You Will Always Have My Heart

A gentle shake roused me from my sleep. Blinking my eyes awake, I turned to look at a dark-skinned woman with a blue mask sitting in the chair beside my bed. Her braids were pulled back into a bun and her eyebrows were perfectly sculpted on her face. Brown eyes looked at me with recognition. She was beautiful.

"Hi mom," I said softly, even though we were the only people in the room. 

"Hi Luna," she replied, tilting her head to look at me. "I'm glad you decided to come to the hospital," she said in a relieved tone.

"I had the strangest dream," I told her. "The pandemic, it's not real." I furrowed my brow, not knowing what possessed me to say such a ridiculous thing like that.

"It is real honey," she said softly, though I wasn't sure that I believed her. 

"Mom…" I said hesitantly. "Are… are you real?" I questioned slowly, as if not to offend her.

"Yes, I'm real," she replied, reaching out to rest her hand on mine. When her fingers gently squeezed my hand, a wave of comfort and relief coursed through me. Maybe she would have some answers.

Before I could ask her, a memory flashed between my eyes. A young man with dark brown curls and green eyes was standing in a lab coat looking at me. He held out his hand and introduced himself with a smile that went straight to my heart. I shook his hand and stuttered out my own name.

The background morphed into that of an American diner, with the same curly-haired man looking at me across the table. He laughed and smiled at me and I could feel my cheeks burn. Suddenly he sank to his knees and pulled out a ring and-

Another place, this time the tone wasn't one of happiness. The same man with green eyes held my hand, a look of sorrow on his more mature face. He told me that he would see me soon, and we wouldn't even notice how long we were apart. He leaned in to kiss me and my heart stopped as if it were the first time. He let go of my hand and stepped away while tears gathered in my eyes.

I sat up and looked around the hospital room frantically, my thoughts moving a mile a minute.

"Henry? Henry? Where's Henry? Henry?! I have to see him! Henry, where are you?! I have to see him I-"

"Pause," my mother commanded in a voice that was firm and clear. I closed my mouth and layed back in the hospital bed, turning my head to look at her calmly. She pressed a button on the side of the bed and a brunette nurse came rushing in. 

"Nurse Beckett, hello," she directed towards the brunette. "I believe we are ready for the Restoration Sequence," she said with a nod. Nurse Beckett's eyes widened with surprise as she looked at me.

"Yes, of course Ms. Lockhart, I'll be right back," she replied, rushing out the door.

My head tilted toward my mother who now held my hand in her own. Her eyes looked happy, as if something had suddenly changed. I opened my mouth to speak but couldn't find the right words.

Nurse Beckett walked back into the room holding a velvet box in her hands. She quickly gave the box to my mother and said she would be back once the process was complete.

My mother opened the black velvet box and picked up a golden heart-shaped locket encrusted with a single diamond. The metal seemed to have slightly rusted but still glimmered under the fluorescent lights. She held the chain out to me and I took it into my hands.

"This will help, my sweet Luna," she said as she stood up from her seat. "I'll be back once the sequence is finished." She strode out of the room before I could say anything.

The lights dimmed as I turned the golden locket over in my hands and felt an engraving on the back. Two cursive L's adorned the smooth surface and I recognized them as my first and last initials. I carefully pried the two halves open to reveal what was inside. On the right was a picture of myself and the curly-haired man smiling at the camera. On the left was an engraving:

'My love, you will always have my heart.'

My memory of the time before came flooding back and crashed like waves in the corners of my mind. The air on Earth had slowly become toxic, and peaked in 2020 with the outbreak of the coronavirus. By the year 2021 billions had died. I was recruited out of Stanford by the Human Preservation Council to work on Project Reset, a suspended animation effort for the world's remaining population of 3 million. I was the one who perfected the process.

We slept underground for 100 years, awaking in the 22nd century in the year 2123. The air had rid itself of toxins and the COVID-19 strain had died with most of the population. We had a chance to start over, better this time around. 

The door swung open and in walked the brunette nurse. She adjusted her glasses on her now maskless face and smiled at me warmly. Her green eyes glinted in the light, and suddenly a feeling of recognition crept up on me like it had been there all along in the shadows of my brain.

