Chapter Text
2024
Another small room.
But this time, it was quite a different situation from the last memory they had been in. It wasn’t sad or lonely in the slightest, instead what seemed to be a small dressing room was radiating with excitement, and it contained more than just the one lonely human being. Bridge and Sky didn’t even see Chase (but assumed he had to be there), but the first thing their eyes were drawn to was a young man with dark blond hair and clad in a handsome suit standing in the middle of the room. It was like he himself was lighting up the room, glowing in happiness. He was also very intently eating a box of chicken nuggets, which somewhat ruined the effect of almost ethereal beauty. It was quite the contrast to the Riley they had seen in previous memories. The plain boy they had marveled at Chase loving in the past memories suddenly seemed done up to an almost angelic state, or maybe Bridge was exaggerating a bit in his mind as he and Sky pieced together more of Chase’s story.
“Riley, I swear to god. Today is your special day and you’re dressed in the most expensive clothing you’ve ever worn in your life and you’re eating chicken nuggets from the Dino Bite?!” A strangely familiar looking woman in a pale pink dress was fussing over Riley, and they realized that she had been present in some of Chase’s photos in his previous memory.
She also looked incredibly stressed about Riley’s action, since she was holding a napkin beneath Riley’s chin as he continued to eat. Every shift and movement he made caused her to follow his mouth in a panic at the mere thought of even the smallest crumb falling onto his expensive outfit. But Riley had a slight upturn on his lips as he watched her panicked expression.
“I’m allowed to eat, aren’t I Shelby?” Riley asked in a mock innocent voice. “I didn’t get to eat breakfast this morning since we were getting the last of the preparations done!” He grinned a bit more widely as Shelby nearly shrieked when she just barely managed to catch a drip of ketchup that nearly fell onto Riley’s dark green tie.
“Y’know...we went to all this trouble of finding foods that you’d actually eat at your reception,” Shelby mumbled, before sighing in relief as Riley finished eating, “I never realized just how much of a picky eater you are. Then again, all we ever ate around each other was fast food.”
Riley could only shrug, and the two friends shared a sweet moment of laughter, before it was interrupted by a dark-skinned young man with a cheery smile sticking his head through the doorway. “Everyone else is ready to go. How about you three?” The young man asked. He looked just as familiar as Shelby had been, probably another friend of Chase and Riley.
“Just a second Tyler, we’ll be out in a second.” Riley assured.
“Well don’t take too long, don’t want to keep Burt waiting!” Tyler gave Riley a wink before leaving.
Bridge could only smile slightly at Riley’s suddenly flushed face before he was suddenly reminded that Chase was in the room the whole time. He hadn’t spoken a word since they entered the memory, and he was standing off in the corner of the room with his eyes facing down towards his phone, and an unreadable expression etched on his face. Sky had seen him glance up momentarily at the sound of Tyler’s voice, but he had frowned when the name Burt came up and his face had steeled as soon as the cheery man had disappeared.
The other two occupants of the room hadn’t noticed this though, and Shelby turned Riley towards herself, dusting him off and adjusting his tie.
“Ready?” Shelby asked, patting Riley on the shoulders.
“You know, you’ve changed. I don’t think I’ve seen you this worried about appearances or clothing before.” Riley responded teasingly.
“Well, today is your special day. I don’t want there to be any problems.” She smiled fondly at Riley.
Riley grinned back, before finally turning to Chase. “Come on, we can’t keep everyone waiting.”
The room was suddenly filled with a strange tension, as Riley reached forward and grabbed Chase’s hand with his own. His bright grin seemed to spread momentarily to Chase, the kiwi had looked up and smiled at his friend, but as soon as Shelby and Riley had turned their heads towards the door to exit, both Bridge and Sky saw his expression fall once again, his attention only on his hand laced with Riley’s as they exited the changing room. Bridge and Sky followed after quickly, both of them squinting their eyes from the sudden bright flash of blinding white light. When their eyes adjusted, they were standing in the middle of green.
So, so much green. The fields around them looked like they went on for miles, and Bridge tugged on the sleeve of Sky’s uniform pointing in the distance. “I think we’re on a farm! Some sort of ranch maybe? I can hear something like horses, and maybe pigs--” Sky put his finger to his lips before Bridge could continue any further.
“We need to find Chase again.” Sky muttered.
Once again they had lost their client in a large haze of mostly forgotten people, before they noticed him up at the very front of what was obviously the wedding ceremony. He was right next to Riley, clearly the spot of the best man. But he was staring at a spot just past Riley as the service continued on. His eyes were glazed over, and the words of the vows sounded muffled and distant to the two SPD employees. Not a bit of the vows had registered in Chase’s mind. The only thing in this part of the memory that was the sharpest clarity was Riley and his soon-to-be-husband, both of them staring deeply into each other’s eyes.
