Erased: My Husband Stole My Memories

1: 1

On our son's fifth birthday, the husband who was supposed to pick him up came home alone.

Where's Jerome Fox? You didn't go get him from preschool?

Today's his birthday. I promised him I'd be the first one there to pick him up.

I was untying my apron at my waist as I spoke.

Never mind, never mind. You can't do anything right. I'll go myself.

"Oh, and there's corn and short rib soup on the stove, Jerome's favorite. Watch the heat, don't let it boil dry."

Just as I was about to pull the front door open, I heard my husband's puzzled voice behind me.

"Preschool? What are you going to the preschool for?"

I turned around, a little startled.

"To pick up our son. He isn't home yet. Where else would I go?"

"Unless his grandparents already got him today? Honestly, my parents should've told me first."

I was reaching for my phone to call them when my husband looked at me, his face full of alarm.

"What son? What preschool?"

"We've been child-free for seven years. Where would a son come from?"

I froze right where I stood, one shoe half on, unable to make any sense of what Barret Fox was saying.

"Our son, Jerome. Did work fry your brain today or something?"

"Okay, okay, stop joking. It's Jerome's birthday. I already bought the cake, it's in the fridge."

Barret let out a small laugh, as if he thought I was the one joking.

"Quit messing around, Jocelyn. Let me bring the food out. Let's just eat."

"You have no idea how tired I am today."

The unease inside me only grew.

Seven years of marriage. I knew Barret. The way he looked right now, this wasn't him joking.

"Barret, what is wrong with you? Jerome is our son. He turned five today. He's in the middle class at Westside preschool."

"Child-free? I was never child-free. I got pregnant one year after we got married."

Barret stopped mid-step on his way to the kitchen, a flash of irritation on his face.

"Jocelyn, the same joke stops being funny after a while."

"I really am exhausted from work today. Can we just eat first, please?"

A huge wave of unease swept through me.

I strode right up to Barret and pointed toward the wall above the couch, my voice rising.

"Isn't that Jerome? What are you even talking about?"

"Look, this is the family photo we took when Jerome was one..."

The moment my eyes landed on the spot where our family photo used to hang, my voice cut off.

The photo of the three of us was gone. In its place hung a wedding portrait of just me and Barret.

Barret rubbed the space between his brows, exasperated.

"Jocelyn, what has gotten into you?"

"Stop this, please. I really don't have time to..."

But I couldn't take in a word of it. My head went off with a roar.

I refused to believe it. I lunged into the bedroom and started tearing through everything.

"The albums? Where are the albums?"

"Jerome's albums. Every year on his birthday I take him to get photos done. I kept all the albums."

Barret didn't try to stop me. He just stood off to the side, watching me come apart.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

The place where I knew I'd kept our son's albums was empty now. The drawer held nothing but a few wedding albums of me and Barret.

I froze there, at a loss for how to face any of this.

Seeing me finally go still, Barret crouched down in front of me, worn out.

"Enough, Jocelyn. Have you had your fun yet?"

Tears fell from my eyes in heavy drops, and my hands started shaking beyond my control.

How could this be?

Barret and I dated for three years, married for seven.

The second year of our marriage I got pregnant and had Jerome without any trouble.

After getting pregnant I quit my job, and after the baby came I stayed home to take care of him full-time. I hadn't worked in five years.

That was a child I raised with my own two hands. How could he just vanish into thin air?

I looked up at Barret.

"Have you forgotten? Jerome. He's our son. He's already five."

"He's such a good boy. He loves his superheroes and his Transformers, he's allergic to mango, and every day he wraps himself around your leg calling you Daddy."

"When I had him I almost couldn't deliver. They had to switch to a C-section. Have you really forgotten all of it?"

Barret's patience had reached its limit.

"Jocelyn Summers, what is the matter with you today? And who is this Jerome?"

"We don't have a child. We never had a child."

"You..."

Seeing that Barret still didn't believe a word I said, I staggered to my feet and ran for the door.

"I'll go get him. I'll go pick Jerome up from school."

"Westside preschool. I'm going right now."

2: 2

The Westside preschool wasn't far from home, ten minutes or so on foot.

I'd chosen it carefully back then. Close to the house, nice grounds, and bilingual classes on top of that.

Barret didn't try to stop me. He just followed a step behind, matching my pace the whole way.

By the time I got there the school day was long over, and I hurried straight to my son's classroom.

The children had all gone home. Three teachers were tidying up the scattered toys and the crooked desks and chairs.

One of the women looked up as I rushed in, and asked, puzzled,

"Hello. May I ask who you are?"

