Rating:  PG

Disclaimer: The characters of Gary Hobson, Chuck Fishman, and Marissa Clark belong to Sony/Tristar and CBS productions.  No copyright infringement intended.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

To Have and To Hold
(parts 1-5)
by inkling
 

She knew she could remember, if she just tried hard enough.  Putting her hands to her head, ignoring the twinge of pain from the bruises on her right arm, she closed her eyes and concentrated hard. Slowly, oh so slowly, she groped through the dark foggy quicksand her thoughts had become, until at last she saw it, felt it, reached for it with every fiber of her being.  So close, now, so close, she could see it in her mind, and, like a door opening into a warmly lit house on a dark night, she began to remember -- comfort... security... laughter, and -- love.  Hungrily, she reached for the door, for the sliver of light opening in her darkened mind, and this time she was going to make it, she was almost there, she was al---

Howling, the storm rose, just like it had all the other times she had tried,  just as her thoughts were beginning to grasp the memories she longed for.  Like a foul, seething vapor, it surged between her and the door she had so laboriously opened, and, like the frightened child she had become, she fell away from its monstrosity, fell back, giving up the hard won ground in her mind.  But not fast enough.  She was never fast enough to get away completely from the screams that now sounded in her brain, the dread and horror that overwhelmed the light and warmth --

"No!"  Unaware that she had cried aloud, the woman reeled, eyes still closed, bumping into another pedestrian.  The man caught her briefly as her eyes snapped open, then shoved her away with disgust when he noticed the blank terror on her face.

"Watch where you're going, bitch!"  He stalked off, muttering under his breath about the crazies they let roam the streets, while the woman, knocked off balance by his push, staggered and fell to the ground.  Keeping her head down, avoiding the curious stares of the other pedestrians carefully stepping around her, she scuttled for the closest shelter she could find, a metal newspaper stand.  A few days ago, she would have read the name of the paper, and perhaps dug for change in her purse to buy the daily edition, but this afternoon she just huddled in its meager shelter, shivering in the biting wind, desperately trying to damp the storm raging in her thoughts before it destroyed her completely.

Don't think, don't think, don't think about anything.  Nothing nothing think nothing be nothing  nothing... Whimpering to herself, she laboriously began to gather the scraps of fog about her thoughts again, her mind  sinking  gratefully into the quicksand that would still it, calm it, refuse to admit the raging beast.

Then, her mind blank, safe once again from the chaos, the storm, the woman leaned her head against the newspaper stand and wept silently.

******************************************

Gary Hobson paused for a second as he strode down the sidewalk, pulling a folded and much read newspaper out of the inside pocket of his bomber jacket.  Green eyes intense, he found the article he was looking for, then looked around to scan the street signs to be sure he was in the right place. Okay, he was in the right place, and a quick glance at his watch told him it was - or shortly would be - the right time, now he just needed to find the right person.

 The cold wind  ruffled Gary's dark hair in as he scanned the city block in front of him, looking for this particular distressed person the paper had sent him to help.  He quickly read through the article again.  Headlined UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN KILLED BY TRUCK, the story went on to tell about a Jane Doe who suddenly ran out in front of a UPS truck on this block at 4:37 p.m.  The driver couldn't stop in time to avoid her, and the woman was struck and killed.  Witnesses reported that the woman had been wandering the sidewalk before the accident, seemingly dazed and incoherent.  Just before she ran out into the street, she had been huddled beside a Chicago Sun-Times newspaper stand.  The article closed with a description of the woman, and the statement that no identification was found on her.  Anyone who thought they might have information was requested to contact Chicago P.D.

Gary finally spotted the newspaper stand, about half way down the block from where he stood.  And there, at the far end of the block was a UPS truck, patiently waiting through a red light.  He quickly pocketed his paper and began to run.

*****************************************

"Hey lady!"  She jerked at the sound of the man's voice behind her, then huddled closer to the stand.  It didn't work.  She cried out as a hand grabbed her arm, yanking her to her feet, where a man's face thrust itself into her field of view.

"Can't you read?  The sign says  No Loitering!'" The burly man jerked a thumb at the sign posted in the window of the pawn shop behind him.  "We don't want any trash like you cluttering up our streets.  Now get lost!" With that he shoved her, almost knocking her down.  Panicked, confused, with a single thought - to get away - she looked wildly around the sidewalk, at the people now ringing around her and the shop owner, all staring at her.  Turning round and round desperately, she ran the only way she could see that was clear of leering faces: toward the street.

*****************************************

Gary thrust his way through the crowd just in time to see the woman head for the street.

"Hey!"  He lunged forward and grabbed her by the arm, jerking her around to face him.  Quickly he shifted his grip, catching her by both arms for the few seconds it took him to watch the UPS truck rumble by, then he looked down - right in time to almost get his eyes clawed out, as the woman he had just saved seemed to go berserk.

"Hey!"  He shouted again, releasing her and jumping back.  He threw his hands up -- too late to protect his face.  The laughter and jeers of the assembled crowd grew louder as he gingerly fingered the long scratch that had suddenly appeared on his face.  Gary stared in disbelief at the blood on his hand, then up at the woman, suddenly frozen in front of him. Her face screwed  into a great "O," she reached with a slender hand toward the red streak down the right side of his face, then met his eyes for one stricken minute. Gary saw a pair of haunted blue eyes as she mouthed, "I'm sorry."  Backing away, she suddenly turned and ran, dodging through the crowd down the sidewalk this time.

Gary inspected the scratch on his face a second time, frowning at the blood on his fingers as the  crowd began to disperse around him -- with a few ribald comments directed his way.  Wiping his fingers on his pants leg, Gary made a face at one of the riper commentators.

"Yeah, yeah, why don't you go get a life or something?"  His comment elicited a few last laughs at his expense from the final hangers on.  Satisfied that the damage to his face wasn't serious, he looked down the street where the crazy woman had disappeared, shaking his head.   "Sheesh!"  Then pulling the paper out of his coat again Gary turned to the last page, checking to be sure he had done all that needed to be done here.

He swore bitterly.  So much for getting back to McGinty's to help out before Happy Hour went into full swing.  The headline had changed, but it was no better.  UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN DROWNS.  The smaller headline under it read: "Evidence indicates victim assaulted in Grant Park."  Gary sighed.  Chuck wasn't gonna be happy about this, not at all.  He shook his head as he stuffed the paper back inside his coat.  Then he zipped it up and headed off in search of the woman again.

It took him over an hour, but Gary finally found the woman.  He spent that hour searching from one end of Grant Park to the other with no sight of the lady in question.  Tired, cold, and hungry, angrier by the minute at the paper's unceremonious pre-emption of his own plans, his own life, Gary turned back with a sigh to check one more time. He found his quarry shortly thereafter, curled up on a park bench staring out over the cold, gray  lake.

Gary pulled the paper out of his coat.  The headline was still there.  Stowing the paper, he flipped his coat collar up, then blew on his hands and rubbed them together to warm them.  The wind was getting colder as the day waned.  He approached the woman warily, reluctant to repeat his earlier face-to-face encounter with her.  This time she didn't seem to notice him, not even when he gingerly took a seat on the opposite end of the bench.

"Miss?  Ma'am?"  There was no response.  She sat on her end of the bench, knees pulled up to her chest and her head buried in her arms as they rested on her knees. Gary watched her in silence for a minute, trying to ignore the growing chill as evening fell.  For all that she had freaked out on him earlier, she didn't look like your typical transient.  She wore a long, full plaid skirt of some soft material that flowed down over her knees and most of her feet. Over that she wore a solid blue tunic sweater.  What Gary could see of her shoes looked like Birkenstocks or something.  Her long, copper hair was snarled and tangled, but it, too, looked as if it was used to being cared for.  She had no coat, but, ragged and dirty as she was, the woman just didn't look like someone who belonged on the streets.

Clearing his throat, Gary tried again.

"Ma'am?  Miss?  Look, it's- it's getting kinda dark out here, and you really should, you really should be someplace warm." Still no response.  Gary sighed.  He reached out and tentatively touched her on the shoulder.  Her only response was to cringe away from him, without lifting her head.  Well, at least he knew she knew he was there.

"Look, Miss, it seems- um, you seem- um, are you in some kind of trouble?"  Gary's voice was low and urgent. "'Cause it's gonna get real cold here tonight, and- and- you know you really shouldn't be out here by yourself anyway.  Isn't there someone I can call or somewhere I can take you?"  Geez, he was getting cold sitting here, even if she wasn't. But then he noticed she was trembling, from cold or fear of him he couldn't tell.  Maybe both.

Not sure what to do, Gary leaned back against the bench and looked around the park.  It was  getting darker by the minute, and there didn't seem to be anybody about other than the two of them.  He pulled the paper from his coat.  A glance told him the headline hadn't changed, but he didn't need the paper to tell him he really couldn't leave her here, alone in the park at night.  Falling in the water wasn't the only thing she had to worry about.  He sat, trying to decide what to do, tapping the paper agitatedly against his hand.

"Who- who are you?  Why are you following me?"  Startled, Gary swung back around towards the woman.  She was looking at him from half behind a screen of hair.  Her eyes were blue, he noticed again, and her lips were too, from cold.  He really had to get her somewhere warm, out of this wind.  She reached up and brushed the hair from her face, beginning to look nervous when he didn't answer her.  Gary winced at the angry purple bruise he could now see high on her forehead.  That had to've hurt.

"You- you hit your head," he blurted, without thinking.

"Wh- what?"  Confused, her nervousness momentarily forgotten,  she gingerly reached up to examine her forehead, blinking a little in surprise when her fingers found the bruise.  As she did so, something on her hand glinted in the nearby streetlight.  It only took a moment for Gary's brain to click; it was a ring on the third finger of her left hand - a *wedding* band.  A fancy, intricately carved wedding band.  His brow furrowed in concern as he stared at it.  Who was this woman, and what had happened to her that put her out on the streets like this?  The woman, her inspection finished, looked nervously at him again.