They were startled, when the fuzzy sounds suddenly sharpened and the voice of the officiant almost boomed around them, announcing that the couple was now going to kiss. They could see Chase’s eyes slip shut just as the distance between Riley and Burt’s lips closed onto each other. The echoing hazy cheers seems to engulf Bridge and Sky as everything around them blurred together. These were choppy memories. All of them from a single day and meant to be in one cohesive narrative, but Chase’s emotions had been so frantic that only chunks here and there were clearly visible and others faded into obscurity. They had witnessed it before, many times in fact. Choppy memories were a fact of life when they had these older patients. But this was more disconcerting to Bridge and Sky, knowing that these sharp-yet-faded memories were the result of such strong feelings and not just old age.
They were still in the same place as the ceremony, but the rows of chairs had dispersed and were now around tables that were set up. The faint pulsating of music was far away to their ears, and the sounds of conversation pressed against their ears even though they couldn’t quite make out what anyone was actually saying. They could see Riley off in the distance with his husband, talking happily to an unknown pair of figures. Bridge couldn’t help but wonder what their importance was, not to Chase but to Riley. But of course this wasn’t his memory, it was Chase’s. No matter how interested in his story that he was, they had to focus on Chase.
He was sitting with Shelby and Tyler, along with some others that had filled the photographs from before. They could catch the names of others, like Koda, Ivan, Phillip Kendall...But neither of them knew which names were assigned to who, but they must have been important to Chase, because unlike the rest of the people they were remembered. He was laughing and talking with them in short intervals, but every time he glanced over in Riley’s direction watching him make the rounds from table to table, his smile and laughs seemed forced. And as Riley got closer and closer to them, his attempts to keep with the conversation lulled, and he was focused more on a napkin sitting in front of him than he was his close friends.
Bridge and Sky moved in closer, hoping they’d get a memento of some sort. They watched Shelby lean over suddenly to see what Chase was doing, her face slightly frustrated. “Aren’t you going to talk more Chase? We haven’t been together as a group in years, this is no time to--” She paused, looking down. “Is that Rubik?”
Chase tried to move the napkin away from her. “Shelby--”
But it was too late, she picked up the square of paper and laughed. “It is! This is so cute, we need to give this to Riley.” The rest of the group seemed to agree with this, but Chase’s face was red with frustration.
“No, it’s fine. It’s just a doodle…” He mumbled, trying to grab it back from Shelby.
“But Riley adored Rubik. He’d love to see this!”
That seemed to be the breaking point, because Chase didn’t say anything. But his mouth was slightly agape, and Bridge and Sky turned to see that Riley had finally arrived at their table, just as radiant as he had been in the dressing room. He happily greeted his friends one by one with a hug, all of them chatting happily and catching up with each other. As soon as he reached Chase and Shelby, the girl in pink proudly held up Chase’s doodle enough that Bridge and Sky could see it.
Neither of them knew what Rubik looked like, but the drawing was surprisingly well done, definitely more than just the average doodle. And the way Riley’s face lit up at the sight of it made them assume it was a fairly accurate representation of his pet dog.
“Chase drew it.” Shelby immediately told him. “Isn’t it cute?”
Riley beamed at Chase. “It’s amazing. Thank you Chase.” He leaned over and wrapped his arm around Chase.
And finally, the smile on Chase’s face seemed to stick. Everything around them seemed to go out of focus, the clearest memories being Chase and Riley, both of them stuck in their own little world of Chase’s memories.
“I knew how much you loved him.” Chase breathed. “I guess I wondered what it’d be like if he were still here. But I hope this doesn’t ruin my actual wedding gift, eh?”
“What is it?” Riley asked excitedly, setting down the napkin on the table as he pulled of a seat. “What did you get?”
“It’s a secret, mate. I’m not breathing a word.” Both of them started to laugh.
“Sky, the memento.” Bridge nudged him, pointing to the napkin which had started glowing.
“Now this one makes a bit more sense than the last one.” Sky said, picking it up.
“Oh, it made a bit more sense after seeing Riley. But I’m just glad we’re leaving this memory on a happy note. I’m not sure I could have handled another depressing end.”
Sky rolled his eyes as he pulled out his license, and the napkin began to glow even more brightly.
“This is getting interesting Sky, I wonder where we’re going next?” Bridge asked, hoping that the world forming around them would just go faster.