to brunch?”

“Sure,” you say with a shrug. He opens his mouth, and you can see your name is right on his lips, and you hold a hand up, effectively silencing him. “Not now.” At his confused look, you give him a small, wicked smile. “A week from now.”

Sam almost jolts, the shock written all over his face. “What?”

“If you can remember my name a week from now, if you want to have made ‘taking up all my time’ tonight worth it, then I’ll go to brunch with you. Next Saturday, eleven o’clock, at Piper’s Diner on Main Street.”

You toss your purse into your car in the passenger seat and he starts to stutter. You smirk, getting into the car, shutting the door, and rolling the window down once you start it. 

He bends down to look at you, the shock still on his face. “You’re being serious?”

“Very serious.” You insist. He lets out a breath, hanging his head in disbelief. You revel in it for a second, then say his name. It gets his attention, his gaze drifting to yours, an almost hopeful twinkle to them. “If you can’t remember it, don’t bother coming.”

Sam blinks again. For a second, you expect him to say screw it, to say it’s not worth it and say thanks but no thanks and head back to the bar.

Instead, he takes you by surprise. “I’ll remember it. See you at Piper’s, pretty lady. Drive safely, okay?” He winks at you, then takes a step back from the curb and onto the sidewalk.

Cocky. You muse. 

Without another word, you put your eyes to the road, putting your car in drive and pulling out of your spot, taking off down the street. You don't even bother casting a glance at him in the rearview mirror.

It won’t matter.

Like always, he won’t remember by the morning.

He never does.

~

In school, they always called it “the true test of love.” 

They made it sound so romantic, so ideal.

But to you it always sounded like a curse.

“Soulmate bonds, true soulmate bonds, are rare for humans now. There are only about three types of identifying symptoms that can help to solidify that the person who is your true match is in fact, yours. The last of those three symptoms is the most common.” Your high school health teacher had explained. 

“All three symptoms have to do with memory. The first symptom is memory sharing - meaning that anything your soulmate learns or begins to remember, so do you. The second deals with memories as dreams, where as you sleep, you ‘dream’ of a memory that your soulmate has. Now these symptoms aren’t as frequent, or as common, but they do happen, and it’s just as it sounds. The third symptom is the most common.”

What she didn’t say was that it was also the most unfortunate, frustrating, and useless symptom known to humankind.

It dealt with memory loss. Specifically, memory loss regarding their soulmate.

It was ridiculous and cruel. To think that you’d meet the person destined for you, to be with for the rest of your lives and every life after, and all they can do is forget you.

“It only happens to one soulmate, not both. But, if you do have a soulmate, it is likely that they will forget things about you. They could forget small things, things like your favorite color, your favorite food, or they could forget time - not realizing how much of it has passed. They can also forget the big things - such as your name, your face, sometimes they may forget ever meeting you. The latter now is not a punishment, but rather a sign - a sign at how imperative you are to that person’s soul, that they must meet you again and again and again to understand what it is to meet you, lose you, love you, and fight to keep you.”

A pain in the ass. You had thought to yourself. 

“There can be small stretches of memory loss, or long stretches. Meaning you can meet your soulmate, and they’d forget you within the next few hours, or, you could meet them and they would remember everything about you until one day, they just stopped.”

“So you could be with them, and they'll remember you every day for years, and then it can just…stop?” You had asked in disbelief.

Your teacher nodded, but her demeanor remained hopeful, while yours turned sour.

That sounded horrible.

“How do you know which one of you is meant to forget the other?” A classmate of yours had asked.

“You won’t know until you either remember it all, or until you meet them for the second time and they forget you.”

Your heart broke in your chest. How awful.

“Do they forget you forever?” Another classmate had asked. “Do they ever stop forgetting? Is there ever a time where they remember?”

There was a fond smile on your teacher’s face when she nodded. “They do eventually remember, yes, and the forgetting will stop when it’s time. There will come a day where they’ll remember everything they’ve forgotten. However, it can take time. My husband and I had technically been off and on for about ten years before he finally remembered everything. It was our wedding day when he finally remembered everything - the best wedding present I could have received.” 

You had frowned at that. That was pure luck, and you knew for yourself you would never get to the point of marriage if your soulmate wasn’t going to remember marrying you.

“Are you supposed to help them remember?” You couldn’t help but ask. “If they forget, are we supposed to tell them we’ve met before? That they already know us?”

She’d paused, clearly trying to choose her words carefully. “You can, but you have to do it carefully. It could interfere with their ability to naturally remember in the long run if you force their memories.”

That pretty much helped you make up your mind. 

If anything, you hoped you were one of the common people who didn’t have a soulmate. You didn’t want to deal with any of that business if it meant dealing with memory loss, if that memory loss was meant to test how “destined” you were for one another, if you couldn’t even tell your soulmate that they knew you before they remembered that they knew you.

Destiny was cruel, and you wanted no part of it.

~ 

Over the last seven years, you’d met your soulmate exactly five times before.

The first time you met was when you were eighteen and at your first college party. He was there too, drinking along with the other freshmen on his team while the older ones supervised. 

The second you saw him, time slowed, your heartbeat picked up, and you even managed to muse aloud, “He’s the cutest boy I’ve ever seen.”

Serena, your best friend and roommate, told you his name then. 

Sam Malinski. 

You’d spoken it softly, repeating it to yourself to commit it to memory before you’d been dragged in the direction of your friend’s friends.

Some time later that night, someone suggested a game of spin the bottle and seven minutes in heaven.

You’d been dragged into the circle by Serena, and he’d been shoved into it by his friends. He’d spun the bottle, and you both ended up pushed into the hallway closet closest to the circle with the warning that there'd be three loud knocks on the door once you time was up. 

Sam was tipsy, close to drunk for sure, his words slightly slurred when he said “Hi there. What’s your name?”

You told him, and he gave his name back to you before he hummed, sobering himself up enough to tell you “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. We can just sit here.” 

“I want to,” you told him honestly. “I don’t mind.”

“Are you sure?” He asked. You could hear him fumbling, moving his hand along the wall to try to probably find the light, and that was the last thing you wanted - was for him to see your face up close, to be able to see you fully.

You were afraid he’d be mortified, think you weren't attractive, stick with just a peck to the cheek or forehead and then fumble around on his phone for the rest of the time.

So you reached forward, managed to find his hand and bring it between you. You traced your hand up his arm until you found his face, and then you brought him down to you and kissed him.

It was your first kiss.

Ever.

You were surprised with how quickly and how easily he had kissed you back, how his hands found their way into your hair, scratching gently along your scalp as he pressed your back against the wall. You kissed each other like you’d done it a thousand times before, but it didn’t feel practiced at all. It just felt…natural. Like it made all the sense in the world.

You were lost in his lips, lost in the way he went from having his fingers in your hair, to dropping them to your shoulders to bring you impossibly closer, to then cupping your face in his hands, using his grip to tilt your head this way and that as he pressed kisses from your mouth, to your jaw, your neck - nosing along the column to inhale your perfume, along the exposed line of your collarbone, and then back again until his lips were on yours once more. 

You kissed and kissed and held tightly to one another until a loud barrage of knocking and laughter rained upon the closet door, and just like that, your first kiss was over, and whatever had developed between you both in those seven minutes began to slowly fade out.

“Dammit,” he’d cursed, hands dropping away from your body.

Your own hands fell to your sides right when the door flew open, the light from the party flooding into the pitch black closet and nearly blinding you. You felt Serena grab your wrist and all but yank you out of that closet, her and your other friends immediately demanding to know if you were okay and whether or not you’d been upset.

As they dragged you away from the closet, you’d turned your head back to look at him, and found him only a few steps outside of the closet as his friends and teammate surrounded him. The second you looked at him, it was like he felt your gaze, so he looked up, and you’d caught each other's gaze, eyes locked on one another, matching dazed expressions on your faces that remained until your friends tugged you around a corner.

You didn’t see each other at all the rest of the night, no matter how hard you tried to look for him.

The second time you’d met was the next day, in the morning breakfast line at the cafeteria. You’d been standing at the back of your group of friends, all of them waiting patiently with their trays to grab the steaming food waiting at the buffet in front of them when someone bumped into you from behind, apologizing profusely the second it happened.

You’d turned around, ready with a kind smile, “It’s oka-” was right on your lips, but the rest of the word died and your heart stuttered.

It was him.

“Oh,” you said. “Hi again.”

Sam stared back at you, puzzled. “Hi there. I’m sorry,” he repeated, voice sleep rough but filled with genuine apology. “Have we met before?”

Your heart came to a crashing halt behind your rib cage and disappointment flooded your veins, but you kept your kind smile where it was as you shook your head. “Oh no, I’m sorry. I think I mistook you for someone else.”

He’d stared at you for a second, clearly trying to think, but your friends had called your name, and you turned, following them as the line began to move. You’d turned back to see him, to ask yourself if that had just happened, but he was already gone, being dragged to the breakfast burrito station by his teammates. 

When you’d sat down to eat, Serena asked “Was that the guy from last night?”

“I thought so,” you’d said. “But I guess it wasn’t him.”

She raised a brow. “Are you sure? It looked just like him.”

You shook your head, digging into your scrambled eggs. “Apparently not.”

Serena gave you a look. “Babe, does that mean he’s-”

“Nope,” you insisted, shoving a forkful of food into your mouth.

You knew what it meant, back then, that he didn’t remember you. You had hoped deep in your heart that it was just a boy being an asshole, that he genuinely didn’t remember and it wasn’t because of some soulmate bullshit.

But you knew. Deep down, you knew.

He was your soulmate. 

And apparently, your soulmate lost his memories of you within twelve hours.

The third time you met, it was three years later, in a class your senior year.