Putting one elbow up on the back of the bench, Gary leaned toward her and gestured with the paper he still held in his hand.

"Look, I - I have this- I just know you're in trouble and you really shouldn't be out here alone and without a coat."  She wasn't buying it, he could tell.  Her feet slipped down off the bench and she gripped the seat with both hands, leaning away from him, looking like she was ready to bolt at any second.  Desperate to keep her from taking off again, Gary kept talking.

"My name's Gary, Gary Hobson.  I own a tavern here, see, and I'm--" he stopped, puzzled at the sudden change in her expression.  She was staring at him intensely now,  almost like she knew him, or thought she did.  Like a light was trying to go on in a dark room -- or something.  Who knew what was going on inside that brain of hers.  He sure didn't.

"Gar?  Gary?"  She turned toward him on the bench and once again reached out tentatively for his face.  Gary, unsure what to make of this turn of events, hesitated before answering.  She was still staring intently at him, hand half stretched out toward him as he spoke again.

"Yeah, that's right, Gary.  Gary Hobson."

Shuddering, she closed her eyes, pulling her hand back and dropping it limply into her lap with her other one.  Gary watched her as she seemed to almost fold in upon herself.  Whatever light she had been trying to turn on was gone now, and she sat there listlessly, head hanging and shivering in the dim light.  Well, he wasn't going to give up now, not when he'd made this much progress.

"Hey, you know my name.  It's only fair you tell me yours."  He made his tone light, teasing.  But he wasn't prepared for her answer, as she stood and wrapped her arms around herself, staring away from him into the frigid waters of Lake Michigan.

"I can't.  I don't remember."

*************************************************

In the end, he took the nameless woman home with him to McGinty's.  Not the best solution, but she balked when he suggested a hospital, and Gary didn't feel right turning her over to the police.  She'd spend the night in some holding cell only to wind up on the streets again in the morning.  Shivering uncontrollably, her face and hands by then blue with cold, she refused his coat at first, but once they had gotten on the EL he finally convinced her he'd be alright without it.  He was really worried she might be getting hypothermic.  At McGinty's he had somehow gotten her in the front door and up the stairs without garnering attention from Chuck or any of their employees.   The last thing he needed to deal with tonight was Chuck's sarcasm or staff rumors or both.  His guest was taking a hot shower now, with a pair of Gary's Bears sweats and a cutoff sweatshirt to put on when she got out.  Gary was headed down to the kitchen in search of something hot to eat for both of them.

"Hey, we got any soup left?"  Gary dodged the cook, who nodded toward the back stove as he hurried by.  In short order, Gary had a tray loaded with two bowls of chowder, two mugs of hot cider and some hot fries.  Picking it up and turning toward the kitchen door, he almost ran into Chuck.

"Geez, Chuck, you don't have to sneak up on a guy!  I almost dropped all this!"

Chuck leaned against the kitchen's center island and crossed his arms across his chest.  His stare was bleak.

"Yeah, well, we almost didn't survive happy hour without you.  I thought you were gonna be here to help out.  You ARE the one who gave both Robin and Crumb the same weekend off."

Gary winced.

"Yeah, well, look, Chuck, you know I really planned on being here, but the paper had other ideas-- you know how it goes.  Just let me take this stuff upstairs, and then I'll be right back down here to help out for the rest of the evening."

Chuck wasn't giving ground.  He eyed the contents of the tray speculatively.

"Dining in for two, I see."  He looked up at Gary, one eyebrow cocked.  "Anybody I know?"

Gary sighed.

"No.  Look, Chuck, it's a long story --"

"I'm sure it is."

"Yeah, well, it is and I, well, I - look, just let me take this upstairs and I'll be right back down, alright?"

Chuck looked at him knowingly for another minute before standing aside.

"Did you ask her out before or after she scratched your face?"

Gary glared and pointed a finger in Chuck's general direction.   "I'm just - I'm just gonna ignore that." he said, stepping around Chuck and heading for the door with his tray.

Chuck followed him through the bar, shoving through the door of the office after Gary.

"Yeah, well you ignored happy hour, too, Gar." Chuck stopped at the bottom of the stairs, one hand on the railing.   "Take your time, Gary.  We'll survive without you; we always do!"  This last was shouted up the empty stairwell as Gary's door slammed above his head.

To Have and To Hold - Part 2
by inkling

"Good morning, Chicago!  It's going to be a cool but clear weekend, with rain and thunderstorms blowing in late Sun-"

The early morning announcer's voice shut off midword as Gary's hand groped out from under the covers and slapped onto his clock.  Lying on his stomach, his face pressed into the pillow, he squinted one eye open with a groan to check the time -- 6:30, same as always.  Why did he even bother to look anymore? And sure enough, there was the familiar "mrreow!" outside his door and the *plop!* on the floor that always followed it.  Gary closed his eye and muttered "Yeah, yeah, be right there," without moving.  Suddenly, both eyes popped open, and he pushed himself up, twisting around to check his couch.  Just showing over the end closest to him he could see part of a head of red hair.  The rest of his nameless companion lay exactly where she had fallen asleep last night after supper, a shapeless mass beneath the comforter he had thrown over her when he came up to bed.

*Well, at least one of us can sleep in.*  Gary swung out of bed and rubbed his face as he padded to the door.  Snow's cat darted in as he opened it and reached down for the paper.  Closing the door absently, he paused to scan the front page.  Sunday's front headline read, "PRESIDENT'S SECRETARY TO TESTIFY AGAIN."

"Well, sorry, but there ain't nothin' I can do about that, Mr. President."

He was halfway to the bathroom before the rumbling purr of the cat registered.  Surprised, he looked around and after a minute located it: curled up in the hollow of the comforter behind his guest's knees.

"Well, if that don't beat all."  The cat opened its eyes briefly to look at him, took a lick at its whiskers, then snuggled in and for all intents and purposes looked to be sound asleep.  Except for the purring.

Gary shook his head and headed for the shower, it being too early in the morning to try and figure out the vagaries of mystery women and cats -- let alone this cat.  Clean clothes in hand, he looked thoughtfully at the couch before taking the newspaper into the bathroom with him.  The woman seemed to be sound asleep, but Gary was mindful of past experience.

In the bathroom he took a few minutes to peruse the rest of the pages, but there didn't seem to be much going on today in the Windy City.  A tree blowing over and trapping a family in their car for a couple of hours seemed to be the worst. Since no one was injured and it was way out in the suburbs, Gary decided he could skip it.  A kid's dog would get run over, not far from McGinty's.  The boy was a terminal cancer patient, and the dog had been a gift from one of those charitable groups that tried to fulfill kid's wishes.  That wouldn't be hard to deal with, and it was early enough in the morning he should be back in plenty of time for the lunchtime rush.  But it didn't seem that anyone in the city or the surrounding area was really going to need his help today. And, there was absolutely nothing in the paper about his mystery guest, at least, not that Gary could find.

I wonder what's going on?  He couldn't remember the last time there had been so little in the paper for him to do, and in a Sunday edition no less.  It made him nervous, but, things could always change.  In fact, they usually did.

Frowning, Gary checked the scratch on his face in the mirror before stepping under the shower.  It was healing nicely.  A glint of gold on the small shelf beneath the mirror caught his eye as he turned away.  It was a pair of earrings, lying next to his razor for all the world as if they belonged there.  Slim gold ribbons loosely woven into an elaborate braid dangled beneath what looked like real sapphires.  Expensive was the first thought that came to him, the kind of present a man would give a woman he really cared about.  Gary wondered again just exactly who the woman sleeping on his couch was, and how she had wound up on the streets of Chicago in such distress.  And why didn't the paper have anything to say about her today?

Then, shrugging, he put the vagaries of the paper out of his mind with the cat and the mystery woman, and settled in to enjoy a long hot shower for once.

********

The bathroom door closed and a few minutes later she heard water running in the shower. Gary must want to get an early start today.  Briefly she considered joining him, but it was warm under the comforter, the familiar weight of the cat rumbling behind her knees.  The light shone softly through her eyelids, along with the warmth of her bed dispelling some of the shadows haunting her.  She sighed comfortably, and, opting for a few more minutes of sleep, snuggled deeper into the cocoon of her covers.

********

Paper in hand, Gary stepped out of the bathroom a half hour or so later.  As he tossed the clothes he had slept in toward the corner behind his bed, his mystery guest caught his eye.  Still dressed in his Bears sweats, she stood by the window, seemingly entranced by the clouds scudding across the sky.  What really caught Gary's attention was the entirely contented cat she cradled in one arm as she gently rubbed its head with her other hand.  Gary shook his head.  He had never seen that cat that friendly with anyone other than himself.  Not for the first time, he wondered just what in the world was going on with this woman.  What exactly did the cat and the paper want him to do with her?

He cleared his throat.  What was the protocol for saying "good morning" to a woman when you have no clue as to who she is, when she has no clue herself as to who she is?  A woman wearing another man's wedding ring and who has just spent the night in your apartment, no less.  (One who tried to scratch your eyes out at least once already , the less charitable side of him added.)

"Uh, good morning."

She jerked around to face him, a remnant of yesterday's terror rising in her face.  Gary tensed, but apparently she remembered something from last night, because she relaxed once her gaze met his.  Gary kept a wary eye on her for a minute or two before he felt absolutely certain she wasn't going to freak out on him again, then he, too, relaxed.  This morning the dark shadow of the bruise on her forehead was matched by the 2 large bruises on her upper right arm, just visible beneath the cut-off sleeves of her borrowed sweatshirt.  She hadn't complained, but he had slid into enough bases in his life to know by how she didn't move her arm just how stiff and sore it had been last night.

"Good morning."  Her voice was low, uncertain. She glanced nervously around the apartment, then back at him.  "This- this - is this ours?"

Gary shook his head.

