I really don't know what will come of this, but I had an idea and had to get it down. Marlena and John have a chance meeting a decade after their affair.

John left Salem in 1994, after he was no longer able to live on the sidelines watching the life that he once had. No Isabella nor Brady. If the twins were 9 in 91, makes their graduation (in my timeline) 2000. It is soon after this that Marlena and John bump into each other. These chapters discuss the idea of regrets and fate helping two people who are meant to be. Quite the rewrite from the original version out there.

What if John left Salem and let Belle be raised by Marlena and Roman? This is a multiple part short story. Well, was a stand alone (old) short story that I have decided to dust off, change a bit, and add to. So, there will be at least two parts. Maybe more. We will see. Thank you MsGoldie for the cover art!

These are all stand alone stories. They do not go together in any way. Just a way to look at all of the ways that J/M could have gotten together, with a huge focus on them being "normal" people, doing "normal" things, especially as parents of younger children.

John and Marlena have their 1993 but it lasts for six months, before Marlena pleads with John to help her break it off. John leaves. Fast forward 5 years and the two bump into each other in Chicago, both attendees at the same wedding.

A love too powerful for the spotlight. A goodbye she never wanted to say. Echo of Almost is a sweeping story of first takes and final cuts, of two actors who played lovers for decades - and spent a lifetime pretending it wasn't real. Delilah Hayes was never meant to fall in love with her co-star. But from the moment Dylan stepped onto the soundstage of THE OATH, something shifted. Their characters, Mara and Jonathan, burned up the screen-but it was what happened between takes that changed everything. What began as late-night rehearsals and secret glances spiraled into the kind of love that redefines a life. But when Dylan's past catches up with him, Delilah is the one who makes the impossible choice. She lets him go-not because she stops loving him, but because she believes she can't give him, what he now needs. Now, years later, Dylan is gone. The world knows him as a television icon, half of a legendary onscreen pairing. But only Delilah knows the truth of what they shared. As Delilah opens the letter he left behind, she's pulled back into the fire of their beginnings - the auditions and the stolen weekends, the passion and the silences, the final scene that was never just a scene. And in remembering him, she is forced to confront not just the love they lived, but the choices they never stopped making. Echo of Almost is the story of a once-in-a-lifetime connection tested by timing, sacrifice, and love too deep to ever really fade. It's about the moments we carry, the truths we bury, and the souls we never stop searching for-even when goodbye is the only word left to say. ------- (if you are a J&M fan read it with them in mind) Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

It's late 2014 when John wakes from a coma believing it's still 2012, and that he and Marlena are still married and deeply in love. But in reality, they're divorced-broken by pain, time, and choices that can't be undone. Marlena tries to guard her heart. John only remembers how to love her. Going Home to Doc is a slow-burn, second-chance romance that asks: can soulmates ever truly let go? Notes about the use of canon in this universe: John & Marlena have been married since 1999 and that marriage was fully intact until 2012. There was no Princess Gina, no RoboJohn, no Alex North, no reasons for multiple separations and marriages over the years. Until 2012 their relationship was solid and the tests to their relationship always came from the outside but their relationship itself was upenetrable. 2012 changed everything.

Their love was rumored fact and fiction, blurring the lines between reel and real. After a decade apart, John Black, a retired baseball player and now Hollywood star, reaches out to Marlena Evans with an opportunity she cannot refuse. The challenge? They must contend with feelings of longing and attraction, leading to an arrangement.

I wrote this many moons ago and never got to finish it up. Going to try to rediscover the story and characters as I go. You're welcome to come along for the journey, if you wish. This is my take on the affair from 1993, set in that moment in time. Hope you enjoy (:

Post Marlena's 1992 return to Salem. Marlena made the decision to give her marriage to Roman a try, but is struggling. John, putting his own pain aside, is frequently there to help her. Thank you to Ms. Goldie for the cover art and for inspiring me to revise and continue this story!