Too Late To Love Me I Already Left With His Twins (Lydia and Dave) novel Chapter 294

Anna POV

So.

Let me tell you guys about my plan.

And before anybody starts judging me, please, I already know.

I know.

I can hear my mother in my head right now.

“Anna, sometimes I wonder where you got your sense from.”

Honestly, same.

Because even while I was thinking about this plan, there was a small, very reasonable part of my brain going, Girl, this is actually insane.

And the other part of my brain was like, But what if it works?

And unfortunately, the second part was louder.

So here we were.

I had decided that I was going to recreate the circumstances surrounding Lydia’s accident.

Not exactly.

Okay, maybe almost exactly.

But safely.

At least, that was what I kept telling myself.

The accident had happened in the evening. Lydia had been in a car, there had been an impact, she’d sustained a serious head injury, and somehow her brain had decided that the best response to all of that was to take approximately ten years of her memories and hide them somewhere.

So I kept thinking about it.

If certain memories could be triggered by smells, sounds, places, routines and familiar experiences, then maybe the circumstances surrounding the accident could somehow unlock something.

Maybe not the entire memory.

Maybe just a fragment.

A face.

A conversation.

A location.

Anything.

I just wanted something.

Because honestly, watching Lydia try to piece together her own life was becoming painful.

She would look at pictures of herself with people she apparently loved and study them like she was trying to solve a mystery.

She would walk through her own house and occasionally pause because something felt familiar.

She would know how to do things she didn’t remember learning.

She would sometimes say something and then look surprised at herself.

Her brain knew.

Somewhere inside that beautiful, stubborn head of hers, her brain knew.

And I wanted to help it find the way back.

The problem was that recreating an accident was obviously a terrible idea.

Like, terrible.

There was no sugar-coating it.

I knew it was risky.

I knew that two people could get hurt.

I knew that an actual accident didn’t care about plans or intentions or how badly you wanted a particular outcome.

And I knew that the real accident had nearly taken Lydia away from us once already.

Which made what I was contemplating even more ridiculous.

But I wasn’t planning to do anything completely reckless.

At least…

That’s what I told myself.

I wasn’t going to make us actually crash.

I wasn’t going to deliberately put our lives in danger.

The idea was to recreate the experience around the accident as closely as possible without recreating the actual injury.

And somehow, even saying that aloud in my own head made me realize how questionable the whole thing sounded.

But I’d already made up my mind.

So later that evening, I got dressed.

And because apparently God had decided to make me look unserious while attempting something this serious, I wore one of the bubu dresses Lydia had bought for me.

Yes.

A bubu.

A very pretty one, though.

I stood in front of the mirror, adjusted the fabric around my shoulders and stared at myself.

“Okay,” I muttered. “You look nice.”

Then I paused.

“Or suspicious.”

I laughed.

“Whatever.”

I grabbed my bag and headed out.

When I arrived at Lydia’s house, the twins were downstairs.

And, thankfully, they were doing something other than talking about dinosaurs, constellations, Saturn, or whatever scientific discovery they had decided to obsess over that particular day.

They were sitting on the floor with some kind of puzzle between them, arguing over something.

The moment they saw me, Eli looked up.

“Auntie Anna.”

“Hi, baby.”

His eyes moved from my face down to my dress.

Then back to my face.

“Auntie Anna, why are you wearing a bubu?”

Ava immediately looked over.

And then she started laughing.

“Wait.”

She looked at me again.

“Actually, why are you wearing a bubu?”

I looked down at myself.

“What’s wrong with my bubu?”

“Nothing,” Ava said, still laughing. “It’s just that Mom has been wearing bubus so much that I think it’s becoming contagious.”

Eli nodded seriously.

“Yeah. Mom is in her thirties, but sometimes she dresses like somebody’s grandmother.”

I gasped.

“Excuse me?”

Ava burst out laughing.

“Not all the time!”

“Your mother doesn’t even wear bubu every day.”

“Exactly,” Eli said. “So why are you wearing it on a normal day?”

I placed one hand dramatically against my chest.

“Maybe I’m entering my grandmother era.”

“Ew.”

“What’s ew about my grandmother era?”

Then Ava’s eyes narrowed.

“Oh my God.”

“What?”

“Does your husband like it?”

I froze.