"No, it's mine."  He stepped closer to her  as she tilted her head in an "Oh" gesture and turned to stare out the window again.  Yesterday he'd had too much on his mind to really pay attention to her looks, first just making sure he'd done what the paper wanted him to do, and secondly worrying about finally getting down and helping out in the bar.  He'd wolfed his chowder, tossed her the TV remote in case she wanted it, and rushed out the door.  She hadn't seemed to want company anyway.  He had found her curled up on the couch, asleep with the cat in her arms the first time he'd come upstairs to check on her.

Now, in the morning light, he studied her.  About his age, more or less, the woman's hair hung down her back almost to her waist in a burnished sheet of copper.  Natural, Gary decided, looking at the freckles on her arms and face.  Her eyes were blue, dark blue, like he'd noticed yesterday, large in a roundish face.  Pretty, but not a knock-out, she was tall and while she wasn't quite fat, she wasn't skinny either.   Round, he decided, round and soft.  Marcia had been all skin and bones. Gary thought this morning that he liked round better.

She glanced away from the window, catching him staring at her.  Gary blushed.  Not wanting her to feel threatened, he quickly smiled and offered, "You like coffee?"

"Yes.... no..."  Confused, she closed her eyes.  Then, opening them, replied confidently, "Yes, with cream and sugar."

Gary smiled again, gesturing with the paper he still held in his right hand.

"That's great, you- you remember something."  She stared at him, then flashed a brief smile.  But the smile did nothing to relieve the fear haunting her eyes.

"You don't know who I am, do you?"

Gary shook his head.  "No, I'm sorry.  I don't.  You- you don't remember anything new this morning?"  He had hoped she'd wake up this morning with at least some of her memory back.

 Her face fell as she shook her head.  "This morning, as-as I was waking up, it was like I could almost see another room, hear a voice talking to me.  But it was never very clear, and when I woke up completely there wasn't a name or anything left to hold on to."  Hugging the purring cat closer to her, she turned to stare mutely out the window again.

Gary hesitated, then headed for the coffee machine.  What he found himself wanting to do, surprisingly enough, was go give her a hug - comfort her somehow, but he couldn't make himself feel comfortable taking another man's wife in his arms, no matter how altruistic his reasons. The cat, seeing him near the source of food, wriggled down from his cozy roost in the woman's arms to come over and rub around Gary's feet, almost tripping him up.

"Hey, be patient, you'll get yours."  Coffee on, he found a can of cat food and started to open it, glancing over at his guest again.  She hadn't moved, still staring out the window, rubbing her arms and shivering slightly.  Frightened, he realized, then silently upbraided himself.  Who wouldn't be, waking up in some strange place, with a strange man, not knowing who you were or what was going to happen to you?  And he, what did he do?  Stared at her like a 12-year-old with his first crush, then couldn't think of anything to say except "What don't you remember?" and "Want some coffee?"  .

How lame can you get, Gar?  He put the cat's bowl down on the floor, considering his next move.  His stomach rumbled loud enough to get her attention, with another brief smile.  Gary grinned back.

"Look, I usually just get something to eat in the kitchen downstairs.  Why don't we go down there and I'll make up some eggs or something.  There won't be anybody else around for a while yet."

Hesitating, she closed her eyes briefly before turning and nodding at him.  Gesturing at his clothes she was still wearing, she lifted one eyebrow and enquired, "Do you think you could show me where the washing machine is?"

**********************************************

"Gary?"

He popped his head out of the back room where the washer was and called out, "Yeah, in here, Marissa!"

Marissa appeared in the door with Spike as Gary finished putting the load in the dryer.

"Laundry?  On a Saturday morning?  Nothing better to do today?"  Marissa's smile took the sting out of her words, and Gary laughed.

"Yeah, well not much to do today, actually."  Gary took Marissa's arm and steered her back out in the bar, toward the office and the stairs up to his loft.  "There is one thing, well two things, and I, um, I kind of need your help."  He paused and looked around as the door opened, waiting to see who it was before he continued in a whisper.

"See, there's this girl, and she's upstairs and she -" Marissa's eyebrows arched in surprise, but she waited patiently for Gary to finish. Gary nodded at the two day shift cooks who had just come in the front door.  He waited until they went by, then pulled Marissa toward the office again.

"The paper sent me to her, twice, yesterday.  She doesn't know who she is or where she's from, and she's kind of nervous, and I- I- well there's something I need to go do and --"

"You need someone other than Chuck to stay with her."  Marissa finished for him.

Gary grinned and nodded, then remembered who he was talking to.

"Yeah.  I thought maybe you could talk to her, see if maybe - maybe you could help her remember something.  Nothing I've done seems to help."  They were at the door to his loft, now, and Gary opened it and escorted Marissa in.  His guest -- he really was going to have to come up with something to call her - was huddled in the corner of the couch, clutching a passive cat.  Like a hunted doe, she threw her head up when the door opened, every line of her body taut with fear.  Letting out her breath with a relieved sigh when she saw him coming through, Gary saw the panic beginning in her eyes as she noticed Marissa.  He hastened to explain.

"There's something I- well I have somewhere to go and I won't be long but I thought you'd rather have someone to stay with, and this is my friend--"

Marissa stepped forward, one hand extended.

"Hi, I'm Marissa Clark, Gary's friend.  And this is Spike."

The woman stared blankly at Marissa, and Gary began to be afraid that he wasn't going to be able to go anywhere today.  He really didn't want to try to get Chuck to go and take care of the paper's business, that never worked well, and then Gary had to listen to Chuck complaining for the next week or so and -- he released a breath he hadn't realized he was holding as the woman slowly stood, and stepped reluctantly forward to take Marissa's hand.

"Hi. " She hesitated, not sure what else to say.  Marissa, as usual, seemed to know exactly what to do. She might be blind, but she seemed to see into those around her more than any sighted person Gary knew.

"Gary told me you can't remember anything about yourself.  It must be frightening."

The woman's hand went to her throat, the other clutched protectively around her waist before she nodded, then spoke when she realized Marissa couldn't see her.

"Yes.  It is a little... disconcerting."

Marissa smiled, and made her way over to sit in Gary's chair.

"Did you have anything marked on your clothes, any jewelry or anything that might have a name or something on it?"

Gary stared at Marissa.  Why hadn't he thought of that?  But his guest was already shaking her head.

"I- I looked last night.  There's nothing in my clothes but the manufacturer's labels."

"Your ring."  Both women turned toward Gary as he spoke.  "Your ring, the wedding ring you're wearing."  He indicated her hand with a wave.  "Sometimes people- sometimes they- they engrave their names or wedding dates on them."  He had wanted to do that with his and Marcia's but she had accused him of being "overly sentimental."  In the end, they  hadn't bothered.

Slowly the woman took her ring off, and gazed at the inside. Then, without speaking, she held it out to Gary.  Confused, Gary took the ring, stepping over to hold it under the light.  His breath caught in his throat.  No wonder she'd reacted when he told her his name.

"November 7, 1993.  Meghan and Gary."  He read the words out loud, for Marissa's sake. Now at least he had a reason why she had suddenly been so trusting after he'd introduced himself at the park. Gary looked up to find his guest staring at him with a pleading expression on her face. He sighed, and shook his head apologetically as he handed the ring back to her.

"No, I'm sorry, it's not me.  I'd never seen you before yesterday."  Just like she had yesterday on the park bench, she deflated, somehow appearing to fold in on herself without moving.  The cat appeared suddenly, mrreow-ing and curling about her legs.  She picked it up and cuddled it as she slumped down onto the couch.  Gary just stared at her, helpless.

"So we don't really know anything we didn't know before."  Her voice was as dead as her eyes had become.  She held the ring out before her while she stroked the purring cat in her lap.

"Sure we do."  Marissa's voice startled them both.  "We know your name."  She held out her hand toward the woman seated on Gary's couch.  "It's a pleasure to meet you, Meghan."

To Have and To Hold
Part 3

Gary's wristwatch said 10:09 when he stalked through McGinty's front door.  His hopes of getting upstairs to his loft to wash and change without being seen were dashed, however, by Chuck's low whistle.

"Look what the cat dragged in."  Chuck eyed Gary's bedraggled form over the large sheet of paper he was inspecting at the end of the bar, then sniffed twice, doubtfully.  "My, my, my, what have we been playing in?"

Gary glared at Chuck.  "Very- very funny."

Setting his paper aside, Chuck came around the end of the bar to stop a few feet in front of his friend, crossing his arms over his chest and lifting a speculative eyebrow.  "Well?  Uncle Chuck is waiting."

Gary wagged a partially shredded and torn paper at his friend, and demanded,  "Do- do you know how big a Great Pyrenees gets?"

Chuck grinned.  "No, but I'll bet you do."

"Yeah, well, it's not a dog, it's a - it's a freakin' horse!"  Gary's irritation with his latest adventure, courtesy the Early Edition, was outdone only by the mud and pawprints splattered over his entire body.  "I was barely able to keep the dumb mutt from running into the street.  Then it tackles me into the only puddle for 5 blocks and stomps all over me while it slobbers on me.  Then the kid tells me to quit messing with his dog, and he starts yelling for his Dad, and then --" Gary, practically yelling himself by now,  broke off as a couple of heads peeked out between the kitchen doors.  The busboy and the prep cook ducked back into the kitchen as he gave them what he hoped was a "Get back to work" glare, and Gary turned back to face Chuck at his most insufferable, dancing up and down on his toes and smirking in glee.

"Yeah, *you* can laugh."  Gary growled.  "I almost got arrested for trying to save the damn dog.  Next time -" he threatened the ceiling with the tattered paper, "next time I'm just gonna let the damn dumb beast get splatted!"

Chuck pointed at Gary's feet.

"Yeah, well this time you're dripping mud all over my clean floor, and we open in-" he checked his watch "- 45 minutes."

Gary made a face at his friend.  "Yeah, well, I'm goin'; I'm goin'."  Hitching his shoulders inside his jacket, he turned toward the office.  Chuck's voice halted him just as he opened the door.