The question nearly broke me.

For two years now, this same Teacher Finch had taught my son. She was his homeroom teacher.

Barret was always busy with work, so except on special days like today, I was the one who picked Jerome up. How could Teacher Finch not know who I was?

But this wasn't the time to press her on that. I grabbed her by the arm.

"Teacher Finch, have you seen Jerome? Did his grandparents come and take him home?"

She frowned, confused.

"Jerome? There's no child by that name in our class."

I wouldn't give up. My grip on her hands tightened.

"How can there not be? Jerome Fox, his name is Jerome Fox. You've had him since the youngest group."

"Teacher Finch, you've taught him for two years. How could you not know him?"

Maybe it hurt, because she winced and pulled her hands free.

"I'm sorry, ma'am, we have twenty children in this class, and none of them is named Jerome."

"Are you sure you've got the right classroom? Would you like me to go ask around for you..."

I couldn't listen anymore. I looked up, swept my eyes around the room, then went straight for the bulletin board at the back.

"How can he not be here? Jerome is a child in this class."

"Look at the big group photo at the back. Jerome has to be in it..."

When they'd started, every class's teacher had posed with all the children for a group photo, and it had hung on the back wall ever since.

But when I looked at that photo, the same wrongness from home was there.

The picture was so familiar. I knew every child and every teacher in it.

Except there was no sign of Jerome anywhere on it.

Still I wouldn't give up. I started searching the watercolor paintings and the crafts pinned to the classroom walls.

The preschool was always assigning craft projects, and every time, Jerome and I made them together.

The next day, after he brought them in, the teachers would smile and pin his work up on the wall.

I went around those walls again and again.

Nothing. Nothing. There was nothing.

Not one piece of work with my son's name on it, and no place for him in the group photo either.

My legs gave out, and I caught the edge of a desk just in time to stay standing.

Only when I stopped searching did Barret step into the room to apologize to the teacher.

"I'm so sorry about this. My wife has probably been under a lot of stress lately."

"We don't have any children. You don't need to look anymore. I'm truly sorry to have troubled you today."

Teacher Finch let out a breath.

"As long as everything's all right. I thought a child had gone missing, which would be serious."

"It's fine, sir. Your wife probably wants a baby. You're both still young. I'm sure you'll have a lovely little one."

Barret nodded and let it go, then led me, hollow and shattered, out of the preschool.

"Can we go home now?"

"Jocelyn, can you please stop this."

I lifted my head and fixed my eyes on his, and the man in front of me felt terrifyingly like a stranger.

We had a son. And he'd been lying to me all along.

I didn't believe him.

"I want to go to my parents' place."

3: 3

I was an only child. My parents had cradled me in their palms my whole life.

I didn't know why Barret was lying to me, why he'd say we had no son.

But I believed my own parents.

When I got to their place, the two of them were sitting at the dinner table, eating.

Mom looked surprised to see me come through the door.

"Jocelyn? Barret? What brings you two here all of a sudden?"

"Have you eaten? If not, sit down and have something."

I didn't answer. I went straight into the spare bedroom and started searching.

Barret was always busy with work, so I raised our child mostly on my own.

When I got bored, I'd bring him back to my parents' house, and there were plenty of Jerome's clothes and toys there.

I rushed into the spare room and yanked open the closet door.

The moment it opened, I froze where I stood.

The closet was empty. Not a trace of a child's clothes anywhere.

I still refused to believe it and started tearing through the rest of the house.

His scooter, his toy cars, his crayons.

All the things that used to be scattered everywhere were gone now, not a single trace of them left.

My parents were frightened by the way I was acting, and for a moment neither dared to stop me.

Mom's face was full of worry.

"Barret, what on earth is going on? What is Jocelyn looking for?"

Before Barret could answer, I'd already grabbed hold of Mom's hand.

"Mom, where are Jerome's clothes and toys? Where did you put them?"

Mom looked confused.

"Jerome? Who's Jerome? Is there anyone in this family called Jerome?"

The instant she said it, it hit me like a bolt out of the sky. I stood there, my lips working for a long moment, and I couldn't get a single word out.

Why?

Why were even my parents lying to me?

That was my own son. Why was everyone lying to me?

Seeing that Mom was still completely lost, Barret quickly explained the whole thing.

Once she understood, Mom came over to me, her tone half-scolding.

"You silly girl, almost thirty and still pulling something this childish. Playing jokes on your own mother now."

"Weren't you the one who didn't want children? So what's all this fuss about now?"

