Two weeks have gone by, and sometimes John forgets. It’s remarkable that he was able to live a relatively normal life before. But I don’t want him to have anything but a full life from this day onward.

I’ll never leave him again. And he knows better than to pull that shit again.

The paper crinkles in my hand as I set it back down and then carefully fold it to put it back in the envelope. It’s the report on John’s mother’s death. Margaret. He wanted to know, and I’m doing everything I can to find out every little piece of his history. An overdose.

The memories he has of his mother are pleasant, but the detailed history of her past isn’t. I don’t know how he’ll take it, but it’s one more piece of information he can digest.

I hear the tea kettle whistle in the kitchen and it rouses me from my seat at the dining room table. As I make my way in, I nearly stumble over the stack of empty cardboard boxes.

Thank fuck I still have a few more weeks left of sabbatical leave. Moving is a nightmare and a half. The kettle silences as I pull it off the stove and instantly hear the rumble of John’s truck.

It’s odd that the most unbelievable thing to me is that Jay’s name was always and has always been John. I’m the only one to have ever called him Jay. A part of me loves it, and a part of me hates it.

The front door opens as I pour the water into the cup. I watch as the steam rises and the bit of calm normalcy is enough to make me smile as I hear his boots smacking on the hardwood floor.

I dunk the tea bag in and then again, watching as the light brown water turns darker and the color consumes the inside of the white ceramic tea cup.

My eyes lift at the sound of John picking up the boxes in the living room. The cardboard rustles as he lets out a heavy sigh.

“Why is there so much yellow?” he asks me. The question makes me smile into the cup and I nod my head once, recognizing the odd obsession.

“Yellow makes you happy,” I say simply. “Just seeing the color makes you happier than you were before.” I smile at him, but there’s a sadness in his eyes from the admission.

He may think he’s the fucked up one, but I needed him too. Desperately.

“Is this the last of it?” John asks and then leans against the doorway to the kitchen, ignoring my answer. His white shirt has a bit of dust swiped across the bottom which only makes him appear that much more masculine. His muscles flex under the thin fabric, pulled tightly across his broad shoulders and I absently blow across the top of the mug as I nod my head yes.

Slowly, we’re making this place ours. A complete home. It’s funny how even our décor seems to need each other for balance.

“Thank you for bringing it all,” I tell him. I almost say Jay, but instead I say nothing.

It’s odd calling him John, because he’s always been Jay to me. He never told me, but I can understand why. In a lot of ways, we’re learning more about each other, but in other ways, we’re learning who we are ourselves.

Love isn’t something we have to learn though. Love was a given from the moment we saw each other. Something in our very souls told us we were meant to be together. Without each other, we wouldn’t have survived what life had planned for us. Not back then when we were only children, and not today or even tomorrow.

I need him as much as he needs me. It’s the only thing I’m certain of.

“Thank you for staying with me,” he says easily as he walks across the kitchen and wraps his arms around my waist. I set the cup down on the counter and the ceramic clinks before I look back up to him. I notice how his hands tighten on me as I lift my hands to his shoulders and rise up on my tiptoes to kiss him on the lips. It’s short and chaste, but I want all the kisses from him. Every sort he has for me.

When I pull away and my heels hit the floor, his eyes are still closed. It’s the raw emotion and truth that drew him to me. And maybe me to him.

“Tell me what you remember?” he asks me in a whisper and my gaze falls, but I rest my cheek to his chest and nod my head, listening to the steady sound of his heartbeat.

Together we’ll get through it all. Together and always.

“I think you loved me when you saw me, didn’t you?” I ask him.

“Which side of me are you asking?” he lets out an uneasy sigh, avoiding my gaze and the question.

“Both, neither, it doesn’t matter really. I already know you did,” I speak with feigned confidence. I want to hear him say it. I need to, really. I need to know that he’s always felt this way. I know I have. I’ll never stop loving him and I’m terrified that one day, he’ll stop loving me.

“He showed me a picture,” he starts to say and then covers his face with his hands. “I… I,” John says. I bite my lip, hating how much pain it causes him when he tries to recall a memory and he reverts. But it’s normal. He has to learn that. He has to accept it.

“When I saw you, all those years ago, I knew I was to protect you. When I looked at your picture. When I knew I was going to take you and face this… this hell in order to be with you. I looked at your picture and I knew I was going to love you.” He nods his head, closing his eyes and I know it hurts, to merge the memories and meld the scene in his head. The medication helps the present, but the past is hard. Nothing’s going to change that.