"Hey, Gar!  Just a minute!"  Chuck grabbed the large sheet of paper he'd been perusing when Gary came in and hurried over to where an impatient Gary waited with the office door half open.  Pausing dramatically, Chuck's eyebrows went up again, encouragingly, as he enquired, "So, what about  last night?"

Gary stared warily at Chuck.

"Wha- what do you mean, about last night?"

Chuck looked shocked.  "What do I mean?  What do I mean?"  He leaned forward conspiratorially and put one arm on Gary's shoulder, careful to check for a clean spot as he did so.  He whispered, "I mean, dining in for two.  I mean, hot chowder and hot cider, for two.  I mean two warm bodies in one room. I-"

Annoyed, Gary jerked his shoulder out from under Chuck's arm, and headed through the office  toward the stairs, Chuck at his heels.

"Nothing happened."

"Come on, Gar, you can tell me.  I'm your best friend, remember?"

"Nothing happened."

"Nothing?"

"Nothing."  Exasperated, Gary stopped halfway up the stairs and, turning on Chuck, hissed,  "She's- she's got amnesia, she was half frozen, and- and she's married, for Pete's sake!"

Chuck's blue eyes mocked Gary solemnly.

"Yeah, I know.  Didn't think you had it in you, pal."

"Didn't think-- didn't think -- You are sick, you know? Sick!"

"Yeah, but you can't deny it didn't cross your mind.  I know, it crossed mine.  You don't have to have a gorgeous face to be gorgeous en toto."  Chuck's eyebrows lifted appreciatively as he traced a curvaceous shape in the air with his hands and his eyes.  Gary, on his way up again, had stopped to stare at his friend suspiciously.

"You - you saw her?  You met Meghan?"  He came back down the few steps necessary to stand over Chuck threateningly, emphasizing his words with his finger shaking directly under Chuck's nose.  "Look, Chuck, you just- you just listen to me.  That girl's in trouble, she's sick, and she's- she's in no condition for you to be trying any of your games with her.  You just --"

Chuck stood up straight and crossed his arms across his chest, his blue eyes glaring back indignantly over the tip of Gary's finger.

"Geez, Gar, I know what condition she's in.  Question is, do you?"

"Huh?"  Gary's confusion was evident.

Chuck motioned Gary closer, then whispered in his ear, "Marissa thinks she's preggers."  Gary stared at Chuck in openmouthed shock, while Chuck re-crossed his arms and stared back, triumphantly.

Gary pointed back over his shoulder toward the door to his apartment.  "Pre- preg- pregnant?  You think she's pregnant?  How -- what --"

Chuck nodded contentedly, then continued in his best gossipy tone.  "Yeah.  She threw up all her breakfast after you left, twice. I told Marissa maybe it was your cooking, but she said no, you'd have poisoned yourself by now if that was the case."  Grinning, Chuck watched as Gary continued to flounder for something to say.  "You know, Gar, you do that mother hen thing really well.  Yeah, your Mom'd be proud of you."  Gary shot Chuck a disgusted look, which he cheerfully ignored.

"How- how far along?" Gary finally managed.

Chuck shrugged.  "Marissa thinks only about 4 months.  Meghan doesn't know.  We asked."

Gary stared bleakly at the paper in his hand.  Pregnant?  Oh my God... His stomach turned over and he closed his eyes.  When he thought about what would have happened if he hadn't had the paper, if he hadn't gotten to her in time--

Don't.  Don't even go there, Gary.  That's why you get the paper, after all, isn't it?  So you can prevent the bad things, and help make happy endings for everyone?  Yeah, so then why do I feel so helpless this time?

"Gary?  Gar?  Hey, you okay?"  Chuck's voice - all teasing gone - broke into his reverie.  Gary nodded, then met Chuck's anxious gaze.

"I- I was just thinking about what the paper said was going to happen if I --" he broke off, swallowing.

Chuck took a deep breath and cuffed Gary's shoulder sympathetically.

"Yeah, well that's why you get the paper and go out every day to be Wonder Boy, right?  To take care of all the little lost Meghans and Rachels and Tommys out there."

"Yeah, well if that's the case, why doesn't this--" Gary angrily shoved the paper in Chuck's face "-- tell me something that will really help her, like who she is and where she's from?  As it is, I don't know what to do to even begin to help her."

Chuck pushed the paper back at Gary.

"Yeah, well maybe the reason the paper doesn't say anything is because you're doing exactly what you're supposed to be doing for her.  Maybe she just needs a safe place to stay until she can get her memory back or someone comes to find her."

"Maybe, maybe... It just seems like there should be more that I could do --"

"Look, right now you can't do anything more for her, but she can do something for us. You remember those new menus we ordered?  The fancy schmancy ones?"  Chuck, having decided a change of subject was definitely in order, waved the sheet of paper he had been holding throughout their conversation in his friend's uncomprehending face.  "They came in this morning, and boy, are they screwed up.  That's how I met your Meghan.  I came up to show you, and Marissa told me you were gone.  So I was telling her all about it, when your guest comes up and takes a look and starts telling me how right I am and whoever did this had no sense of style and whatever."  Gary frowned.  He had chosen the layout for the new menus, from the canned ones available at the printer, admittedly, but he didn't think it was that bad.  Chuck was still talking.

"...she starts drawing on the back of it and then I asked her if she could do a real one, and she sent me out for supplies and, well, she's working on the real thing for us now.  Pretty cool, huh?"  Chuck offered the sheet of paper to Gary with a pleased grin.

Gary could see why Chuck was pleased.  The new menus they had ordered were nice, but they were just your basic menu.  This... this was classy.  "McGinty's" was lettered large in stylish calligraphy, with intricate graphic knots and graceful lines bordering the page.  The menu lettering was brief, only indicating what the finished product would be, but it was all in that same classy, readable calligraphy.

"Wow."  Not brilliant, but it was the truth.

"Yeah, and that's just the rough draft."  Chuck was definitely pleased with himself.  "What's really cool is all that Celtic stuff is really big, I mean *really* big right now.  And with a name like McGinty's, Meghan said we should have an Irish look to our stuff and she--"

"Wait-- wait -- just wait a minute."  Gary pointed a skeptical finger at the paper in his hand.  "You mean she can remember how to do all  this, but not her name or her address or anything else like that?"

"Marissa says it's typical of psychological amnesias.  Said working on this, since she seemed to know so much about it, might help her remember more important things."

"Psych-- psychological amnesia?"  Gary gave up.  He slapped the sample menu back at Chuck.  "I'm gonna- I'm just gonna go get a shower, and get cleaned up now.  Okay?  I don't want to talk about any of this anymore.  I just want to go get warm and clean and dry."

"Yeah, you go do that, Gar.  I'll go clean up your mess before paying customers slip on it.  Oh, and, hey, don't forget to wash your face.  There's a big, well, you'll see."  Cheerfully ignoring Gary's answering scowl, Chuck trotted down the stairs towards the office.

To Have and To Hold - Part 4
by inkling

Gary set a large glass of milk on the counter while he rummaged in the small fridge under the bar for a beer.  Finding the brand he wanted, he opened it and, snagging the glass in his other hand, headed around the bar towards the office and the stairs to the loft.  The night was late, and Meghan had been hard at work all day.  The new McGinty's menu was looking good, and this afternoon she had started on the beer list.  Due to her nausea she wasn't eating much, however, and Gary was hoping with the milk the sandwich she'd finally tried for supper would sit easier in her stomach.

The paper had been strangely silent for the last three days.  Not just about Meghan, but about lots of things.  It had been the easiest time Gary could remember since the paper first came to him.  It bothered him at first, but as he focused more on Meghan he worried less and less about the strange quietude of the paper.  And, in spite of her skittishness, Meghan was a pleasant companion.  At least, as long as Gary was nearby.  It had been obvious when Gary got back from the dog fiasco Saturday morning that *he* was the one Meghan was relying on to help her keep an even keel in the unknown waters she found herself navigating.  Uncomfortable downstairs when any of McGinty's staff were around, she panicked at the thought of being alone even briefly in his apartment.  Chuck and Marissa were accepted as temporary companions when Gary had to be gone, but she paced and fretted and bordered on nervous hysteria until his return.  "Like Princess Di at a paparazzi convention," had been Chuck's tactless assessment this morning, after he stayed with Meghan while Gary averted a small disaster at a local dry cleaner.

Saturday afternoon, at Marissa's suggestion, Gary had coaxed Meghan out for a drive in Chuck's car.  They had spent an entire tank of gas driving around Chicago, hoping something they saw would jog her memory.  No lights came on in her darkened mind, though, and they ended their outing at Grant Park - also Marissa's suggestion - sitting on the bench where Gary had found her the night before, sharing hot dogs and laughter at the antics of the sea gulls fighting over the scraps they tossed out.  Meghan laughed easily, and well, and Gary often found himself laughing along without quite knowing what was so funny.  Later that night, he realized that even though they had supposedly gone in search of Meghan's memories, his own reminisces had been the topic most of their day.

Meghan was easy to talk to, Gary discovered, keeping her company for the long hours she was putting in on their new menu up in his loft, and not just because she didn't have much to say about herself.   Meghan seemed genuinely interested in him, in *Gary*, in the events and people that made up his life, in the things that mattered to him.  And, as time went by, it wasn't just her listening skills Gary enjoyed.  Somehow they had established an easy camaraderie, a relaxed acceptance of each other that demanded nothing in return.  His relationship with Renee was comfortable, but not like this.  There was still too much unknown territory between them, too much left to say.  With Meghan, it was as if it had all been said already.

Last night, Sunday night, after her inks and pens were put away, they had sat on his couch and talked into the wee hours of the night.  Gary somehow found the subject turning to his luck - or lack thereof - with women: his marriage and divorce with Marcia, giving up Emma, and a little bit about Renee.  Meghan had listened quietly, attentively, with a few astute questions and observations to contribute here and there.  Gary stayed awake long after her even breathing on the couch announced her slumber, thinking about things he'd hadn't considered until tonight, until Meghan pointed them out to him.  Drifting off to sleep, he briefly wondered why he could talk so openly with this woman, a total stranger.  Marissa and Chuck had never heard most of what he told her tonight, though they might have guessed a lot of it.  Gary sleepily told himself it was because they had never asked, and Meghan had.  Besides, somewhere in the time they spent together he had ceased altogether thinking of her as a stranger.  She was rather like an old and intimate friend, their two souls long linked in life and knowledge.