You’d seen him here and there over the years. Never kissed him again, never ran into him intentionally or accidentally, never dared to put yourself in his path. He went pro sometime during your sophomore year, so you thought for sure you’d never see him again, until senior year, when he hopped into the lecture hall of your mythology elective class during the first day, a cast on his leg as he moved on crutches, and plopped down in the seat in front of you.

You kept your composure, resolved to pretend like he didn’t exist.

Till he turned around and gave you a kind smile, hair still a little wet from his morning shower.

“Hi there, I’m sorry, it’s been a while since I’ve done this so it looks like I forgot a pen. Would you happen to have a spare?”

“Oh,” was all you could muster. “Sure.” You dug in your bag and handed him the only spare you had, and he’d given you a kilowatt smile in return.

“Thanks.” Sam said, and then his face morphed into a softer expression, smile getting smaller, a little dimmer, but still kind. He introduced himself again, then said “And you are?”

You gave him your name for the second time in your lives, and this time, he repeated it, saying “Well it’s nice to meet you,” before turning around as a couple of his buddies, and now former teammates, spilled into the lecture hall and rushed to sit beside him.

From what you gathered from eavesdropping - well, it was hardly eavesdropping when they were speaking so loudly, and right in front of you - he’d gotten injured toward the end of his season in the big leagues and got surgery at the end of the summer. He managed to work out a deal with the school and his team for him to be able to come back to campus as a commuter and finish out his degree that he’d apparently been working on online, even though he’d left campus two years prior.

You found it admirable, at the time.

Once class was over, he’d gotten up and left without so much as a glance back at you, taking your pen with him. 

He never showed for the next class, his teammates griping about how he’d been forced to go back to the team and to travel with them instead, continuing his courses online.

“Good riddance,” you tried to convince yourself to think. But it didn’t work.

You graduated, got a job, moved to Denver, and started your life. 

A few years later, he got traded, and moved to the same city.

So, you’d met for the fourth time on a Friday night in a club downtown, a place called Luisa’s. It was popular, frequently packed, and exactly the kind of place you went to when you needed to let loose and pretend your life was anything other than it was.

You’d been dancing with your friends and some co-workers, and once you grew thirsty, you found your way towards the bar where you ordered yourself and your friends a few drinks.

He was there of course, waiting for a round of beers for his friend, and when he spotted you, that same, signature smile of his already splayed on his features.

You didn’t get your hopes up that time either. You looked different than you had the last time you’d seen him, your hair had gotten longer and a little lighter from all the time you’d been forcing yourself to spend in the sun. All your friends told you how much hotter you’d gotten with age.

Figures your soulmate would confirm that for you, all the while not remembering a single thing about you. 

“Hi there.” Sam had said, then handed his card to the bartender and gestured towards you with his head. “Put her drinks on my tab, too.”

The bartender nodded and took the card before you could even start to protest, and you let out a small sigh. “Thank you, but you didn’t have to do that.”

“Gave me an excuse to talk to you, didn’t it?”

A small bubble of a laugh had almost left you in the moment. That was new, you remembered. He’d never been cheesy before. The trace of that smile had been on your lips still when he’d saddled up to you, getting in your space enough to close the distance but also remaining far enough away that you could leave if you really wanted to.

He introduced himself the same way he always did, and for the fourth time, you introduced yourself too, the same way you did before. He repeated your name again, a smile playing on his lips.

“What brings you to Luisa’s?” He asked you.

You shrugged. “The same as everyone else. You?”

“Well it was the same as everyone else.”

“Was?”

“The same as everyone else was getting kind of boring till I saw you. Now I’m staying because I want to get to know you.”

You remember you scoffed internally at that. You were sure just like before, you’d never get that far.

And you were right.

Later that night, you found yourselves drunkenly making out in a supply closet toward the back of the club, when the fire alarm went off, forcing you apart, which had been followed by a barrage of knocking on the door. He opened it with a frustrated sigh to find that his friends and yours were waiting there, the latter of which grabbed you and dragged you away, the blaring of the alarm drowning out their no doubt intense line of questioning. 

He’d called after you that time, shouting your name among the alarm, but you didn’t look back.

Not right away at least.

When you did chance a glance behind you, you were slightly surprised to see Sam was watching you go, and you gave him a little wave goodbye.

The fifth time you met was the following morning in the grocery store. 

You’d managed to ease your small hangover earlier that morning and decided grocery shopping would be a good way to get yourself out and about so you didn’t just sit and do nothing for the rest of the weekend.

He was there, in the produce section grabbing potatoes while you grabbed onions. 

When he accidentally bumped your side when moving to get onions next, you didn’t bother looking up at him. Just accepted his sorry with a quiet “no worries,” and turned your back to him, heading for the bell peppers next. 

You chanced a glance at him, to see if he might have remembered who you were this time, considering it was the second time he’d had his tongue down your throat.

He didn’t. 

Sam barely looked in your direction before he sauntered off, and you grabbed your produce and went in the opposite direction.

As always.

Of all those five times, he never remembered you the next day, never seemed to be able to remember your name, your face, or the fact that you’d been pretty familiar with each other’s lips. 

So you knew, as soulmates, that would probably be the pattern you had until fate decided it was time for him to remember.

That’s why when this sixth encounter came, you’d been better prepared. 

He may have gone off script for once and suggested meeting again, but even if you knew whether you’d meet again or not, it would be just like always.

Hi there.

What’s your name?

The night would progress, maybe with a kiss, maybe not, but once you were out of sight, time would reset for him, and then it’d only be a matter of time before you’d meet again - you with every memory of before, Sam with no recollection at all.

Hi there.

What’s your name?

Repeat. 

~

That fateful Saturday, you saddled up in your normal seat at the breakfast bar at Piper’s, smiling at Serena from her place at the espresso machine. Piper’s was extremely busy, busier than normal for a Saturday morning rush, and yet Serena looked as beautiful as ever, like none of this fazed her in the slightest.

She’d quit her corporate job about a year and a half ago, exhausted with the mundanity of her nine to five, and on the walk back to your shared apartment, had found a restaurant space for lease. After considering her savings and deciding she had nothing to lose, she opened up Piper’s Diner.

You were proud of how far she’d come, proud of how she never seemed exhausted or tired, proud of how much she loved the place.

“One best friend special, Eddie,” Serena calls back to the kitchen, tossing a wink in your direction before expertly loading up three coffees, two hot chocolates, and a few matcha lattes onto a tray and distributing them among the customers around the diner.

One of her waitresses, Jenna, places an orange juice and a glass of ice water down in front of you, like always, then puts her phone down, a picture of her latest design on the screen.

“Holy shit!” You exclaim, grabbing her phone and zooming in. Jenna was a student at the fashion institute, and had been working on a collection of clothing for one of her exam grades. 

The design you were looking at was of a floral embroidered midi dress, flaunting a corset-style bodice and a column skirt topped with blue floral embroidery. It was stunning, and in the next picture, you saw the corset top had a lace-up back, along with a low-back cut-out.

“The collection theme I’m going with is ‘Eve’s Garden,’ and that is my first piece.” She says. 

It was truly stunning, and Jenna giggled when you looked up to gape at her.

“How on earth do you come up with these designs?” You ask, then zoom in on the photo to get a closer look at the embroidery. 

Jenna shrugs, “Oh you know, just magic I suppose.”

You open your mouth to respond, but your voice is seized from you when you hear a familiar voice call your name.

Hoping the shock isn’t written all over your face, you turn on your stool, in complete disbelief when you see Sam standing there.

What.

The.

Fuck.

Your heart rate skyrockets to a hundred, and you do your best not to unhinge your jaw completely when it drops a little in shock, before you snap it back shut almost immediately.

What is he doing here?

Did he actually just call my name? You think. You want to pinch yourself to be sure, but instead, you flex your toes in your sneakers, rolling your ankle subtly, trying to find any proof that you are in fact, settled in reality and that Sam Malinski of all people is still standing in front of you.

Your soulmate.

Your soulmate who until now - never remembered a thing about you, and certainly not your name.

He’s in a light sweater, black jacket, and dark jeans, hands stuffed in his pockets as he looks at you with a sheepish smile. “I said I’d remember it, didn’t I?”

And he did…but…

“How did you-” You cut yourself off, knowing you can’t actually ask him. How did you remember me? How did you remember any of it? How are you here right now?

“Cat got your tongue?” He teases, moving from his spot and taking a seat on the barstool next to yours.

Jenna’s staring at him with a skeptical look, dragging her gaze back to you as if to say “Who’s this dude?” 

Sam either doesn’t notice the tense atmosphere he’s created or doesn’t care, smiling easily at Jenna and saying “I’ll have whatever she’s having, please.”

She nods, shooting you a look that means “the group chat will hear about this,” before turning to the little window to the kitchen, shouting her order to Eddie and grabbing a couple glasses to fill for Sam's orange juice and water.

You realize you’re still staring at him, and it’s probably uncomfortable, but you don’t know what else to do.

He smiles, laughing a little. “I can understand why you’re shocked, but I did say I would remember, and that I wanted to see you again.”

Again?

There has never been an “again,” never been a “next time,” and you want to tell him that. You want to tell him that and shake him and explain to him just why this is exactly the big deal you are trying so hard to not make it out to be.

But then his smile fades a bit, and his eyes fill partially with concern. “Did…did you forget?”

“No,” you insist, and his concern disappears almost immediately. “I didn’t forget.”

I just thought that you would.

“I’m surprised, that's all.” You continue. “A week is a long time.”

“Is it?” He muses. “I mean…it did feel a bit long - I was pretty excited to see you again.”

The smile that creeps up on your lips is there before you even realize it, and you can feel the heat flush in the apples of your cheeks. You see Jenna approach out of the corner of your eye, and turn your head toward her as she approaches with Sam's drinks. She puts it down, her eyes darting between you two.