Eli immediately looked interested.

“Wait, yeah. Tell us.”

“Tell you what?”

“Your husband.”

I stared at both of them.

“Why are you people suddenly interested in my marriage?”

Ava grinned.

“Because you never tell us anything.”

“And honestly,” Eli added, “we deserve to know the love story.”

I nearly choked.

“You two are children.”

“We’re curious children.”

“Ew,” Ava said. “Don’t be boring. How did you and your husband fall in love?”

I covered my face.

“Why is everybody obsessed with my relationship?”

“Because it’s interesting,” Eli said.

“There’s nothing interesting about it.”

“Then tell us.”

“No.”

“Please.”

“No.”

“Pleaseeee.”

“Absolutely not.”

They started laughing.

I pointed at both of them.

“You know what? Go away.”

“We’re already going.”

“Good.”

“But we’re coming back.”

“I don’t want you to.”

“Too bad.”

And just like that, they ran off, still laughing.

I watched them disappear down the hallway and shook my head.

“Children.”

Then I smiled.

Because as annoying as they were, I was glad to hear them laughing.

At least they were slowly getting back to themselves.

I went upstairs to find Lydia.

She was in her room, sitting near her vanity.

She looked up when I walked in.

Her eyes immediately moved over my outfit.

Then she laughed.

“Oh, my alleged best friend Anna.”

I smiled.

“Alleged?”

“Yes.”

“Why am I alleged?”

She pointed at my bubu.

“Why are you dressed like this again?”

I frowned.

“Again?”

“Yes.”

“The last time I dressed like this was when I came to pick you up.”

She paused.

“The hospital?”

“Yes.”

“The day we all came to pick you up.”

She stared at me for a second.

Then nodded slowly.

“Right.”

There was something about that tiny pause that made my chest tighten.

She was trying so hard.

I could see it.

“Anyway,” I said quickly, changing the subject, “what are you doing?”

“Looking through my drawers.”

“Why?”

“I found some pills.”

She held up a small container.

We kept scrolling.

There was another influencer who had built a huge public image around speaking against racism, only for the internet to start digging into her personal life and uncovering the most ridiculous contradictions.

Lydia stared at the screen.

“You cannot be serious.”

“I swear.”

She started laughing again.

“People are insane.”

“That’s why I love PR.”

She looked at me.

“You love chaos.”

“I love professional chaos.”

“There’s no such thing.”

“There absolutely is.”

And for the next few minutes, we went through scandal after scandal.

Five different situations.

Five completely different disasters.

And Lydia laughed through almost all of them.

Real laughter.

The kind that made her throw her head back.

The kind that made her eyes water.

And for a moment, I forgot.

I forgot that she didn’t remember me.

I forgot that she didn’t remember Theo.

I forgot that she didn’t remember Dave.

I forgot that she didn’t remember the life we’d built around her.

She was just Lydia.

My Lydia.

And then I remembered why I was there.

I looked at the time.

It was getting late.

I stood.

“So, Lydia.”

“Hmm?”

“Let’s go somewhere.”

She looked at me suspiciously.

“Where?”

“Just for a drive.”

“A drive?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve been inside this house all day.”

“Exactly.”

She glanced toward the window.

“It is evening.”

“Perfect.”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on.”

She laughed.

“What are we doing?”

“Nothing serious. Just driving around town.”

She looked at me for a few seconds.

Then shrugged.

“Okay.”

I smiled.

“Good, I’m a very good driver, so I’d drive us.”

“Are you?”

“One of the best.”

“That’s a very bold claim.”

“I can back it up.”

She laughed.

“Okay, fine.”

I smiled.

And as we walked toward the door, I tried not to think about what I had planned.

I tried not to think about the accident.

I tried not to think about the risk.

I tried not to think about what could go wrong.

Because I had already decided.

Tonight, I was going to give Lydia a chance to remember.

Even if all she remembered was one tiny fragment.

One second.

One face.

One feeling.

Anything.

I just needed something.

And as we stepped outside, I looked at her.

She looked completely unaware of what I had been thinking about all week.

She trusted me.

That was the part that made my stomach twist.

Because suddenly, my mother’s voice came back into my head.

“Anna, don’t let desperation make you stupid.”

I swallowed.

“Yeah,” I whispered to myself.

“Too late.”