This morning, Monday, Marissa and Chuck had wanted Gary to call the police and check for a missing persons report on Meghan, but the panic arising in Meghan's eyes even as it was mentioned led Gary to immediately veto the idea.  The paper would let them know where Meghan belonged soon enough, and he was content to wait until then.  Chuck and Marissa hadn't liked his decision, but with the cat's proprietary attitude towards Meghan as evidence on his side, they had given in.  For now, anyway.

A gust of wind rattled the windows, startling Gary as he hurried through the nearly empty bar.  The thunderstorms promised by the radio announcer Saturday morning, had arrived in the last couple of hours, a day late and irritated about it.  The night outside McGinty's warm glow was filled with high winds and lots of lightning.  Tornado warnings were now posted for most of Chicago and the surrounding areas.  Chuck and Marissa were waiting upstairs with Meghan, before coming down to finish closing.  Gary hadn't liked leaving the final nighttime chores entirely to them for the last three days, but they had all agreed there wasn't much choice.  He pushed the office door open just as Marissa came out of the stairwell.

"Gary?  Is that you?"

"Yeah, Marissa.  How's it going?"  Gary spoke softly, trying to avoid the overly-attentive ears of the nearby waitress.  Speculation about Meghan was rampant among the help, and he didn't want to add any fuel to the fire. He and Chuck had fabricated something about Meghan being Gary's cousin and getting mugged in the park, but he didn't think too many of their employees had bought that line.  Gary stepped into the office, gently closing the door behind him with his foot.  Marissa found a desk to lean against.

"Well, that's what I wanted to talk to you about."  Marissa's face was clouded.  "Chuck's with Meghan.  The weather seems to be making her nervous."

Marissa's concern was contagious.  Gary half-sat on the desk across from Marissa, his beer and the glass of milk forgotten.  "So, what's up?"

Marissa sighed, unsure how to begin - unsure tonight where her greatest concern lay: with the woman upstairs who had no identity and no life, or her friend's apparently growing involvement with that woman.  Deciding the direct approach was best in at least the first case, she said, "Gary, we've got to get Meghan back to where she belongs.  Soon."

"You know I'd-- you know I'd love to do that if I could, but right now, right now we don't have any idea--"

"No, Gary, I mean it.  People with this kind of amnesia, something has happened to them that is so terrible they've *chosen* to forget who they are. It's easier than dealing with whatever it is they are running from.  People like Meghan have been known to go out and start whole new lives.  Meghan is an accomplished graphic artist.  She knows how to use a phone book, how to cook, and how fill out a job application.  She is fully capable of living not just the next few weeks, but the next few months or even years without remembering who she is or where she's from.  The best cure for her is to go home."  Rain slapping against the windows punctuated Marissa's last comment.

All of a sudden Gary wasn't just concerned, he was irritated, and he wasn't quite sure why.

"Oh, and you think, you think I'm keeping her here?  That I don't want her to go home?  What if that home is why she is the way she is?  Did you ever stop to think about that?  You didn't see that bruise on her head, or the ones on her arm."  The milk in the glass slopped out over Gary's hand and onto the floor as he gestured angrily with it.  "Maybe the paper doesn't want her to go home because she's safer here with me!"  He looked at his hand in disgust, then set both milk and beer down on the desk.  Looking around for something to clean up the mess, he headed back out into the bar long enough to grab some napkins.

Marissa just stood there, trying to assess Gary's mood.

Regretting his outburst almost as fast as it had spewed forth, Gary finished his cleanup, then tossed the sopping napkins into the garbage.  One hand in his back pocket, Gary hesitated , then said softly,  "I- I- I'm sorry, Marissa, I didn't mean to snap at you like that."

"It's alright, Gary.  It's been a long three days for all of us."

"Yeah."  Gary picked up his beer and took a long swig, avoiding Marissa's eyes even though he knew she couldn't see him.  Sometimes Marissa's ability to see things beyond ordinary sight unnerved him, and he wasn't sure he wanted her peering into his thoughts right now.  But he gave her his full attention when she spoke again.

"Gary, I know you don't really think Meghan's from an abusive home.  She could have run her car off the road or tripped and fallen.  There are lots of places she could have picked those bruises up.  If she is in a bad situation, we can deal with that when we find out for sure.  But, for right now, if yo-- if we really want to help her, we've *got* to get her home."

Gary turned away from his friend, moving across the office to lean on his arm against a window.  Taking another long pull on his beer, he stared at the rivulets of rain running down the outside of the window and tried to sort out his own thoughts and feelings.  He knew he was being unreasonable, but he couldn't seem to help himself.  Was it because he felt so helpless to do anything for Meghan?  No, the truth was right now he didn't want to do anything to get her home. He wanted her to stay here, for a while, anyway.  Why?  The window lit up and then rattled as the thunderstorm outside intensified, the sound of the  wind-driven rain against it more like pebbles hitting.  Watching the abstract pattern the runnels of rain made merge and change with each howling gust and brief flash of lightning, Gary realized he knew the answer to that question.  He just didn't want to admit it - to anyone, including himself .

Beer forgotten in his hand, eyes closed, Gary finally let the thoughts have play that had been lurking in the back of his mind since last night:  With Meghan, for the first time he could remember in two years, the aching despair he had felt since he realized just how wrong things had gone with Marcia - that same despair that fed his bone-deep fear the past would only repeat with Renee - had been eased.  Plopped into his life out of nowhere - like the paper that first fateful morning at the Blackhawk - Meghan not only needed him desperately, she accepted him, just as himself.  Gary Hobson, reluctant hero and all-around average guy,  just-trying-to-do-the-right-thing-and-find-a-little-happiness-along-the-way, was good enough for Meghan when he hadn't been good enough for any of the other women in his life.  Even in the time he and Renee had spent together, she had yet to make him feel as comfortable and accepted as Meghan had in just a couple of days.  And, he couldn't be comfortable with Renee until she knew and accepted the truth about the paper.

But, attractive as she was, and comfortable as her presence might be, Meghan still belonged with another man, and Gary wouldn't - couldn't - cross that line.  A picture of Renee on their last date crowded in on his thoughts.  Out of town for the last couple of weeks, she would be back.  After their first inauspicious meeting, Gary had decided Renee might be the chance for happiness he thought had passed him by when he and Marcia divorced.   But, if he really thought Renee was his key to future happiness, why had he so willingly slipped into the shoes Meghan put out for him to fill?

Gary stared out once again into the storms outside McGinty's, reluctantly facing the answer to that question too.  With her assumed intimacy, her easy acceptance of him and his life, Meghan had walked right past his inner defenses, reached into his heart and gathered up all his broken hopes and dreams into herself. Companionship.  Intimacy. Stability.  Even - with her pregnancy - children .  All the intangibles that he thought made life worth living.  Things that as a young man, a newly married man, he had just assumed would come his way.  Things that now he often wondered if he would ever have.  Someone to share his days and nights with, to share his joys and sorrows, his triumphs - and defeats.  Someone who was interested in all the little details of his day, the way Meghan had been the last 3 days.  Someone to have and to hold, to raise a family with.  In Meghan's fantasy, his dreams, too, were complete - however illusory that completion was.

Oblivious to his own need, he had followed her lead the whole way, eating up her assumed intimacy like a starving puppy, happy to pretend - for a little while - that his life had turned out the way he always dreamed it would, savoring the emotional intimacy he found with Meghan as the hours had slipped by.   Now, like any baby with its favorite blanket, he didn't want to give that comfort up.

Marissa waited quietly, fairly certain now of the source of Gary's tension.  She knew how lonely her friend was, despite the close companionship he shared with her and Chuck.  But their friendship these last two years had been forged in the loneliness of their common status as misfits.  She had always felt it was their disabilities that drew them together as friends to begin with.  Hers was easy to spot: she was a blind woman in a sighted world.  Chuck's was too: a too sensitive boy who had been wounded far too many times, grown into a man who used laughter and disdain to hold the sharks in the water around him at bay (though Chuck would have been mortally offended to hear himself defined that way).  Gary's wasn't quite so easy, but the paper brought it out.  He was too willing to save the world, at his own expense.

Uncomfortable in crowds, Gary had one of the most caring hearts toward individuals she had ever met.  He could never have done what he did with the paper everyday without that heart.  Marissa often wondered why Gary hadn't gone to medical school, or become a fireman, or found some other similar career.  Though it was a mark of his willingness to sacrifice himself for other people that he even became a stockbroker.  That had been Marcia's dream, his ex-wife.  As always, Gary had sacrificed himself to make someone else -  his wife, in this case - happy.  And made himself utterly miserable in the meantime.  Marcia had done him wrong in more ways than one.

Marissa wondered if Marcia had ever realized that what she found so appealing in Gary after she divorced him was the simple fact that he was living his own life now, and not the script Marcia had written out for him.  Probably not.  She wasn't that astute.

Straightening from her perch against the desk, Marissa also heard in Gary's extended silence just how entangled her friend was becoming with his mystery woman.  She worried silently when - or if - she'd find the courage to say something to him about it.  To warn him to be careful - before it was too late.  Marissa wanted Meghan out of here, fast, before Gary got himself in any deeper, before Renee came back.  But, her efforts tonight weren't going to accomplish that.  Until Gary found something in the paper, Meghan would stay.  Marissa had encouraged him to rely on the paper in the past when there seemed to be no other direction available.  Now she wondered if she had been a little too insistent with that particular lesson.  Maybe she could mention her concerns to Chuck.  Sometimes his tactlessness did come in handy.