“This is Sam,” you explain, cutting to the chase. 

When she hears his name, you can see the bit of recognition there, and she offers a polite smile. “Nice to meet you,” and then to you, she says. “Food will be out in a bit. Did you need a side of fries?”

You look at Sam, who gestures as if to say “up to you,” before turning back to Jenna with a nod.

You’d need all the comfort food you could get, at this point.

When she walks away, you turn to him, fumbling for something to say. 

You’d never actually gotten this far with him before.

For all that in the past he’d prepared you to deal with meeting him over and over, and then him forgetting you over and over, you’d never actually considered or had to be prepared with him remembering you. 

He beats you to it though. “So, was it officially worth it? Me taking up all your time last Saturday?”

“Yes,” you say, almost immediately. Because it’s true.

Because this is the first time you’ve gotten this far with him before.

And it was new, exciting, and nerve wracking.

It maybe even made you feel a bit…hopeful?

You tamp it all down anyway, because again, you’ve never gotten this far with him before, and you don’t know how much farther you can go.

But for now…for now you’re just tempted to find out.

“It was worth it,” you promise him. 

Sam smiles, dazzling and charming and soft, and holds out his glass of orange juice. You hold yours up, and he lightly clinks your glasses together.

“To it being worth it,” he explains, and you smile right back at him.

“To it being worth it.”

~

Brunch flies by, your plates of food cleared and discarded as the two of you split a second basket of fries.

You’d learned so much about him this time. More than you ever got the chance to before, and it had you clinging to your barstool as you leaned in, listening with rapt attention as he spoke to you.

It wasn’t until he happened to glance at the clock on the wall that he flashes a sheepish smile, wiping his hands nervously on his jeans. 

“Sorry,” he says, “I didn’t mean to take up all your time. You probably had other plans.”

“I didn’t,” you say, honestly. “Usually my Saturday mornings are brunch here, and then I spend the rest of the day at home.”

He smiles softly. “Oh, okay. In that case, do you feel up to doing something else? With me, I mean. Something else with me. Maybe?”

His nervousness brings a smile to your lips. Cute. 

“I’d love to.” You say, and Sam’s charming smile is back in full force. He politely waves Jenna over and hands her his card for the bill. When you protest almost immediately, he shakes his head. 

“Absolutely not,” he tells you. “This is definitely a date and I prefer to do things old school.”

A date.

Your heart flutters, even if just for a little. There’s also a part of your subconscious that tells you it’s a bit silly to get excited over a date with the guy who is most definitely your soulmate, but you tamp it down, offering a kind smile instead.

“Well, thank you. Genuinely.” You say, “I appreciate it.” 

It’s another few minutes before Sam settles the bill, and when you both stand to leave, you see Jenna and Serena watching the two of you with curious eyes. You flash them a reassuring smile, waving your fingers. They both give you another look that says “We’ll discuss this later.”

You follow Sam outside, and he stuffs his hands in his pocket, turning to you. “Would you prefer to take your car, or mine?”

Quietly, you gesture to where your car is parked near the curb. “I’m right here.” 

He smiles, pointing to the black BMW next to your car. “I’m right next to you.”

“Rock, paper, scissors?” You tease, smirk playing at the corner of your mouth.

You’re only half surprised when he actually sticks his hand out, fingers curled into a loose fist. It makes you laugh a little, and you hold out your own fist.

You both shake your fists three times, then throw out your weapon of choice.

You throw scissors.

Sam throws rock.

You push air through your nostrils, absolutely not pouting when you look at his face. He laughs, eyes crinkling, playfully and gently bringing his fist down on to your two fingers. A shiver runs up your spine at the contact, goosebumps erupting on your arms. 

“Looks like you’re riding with me, pretty girl.” He teases, then walks over to his car, unlocking it as he approaches and opens the passenger side door.

You pointedly ignore the pet name.

Sam looks up when he notices you’re not there, frowning slightly when he sees you’re still standing in your place on the sidewalk, arms crossed over your chest and a questioning look on your face. He smirks as he rests one arm on the roof of his car, the other on the top of the door. 

“Need something else?” He asks. “You can take a picture of my license plate to send to your friends, if you need to. I don’t mind it.” 

“They’ve got my live location,” you inform him, “So that’s not really wholly necessary.”

“Then why aren’t you getting in?” Sam questions, gesturing at your current position with his chin. 

You tilt your head at him curiously. “Where are you taking me?”

“On part two of this date I worked so hard to earn.” He teases.

You scoff. “I didn’t make you work that hard.”

“Waiting a week to see you again was hard,” he reasons, stepping around the car door and then shutting it so he can approach you on the sidewalk once more. “Especially because it was all I could think about every day.” 

You look up at him from below your lashes, skeptical. “Sam, I-”

He takes you by surprise, carefully undoing your crossed arms and taking one of your hands to link your pinkies together. He makes a small cross over his heart with his other hand, before resting it on top of your linked pinkies. “I swear that I will take you on a fun and enjoyable second half of this date and return you here early enough that you can drive home safely while the sun is still out. And if you don’t have fun with me, then you can call it quits at any time and I will immediately bring you right back.”

He looks at you afterward, expectant, and you can’t help the small smile that creeps up on your face, looking down at your feet to school your expression before the smile gets too big.

It’s just because you’ve never gotten to this point with him. You remind yourself. It’s not a big deal.

“Alright,” you concede. “I accept your promise.”

Sam gently untangles your hands, only to lace his fingers between yours, taking a tentative step back and pulling you with him. “You trust me, right?”

There was…so much you wanted to say in response. Because in truth, of course you did. It didn’t matter if he didn’t know that you’d known him for almost ten years at this point, it didn’t matter that he didn’t realize you two had been more than well acquainted, or that he couldn’t remember a single bit of it.

He was your soulmate, so even if he didn’t know it, of course you trusted him.

But still, this was a version of him you weren’t completely familiar with, so you just say “I’m starting to.”

The smile Sam gives you in return is blinding. “Good enough for me.”

~

There had been times over the years you’d thought about him.

You couldn’t help it - no matter whether he remembered you or not, no matter how much time had passed, no matter how much you hated the things you’d have to endure as his soulmate, the unknown amount of times you’d have to have your heart broken over and over and your hopes shot down, you thought about him.

You would think about him on your tough days at school, your tough days at work, during holidays when you would see couples and families out and about, even at home with your own family as each of your cousins got engaged, got married, started having children. 

If it was on, if he played, then during the nights you missed him, or wanted to be close to him, you’d turn on one of his games, content to just sit and watch. Whenever he came on screen or the announcers spoke his name, you’d felt your heart almost throb in response, as if it was trying to leap out of your chest to go to him. Serena and Jenna and your other friends crowded around you in those times, sharing in your joy.

They were there for you through it all, and especially in that moment - knowing exactly who he was, knowing what you’d been through with him, knowing who he was to you, and knowing that it was still very important for you to have this moment to celebrate with him from a distance. 

You still weren’t quite sure what was next for the two of you, what this all meant, but you knew that if anything, it was nice for the two of you to be able to have something tangible for once, for him to be more than just a passing encounter, or a wistful thought before bed.

~

You pull up to the player’s lot behind Ball Arena, a little hesitant as you roll your window down for one of the attendants in the lot.

“Hi,” you say, trying to sound confident. “I’m uh, I’m supposed to be picking up Sam Malinski? He told me to wait for him here?” You say, and you’re surprised when the attendant’s face lights up at the mention of Sam.

“Oh of course! He did mention you’d be coming. Right this way, I’ll have you park in his spot.”

You nod, offering a kind smile before rolling your window up, following the attendant to a parking spot a few doors down from an entrance, pulling in and parking. The attendant taps on your window, and you roll it down again, accepting the visitor’s pass he offers.

“You’re welcome to stay in here, or if you need to use the restroom or anything, the door is open and you’re free to go on inside.”

You carefully place the visitor’s pass on your dashboard, “Thank you, I appreciate it.” 

Once the attendant walks away, you feel yourself being able to breathe a little easier, but there’s still a small bundle of nerves sitting in your stomach. You decide to stay in the car, texting Sam to let him know you’d arrived, and that you were in his parking spot whenever he was ready.

He’d taken you to Meow Wolf, an interactive exhibit that the two of you surprisingly spent a solid three hours at, before he took you to Little Man Ice Cream, and eventually dropped you off at your car in front of Piper’s. At that point, you and Sam had exchanged numbers, and over the past two weeks since, had been texting back and forth, speaking on the phone a few times, and FaceTimed once. 

With his schedule and yours, it had been a little tough to find time to meet up since that initial Saturday, but you’d managed to find some time today. It was a Thursday afternoon, and you’d agreed to come and pick Sam up once you’d finished work and he’d finished practice. He had a game tomorrow night, one you’d be attending with Serena, and then Sam would be heading out on a trip for a series of games in California that following day.

He wanted to take you out for dinner at one of his favorite restaurants to enjoy the outdoor patio before the cold really settled in, and you couldn’t help but be a little excited. 

Again - you’d never gotten this far with him before, so every new moment the two of you spent together, every day that passed that he still remembered you, it made you tingle.

The hope that had bloomed that first day at Piper’s continued to grow and grow, a swarm of butterflies taking permanent hold in your stomach with a field of flowers to match. 

Sam doesn’t make you wait long - he’s coming out of the player’s entrance after less than ten minutes, a duffle bag slung over his shoulder. You hear a cacophony of noise follow him as the automatic door slowly shuts, can see his teammates and friends jeering at him, a few of them smiling and waving at you.

You’re familiar with them, of course. Had met them a few times since his arrival in Denver, but Sam didn’t remember that, and his teammates and friends probably didn’t either.