“I love every part of you, the man who wants to forget and the man who suffered for his father’s sins.” I cup his face in my hand and kiss him on his jaw and then softly on his lips.

He stares back at me with nothing but pain in his eyes.

“I don’t know how you can love me,” he says in a whisper.

“I don’t know how you can think I ever didn’t love you. Even when I ran. I’ve always loved you.” A weak smile forces its way to my face as I struggle to use his name. He doesn’t want me to call him Jay, but he’s always been Jay to me. “My wolf.”

John stares back at me, confused for a moment. Sometimes it’s like this, when he doesn’t quite remember, but then it clicks.

“Wolf,” he huffs a sarcastic laugh and shakes his head. “You don’t need a wolf, little bird. You needed another, someone just like you. You needed Jay.”

I nod my head as my heart splinters. “I need all of you,” I whisper against his lips. I can feel it, the moment Jay comes to the surface, the moment the possessive man inside of him moves his hands to the back of my head and deepens the kiss.

I pull back and look into his eyes whispering, “Jay?”

A small smile tugs his lips up, only just and he says quietly, “You can call me whichever name you’d like.” He rests his forehead against mine and it’s then that I realize our past needs to stay where it belongs. “You can call me Jay if you want. I’ll be anyone for you. I’ll do anything for you. I only exist for you.”

I brush my nose against his, trying to lighten the mood. “Maybe when I’m mad at you I’ll call you Jay,” I tease and try to smile and when he does, my lips turn up easily.

“I love you, John,” I tell him quietly, brushing my fingers against his lips. “And I love Jay, too. Both sides of you.”

“I love you, little bird.” He says the words just like he always has, with a hint of teasing and a touch of darkness.

I lean against him, and he holds me tightly. I wouldn’t have it any other way. We’re both broken from what happened to us. But the love that’s come from it can’t tear us apart. As long as we stay together.

“Always?” I ask him.

“Always.”

*** John

---

I can hear the shower running as I stop in front of the shower door. The tips of my fingers tap against the wood. She’s waiting for me, and so many times I think I should leave her. As if I’m undeserving of her and hurting her, keeping her back.

I close my eyes and let out a slow breath. When I inhale, the gentle smell of lavender fills my lungs. It’s what my little bird smells like. And just that little bit makes the memories of holding her come back to me. They flood to me now. The bad ones I try to ignore, but the ones with her, the ones with my little bird, I hold on to them with everything I have.

It’s why I want to let her go. And why I never will.

My eyes pop open wide, the selfishness and depravity making me hate the thought. She’s a grown woman though, and she knows who I am in every sense of the word. As long as she wants me, I’m staying with her.

I push the door open slowly and the steam greets me with warmth and slowly passes behind me.

The anger surprises me sometimes, but more than that, the fear.

My father’s dead and burned to ashes, but the fear is very much alive. I always knew the other side of me was filled with a darkness, but I wouldn’t have thought it was fear.

But that’s what creeps up more than anything. Especially at night.

Until my wife leans against me, giving me much-needed warmth. Until my hand splays across her belly and we both fall easily to sleep.

“I heard something about you always being right,” I tease and then pull the shirt over my head. She peeks out from the shower curtain with a quip on her lips, something smart no doubt, but instead her eyes fall to my chest and the thought is long gone.

A deep groan of satisfaction rumbles up my chest and her eyes reach mine as a blush creeps up her chest and she pulls the curtain back into place to hide behind.

I fucking love it. I love her. And to think, I may have never had her.

The past can ruin a person forever. They may recover, but they’re never the same. Never what they once were. The scar may be thicker than delicate skin. It may protect you from some things and give you a wall to hide behind.

But it’s the gentle things that will cut it open and leave you raw and wounded once again.

Love is gentle and unassuming. It won’t be denied.

My love saved me in so many ways, my little bird.

I could forget the pain and burdens.

I could forget the fear that the monster would return. Or worse, that I would be like him.

I could forget it all and leave it where it belongs, in the past.

But I can’t forget Robin or the genuine love I felt for her. I can’t deny that.

Not when I’m so desperate for her.

Not when she needs me in return.

And not when she’s right here, loving me with everything she has and only wanting the same in return.

My memory destroyed me, but love is so much more.

You can’t forget love, no matter how hard you try.