I couldn't take another word of it. I lost control and screamed at her.

"What is wrong with all of you? Why is everyone lying to me?"

"Jerome! That's Jerome! He's my child! Where on earth have you hidden my child?"

Seeing that I wasn't joking, Mom went into a panic.

"Jocelyn, what are you talking about? You don't like children. You're child-free by choice, just like Barret."

"Right after you two got married, your dad and I wanted you to have a baby, and you fought with us plenty over it. You said you loved your freedom, that you weren't ready to be a mother."

"All these years your dad and I made our peace with it. Your own happiness matters most. If you don't want children, then you don't. But what is this now?"

The more she spoke, the more frantic she got, her eyes brimming with worry for me.

When I said nothing, the tears came, rolling down her face in big drops.

"What's wrong, Jocelyn? Talk to Mom. Did something happen to you recently?"

"Don't scare your mother like this. Say something."

I forced my mouth open, wanting to say something, and found I couldn't make a single sound.

A moment later, I finally couldn't hold myself up any longer.

Everything went black, and I lost consciousness completely.

4: 4

When I woke again, I was in a hospital, and all I could see was endless white.

A nurse was changing my IV.

Seeing me awake, she smiled.

"You're awake, miss? Your blood sugar was low. You were unconscious when they brought you in."

"Don't worry, your husband went out to get you something to eat. He should be back soon."

I said nothing, just stared blankly at what her hands were doing.

Even after she finished with the IV and left the room, I kept my eyes fixed on her retreating back.

Then, all at once, something came back to me.

When I had Jerome, the birth hadn't gone smoothly. I'd labored for hours and still couldn't deliver.

In the end, on the doctor's advice, I'd switched to a C-section. Jerome was born by cesarean.

During my recovery I even joked with my mother.

I'd given birth once and gone through the pain of both a natural birth and a C-section.

I bolted upright, threw back the blanket, and yanked down the waist of my pants.

What I saw made my pupils shrink.

The spot on my lower belly, where the scar had always been, was completely bare.

That scar was from the C-section, and it still itched a little on rainy days.

But now my lower belly was smooth, without the faintest trace of any scar.

The strength drained out of me and I dropped back onto the bed.

Before I ended up in this hospital, I'd believed the whole world was lying to me.

But now, for the first time, I doubted myself.

My husband could lie to me. The preschool teacher could lie to me. My father and mother could lie to me.

But my own body? Could that really lie to me?

While I was still lost in a daze, Barret pushed open the door.

His hands were full of things.

He set them down on the nightstand one by one, talking as he went.

"You scared me half to death. How did you just faint like that? Thank goodness the doctor said it was only low blood sugar."

"These are the soup dumplings from that place on the west side, your favorite. And this, this is the wonton soup I got packed up special from the shop by our gate. You always want this when you're not feeling well."

"And this is the fish soup Mom made. It's really fresh. Do you want to try some?"

When I didn't answer, Barret showed no irritation at all.

"The doctor said you should eat something light for now, nothing that would upset your stomach."

"See if there's anything here you feel like eating. If not, just tell me what you want and I'll go buy it."

Only then did I slowly turn my head to look at him.

Three years dating, seven years married, a full ten years together. Barret and I had always been close.

He put me first in everything, my feelings before his own.

Even after everything that had happened today, when in everyone's eyes I was the one making trouble over nothing, there wasn't a word of blame from him, only worry filling his whole face.

I couldn't bring myself to say anything more, and only nodded.

"I'll have the wonton soup. It's been a while."

After I ate, the IV had just finished, and Barret got up to call the nurse to take out the needle.

But watching him walk away, I couldn't shake the feeling that something was still wrong.

After thinking it over, I called my oldest friend, Lavinia Butler.

"Lavinia, are you free? Want to come over to my place in a bit?"

My parents and Lavinia's parents were good friends, and we'd been neighbors since we were kids, practically raised together from diapers.

After I got married and had a child, Lavinia naturally became Jerome's godmother.

Lavinia and I were the kind of close where one of us could kill and the other would hand over the knife.

There wasn't a single person in this world I could trust one hundred percent.

But Lavinia, I knew for certain she would never lie to me.

Barret and I hadn't been home long when there was a knock at the door.

Before I could even get up and speak, Lavinia's voice came through the wood.

"Jocelyn! Get over here and open the door! The toys I brought for my godson weigh a ton!"

"Where's my godson? Is he asleep? Go wake him up."

"I've been away on business, and his godmother has missed him to death!"

It hit me like a lightning strike.

For a moment I froze right where I stood.