Gary shifted his weight, and the paper fell out of his back pocket onto the floor, breaking the momentary silence that had stretched between them.  Gary had always appreciated Marissa's rare ability to just be silent when someone else needed silence.  Of course, she could also be counted on to speak her mind when she thought it was necessary.  Which she proceeded to do now as he bent down to pick up the paper.  Neither of them noticed the cat that had suddenly appeared in the open stairwell door.

"Gary, I know how protective she makes you feel.  She seems to bring that out in all of us."  Marissa made one last effort.  "But she needs to go home.  Are you sure the paper doesn't have anything to say about her?"

"Yes, I looked again a while ago and---."

Chuck's hoarse shout cut off the rest of Gary's reply.

"HEY, GAR!  I NEED YOU UP HERE, NOW!"

To Have and To Hold - Part 5
by inkling
 

"Meghan?  Meghan?"  She stirred slowly on the couch - the couch?- and turned toward the warmth of Gary's voice in her thoughts.  He stood, just inside the half open door, his face hidden in the light that streamed around him into her darkened mind -- the open door that was abruptly closer than it had been since her nightmares began.  Gary held his hand out to her, and, hesitating for a moment, she began to move once more towards the door, through the fog swirling about her.  A fog that was less dense now, less encumbering.  Suddenly, a ray of hope shot through her, and, all hesitation forgotten, she began to push her way through the thinning darkness towards the door that Gary held open, running now towards the light, the warmth that came flowing in with him, rejoicing as she reached out to take his extended hand.  She was really going to make it this time!  She was almost there, she could almost remember, she--

Glass rattled sharply in the windows as the entire building shuddered abruptly in the gusting wind, and the door was gone, slammed shut in the roar of the gale outside.  Her world was once again inky black, the windows staring eyes, large and faintly gray in the wall of night surrounding her.  The cat jumped up beside her, forgiving after being unceremoniously dumped on the floor in her first lurch upward into awareness.  Her hands flew to cover her ears as rain now shotgunned against the windows, driven by the same wild wind plucking at the glass in each pale opening.  But covering her ears couldn't stop the wolfish gale howling around this brief refuge she had found.  The storms inside her mind began to rise now,  hand in hand with her certainty of the tempest's only goal, to get to her, to pluck her away like the windows, just as it had before....

      ****************

The first scream wrenched Gary out of a sound sleep.  By the second scream his foggy brain had cleared enough to realize that the screams were coming from the couch where Meghan had insisted on sleeping, despite Gary's best efforts to switch places with her.  Fighting free of his covers, he stumbled toward her in the darkened room, groping at the last minute for the lamp beside the couch.  Meghan didn't even blink as its warm glow illuminated the room.

Gary stared at her, the hair on the back of his neck standing straight up.  Dressed again in Gary's borrowed sweats, Meghan sat upright on the couch, knees drawn up tight against her chest and her copper hair rising in a staticky mass all around her.  She stared blankly into the night, eyes wide open, each blue iris a thin rim around a dark cauldron of pupil.  White knuckled fists were rammed against her ears.  There had only been the two screams that brought Gary to her side.  Now, she sat rocking agitatedly back and forth, keening a sound almost beyond human hearing.  It reminded Gary rather too much of a hunted rabbit's dying shriek, only this sound didn't end.  The cat was at her side, up on its haunches, kneading Meghan's arm with its front paws and purring loudly.  Glaring at him, it gave what sounded for all the world like an impatient mrreow.

"Yeah, well, could you be a little more clear with your advice?"  Gary snapped at the cat.  Meghan still didn't seem to have seen him.  At first afraid to do anything for fear of only making things worse, Gary quickly realized he was going to have to try something -- anything to stop that unnerving noise she continued to make -- or else leave Meghan trapped in whatever nightmare had claimed her.

Kneeling on the floor beside her, Gary gently tried to pull her hands away from her ears.  He called her name, softly at first, then more firmly.

"Meghan.  Meghan.  Meghan! You're alright. You're safe.  It's me, it's Gary."  The keening never wavered, and he couldn't budge her hands, not without hurting her.  Resting his hands on his thighs, he  sat back on his heels for a moment, not sure what to do next.  The cat jumped from his perch on the couch beside Meghan, landing in Gary's lap.

"Hey!" Gary grabbed the cat out of reflex.  The cat stood up in his lap, putting its paws on Gary's shoulders as it stared intently into his face, "Mrreow!"  Meghan still keened, and Gary pushed the cat aside to try again.  This time he put his face up close to hers.

"Meghan!  Meghan! Wake up!"  He tried to pull her hands down again.  There!  He was sure he felt a slight slackening of tension in her arms.  Gradually, his eyes never leaving her face, he pulled her hands down in front of her, then grabbed them in between his.

"Meghan!"  Switching both her hands to one of his, he touched her face with his free hand.  The keening stopped abruptly at his gentle contact, startling Gary almost as much as the first scream had. Encouraged, he stroked her cheek a couple of times, as she continued to rock back and forth, then, grasping her chin, he tried to turn her face toward him, willing her to break the rigid stare.  Once again, gradually, he was able to turn her head, until she was facing him.

"Meghan!  Wake up!"  He searched her face intently, looking for some sign of returning awareness.  She blinked suddenly, and then her eyes rolled up in her head, and with a shudder she collapsed limply against him, sobbing.

Awkwardly, Gary held her as she cried. In his relief at being able to snap her out of her fit, it was a minute before he realized her sobs had become  a not-quite-hysterical mumbling.

"...sorry so so sorry I couldn't hold on I couldn't hold mommy I never told I never did forgive me God please bring Eddie back please give him back I'll be good forever I'll be goo--"

The hair on the back of his neck stood up again.  If what Marissa had told him was true, it sounded like Meghan had been dreaming about whatever it was that had triggered her amnesia.  Gary wasn't sure he really wanted to know what she was talking about.  He gave her a gentle shake and pushed her away far enough he could look into her face again.  Her eyes were closed this time, freckles stark against her dead white skin.  Her lips barely moved as she chanted her apologetic mantra.

"Meghan."  Another shake, firmer.  No reaction.  "Meghan!" The shake he gave her this time was sharper, much sharper.  Flinching, her eyes flew open.  Gary was relieved to see confusion replace the blank stare, confusion that swiftly became dawning comprehension as Meghan stared first at him, then at the cat and the room at large.

"Gar- Gary?" She was trembling again, but she was aware of him at least.

"Yeah.  Are you alright?"  He hesitated, not sure which Gary she thought she was talking to.  "You- do you remember where you are?"

Her eyes closed as she thought for a moment, then gave him a ghostly smile, "I'm in your apartment above a restaurant you own but you're not my husband and beyond the name engraved on my wedding ring neither of us know who I really am."  She looked at him sideways. "Did I get it right?"

Letting go of her hands and sitting back on his heels again, Gary smiled in return.

"Yeah."

The cat jumped back up on the couch and wriggled into her lap, purring again.  Meghan ran her hands over her hair in a vain attempt to tame it, then gathered the cat up and closed her eyes, searching for the same calm inside herself that, for the moment, reigned outside in the night between storms.  Gary squinted at the clock over by his bed:  2:13 a.m.  Meghan was still shivering slightly, and he figured it would be best to make sure she was completely over her fright before they tried to get back to sleep.

"Um, you um, want some hot chocolate or something?"  He had the fixings upstairs now, thanks to Marissa.  Meghan nodded as Gary moved off to fill the coffee pot and heat the water.  10 minutes later, they were sitting at the table, their hot chocolate almost gone.  Meghan was still giggling after Gary's recitation of the reasons for Chuck's phobia about pregnant women; her recovery from the nightmare appeared complete.  Gary was reluctant to disturb her fragile peace, but he decided it would be best to ask his question now, before any opportunity was lost in Meghan's mental fog.

"Meghan, do you remember,  is there anything... Can you remember anything from your dream?  Anything that could tell us something about who you are?"

Her smile fled as Meghan hunched her shoulders.  She studied the remains of her hot cocoa without answering him.  Gary finished his cocoa, then took his mug and hers as she handed it to him silently, without meeting his gaze.  He washed the mugs out at the sink, while Meghan contemplated the table top, drawing some abstract design on its plain surface with her thumbnail.  As he sat down again, she finally met his eyes, and shook her head, her blue eyes dark now with despair.

"No.  Nothing.  It's the same as it was...  Friday?" she made the day a question, and Gary nodded briefly.  "...before you found me, and Saturday  morning.  There's a door, and behind it I know I remember everything about me.  I'm happy, I'm warm, I'm loved... I could even hear you - a - voice," she quickly amended, her face flushing as her eyes momentarily refused to meet his, "this time."  Shaking her head, Meghan clenched her hands together on the table in front of her.  "Then, just like before, the storm rises up inside me, and my mind is being torn apart, like I'm going crazy or something, and - and- the only way to survive the storm is to quit trying to remember and run away and then the door just snaps shut and disappears."  Her voice edged with frustration, she finished, "I just can't seem to make myself get past the storm to the open door.  I don't know what to do that will change it!"

Gary sighed, tapping the table with one finger.  Marissa was right.  If she was going to remember anything, Meghan needed to be in her own home, surrounded with familiar things... What could he do, though?  The paper had been less than helpful so far. He glared at the cat.  If you'd bother to be of any use whatsoever... he silently threatened it.  Getting no response from the feline half of his routine, he reluctantly got practical.

"So, so you don't, you don't remember anything new?"

Meghan shook her head.

"Okay.  Look, Meghan, I- I have a friend, a retired policeman, he works for me now and he can help..."

"No!"

 Gary couldn't understand her reluctance.  It had been the same way that first night at the park when he had wanted to take her to a hospital.

"Meghan, it's not like you'll have to go to the police station or anything.  He, he'll come here, and--"

"No!"  She shook her head vehemently.  "No, Gary.  I - I'll just leave, I've presumed on you long enough."  She smiled, and suddenly Gary could feel her pulling away, feel her severing the fragile emotional bond they had established.  "I appreciate--"

No!  He reached for her hand, refusing to let the bond between them snap - for Meghan's sake, he told himself.