To be kind, you wave back, smiling softly and then laughing when you can see Sam follow your wave, turning back to his teammates and shouting something at them that makes them scatter like ants.

When he approaches your car, you pop the trunk for him before opening your door. He meets you right as you exit the car by wrapping you into a warm hug, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of your hair.

“Hi there,” he murmurs, and you fight back the shiver that threatens to run up your spine.

You were starting to like that phrase from him more and more by the day.

“Hi,” you parrot back, rubbing his back gently. “Ready to go?”

Sam nods, then carefully releases you. You lead him to the trunk so he can put away his bag before you’re both rounding back to the front of the car, Sam taking the driver’s seat and you in the passenger seat, since Sam knows where he’s going.

As the two of you pull out of the lot and head through the city, you turn a little in your chair to face him. “How was your day? Good?”

“It was good, better now though.” He says, turning to you to give a playful wink before returning his attention to the road. “What about you? How was work? Did the photoshoot go well today?”

You worked at an interior design firm as a photographer and assisted with set design on the side, and Sam found it extremely interesting. He’d told you that once upon a time he wanted to study architectural design, which you’d already known, but you didn’t think that because of that he’d be all that interested in your line of work. 

He’d proven you wrong - another unexpected but welcome miracle.

“It did,” you admit. “Better than I expected.”

“Told you that you didn’t have to worry about anything.” Sam points out. His tone is gentle, encouraging, and he reaches across the center console to rest a calm hand on your knee. 

The touch makes you shy all of a sudden, though you’re not sure why. He’d been handsy in the past, so you had a feeling physical touch was something he preferred, but this was different.

Everything was different, especially now.

“You did say that,” you muse, resting your own hand on top of his. 

“Good thing we’re gonna go stuff our faces with pasta to celebrate then, isn’t it?” He says teasingly.

You look at him, really taking him in.

From the outside, anyone who might not know that the two of you did have a past, they might tell you that you’re moving a little too fast, that your efforts for the past several years to keep your heart out of the equation was starting to be for nothing.

Sam was your soulmate, and not even death could sever that, or change it. And the more you got to know him, the more you knew the possibility of him forgetting you was still high, and probably unavoidable.

But you didn’t know if you really cared about that anymore.

“Yeah,” you say, almost too quiet. “It’s a good thing.”

~

You two stuff your faces full of pasta and share a slice of the richest chocolate cake you’ve probably ever had in your life.

Sam has his game the next night, which you and Serena attend - you with bright eyes and a thrill of excitement as you sit several rows above the glass, eyes on him the entire time. 

The Avalanche win 3-1 and after the game, Sam asks to meet you near the player’s entrance in the lot.

Serena waits with you, the both of you chatting idly and greeting some of Sam’s teammates and their family and friends as they each make their way out of the arena to head home.

Sam follows after them a little later, hair still wet from his post game shower and dripping a little onto his suit jacket. He finds you easily, and once you lock eyes, you smile at him, waving. He responds with a smile of his own, opening his arms when he’s only steps away and you fall into him when he gets close enough, eyes falling shut and inhaling the scent of him.

He presses a kiss to your forehead, his quiet “hi there” pressed against your scalp before he pulls away, keeping one hand resting around your waist as he greets Serena.

“Do you mind if I steal her from you?” he asks, and Serena sends you a smirk and a wiggle of her eyebrows.

“Not at all,” she says sweetly. The two of you had arrived separately because Serena had a feeling this might happen, and though you had initially denied it, you did pack an overnight bag just in case, one that was resting in the trunk of your car right now.

Sam turns to you, a small question in his eyes. “Do you mind being stolen?”

“It’d be a first,” you tease, “but I’m open to it.”

You say your goodbyes to Serena, who promises to text you when she gets home, and Sam follows you to your car. You hand him the keys, climbing into the passenger seat while he throws his things into your trunk.

When you pull out of the lot, there’s a part of you that wants to ask where you’re going, but you already know the answer, so you keep your mouth closed, welcoming Sam’s resting hand on your knee. You lace your fingers with his loosely, resting your head against the back of your seat as Sam navigates his way through the city.

You’d never spent the night at his place before, not now, not all those years ago, so you’re a little surprised when Sam drives past apartment building after apartment building and pulls into a residential neighborhood, driving past house after house until he pulls into a dead end street with a roundabout at the end. 

Sam parks just two houses down from the roundabout, in front of a two story contemporary style home, with an honest to god wrap around front porch with the lights on. 

A quiet exhale of amazement leaves your chest, and Sam chuckles softly from beside you. Your head turns to him at the sound, and he smiles. “Like it?”

“It’s really nice,” you say honestly. Because it is. 

“I just want to say, before we go in,” he starts, throat thick with what you can sense is both hesitance and anxiety. “I’m not…I’m not expecting anything, you know? I just wanted to spend time with you before I left, and I don’t expect you to stay the whole night. My teammate is picking me up in the morning so we can head to the airport, so you don’t have to worry about it if you decide you want to leave, and-”

You squeeze the hand that’s resting on your knee, laughing a little when you say “Sam. Sam, it’s okay. I want to stay.”

He blinks. “You do?”

“I do,” you nod. “I um…I don’t know that I feel comfortable with…anything else? But I’m fine to stay, to spend time with you. I don’t mind spending the night, so long as it is just to spend the night.”

The smile filled with all his boyish charm spreads wide across his face, and it makes you giggle a bit. He laughs with you, relieved, and nods to himself. “Okay, okay cool.”

Together, the two of you exit your car, grabbing your belongings and heading inside.

There’s a split second when you cross the threshold into his house for the first time when you feel a shock of electricity run down your spine, and you can’t help but wonder if it’s a sign, or an omen.

~

In the morning, you wake first, content to remain in his arms and watch him for a moment.

Mornings after or next days had never been kind to the two of you.

This was the first time you’d really gotten to see him like this - soft, gentle, at peace and sleeping like he didn’t have a care in the world. And maybe he didn’t. 

At least that made one of you.

You’re not sure how long you lay there watching him, listening to him breathe and thinking about all the times you’d silently wished for moments like this before. His alarm eventually rings, vibrating under his pillow.

You do what you think is the decent thing and close your eyes, breathing quietly and listening as Sam slowly wakes, sheets rustling as he turns his alarm off then stretches out. A moment later, you can feel his hand gently brushing hair out of your face, fingertips brushing against your skin as he goes. You open your eyes then, and when you do, you observe the way he tracks your expression, staring back at you quietly, almost like he’s looking for something.

Whatever it is, you think he finds it, because then he’s smiling at you, leaning forward in the space between you and pressing a series of gentle kisses to your hairline, murmuring “Hi there,” voice fraught with sleep.

You hum quietly, murmuring it back into his shoulder. 

“I have to get up,” he speaks into your hair, but it sounds a lot more like he’s convincing himself. “I still have to pack and make food and stuff.”

“Don’t you eat on the plane?” 

“That’s lunch, not breakfast.” He says, and you can’t see him, but you can picture the wrinkle in his nose.

“You get ready then,” you say. “I’ll make you something.”

Sam makes a small noise of protest. “You don’t have to do that, I can-”

“Breakfast is kind of my specialty.” You say. “My best friend owns a diner, and all.” 

He gasps a little. “Serena owns Piper’s? You didn’t tell me that.”

“Surprise?” You offer, and Sam laughs, lips meeting your forehead once more. “Go,” you say, patting his side. “You get ready, and I’ll go make breakfast.”

Sam gets ready in his bathroom while you get ready in the half bath and then head out into his kitchen. You find what you need, making quick work of his breakfast and putting it in the open lunch bag on the counter, cleaning up after yourself as you go. 

You hear a car pull into his driveway at the time Sam comes downstairs, he’s dressed in black slacks, a white dress shirt, navy blue tie, and a black blazer, his suitcase in one hand and his phone in the other. 

You take him by surprise a little when you hand him the lunch bag, “Two breakfast burritos. One with bacon, one with sausage.”

Sam is quick to smile, accepting it with a quiet and shy “thank you.”

“Like I said, it’s my specialty. It was nothing, really.”

“That’s more than I deserve,” Sam says, and you shake your head.

“I don’t think that’s true.” You say, smiling kindly, then double check the time on the clock on your oven. “You should probably get going though, I think your ride might be outside and I don’t want you to be late.”

“Okay baby, thank you.” Sam says, leaning forward and quickly dropping a kiss to your lips, once, twice, three times, before he pulls away.

Sam turns to bend and put on his shoes, failing to see the stunned look cross your eyes, your entire frame frozen in shock, lips still tingling from his affections. 

You hadn’t kissed him since…well, since that night at Luisa’s.

And that was two years ago.

Sam had only kissed you on your forehead so far. 

You’d forgotten how much you enjoyed kissing him, how soft his lips were, how earnest. 

But by the time he rights himself again, glancing back at you with a smile, you’d manage to wipe the incredulity away, smiling softly back at him in turn, offering a little wave when he tosses a “See you soon pretty girl” over his shoulders. 

You move to the front window, watching him get into his teammate’s car and drive off, watching till it disappears down the street, trying to understand why the tingling of your lips would not go away, and why your confusion around his kiss suddenly formed a ball of sadness in the pit of your stomach.

~

You’re at Piper’s later that day, still a little dazed. You were surprised you’d managed to lock up after yourself at Sam’s and had the wherewithal to bring yourself here to have a late lunch.

You’re almost done with your food when Serena approaches you from the other side of the counter, refilling your orange juice.

There’s a small look on her face that you can read from a mile away, so you gently set your fork down. “What?”

She raises a brow in open curiosity. “Have you told him?”

“Told who what?” You lie.

Serena sees right through you, of course. She always has. Instead of answering your question, she sets the pitcher of orange juice down behind her next to the soda fountain, then turns back to you, resting her hands on the countertop. 