"You're Henry's mother," I said with certainty. Perhaps the first thing I was certain of ever since I came to the hospital.

"Yes Luna, I'm Henry's mother. And I'm not just a nurse, I'm also a doctor, like you and Henry." I let her words process in my mind and smiled for the first time in what must have been ages. This brunette woman in front of me was my mother-in-law, and Henry was real.

"I hope that the locket has helped you access more of your memory, but I'm here to help you fill in the blanks," she explained, taking a seat to the left of me. "As you can tell, the coronavirus pandemic is over and the year is not 2020 like the nurses told you." I nodded my head with comprehension and started to realize that my memory loss was more severe than I initially thought. 

"Actually, it's not even 2123. It's 2130," she said, pausing to look at me for a reaction. I felt my eyebrows raise though I wasn't that surprised. I knew that we had slept until 2123, but not that it was the current year.

"How long have I been here?"  I asked, not fully wanting to know the answer but understanding that I needed to.

"It's been six months since the car accident," she explained. "What happened to you was so traumatic, and given your abilities, your brain blocked out everything in order to protect itself. In the first few weeks we had to tell you your own name. It wasn't until recently we decided you had made enough progress on your core memories that the decision was made to reset you."

"Reset me?" I asked, a bit confused. She was using terms that one would use for a computer or machine. "And what special abilities are you talking about?"

"They call you the Human AI," she said with a smile, "your 'processing power' is that of a supercomputer. You can calculate and comprehend more than a room full of scientists combined. And you have a photographic memory, though sometimes that works against you and you shut down from all the memories of the trauma you endured. That's what happened six months ago. The only upside is that during those six months we've been able to reprogram your memory so that you're able to store and access the traumatic memories, but they don't trigger such a negative emotional response."

"So, I'm like a computer," I said with a small laugh. It all sounded rather ridiculous, but it did explain why I responded to my mother's command.

"Oh Luna, you're entirely human my dear. Your brain just works at a level most of us can't access. It's part of what makes you so special. When humanity was on the brink of collapse, you developed a solution to save us all. You held the key to our survival. We all owe our lives to you."

More of her words started to make sense as the pieces of my memory delicately fit back together.

"I remember," I said with a sigh of relief. "I remember our work on Project Reset. And marrying Henry, and going to sleep. But what has happened in the past 7 years?"

"Well, you were awarded a Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine, and have been working with a new team of scientists who specialize in climate science. We never want an apocalypse to happen again and we're going to make sure of it." I nodded as I registered her words. My memory seemed to hold up until the year 2123, but I was confident that the rest would slowly come back. Right now there was only one thing I wanted.

"I want to see him," I said, tearing up slightly. "Is he here?" I looked at the brunette woman and she nodded, knowing exactly what I meant.

"Of course dear, he's been here this whole time waiting for progress updates. I'll go get him and send him in," she patted my hand and turned to get my husband.

To say I was nervous to see him was an understatement. If my memory was correct, I hadn't seen him in person since I was first admitted six months ago. The longest span we had spent apart in our decade-long marriage. I attempted to smooth down the top of my brown curls and placed my caramel-colored hands in my lap.

The doorknob twisted and I sat up in anticipation. In walked a man of average height with short brown curls atop his head. He wore a black button-down shirt and slacks. I looked into his green eyes that I had first fell in love with. He sat in the chair left by his mother and scooted closer to me.

"Henry," I said breathlessly, and he closed his eyes at the sound. His face twisted into what could be a grimace, but that I knew was an expression of intense relief. He opened his eyes and reached out his hand. 

"Luna," he whispered as I clutched his hand firmly. I smiled as my name rolled off his lips, remembering the voice that had comforted me countless times.

"It was you," I said, trying not to cry. "You helped me remember it all." My effort was useless as wetness rolled down my cheek. Henry lifted my hand to kiss it and smiled at me with pure happiness.

"You have always had my heart." He said, pulling my wedding ring from his pocket and placing it on my finger. I reached out and wrapped my arms around his neck, inhaling his familiar scent and resting my head on his shoulder. After a few moments I leaned back, looking at his handsome face.

"I love you," I told him, and in that moment, I knew that I was okay.

"I love you so much Luna. Let's go home."