The horses were surprisingly active that evening. An entire day of work around the ranch and yet they were still pounding their hooves as they ran along the rails, chasing each other and flicking their tails playfully. Arden watched on in jealousy. She wished she could have that energy, that desire, that love of sheer existing.

The sun was setting behind the far pasture, highlighting the rolling grass in gold and pink hues. The horses had a lovely glow about them. They basked in the last bit of warmth for the day and the cold was beginning to bite as the sunlight faded. She held a cigarette limply between her aching fingers, only occasionally bringing it to her lips for a slow and pensive inhale.

Her evening cigarette held a darker meaning today, and not because it was barely nightfall. Her eyes burned from the smoke, bringing out their bloodshot appearance. She could feel the puffiness of her skin and her tongue licked at her dry lips. Despite feeling terrible, both inside and out, the cigarette kept her going.

The sound of heavy work boots grabbed her attention, though she didn’t look to see who it was. She knew the sound, the person attached to them, and for the first time all day she felt her heart sink into comfort.

A strong hand scooped the cigarette from her fingers and the man took in a long drag as he plopped down into the chair next to Arden. Luca was covered in dirt. He ran a hand through his short hair and a cloud of dust came wafting out. Luca worked hard, probably harder than anyone or anything on this ranch, and yet he sat next to her with the calmness of a grey sky after a summer storm.

“Emmett did really well, today,” he said between puffs.

“He’s so young, it’s hard to imagine him working the ranch,” Arden replied.

Luca scoffed and shook his head. “He can barely ride a horse, but the kid has heart. He gives it his all, even when he gets frustrated.”

“He’s barely five, he gets frustrated at everything.”

“Like his mother,” Luca said, glancing over at Arden with a smirk pulling at his lips.

Arden couldn’t look at him when he gave her that face. His green eyes would melt her in an instant and send her heart fluttering, but she wasn’t ready to be in the throws of passionate romance with him. Not after how she was earlier.

He hung his hand between them and she instinctively took hold. Her fingers gingerly traced the hard callouses on his palms, some already split open from the day’s work.

“Luca?” She said his name quietly. He didn’t answer, but she knew he was listening. “Luca, I’m sorry about – about today,” her voice choked between the words and a tear slipped out

Luca squeezed her hand tightly. “Don’t be, don’t be sorry. That was the promise we made, that you would never be sorry.”

“I know,” Arden swiped her tears with the back of her hand. “It’s just…It’s getting harder to control. Every time it happens, I feel like I’m going to just burst. And this time…I think I got too close,” she stopped and sniffled, wiping more stray tears before they could get too far down her cheeks. “I worry about Emmett – “

“Stop,” Luca interjected. “Emmett is always safe here. YOU are always safe here.”

“But Emmett isn’t even –“

“He’s mine, Arden. He might not look like me, or have my blood, but he’s mine, Arden. That’ll never change.”

“Even if I go too far?”

“Even if you go too far. Which you won’t, because I’m here. I’m always here. Now c’mon.” Luca flicked the cigarette over the rail and pulled her up by her hand. He slipped his arms around her waist and placed one hand on the back of her head, letting her wild curls get tangled around his fingers. He pressed the side of his face next to her cheek and hummed quietly, then slowly began singing. “No matter how bad it gets,” he whispered, “I’ll always be here to hold you tight.”

Arden nodded her head, taking in a deep breath of his scent, the musky warmth of an entire day in the field. The dirt, the pine shavings, all of it swirling together to create a perfect blend of home.

“Do you think one day…One day I’ll remember what happened, Why I’m here?”

Luca began to slowly side step, leading them in a quiet dance. “Maybe, maybe not,” he said softly. “Even if you do, it doesn’t change that you’re here.”

“I can’t stop thinking about it. I just replay the day I showed up, over and over again.”

“You looked helpless. Emmett was barely two. I don’t think you’d showered in two weeks, at least that’s how you smelled,” he said with a chuckle. “I couldn’t not take you in.”

“You had no idea who I was,” she said softly, burying her face in his chest.

“I didn’t need to. I could see you, and that’s all I needed.”

“What if I did something horrible?”

“We would have known by now.”

“What if I forget again? What if I forget…this?” Her voice was quieter now, and Luca could feel her tears dampen his shirt. She was squeezing the back of his jacket as tightly as she could with her petite hands.

He squeezed her tighter, breathing in the scent of her hair. She always smelled like crisp apples. No matter how many cigarettes she smoked, the scent of apples filled his mind. “Arden,” he pulled away, holding her arms as he bent down to look her in the eye. He knew she couldn’t look away. “Arden, I’ll never let you forget what we have. Even if I have to write you every day, leave you love notes, play songs, I don’t care. I’ll never, ever, let you forget what we have.”

He kissed each of her cheeks, brushing away the tears with his lips. He pulled away and retrieved another cigarette from his pocket, lighting it quickly before handing it over to her. She took a drag and sat back in her chair. The sun had completely fallen. Emmett would be asleep now, and all that was left was this moment with Luca.

She wanted to take what he had to say to heart. She wanted so desperately to believe that they could have this moment forever, that he would hold on tight and never let her go. She pulled her thick jacket tight in front of her and shoved a hand in the fleece-lined pocket to stay warm. She wanted this, all of this, the horses and the muck and the endless work to be her permanent home, but deep down she knew that was a lie.

It would only be a matter of time before she woke up in a new place surrounded by strangers, giving her a name they’d picked out and telling her how she just showed up one day with no memory of how she got there. Was it drugs? Drinking? A car accident? There was never a reason or a cause to this sudden phenomenon. She was always just there, wide-eyed and terrified.

The worst was in the hospital while giving birth to Emmett. Waking up to the lightening sharp pain between her legs with so many doctors shouting that she was awake. She hardly had any time to get a straight answer before there was a cold, wet infant placed on her chest. He was born with eyes that looked like ash, eyes that she felt like she knew, but she couldn’t quite place.

She pleaded with the doctors to take him, give him to an orphanage or a foster system. She didn’t recognize him. She wasn’t pregnant when she woke up that morning. A toxicity screen later revealed she was clean as a whistle. A CT and MRI showed there had been no accident. One visit with the social worker and a night in psych proved she was fit to be his mom, but if she really wished, they could take him. They handed her the belongings she showed up with and told her they could do what was best.

She almost did it. She almost gave him up right then and there. She held him one more time as she sifted through her bag and found the pieces of her old life. So many different groups of friends. Letters she’d written to herself. One diary that was piecemealed together. And then she saw him. There was a photograph of her sitting on a couch with a man in a grey beanie and ash-colored eyes. She flipped over the picture and saw the date, almost exactly a year ago. “Emmett,” she said quietly, looking down at her son. She didn’t understand where the name had come from, but there it was.

That was five years ago, and based on the evidence in that backpack she’d determined this was the longest she’d gone without some kind of memory lapse. Part of her hoped that it was all done. That having Emmett somehow fixed the hole in her brain. When in reality, part of her knew the clock was ticking and it was only a matter of time before she’d lose it all again, and the dreaded red eyes would appear.