ROOM 211

PART FORTY

46.

'Can I get this?' Bonnie asks Mandy as they are locked in an embrace within the confines of room 211of the Mulberry Hotel. The this she refers to is a knock to this room's main door.

'Sure ... go right ahead.'

Bonnie is one hundred percent of who it is on that other side of the door. She does not need to hear a voice, she does not need to see to know for she knows anyway despite the fact that others are surely coming too, the need she does have to hear, see, or even feel comes from somewhere else.

She opens the door wide to see Henry standing there. For a moment or two there is no movement, both Henry and Bonnie just stand there looking at one another before the biggest of smiles decides to completely take up the whole of Henry's face. The two embrace as if they have been waiting their whole lives for this moment, as if they are the closest of friends who may have spent months or even years apart.

'Someone call for a doctor?' calls out a voice approaching from down the hall, 'oh ... that's right, the doctor is already here' continues the voice.

'Archer ...' speaks Henry as he stretches out a hand as his embrace with Bonnie comes to an end.

'That would be your name Doc, but I am happy to hold onto Henry for a little while longer.'

'Hey, hey ...' speaks Sue as she turns a bend into this corridor and as she catches up to the others she continues to speak, 'I swear, this guy is like a child at Christmas, he couldn't get up here fast enough.'

'Not true' says Archer trying all he can not to smile.'

'It so is ...'

Hugs and cheek kisses all round and Mandy comes out into the hallway to join in with a key card in hand in case the door to the room closes over before they all can get back inside. Things hardly have a moment to settle down inside the room when a new knock marks another arrival, a dual arrival.

Blue and Red are back and wearing fresh suits, no traces of nose bleeds or blood hailing from any other origin on their clothing. They look a lot less like bank robbers and a lot more like successful businessmen or even possibly fashion designer which Sue would like to comment on but doesn't; still, they may one day have to deal with the repercussions of the actions which ultimately brings them to where they are today.

Down in the lobby of The Mulberry Hotel, Maggie has taken herself a seat the instant she made her return. It is the same seat she took when she first arrived here with her memory loss in tow. She is fearful to a degree of returning to room 211, not a frightening kind of fear but more of a fear of having things come to an end.

Oddly enough this whole situation has given her more stability in her life than what she has had for quite a few years. She is glad an end is coming though she also doesn't want it to end at all and the end is what she fears for it will leave her with a proper what next? for the first time in her life.

Maggie's long term or longer-term bout of having short term memory loss made it ever so difficult to settle down. Now a recent bout of memory loss has ended and in turn has hopefully ended any and every chance of short-term memory loss returning. As soon as she had sat herself down, she had got herself a brief glance of someone relevant to the past few months of her life.

The sighting of a blond-haired fellow only lasts a split second as she has looked away before realizing who she caught sight of. This fellow would hold more relevance for Sue than for Maggie and with not being able to see where that fellow could have gone to Maggie decides not to investigate his presence any further.

It is not long before further distraction comes, and a friendly one at that.

'Hi ... do you mind if I join you.'