“How long are you going to keep it from him?”

You pause. 

Because you honestly don’t know. 

“You can’t not tell him, you know.” Serena says, and though it’s gentle, it registers to you as ominous, and your stomach twists. 

“Does it matter?” You say instead, which you know is the wrong thing to say. Because it does matter. It mattered a whole hell of a lot to you a month ago, and you both know it. 

Serena just smiles easily, and somehow that makes it worse. “It doesn’t. Not to him, at least not right now, but it does to you.” When you frown, taking a bite of your french fries, she continues talking. “I just don’t want to see it happen to you again, and I think if you tell him, then it won’t.”

You blink up at her. 

Serena had been there for you, she’d seen it all. You knew she knew what she was talking about.

But all you could say in return was “It’s just…it’s still new. I’m just trying to enjoy it for a little longer.”

She’s quiet, and it unnerves you just a little. For all that Serena was your best friend, there was a part of you that looked to her like an older sister, so when she sighs through her nose and offers you a placating smile, it feels a lot like you’ve let her down.

~

A week later, you’re back at Sam’s house again, and he’s watching you work through editing some of the photos you took at your last design shoot. 

“Do you need anything?” He asks, approaching you from behind. Once he reaches you, your frame tense in the barstool at his kitchen counter, he places a comforting hand on your shoulder, gently caressing the skin there. You think at first he means to massage it, probably ro try to work through the small bundle of nerves at your shoulders, but that’s not what happens.

You can feel his careful movements as his hand moves up to your neck, reaching around and using his finger to tip your chin up, head back, so he can bend down and kiss you gently. His fingers gently rest on your throat, and it sends a shiver racing through your body.

It’s so…reminiscent of before. Of the way he would kiss you like the world would stop tomorrow if he didn’t, only for him to forget you the next day.

Part of it feels nice, familiar, and warm. The other part makes you a little afraid.

When he pulls back to look you in the eye, you stare right back at him, eyes widened in slight surprise and blinking at him. 

The corner of his mouth ticks up in a small smile as he watches you right yourself then turn on the barstool to face him, reaching out to brush your hair out of face. “What is it, pretty girl?”

There’s a pause, and you’re a little lost, afloat in the ocean and stranded. 

That is…new. Wholly welcome, but new.

When you see Sam’s patient expression, you shake your head softly and swallow down the lump in your throat. “Nothing. It’s nothing.”

“Was that…” He starts, suddenly looking unsure. “Was that okay?”

“More than okay,” you answer quickly, almost too quickly. “I just…”

He nods, as if to urge you on.

You’re not sure how to broach the subject at all, if you’re honest, and you almost regret saying anything instead of just enjoying it. You can see the nerves start to rise in his eyes, and you shake it all off, pushing it away.

You smile easily, reassuringly, and instead say “I really like you.”

Your confession visibly stuns him, his head jerking back slightly. He blinks at you, his hand falling to his side lamely. 

“I really like you, too. Though that might be a bit of an understatement.” he says simply, like it's a fact, like it’s a written rule in the universe, and smiles. 

“It’s only been like…two months, though?” You point out, not to prove him wrong, or say you don’t believe it, but also as a fact.

Sam doesn’t even falter. “I know. But when you know, you know, right?”

You blink back at him this time, shocked. Your heart hammers in your chest, pleased with his answer and still shocked at how easily those words come so easily from him, but the pit of doubt at the base of your spine is still there, still reminding you that this could be gone in the morning.

He misunderstands your silence as dissatisfaction with his answer, and you can see the worry as it begins to brew.

“Do you not…” He pauses for a second, unsure how to ask. “Do you not?”

“I do know.” You say, nodding. “I just…this is the first time.” 

The first time I’ve allowed myself to admit I might love you, even if you don’t know why, or for how long. 

“What?” Sam asks in a surprised gasp. 

You worry your bottom lip between your teeth, hesitating, before finally letting out a stressed breath. “Not with anyone.” 

He blinks. “What? No one?”

“No one.” You confirm. “I haven’t had something like this.”

“Like this?” He parrots, and you can tell he’s not asking because he’s not understanding. He’s asking because he wants to be sure of what you’re saying.

So you say it.

“Love.” Sam technically put it out there first, right? So… “A love like this. It’s new, and I guess I’m getting used to it, trying to understand it.”

Words, so many words, get caught in your throat when he doesn’t say anything, to the point that you’re not totally sure where to go from here. But then he’s reaching out to pull you in by your shoulders, wrapping his arms tightly around you and pressing his cheek to the top of your head.

“You can ask me as many questions as it takes for you to be able to understand it.” He says finally, pressing the words into the crown of your head. “I’ll answer every single one.”

“There might be a lot.” You murmur against his chest after a moment.

Your bodies shake together at his soft chuckle. “Every single one, baby. I’ll answer them all.”

~

As the next few months pass by - the two of you fall into a routine. 

You spend time after work and between his practices and games and all his travel. It’s at his house, mostly, but sometimes at your apartment. In the mornings, you make breakfast, and he will usually handle lunch, or dinner, or both. 

Sometimes, he’ll drive your car, or sometimes you’ll drive his, taking each other on dates around the city, or to and from each other’s place. As it gets colder, Sam insists on taking you skating, which you agree to, but it gets harder to plan for when the holidays kick up your schedule and Sam has to buckle down and focus on the season, the team quickly moving up to the top spot in the division.

You decide to save it for a special day, one that hasn’t arrived yet but probably will, and it excites you every time Sam mentions how much he’s looking forward to it.

He meets all of your friends, spends his free Saturday mornings at Piper’s with you. Even on the few days where you tell him you have to hop behind the counter to help out as Serena’s barista, Sam parks in your usually barstool and eats your regular order, ordering refills of his orange juice while he chats idly with Jenna, Serena, and even Eddie, who wanders out from the kitchen every now and again to slip Sam some fresh cookies before you can even put the rest on the counter. 

Most mornings, especially the ones where you wake up together, there are moments where you wait with bated breath to see if today will be the day, if you’ll have to let him go. You wait with so much anxiety you think it might make you burst, until the moment where he opens his eyes and greets you softly, pressing kisses to your face.

“Hi baby,” he says now. 

It’s what he says when he picks you up, when you pick him up, when he wakes up, when he comes back to you or you back to him, even if you’ve only been separated for five minutes, or even if you’ve only crossed the room to go right back to him.

“I love you,” he says now. 

In the moments when you come back to him, when he goes back to you, when he always has that smile ready for you, when he sees you in the kitchen, when he sees you waiting for him, opening his arms,  waiting and ready for you to run right into them.

It’s those moments, where you come back to him, when he comes back to you, that keep you hopeful.

~

“When are you going to tell him?” Serena asks you, more than once. 

Enough times in the six months that you go from saying “I don’t know” to “Soon, I will,” which in your heart means probably never, not if you didn’t have to.

Except you’d have to.

And you should’ve known better than to be hopeful.

~

About six months into your relationship, you agree to go out with Sam on a night out with his friends and teammates. Some of them you’ve met in passing when they pick Sam up at his house, or when you pick him up from practice, or when you say hello and make small talk at his games. You’ve met Gabe and Melissa, something Sam mentioned had to happen first, then met Nathan, the other Sam, Parker, Mikko, Casey, Miles, and Cale. 

You haven’t met all of them, or all of their significant others, but that’s part of what tonight is for, you suppose.

You and Sam arrive a bit early, Sam insisting that he wanted to have some time with you alone before things got crazy. And he was right.

The arrival of his friends and teammates and their significant others brings noise and creates quite the crowd. You’re in a bar you don’t think you’ve ever been to before, the name of it completely lost on you. 

You were too distracted by Sam and the tight grip he had on your hand as you walked in, eyes never leaving the side of his face, too insistent on taking in that excited expression of his.

Some of the older teammates get in a little later, including Nathan, who after he greets you, is visibly surprised.

“Oh! You two are together now?” Nathan teases, a hint of mirth in his eyes as his gaze falls on you, then back to Sam. “Since when?”

“Not long after we met for the first time at Valley Tavern, maybe a few months after?” Sam says proudly, wrapping an arm around your shoulder and pulling you closer. There's a cocky smile on his face, and he presses a noisy kiss to your forehead. “She didn’t fall for any of my charms but she still let me take her out on a date anyway.”

“Valley Tavern?” Parker parrots, confused. 

You turn to him, equally confused. He wasn’t there, that much you remember. You may not have known his name then, but you do remember his face. You remember seeing him at Luisa’s, two years before, since he was the one to pull Sam away from you, but you didn’t think he remembered any of that, or that any of them did, for that matter.

Parker’s gaze falls back to you, and you can see it then.

Recognition.

It rattles you a little. You stare at him, not sure what you’re meant to say, not sure what it is he expects from you.

To correct Sam? Correct him when he didn’t remember you in the first place, especially that night?

That’s when it clicks - when you realize why Parker’s staring at you that way. 

You can see that while Sam didn’t remember you, some of his friends did. 

“Valley Tavern,” you confirm anyway, trying, and failing miserably, to subtly communicate to Parker and the others around you who know to just accept that as an answer and keep their mouths and memories shut and locked away.

Parker barrels on, and you can feel yourself wishing for time to stop. “But you met before at Luisa’s?”

There's a pause, a shift in the air that you can feel. When Sam squeezes your shoulder and pulls you closer, there's a part of you that has to resist pushing him away. 

He laughs awkwardly, and you can feel his body tense against yours slightly. “Nope, it was Valley Tavern. You weren’t there that night, so you’re probably mixing things up.”

“Yeah man, we know he was a playboy before but he’s changed his ways. He definitely remembers where he met his lovely lady,” Miles pipes up, causing a few people in their group at the table to laugh. From beside him, his girlfriend sends a worried look your way, and you try to smile back at her in a way that is reassuring and positive, but it doesn’t work.

