Whisper My Name

Chapter 27

February 15, 1992

Charles Wright Cabin, Outside Telluride, Colorado

Ooh, I can't help thinkin'

When I look in your eyes

How much I need you,

It's so hard to hide

~ Secret ~ Heart ~

John sat on the bed, beside Marlena, scooping soup into her mouth. "You know, Doc, I should thank Sami for making me buy all of that soup," he said with a laugh. "Her fascination with all things soup related has come in handy."

Marlena moaned dramatically, "When do you think I might get some real food?"

John's hand stilled mid-air. "Tomorrow," he told her with a teasing wink.

He was beautiful. There was no other way to describe him. Twelve days earlier she had been focusing on her marriage to Roman, and trying to get her life in order. She'd been working hard to help the children adjust, and forget her confusing feelings for John. Now she realized she was more deeply in love with him than she had been previously. His tender touch, and his care for her over the last week had solidified those feelings. He grinned at her, and her stomach rolled with that pleasant fluttery feeling. Her heart skipped a beat, as she smiled shyly.

Marlena had seen her sutures for the first time that morning, since she'd been drugged sleeping for the last seven days. They were neat, professional, and clean, with no sign of infection. They were so well done, they looked as if they were done by a surgeon, and John was not a surgeon. She looked up at him, asking softly, "How did you know what to do... with the sutures?"

He thought for a moment. Her question was the same one he'd been asking himself since she was shot. "I don't really know, Doc. I was panicking. I mean really panicking, but there were flashes of memories... images that were assaulting my mind. I couldn't... I was trying to slow them down... get them to stay, you know? It was like the dreams I have. The threads were there but they kept slipping from my fingers." He stroked his fingers across her cheek gently, " I had you laying on the couch, and I remember collapsing on the floor beside you, pulling at my hair, and screaming at myself to remember... and something happened. I was able to remember..."

Her heart started to beat quickly, racing in her chest, as she whispered, "Remember what?"

The images that he'd recalled seven days earlier, now refused to leave. John wasn't sure whether that was a curse or a blessing. He closed his eyes briefly, "I was... a surgeon. In Grenada... I remembered that, Doc."

"You remembered? All of it?" she asked him in wonder.

"Enough to take care of you. Enough to clean your wound, excise the dead skin around the edges, remove the bullet, and sew you up... enough to matter," he said, placing the empty soup bowl, and the spoon off to the side. He didn't tell her that he also remembered the sounds of men screaming for their mothers, or the sight of dead soldiers swollen on the battlefield.

Marlena thought for a moment, "Do you have the notebook... the one you mentioned on the plane?"

He knew she was worried he might forget what he'd recalled, and he'd had the same fear. "I wrote everything down, if that's what you're wondering. I even drew pictures," he told her. He'd drawn sketches of scalpels, suture types, and knots. Things he didn't understand. He wrote down names he was unfamiliar with. "For the things I didn't understand."