"Meghan, you're not leaving.  For one thing, you don't have any money, for another you don't, you don't have anywhere to go, and you're no trouble--"

"Gary--"

"No. You're staying here until you remember something or we can find someone who's looking for you.  End of discussion."  Gary chopped the air in a "cut" gesture as he stood up, grasping her hand in his.  "Now come on, let's get some sleep."  Outside, rain began to rattle against the windows.  Meghan stared at Gary, a wild light in her eyes, and he feared briefly she was going to freak out on him -- like she had earlier with Chuck.  When Gary had come racing up the stairs in response to Chuck's frantic yell for help, he had found Chuck barely able to control a hysterical Meghan.  Chuck said he had no idea what set her off, just that her anxious pacing had suddenly blown up into complete hysteria.  Gary had been able to calm Meghan eventually, but Chuck and Marissa had taken some convincing that he'd be alright without one of them around to help him out.  Gary wasn't certain Chuck hadn't done something to set Meghan off, so he had been more than usually insistent that his friends leave.  Chuck wouldn't go without Gary's promise that he could return early in the morning with breakfast.  Marissa had an early morning class, but she too had insisted she'd be there later.

Irritated by their intrusion into his affairs -- the paper came to him after all, so he was responsible for Meghan whether they liked it or not -- Gary thought uncharitably that Chuck and Marissa both felt like he was getting way too involved with Meghan.  Pushing aside his earlier insight into his own motives concerning the woman in front of him, he told himself that he wasn't too involved.  She needed him.  He was, he was, well, if it had been their wife or their sister out like this, they'd have wanted someone to take good care of her until she came to her senses, wouldn't they?  He would have, and that's all he was doing for Meghan, looking out for her until she regained her senses or her husband showed up to claim her.  After all the ingrates he had rescued it was nice to find someone who appreciated his help.  Surely Chuck and Marissa could understand that.

Eyes closed now, Meghan sat utterly still for the few moments it took Gary to work his thoughts through.  Her hand warm in his, Gary's gaze softened as he watched her now, obviously struggling to regain control of her emotions.  How could he not feel sorry for her, lost and completely alone, totally dependent on the kindness of strangers?  How could he not want to do anything he could to help her out?   She was lucky he had found her before someone else with darker motives had.  Come to think of it, how well would he be doing in the same circumstances?  Unable to remember the slightest detail about yourself, stuck staying with a total stranger, no way to know if or when you'd have any of your life back?  She was actually doing very well, considering.  Her eyes opened and as she smiled at him their gazes locked.  Gary's heart leaped, and his throat was suddenly dry.

Slowly, he pulled Meghan to her feet.  They stood, facing each other uncertainly, Gary's pulse pounding so hard he wondered Meghan didn't hear it.  He caught his breath as Meghan reached with her free hand to softly trace the scratch she had left on his face three, almost four days ago.

"I never apologized for this."  She smiled ruefully, her hand still on his cheek.  "I'm sorry.  If I had realized..."

Swallowing, Gary shook his head.  "It's okay.  It's not that bad... You, you didn't..."  His voice trailed off as green eyes once again encountered blue ones.  Her dark blue eyes were a shade he had never seen before.  The windows rattled anew, another spate of rain driven against them by the rising storm outside.  Meghan jumped, unconsciously stepping closer to Gary as her eyes roamed the room nervously.  Gary shifted his grip on her hand to draw her in as his other arm went protectively around her.

"It's all right.  Don't be frightened."

Outside McGinty's, the lightning flickered as her eyes found his again.  His gaze never leaving her face, tilted now ever so slightly towards his, Gary bent to kiss Meghan.  Neither one of them heard the faint boom of thunder that followed the lightning seconds later.

Blue eyes closing reflexively as their lips touched, Meghan's mouth was soft beneath his.  Without stopping to think, Gary kissed her again, longer this time, his stomach tightening as her lips now responded to his.  With the third kiss, Gary's hand dropped hers, reaching up to brush her face before burying itself in the copper cascade of her hair.  His other arm wrapped about her waist, Gary clasped Meghan closer, his eyes closing now as their kisses began to run one into the other.  The soft, round firmness of her pregnancy pressed against him, but Gary didn't care anymore, not as her arms went around him.  In the last three days Meghan had given him all the intimacies a husband and wife shared - all but this.  Slowly, Gary turned them both towards his bed, claiming her fantasy for his own.

A huge chorus of thunder reverberated outside, and they both jumped.  The escalating intensity of their embrace broken, still Gary held Meghan while the echoing thunder faded.  Releasing each other reluctantly, they both stepped back, eyes catching awkwardly now.  The storm filled the silence that stretched between them as reality seeped back into the loft.

Then, flustered, Meghan pushed her hair back from her face.  "Gary, I- I -" Her apprehension now was as palpable as her earlier terror.  "I can't... I didn't... You're not--" Her voice breaking, she looked everywhere but at him.

Gary felt the flush creeping up his face as he stood, arms limp at his sides, completely and utterly appalled at his recent actions.  "I, uh, I know...  you didn't..."  The words wouldn't come.  He closed his eyes. What were you thinking Hobson?  He knew exactly what he had been thinking, and Gary wasn't sure he could forgive himself for what he had almost done.  Opening his eyes, wanting to ease the tension that abruptly filled the air, he gestured with one hand, shaking his head regretfully as he did.  Earnestly:  "What I mean is, I understand, and, it's not, uh, if it makes you feel any better, I didn't mean for this to happen, either.  Okay?"  Gary waited anxiously for Meghan's response, catching himself before he stepped towards her.

"No. I mean, yes."  Meghan shook her head.  "You don't, you don't have to apologize, it's my fault--" Her eyes flicked across his, nervously, as she backed a few steps away from him.  Taking a deep breath, she looked up at him from a safe distance.  "Um, I'm sorry too.  I didn't mean..."   She tilted her head to one side, as her lips curved into another rueful smile.  "I guess you know what I mean."    Swallowing, Gary nodded, trying to recall Renee's face the last time he had kissed her.  But thoughts of Renee paled next to Meghan's glowing presence in his arms tonight.  What was that old saying?  Something about a bird in the hand being worth two in the bush?  He quickly abandoned that train of thought.  It had already come much too close to derailing them both.

"Well, okay, then, we should probably get some sleep before the night is completely shot."  The wind outside was growing more violent, and hail now began beating irregularly against the windows.  "I uh, I guess I'll see you in the morning."

Meghan nodded, and turned toward the couch, where the purring cat was ensconced in her pile of abandoned covers.  Gary headed for his bed, cold now after his long absence.  When they were both settled, she reached for the light.  Gary thought she hesitated for a moment before turning it off.

"You all right?" he asked, half sitting up so he could see her clearly.

Meghan nodded, running one hand through her hair to pull it away from her face.  "It's, it's just the storm.  I'm okay, though."  She still wouldn't meet his gaze.

"You're sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure."  Meghan didn't sound sure, but Gary didn't argue with her.

"Okay, well, um, good night."

Turning out the light, she didn't answer.  One arm behind his head, heart still racing, Gary stared at the night around him, trying to forget what had just happened.  How could he have let himself  go that much?  Pushing the memory of Meghan's soft curves beneath his hand resolutely away, Gary found his thoughts whirling as snatches of the last few day's events replayed in his mind: Chuck's confusion, as Gary held and tried to comfort a desolately sobbing Meghan:  "She just started freaking out about the wind, and kept saying you'd never come back, and I couldn't get her to calm down..."  His own voice, sharing with an all too understanding Meghan, her head bent over her work, earrings glinting in the soft light each time she glanced his way as he talked - and talked and talked:  "...I told him I thought he still had a choice, but I never thought... ...then we threw the money off the building and the cops arrested *me*..."   Marissa, looking right through him in that way she had as he snapped at her tonight... He smiled as a picture of Meghan rose, laughing uninhibitedly at something he had said.  Her nose wrinkled in the funniest way when she laughed like that.  Gary liked it.

Then other memories from other times intruded:   Renee, staring at him in utter disbelief as he tried to tell her the truth about the paper, "You almost had me there..."  His own voice, telling Marissa - how long ago? -  "I would never have known if I was just a substitute for someone else..."  Yet here he was, playing the substitute - *too* well tonight, he thought, guiltily  -  and gladly to boot.  How in the world did he get himself  into this situation... no, why in the world did he let the *paper* set him up like this?

A blast of wind shook the building, and Meghan cried out, softly, but Gary heard her.  His eyes narrowed: the *wind.*  It was the wind!  That's what was upsetting her, now, and before, with Chuck.  More muffled noises came from the direction of the couch.  Was she crying?  Gary hurried over to her side, switching on the light as he got there.  She lay in a fetal position, eyes screwed shut and a fist jammed in her mouth.  Tears were streaming down her face, and she cringed and shivered with every blow of the storm.

"Hey, hey..."  Gary sat beside her and - once more, without thinking - gathered the sobbing woman in his arms.  He rocked her back and forth for a few minutes, until he felt the sobs easing, though she still shuddered at every manifestation of the storm outside.

"Gary?"  Her voice muffled against his shoulder as she rested against him, he could barely hear her.  He leaned back a little to see her face.

"Yeah?"

Eyes still shut tight, Meghan whispered,  "It's- it's  not the storm inside my mind...  it's the storms outside... the wind... It's the wind.  I can almost see somebody... and the wind, the wind comes and he-- he's just gone, and I'm all alone.  That's why I got so frightened when you weren't here earlier and the wind started to blow so hard.  I- I- knew you were downstairs; I knew you'd be right back, but I couldn't stop the terror that I'd never see you again from taking over.  I was so afraid that I'd be all alone like before and no one would be there to help me.  I tried, I really tried, and poor Chuck, he tried so hard to help me, and I just couldn't ---"

"Shhh, shhh..."  Gary could hear the hysteria creeping into her voice, and he held her tighter and stroked her hair.