She murmurs your name, reaching out as if to try to whisk you away to the bathroom, to get you out of this situation, because she is a kind friend and an ally, but that doesn’t work either.

Sam squeezes your shoulder again, and then turns to glance down at you before looking back at his teammate. “No man, we met at Valley Tavern.”

“Dude,” Casey tells him, a serious edge to his tone. “You met her like…two years ago? At Luisa’s. Remember? The girl from the supply closet?”

Sam blinks, fingers flexing against your skin. “Bro-”

“It’s her.” Casey insists.

Parker nods in agreement. “I swear. I wouldn’t say this in front of her if I wasn’t absolutely sure. You couldn’t stop talking about her for the next like two days. You even swore you saw her the next morning.”

Your heart comes to a crashing halt against your rib cage. 

He…he recognized you?

He remembered you.

There’s no way.

It can’t be.

“I don’t…” He starts, and you know what he’s trying to say. What he wants to say. I don’t remember. 

But it never comes.

As loud as it is, it suddenly becomes quiet enough to hear a pin drop.

And really, you should all be happy, you should all be ecstatic and over the moon and happy and joyful.

But all you can feel is like your heart is being squeezed within an inch of its life. You feel panic, anxiety creeping in and clawing at your throat. 

~

The drive back to your apartment, where the two of you had agreed to spend the night, is completely silent. 

Sam still keeps a hand on your thigh, squeezing every now and again. It’s a gentle touch, anchoring almost, and halfway through, he turns his hand over, palm up, and you know what he wants.

You’re hesitant, but you still give it to him, resting your hand gently in his palm. His fingers lace through yours, and he holds your hand tight. It’s not tight enough to hurt, or tight enough to worry you, but you feel it all the same.

His sadness, his worry. 

He’s half of your soul after all. Of course you feel it.

When he parks in the garage of your apartment, he shuts off the car and turns to you. It’s quiet for a beat, and you swallow past the lump in your throat, taking a deep breath before you speak.

“Sam, I-”

He takes you by surprise, all but launching across the center console, hands cupping your face and kissing you.

It’s intense, desperate.

Familiar.

He kisses you with the same urgency he did before, all those times before. There’s a bit of that gentleness underneath, a bit of the parts of him that just met you before he decided he needed to have you. 

“I just,” Sam says, breathless as he pulls back an inch. “I just needed to do that. Is that okay?”

You nod, pulling in a deep inhale. “Yeah, it’s okay.”

He nods, and the ghost of his lips brushes against yours, almost a phantom kiss, before he presses a firm one against your mouth. He pulls away after a breath. “Let’s go inside, yeah?”

You nod, and the two of you carefully get out, Sam locking his car before taking your hand in his and leading you both to the elevator. 

Once the elevator doors close, he holds you tight to him, keeping you close, and if you didn’t know better, you’d say he’s worried that you’d disappear.

You wonder if he knew that you were feeling the same way. 

Once you’re safely inside, Sam making sure the door is locked behind you both, you turn to one another, and the silence says everything.

He knows. 

He reaches out, takes your hand again, and you let him, let him lead you to the couch, but you don’t sit. You can’t.

You shake your head, and he blinks, nodding. You drop your hands, but he reaches for them right when you move to take a step back, and his fingers gently circle your wrists. 

You open your mouth to say something, anything.

It’s been years.

I didn’t think this day would come.

I didn’t know what I would do if you forgot me again.

Nothing came out.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He murmurs, the fingers circling your wrists loosening as he tries to intertwine your fingers.

You smile at him sadly, shaking your head. “It didn’t matter.”

“But it did,” Sam insists. “It does. It mattered to you for a while and it matters to me.”

“It doesn’t.” You say, trying to take your hand back. “It doesn’t and it never did. It’s in the past and I was the only one who remembered.”

He frowns. “But I remember, too. I do.”

“You didn’t remember until someone else told you,” You remind him as gently as you can, no heat or anger behind your words. “You didn’t remember any of it, and it’s okay. It doesn’t matter now.”

“Stop saying that,” he practically pleads. “Why do you keep saying that?”

Your last bit of restraint snaps and you rip your hands away, taking a large step back from him.

“Because you didn’t remember!” You cry out in frustration, “Not a single time that we’ve met have you remembered a single thing about me. Not my name, not my face, not a thing.”

You can see the way your confession breaks him.

There’s a long pause. He looks absolutely guilt stricken, and as much as it hurts you to see, you don’t know that you can comfort him. 

“How many times?” Sam finally asks, voice quiet. “How many times have we met?”

Now it’s your turn to pause. No matter how frustrated you were, you knew admitting this would hurt him, but there’s no way around it. “Including Valley Tavern, we’ve met six times.”

His face twists into an expression of agonizing pain. “Six times?” All you can do is nod, and he practically deflates. “How…” he swallows past the lump in his throat. “How long have we - how long have you known me while I haven’t known you?”

You don’t know which answer is going to hurt more - the number of years or the age at which you first met. You’re also not sure which is going to hurt you more to say.

You just say the first thing that comes to mind, which is “We met freshman year. In college, in the fall semester.”

He visibly winces, taking a step back and running a frustrated hand through his hair. “I’ve known you since I was eighteen? Since we were eighteen?”

All you can do is nod. He completely deflates then, weight collapsing beneath him as he takes a seat on the couch. He props his elbows on his knees, holding his head in his hands.

You don’t say anything. You don’t know what to say, or if there is anything to say.

It’s not until you see the small shake in his shoulders that you find yourself sinking to the floor in front of him, your knees hitting the plush carpet and hands coming to rest on his forearms, pressing your forehead to his. 

“Sammy,” you say gently, silent tears of your own cascading down your cheeks. “I’m sorry.”

He doesn’t say anything back, just quietly cries for a moment. You stay right where you are, waiting.

A few minutes pass before he sniffles, raising his head and wiping a few stray tears with the back of his hand. He looks at you then, and frowns, reaching out to thumb away your tears.

“Can you-” he starts, clearing his throat when his voice comes out shaky. “Can you tell me about it? About all the times we’ve met.” His request takes you by surprise, and for a second all you can do is blink, wondering if it’s a good idea. But then his expression crumbles a little more, his eyes tearing up again, and he lets out a quiet “Please.”

You nod, resting your hands on his knees. 

You tell Sam everything. From seven minutes in heaven to seeing him at breakfast. From his first day in class after three years and meeting at Luisa’s, and then meeting again the next morning at the grocery store. You recount meeting him again at Valley Tavern, about how you only offered up that condition of seeing each other again because you didn’t think you would be seeing each other again. At all. You recount every detail and hope it answers whatever questions are going through his head.

You tell him again in different words that you never thought to remind him of you because if he didn’t remember you in the morning, you thought you’d both be better off that way. You try to impress on him that you thought you were doing the right thing for the both of you, that you thought it would be better for him given the circumstances. You can hear the desperation in your voice when you tell him, can hear that you’re practically pleading for him to understand that this wasn’t easy for you, that you didn’t mean to hurt him, that you didn’t mean to keep this a secret, but you didn’t know what other option you had. 

When you finish, he just stares at you, a storm of emotions behind his eyes that you can’t read.

“I-” he starts, clearing his throat. “I understand your side of it, I do. But I…I’m not gonna lie to you, I’m upset. I’m not mad, or angry but I’m upset.”

You nod, swallowing past the lump in your throat. Your hands fall from his knees to your lap, and you sit back, taking a deep breath. “Okay. I understand.”

Sam stares at you, eyes roaming over your face. He reaches out, brushing a stray strand of hair away. “I was so worried, for a long time, that I didn’t have anyone out there for me.” He starts, voice thick with emotion. He speaks slowly, trying to tamp it down as his fingers continue tracing the features of your face. “I thought I’d have to wait forever to meet you, to have you with me. When we met at Valley Tavern, I felt it, you know? I could feel that it was you. And I was so relieved, and yet I was also so worried that you’d forget me.”

His voice almost breaks on the last word, but he clears his throat, hand falling away from your face to rest limply at his side. “When I walked into Piper’s that day, for the first time, I was so scared that you’d have forgotten me that week. Every time we saw one another, I felt myself bracing for it. But then you’d look at me and you’d smile, and I felt like I was flying. Every morning I woke up next to you and had you there, it was worth it. I was still on eggshells, waiting for you to forget me, or anything about me, but this whole time…”

The tears that fall from his face break your heart into pieces, and you’ve never been more upset with yourself in your life than you are right now. If Sam were to decide he needed time apart to process this, you’d grant it to him. You’d give him anything he needed.

You wait for him, reaching up to brush the tears from his face. It takes you by surprise when he turns his head into your touch, pressing a kiss to your palm. Then he’s sliding off the couch, joining you on the floor and pulling you into his arms.

There’s a breath of relief that leaves your chest when you’re in his embrace, and you start to sob, fat wet tears rolling down your cheeks as you bury your face into his shirt. His chest stutters as he tucks your head under his chin, and you both sit there for a moment to cry it out.

You know you’re crying out of anger towards yourself, frustration at how you handled the situation, and fear that he’d leave you. You’re not completely sure why he’s crying. You know there’s relief for him, confirmation of something he’d been desperate to know that you’d selfishly kept from him, but the rest has that fear gripping at your heart with barbed wire.

“I’m so sorry, Sammy,” you choke out, uncaring of how terrible you sound. “I’m so sorry, I never meant to hurt you.”

“I know, baby.” He says, pressing kisses to your hairline. “I know. It’s okay. We’ll figure it out, okay? We’ll figure it out.”

His words break your heart even more, and you continue to cry. You both stay like that for what feels like hours, until eventually he picks you up, guiding you both to your room, then your bathroom.

