Too Late To Love Me I Already Left With His Twins (Lydia and Dave) novel Chapter 292

Anna POV

Honestly, I had been watching Lydia.

Like, really watching her.

It had been approximately a week since she came back from the hospital, and if there was one thing I could say about the entire situation, it was that there had been so much happening.

So much.

Aside from the obvious fact that Lydia still didn’t recognize most of us, she had actually been trying. And I mean genuinely trying. She wasn’t shutting us out. She wasn’t acting like she wanted everyone to disappear. If anything, she seemed determined to somehow rebuild whatever relationships she apparently had with all of us, even though, technically, she didn’t remember having those relationships in the first place.

She asked questions.

A lot of questions.

She wanted to know things about us. She wanted to know what we liked, what we didn’t like, what our relationship with her used to be, where we had met her, what she apparently did for a living, what kind of person she used to be, and sometimes she’d just sit there and listen to us tell stories about herself with this fascinated expression on her face, like we were describing the life of some very interesting stranger.

Which, technically, we were.

And honestly?

That part broke my heart more than I wanted to admit.

Because there were moments where I would look at her and think, That’s my Lydia.

The way she laughed.

The way she’d tilt her head when she was confused.

The way she’d roll her eyes when somebody said something ridiculous.

The way she’d randomly walk into the kitchen, open the fridge, stare inside for about thirty seconds without touching anything, close it, and then walk away like she had just completed an important task.

That was Lydia.

Even without the memories.

Even without knowing me.

Even without knowing Dave.

Even without knowing that Ava and Eli were literally her entire world.

She was still Lydia.

And honestly, if somebody had told me a week ago that I could have my Lydia back but without all the memories, I probably would have taken it.

Like, bro.

I would have taken it.

Give me this girl forever, even if she never remembers me again, and I’ll manage. I’ll adjust. I’ll figure it out. I’ll probably cry about it every other day for the rest of my life, but I’ll manage.

Because having Lydia alive and physically here was already a miracle.

God knows I had lost my mind when she was unconscious.

But there was something about watching her now that I couldn’t quite explain.

Something was missing.

And I knew exactly what it was.

Her life.

Not her personality.

Not her face.

Not her laugh.

Her life.

The history behind all those things.

The memories that made her understand why she loved certain people. The memories that explained why she trusted some people and didn’t trust others. The memories that told her why she was so comfortable around Ava and Eli, why she could recognize Dave from a single glance even if she couldn’t remember him consciously, why she could look at Theo and somehow feel this strange closeness with him despite not remembering the years they’d spent around each other.

She was picking up pieces.

Tiny pieces.

Sometimes so tiny that she probably didn’t even notice them.

She’d walk past a particular painting and stop for a second.

She’d hear a song and hum along without realizing she knew it.

She’d cook something and somehow get the recipe exactly right despite insisting she had never made it before.

She’d look at one of the kids’ toys and casually tell them where it belonged before catching herself and asking how she knew.

And then there were the little things with Dave.

Those ones were especially weird.

She didn’t remember him, but sometimes she’d respond to him in ways that felt so naturally Lydia that even I would stare.

Like her brain knew something her conscious mind didn’t.

And maybe that was what gave me hope.

Because if those little fragments were still somewhere in there, then surely the rest of it had to be somewhere too.

“Just wanted to see how she’s doing.”

“I was in the area.”

Sir.

You were absolutely not in the area.

You crossed half the city.

And somehow, every single time, he would have some perfectly reasonable excuse for why he needed to be there.

The funniest part was that Lydia didn’t even seem bothered by it.

If anything, she liked him.

She didn’t remember him, but she had apparently decided that Theo was one of her people.

And I couldn’t even blame her.

My brother had that effect on people.

He was annoying, dramatic, ridiculously confident, and had the kind of cheesy smile that made him look like a teenage boy who had just discovered flirting.

But he was also genuinely kind.

And he loved hard when he cared about someone.

I knew that about him.

So seeing him around Lydia didn’t surprise me.

What surprised me was just how much he was willing to rearrange his life to be around her.

This was a man currently dealing with one of the biggest business moves of his life, and yet somehow he still found time to go to Lydia’s house, sit with her, talk to her, make her laugh, and pretend that he wasn’t clearly emotionally invested in the situation.

He’d even gone to visit with his daughter recently.

And I remember looking at him like—

Okay.

This is nice.

Because regardless of whatever history existed between Lydia and Dave, I was rooting for my brother.

Obviously.

I mean, what kind of sister would I be if I wasn’t?