She rested against him for a minute more, then pushed away to sit up, her eyes wide with fright.

"Gary, what if- what if-"  She closed her eyes and swallowed, then tried again.  "What if my Gary, the one who gave me the ring, what if he's the one, the one the wind took and I'll never see him--" the despair in her voice was heartbreaking.

"Hey, hey, let's not get the cart before the horse."  Gary captured Meghan's chin with his free hand and held her so she had to look him in the face.  "We don't know any such thing, and there's no sense borrowing trouble, okay?  The best thing for you to do right now is get some sleep, and you and I, you and I, we'll figure things out in the morning when we can both think clearer, all right?"  And, hopefully, when the paper would have some useful information for him.

Childlike, she nodded, but when Gary started to get up she grabbed his arm, pulling him back down beside her.  He sat, staring uncertainly at her.  Meghan shut her eyes briefly, then looked at him apologetically.

"I, um, I know this is a lot to ask, especially after..."  Her eyes flitted around the room as lightning flashed and another roll of thunder boomed after it, shaking the entire building.  Shuddering, she looked at him pleadingly.

"I, I don't want to be alone right now...  With the wind, and all, I, I don't think I could sleep.  Do you, do you think you could just, um, just be with me - hold me until I fall asleep...please..."  Her voice faded as Gary stared at her, and she released her vise-like grip on his arm.  Trembling slightly, she wouldn't meet his gaze, rubbing her arms then picking at a loose thread in the comforter over her knees.

Gary was at a complete loss.  Didn't she realize what they had narrowly averted less than 10 minutes ago?  The cat jumped up in his lap suddenly, and Gary had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.  They couldn't expect him to do this!  Not after... what?  Nothing happened, after all.  Still, Gary hesitated.  As he opened his mouth, intending to refuse, lightning flickered outside, its thundrous accompaniment jolting the windows a second later.  Meghan flinched and shivered.  Her eyes huge in her face, she suddenly looked very much like a terrified and desperate child.  Closing his mouth, Gary considered her.  What had he told himself earlier?  Something like ‘How could you not want to do anything you could to help her out?'  The cat's "Mrreow" answered him, and he shot it a lethal look as he conceded the battle.

"Um, yeah, okay..."  Was he nuts?  Yeah, but what else could he do?  Neither one of them would get any more sleep tonight if he didn't do something.  "Just, um, just until you fall asleep, okay?"  Meghan nodded her assent. Sizing up the couch, Gary reluctantly realized they'd never both fit.  It would have to be his bed.  He could finish out the night on the couch once Meghan was settled.  Rising, he pulled to her feet again, grabbing her pillow in his other hand.  Silently swearing vengeance on a certain feline and it's companion tabloid, this time he led Meghan all the way over to his bed.
 

*******************************

Gary dreamed that night of mystery women.  Mystery women with copper hair, who always walked away just as he caught up to them, just as he reached for them.  If he did manage catch one, she turned into Marcia, laughing maniacally at him before she flew away on invisible winds.  Then he'd find himself face to face with an irate husband, whose he wasn't ever sure, but who always looked an awful lot like his former boss Mr. Pritchard.  The guy wouldn't believe Gary, no matter how he strongly he protested that nothing had happened.  Mercifully, that part of his dream always faded before the husband caught Gary.  At the end, he found himself standing with Renee.  She gazed sorrowfully at him before turning and walking away, refusing to listen to his desperate explanations...

**************************

The persistent rapping noise slowly tugged Gary up from a deep sleep.  He eased sandpaper eyelids open, wincing at the bright morning light that filled his apartment.  Trying to rise, Gary found he couldn't move his right arm.  Groggily he reached over to free it, encountering a warm, fleece-clad shoulder, and long hair... "Hunh?"  With a rush the events of the past night returned.  Geez, he must have fallen asleep too!  He looked over to find a slumbering Meghan curled up with her back to him in the crook of his arm.  She looked angelic; evidently her nightmares had ended with Gary's comforting presence.  Too bad he couldn't say the same.

His clock was blank.  Gary frowned; the power must be out.  The knocking continued, and now he could hear Chuck's voice in the hallway.

"Gar?  Hey, Gar, are you in there?  Gary!"

"Yeah, yeah," he mumbled, gently lifting Meghan's head to extricate his arm, freezing momentarily as she sighed and mumbled something unintelligible.  Snuggling deeper under the covers, she was still fast asleep, and he carefully pulled his arm all the way out.  Getting to his feet, Gary hurried to the door.  Chuck's pounding was getting more insistent.

"Hey, Gar---" His shout cut off  abruptly  as the door swung open.  Gary scowled at the cat running in beneath their feet.  That cat still owed him a chat, and a long one.

"Well it's about time."  Chuck held a food pack with 3 steaming cups in one hand and a grease streaked bag of donuts in the other.  A paper was folded beneath his arm.  He cocked an eyebrow  at Gary's rumpled just-out-of-bed appearance.  "Sleeping in, are we?  Must be nice.  Get ol' Chucky-boy out at the crack of dawn to bring you breakfast in bed--"

"Do you mind?  You'll wake Meghan up!"  Gary whispered, irritated, as he opened the door wider for Chuck to enter.  "And, if you'll recall, it was your id--"  Too late he realized his mistake.  Chuck strode into the room, halting abruptly when he saw the cat settling into Gary's all-too-obvious vacancy next to Meghan in the bed.  Chuck turned incredulously to Gary, but before he could say anything Gary grabbed the bag of donuts from him, whispering defensively, "It's - It's not what you think!"

"I don't have to think when it's all laid out right there in front of me."  Chuck whispered in return, leveling a steady stare at his friend.

"She had a nightmare and she couldn't, she couldn't sleep.  I was just gonna sit with her until she fell asleep and -- why am I explaining this to you?"

Chuck held his paper out to Gary.

"Because I'm your best friend, and I'm worried about you."

"Nothing happened. Nothing."  Barely , he didn't add, and felt his cheeks flame.

"Yet,"  Chuck insisted, soberly taking in Gary's red face.

Gary glared at Chuck, then frowned at the paper he was holding out.

"What's that?"

"The paper. Your paper."

"My- my paper!"  Gary snatched the paper from Chuck, flipping it open with one hand to check the date.

"Yeah, your paper.  The one that arrives at your front door every morning, with the cat. The one with tomorrow's news in it, today."  Chuck set the tray of coffee cups down, and folded his arms over his chest as he regarded Gary, his blue eyes somber.   "The one that you never leave lying around for me - of all people - to find. At least, not until the morning I come in and find you with another man's wife in your bed."

"I told you, nothing happened.  Nothing's gonna happen."  Gary threw the sack of donuts on the table.

Chuck cocked another eyebrow at his friend.

"Gary, this could get serious."  He lowered his voice at Gary's urgent gesture.  "Did you ever hear of kidnaping?  They'll lock you away for a long, long time if they decide that's what you've done. You should have gone to the police in the first place.  Saturday.  Look, I know you think the paper wants you to take care of her--"

"Think it wants me to take care of her? *Think* it does?" Gary whispered, hoarsely.  "It sends me to her twice in two hours, then gives me nowhere else for her to go for three - alright, four days," he conceded, as Chuck silently held up four fingers, but he didn't back down.  "What am I supposed to think?  Huh?  She wouldn't go to the police, I tried.  And the cat-- you've seen the cat, it's been all over her ever since she got here.  There has to be a reason for her to be here this long."

"Yeah,  long enough for you to screw up any chance you have of a lasting relationship with Renee.  Speaking of whom, what exactly are you gonna tell her if she should happen to walk in while you've got little Missus Muffet stashed over there in your bed?"

"Nothing.  Cause she's not going to."  Gary glared at Chuck belligerently.  But Chuck's concern for his friend overrode caution at this point.  Stepping closer, he stabbed a finger at Gary's chest.

"Look, I'm your best friend, and I'm telling you, Gary, you have taken a serious leave of reality here.  It's bad enough watching you have to deal with that," Chuck jabbed his finger at the paper, then pointed it back at Gary's chest, "all the time, but watching you and little Missus Muffet play ‘Ward and June Cleaver' has been downright scary."  Chuck nodded at Gary's startled look.  "Oh yeah, I noticed.  Marissa noticed, everybody noticed, Gary.  It's weird, it's not normal, and you have to get her-" he jerked his thumb toward the bed behind them, "out of here so you can get your head on straight and out of the Twilight Zone before Renee comes back."  Finished, he crossed his arms and stepped back, keeping a wary eye on an unreasonably - in Chuck's opinion, anyway - angry Gary.

Gary slapped the paper down on the table.  "I don't, I don't--You know, I don't have to listen to this."

"Yeah, I know you don't, buddy, but you should."  Chuck studied his friend's flushed face, and softened his tone.  "Gar, how long do you want to hang on to this little fantasy?  I thought real life was looking up for you lately.  You don't want to blow your chance for something really great with Renee on a few days' worth of warm fuzzies."

"Are you finished?"  Gary's body was taut with anger.

Chuck calmly returned Gary's irate stare.  "Yeah.  I guess I am."  Reaching for the bag of donuts, he lifted an eyebrow.  "I'm hungry.  You hungry?"

"No."  Gary took refuge in the paper as Chuck rooted through the donuts.  Picking it up and shaking it open, he scanned the headlines.  The banner headline read POWER OUT FOR HOURS IN AFTERMATH OF STORM.  Great.  That meant no business at the tavern today.  He could only hope that meant there would be news somewhere in the paper that would lead him to Meghan's real existence.  Because as much as he hated to admit it, Chuck had a point.  Especially if last night repeated itself - that was a sure recipe for disaster.  Gary shook his head.  Meghan needed more from him than he could give, and it would be too easy, far too easy given the events of the last three days - let alone last night - for him to take more from her than she had to give.  He had to get Meghan back to her own Gary -- before "nothing" quit happening.

He almost missed the headline, buried at the bottom of the second page in the Metro section.
 

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