Sam takes care of the both of you - making sure you shower, wash your face, brush your teeth - and it’s so much more than you deserve. He dresses you in one of his shirts from his drawer before he settles you both into bed, where you sleep through the night with your arms wrapped around one another.

When you wake in the morning, your heart is still heavy, and your head hurts from all the crying, but you force yourself out of bed, carefully extracting yourself from his arms to brush your teeth before you head into the kitchen to make breakfast for you both.

It’s a welcome distraction, and you allow yourself to get lost in it until you hear him pad out from your room.

“Are you hungry?” You ask, back still turned as you flip the french toast over for the last time, then flipping off the burner. “I made-”

Words die in your throat when you finally turn to face him, and you nearly drop the spatula on the floor when you see him there, dressed in his jeans and his shirt from last night, a sheepish smile on his face.

“What are you…” Your voice trails off when you see the way he takes in your apartment, like he’s never seen it before, and then his eyes fall on you.

“Hi there.”

That signature smile with all his boyish charm is on his face as he says it, and you drop the spatula.

You swear you feel your heart drop to the floor with it, shattering in a million pieces.

No. You beg the universe. Please, no. Not like this.

The universe does not listen.

He is gone. 

Your “Sam” is gone.

“I’m Sam. I don’t know if I said that when we uh…met? Properly? Last night. What’s your name?”

He winces after he asks, almost as if he’s made a mistake by doing so.

This isn’t funny, you want to say. Don’t do this to me.

But it’s the truth. 

You murmur your name. It’s so quiet that even you can barely hear it, but Sam seems to hear it just fine. 

“It’s nice to meet you,” he says. It’s so genuine that you almost feel like dropping to your knees right there.

You don’t respond to him. You can’t. You’re too focused on trying not to cry, on trying to refrain from throwing yourself at him and begging him to remember you, just this once. 

To not let history repeat itself. 

You didn’t realize how much you didn’t miss the way you’d been used to him forgetting you over and over until he finally remembered you long enough.

Long enough to make it hurt. 

He doesn’t see the internal war you’re fighting and losing, and he keeps talking. “I’m really sorry, genuinely, since you made breakfast, which is really nice of you to do, by the way. But I um…I’ve got to go.” He says, clearly embarrassed, pointing toward your front door. 

All you can do is nod, swallowing past the lump in your throat and biting the inside of your cheek so hard you can’t guarantee you’re not bleeding. 

Sam heads to the door, toeing on his shoes, patting his pockets for his wallet and keys. You’re rooted to your spot, too terrified to move, tracking every step with your eyes. Just before he reaches the door handle, he turns to you, a torn expression on his face. 

“I um…this is going to be embarrassing for me to say, but I feel like I have to. I don’t remember last night, like…any of it. And that’s probably my fault, so I’m sorry if I took advantage of you, or if I crossed a line.”

This, unfortunately, does warrant a response. Because even if you can feel your soul being ripped to shreds, the last thing you want is for him to somehow turn himself into the villain of this story, when it’s definitely not him.

It’s you. 

But he doesn’t know that.

Not anymore.

“It wasn’t like that.” You assure him. “You didn’t take advantage of me.” 

A small smile creeps onto the corner of his mouth. You know he’s trying not to show how relieved he is. 

You hate yourself for how familiar you’ve become with him, only to lose it of your own accord.

“Okay,” he says. “That’s good.”

Sam undoes the lock and opens the door, stepping through it and into the hall. He turns to you, and your battered soul succumbs to defeat when you see the caring smile on his face.

“Lock up behind me, okay? It was nice meeting you.”

You nod once, and then he’s pulling the door shut, the automatic lock snicking back into place, and then there’s silence. 

You fall to the floor in a heap on your knees, allowing your sobs to fill the room, sadness and emptiness settling in.

~

Despite your better judgment, you head out the next morning, thinking you’ll see him.

You don’t.

~

You don’t see him the next day, either.

~

Or the next day.

~

Or the day after that. 

~

Three weeks go by, and there’s a text from Nathan and a text from Serena on your phone.

Serena

Babe, please call me. I just want to make sure you’re okay

You ignore it.

Nate Mac

Did you break up? Why can’t Sammy remember you?

You ignore that one, too.

~

At first, there was a part of you that had hoped. 

You hoped that it wasn’t going to be like before, where he would forget you so quickly and move on. You hoped that there would be a day where his memories would kick in and he would show up with his boyish smile and your favorite take out, apologizing for his momentary lapse.

You had hoped that every time your friends, his friends, or a teammate texted or called, that they’d tell you that he remembered.

They didn’t.

He didn’t.

Perhaps this was fate’s cruel way of punishing you for resisting him - your soulmate - for doubting him and keeping the fact that you were soulmates to begin with a secret. 

You used to know exactly what to expect from Sam.

This hadn’t been anything like those times before.

Before, you didn’t know him. You knew his lips, his touch, his charm, his usual game. You didn’t know how sweet he could be to you, how loyal, how devoted and attentive and kind and wonderful and intelligent and everything you’d never imagined.

Before, you didn’t know what it felt like to wake up next to him, didn’t know what it felt like to have his arms wrapped around you as morning crept in, didn’t know what it felt like to have him squeeze you tighter to his body before he even opened his eyes because he wanted to be close to you.

Before, you didn’t know how his eyes crinkle when you made him laugh. You didn’t know how he loved eating breakfast together in the morning with you. You didn’t know how he always kept an arm around you when you were out because he didn’t want you to be too far from him.

You didn’t know he’d been waiting for you.

You didn’t know he’d been afraid of you being the one to forget him.

You didn’t know that he held every single bit of hope that you had about finding, loving, keeping, and remembering your soulmate in the palm of his hands. 

You didn’t know that this whole time, you’d been hoping, wishing, praying, that everything you feared soulmates were and all the heartbreak that came with it wasn’t true.

And when it had finally been about five months since you’d seen him last, you stopped hoping.

~

“What did you do when your husband forgot you?” You had asked your teacher after class, voice quiet and shy. 

“What do you mean?” She’d asked. It was judgemental, it was a clarifying question, and you recognized it, but you still felt put on the spot.

“You said there were ways to help them remember when they forgot you. You said you and your husband were on and off for ten years before he remembered you. Did you help him? Or...” 

She smiled at you, keeping her expression neutral, but her smile was still gentle. “I gave him things that helped him remember.”

Your brows had furrowed at that, unsure of what she meant. “Gave him things? Like what?”

She sat back in her chair, exhaling a small breath. “It’s different for everyone, but sometimes little reminders or hints of who you are help jog their memory.”

“Reminders like what?” You pressed. “Like a diary? Or a picture?”

This time her expression turned placating, and you frowned. “It’s different for everyone,” she says again gently. “When the time comes, if the time comes, you’ll have to figure it out for yourselves.”

~

“Oh,” you say when you open the door, definitely not expecting the people on the other side.

Gabe Landeskog and his wife Melissa are standing there, Melissa with a fresh bouquet of flowers and Gabe with an empty plastic bin that manages to look small in his grasp.

You feel like the principal just showed up and you’re in deep trouble.

Which, if they’re here, you most likely are.

Your throat goes dry.

You suppose they’re here to get Sam's belongings, so you step to the side with as polite a smile as you can manage and say “Come in.”

Mel smiles warmly at you once they’re inside and you shut the door behind you. She takes you by surprise, embracing you in a warm hug and then handing the flowers to you.

“Happy Birthday!” She exclaims.

Oh. 

She remembered.

That was…nice of her.

“Thank you,” you say honestly, then look between her and Gabe, uneasy.

“I uh…I had a feeling you’d be by but I wasn’t sure when. Had I known you were coming I would’ve organized a bit better but um…” you shift your weight from foot to foot. Mel looks confused, Gabe even more so, so you barrel on. “Um, make yourselves at home, help yourselves to whatever’s in the kitchen. I’ll be right back.”

You turn on your heel and head to your room, placing the flowers on the nightstand to exchange it for Sam's watch that’s been sitting there. 

He must have been in such a panic that morning, waking up in a stranger’s apartment, that he missed that it was there. And of course, he probably didn’t think to check if he had your number, so there was no way for him to ask for it back.

Technically, you could’ve just given it back - you could’ve given it to anyone of the people who’d been reaching out to you. But you couldn’t bring yourself to part with it.

Now though, you suppose you don’t have much of a choice.

You move around the room on autopilot - collecting all the crumbs of him there and try not to cry as you go.

His hoodie from your closet, the few shirts and sweatpants, a few pairs of briefs, a pair of his socks from his designated drawer in your dresser - your drawer, technically, again, now - along with a pair of shorts, a tank top, and swim trunks, his tie from your vanity, another shirt from the laundry you washed this morning, another hoodie from where it rests on your chair.

You have it all in a neat pile when you come back to your living room and nearly drop it when you see Mel and Gabe on opposite sides of your kitchen island, Mel making drinks for three and Gabe elbow deep in a container of cookies.

They don’t look sheepish or embarrassed, and you expect nothing less, honestly, but it still feels weird that they’d feel so comfortable here. 

Here. In the home of their friend’s technically ex-girlfriend and ex-soulmate who harbored all those secrets from him.

You shake it off, heading over to them since Gabe has the plastic bin at his feet from where he sits on one of your barstools, and carefully place Sam's belongings inside.

“I think that’s everything, but if…if you guys think he’s missing something, just let me know and I can look for it.”

Gabe raises a brow at you, then at the contents of the bin, then back to his wife, who slides a glass filled with a pretty orange liquid across the counter to you, then to her husband, before topping it with a lime. 

“What’s all this?” Gabe questions, voice slightly muffled by the bite of the cookie in his mouth, gesturing to Sam's clothes with the other half of the cookie still in his hand.

You raise a brow. “His clothes? His stuff he left here?”

“Oh babe,” Mel says, shaking her head. “No no, the bin isn’t for Sam's things. It’s for yours.”

You blink. “What?”

Gabe swallows his cookie and clears his throat before he speaks. 

“I was the one who forgot, back then. I couldn’t remember a lot of things about Mel, at first, but I never forgot her. The first time I actually forgot her was two weeks before our wedding, and it was awful. I couldn’t remember her even though she was right in front of me.”

“I was so sad,” Mel remembers, but she doesn’t sound sad. If anything, she sounds fond. “I was pretty pissed, too. I was in a bikini and he didn’t even recognize me.”

Gabe rolls his eyes, then turns back to you. “My mom had remembered that when she used to forget things about my dad, he would give her things like his clothes or his journal, a book he told her he had read, and it helped her remember him because she had pieces of my dad to jog her memory. My mom brought me the blanket Mel liked cuddling on the couch with and the shirt of mine Mel always wore, even her pillow with the pillowcase on it, to help me remember.”

“Did it work?” You ask, voice hesitant, unsure. You know where this is going, but you don’t doubt it.

“It did.” Gabe nods. “I felt like I was missing a piece of myself when I forgot her, I was sad, angry, and no one would tell me anything. But the second I had her stuff, it came back to me. Not all at once, it was slow, but it worked. I remembered her after about four days. I remembered it all.”

“What triggered it?” You ask. “What happened that made you forget?”

“I thought it was because he got cold feet,” Mel answers. “But it was actually because he was so nervous about things going so perfectly right that he just sort of…panicked? I guess.”

“I wanted it to be perfect for Mel,” Gabe explains. “I panicked thinking it wouldn’t be, that I wouldn’t be.”

“And you think…you think if I give Sam some of my things, that he’ll remember me again?”

Gabe nods, grabbing another cookie. “I don’t think it, I know it.”

You frown. “But…it’s been five months. Why…why now?” 

Why are you both here now? Is what you want to ask. What’s changed? Is he okay?

You don’t. You don’t really think you deserve to know, but you want to anyway. 

Gabe reaches for another cookie, but drops it, putting the container on the kitchen counter in front of him. “Well, Sam, he…he said he…saw you. Yesterday.”

That shocks you. You run through what you did yesterday - work, pilates, book store, grocery store - but you don’t remember seeing Sam at all. 

“He was at the grocery store. He said he saw you, from behind, and you were wearing his shirt. The same one he saw you in on the morning when he…” His voice trails off, and you can tell he’s trying to be careful, but it doesn’t sting anymore. 

“When he forgot that day,” you finish for him, and Gabe nods.

“Yeah. He recognized you yesterday. Said there was something familiar about you, that he felt like he knew you beyond the one night stand he thought you had. He asked the rest of us if we knew anything.”

You shake your head. “I can understand that. I just mean…why are you trying to help us now?”

Help me. You think bitterly. 

“We didn’t know what happened.” Mel says gently. “You wouldn’t…you wouldn’t talk to anyone. Even Serena said she couldn’t get the full story out of you, just that he forgot. It wasn’t until Sam mentioned it to some of the guys, and Nate told Serena about it, that we understood.”

You chew nervously on your bottom lip. “Serena told you?” 

Mel smiles. “She told us what she knew. Don’t be too angry with her. She was just trying to help.”

“I’m not,” you insist. “I just guess I’m surprised she didn’t tell you anything earlier.” 

“You weren’t very talkative about it earlier,” Gabe points out. “She said you didn’t say anything about it till a month went by.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Mel finally asks. “Why didn’t you tell someone?”

“I didn’t know how to,” you admit. “I didn’t…every time we’d met before, he’d forget me in twenty four hours. That first date, when he remembered me even after a week - it had never happened before. I didn’t think it was even possible. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, for him to forget, but he never did. So it never seemed important.”

Mel offers an understanding and sympathetic smile. “Until it was.”

You nod, swallowing past the sudden lump in your throat. “It’s fine. It was my fault anyway. I shouldn’t have kept it from him.”

“No one blames you for it,” Mel reassures you. “Everyone understands, really. And Sam will probably understand when it comes back to him.”

“If it comes back to him,” you correct.

Gabe shakes his head. “When. He will remember, just give him some time.”

You smile sadly at both of them. “Time is all I have.”

~

You were curled up in a corner booth of Piper’s leaning into the L-shaped seat while you focused on your laptop, trying to sort through all the photos from the design shoot you’d done the day before. Every now and again, you could see Serena checking in on you from behind the counter, and you would always meet her eyes with a reassuring smile.

You knew why she was concerned, knew Jenna and Eddie kept coming around every ten minutes for the same reason, but you were fine now.

The loss didn’t hurt as much anymore.

You let time pass as you focus, accepting refills of your orange juice and water and welcoming the fresh basket of fries that Eddie brings you when you’d been there for about two hours.

When a random shiver runs down your spine, electricity pricking on the back of your neck, you pick your head up abruptly, scanning your surroundings. You had put your headphones on to try to stay focused, noise cancellation activated, so you knew it wasn’t that you’d heard some phantom voice call your name. 

No, someone was staring at you. You still had an uncanny capability for sensing when someone's eyes lingered just a second too long for it to be a passing glance. 

A cursory glance around Piper’s brought you up empty. You try again, glancing around a little slower, yet still nothing. No one seemed to be paying attention to you, which was fine, but you could’ve sworn…

Slowly, you leaned forward to look out the glass of the front door, scanning the street. 

Still nothing.

Shaking off the lingering electricity, you settle back against your chair, squeezing your eyes tight before focusing back on your screen. Flexing your fingers, you’re just about to scroll through the next set of photos when you can see someone approaching from in front of you. 

Assuming it’s Serena, or Jenna, or Eddie, you pick your head up again, and try to keep your expression neutral while your gut twists painfully at what you see instead.

It was…him. 

Sam. 

But…how?

He waits until you pull your headphones from your ears to rest them around your neck before he speaks. 

“Hi there.” 

You blink at his gentle greeting, hands falling into your jean-clad lap.

“Hi there,” you all but squeak. 

He looked…good. Not that it was difficult for him. He donned light jeans, a gray sweater, and black jacket. 

It took his small smile for your heart to plummet to your feet, and he gestures to the booth. “Is this seat taken?”

You shake your head, closing your laptop, photos be damned. “No, uh, feel free.”

For a second, you don’t know whether to be optimistic, or to play it natural, go back into the flow of how it all used to be.

You really didn’t want to, but it was a logical possibility given everything that happened, no matter how much it stung.

Instead, you’re surprised when Sam drops into the booth, another of his small smiles quirking up the corner of his lips. “I saw you outside.” He admits. “I was just walking by, and I saw you and I had to come in and say hi.”

So that explained that. You knew you weren’t going crazy.

It also slightly hurt that he could still send that zip up your spine after all this time.

“Oh.” Was all you could come up with.

Nearly six months since you’d last seen him, a year to the day at Valley Tavern, Sam Malinski, your soulmate, walked back into your life.

It seemed too good to be true, and you couldn’t help but feel like he was a complete stranger in this moment. 

He says your name, and you blink at him, completely stunned. He laughs a little at your expression, offering a small smile. “I don’t know how to say this,” Sam begins, resting his hands on the table. “And I can imagine this has been a lot for you, and I’m really sorry. I didn’t…I didn’t mean to be away for so long, but with the team, and trying to get my memories back, I didn’t want to see you again until I remembered.”

Wait…what?

“You…” you start, “You remember?”

Sam nods, smiling when he says “I do. Hi baby.”

The relieved laugh that puffs out of your chest makes you feel almost delirious, and when Sam turns his palm upside down, you barely contain the excitement that runs through you when you rest your hand in his. He squeezes tight, pressing a kiss to the back of it before resting it back on the table.

“It took me a long time.” He admits. “I kept seeing you everywhere. In passing, from a distance, everything. I knew who you were, I could still feel it, but I knew I was missing something. With Mel and Gabe…they were right. Having your things really helped, and Parker nearly dragged me here every Sunday he could once I started to cause he thought it would speed things up. It did, I mean, kind of, but I had to be sure. When I saw you from outside just now, I admit I wasn’t sure about coming in. I didn’t want to come back to you until I knew for certain I didn’t forget a single thing, but I couldn’t take being away anymore.”

You nod in understanding, smiling at him reassuringly. “It’s okay, I understand. I put you through a lot, and-”

“No.” Sam insists. “No, you didn’t do anything wrong. And no one blames you for it, especially me. It was all you knew, before, and all I can say is that I’m sorry.”

You shake your head, trying to keep the happy and bittersweet tears at bay. “Nothing to be sorry for.”

“There is,” he insists. “I didn’t mean for that to be all you knew. I didn’t mean for that to be your constant, and I promise, I swear to you that I will change it. If it happens again, all that I ask is that you help me remember.”

“I’ll do that,” you promise. “I will.” 

Sam smiles, knocking his feet against yours under the table. “I’m sorry I didn’t eat your french toast that morning.”

You laugh, shaking your head. “It’s okay, I can make it for you whenever you want.”

“What about tomorrow morning?” He asks. “If that works for you.”

“That works for me,” you confirm, allowing the kilowatt smile to take over your face. 

Sam nods, squeezing your hands again, standing up to lean over the table and press a soft, gentle kiss to your forehead. “Thank you for always waiting for me, baby. I promise you won’t have to anymore.”

“I’d wait for you forever,” You tell him, because it’s true. This whole ridiculous prophecy you’d been gifted of him forgetting you was long gone. You and Sam were in this now, for real.

Even if tomorrow morning, he woke up again and didn’t remember you, you wouldn’t let him leave anymore.

You’d make him french toast, sit him down, and tell him your story.

From the beginning.