Here we are again! Please close an eye on my medical inaccuracies, while I did research, I overlooked a few things for plot reasons.

Chapter 7

October 1917

The staff at the field hospital held its breath the whole duration of Tom's operation. Kitty didn't sleep the night before, and Matron Carter decided she better stay away from the wards and do something more mindless. She spent those hours vigorously scraping the pans. Once the operation was over Miles himself came to talk to her and explained that everything had gone well.

Kitty sat beside Tom, when early afternoon they brought him to the officer's ward, where luckily there were only two other officers. She left many hours later, when only Rosalie finally managed to convince her it was time to sleep and that he was in good care anyway.

The following morning

Tom squeezed his eyes a few times, and the carefully opened them up. He felt weird. He didn't know why, and that made him uncomfortable. He looked around and he saw wooden walls and beds. Two people were sitting beside him with a relieved and overwhelmed look on their face. Who were they? And where was him?

He tried to get up but a stinging pain in his head made him fall back. He heard the woman say "Careful Tom, don't!" while the man reached out to help him.

"What happened?" He asked hoarse.

"You've just had surgery Tom. On your head. You need to lie down and rest"

The man called him Tom. He didn't remember his name was Tom. There was something wrong because there was nothing he could recall about himself or the things and people around him.

Kitty and Miles saw Tom's panicked expression and after a quick glance at each other they silently agreed that there was something else beside the pain in his head.

"Tom dear, what is going on? What can we do for you?" She had called him dear, he noticed.

"I...I don't know. I don't know who I am, I don't know who you are" He said his voice fading.

These words went deep into Kitty's and Miles's chest like daggers.

"Maybe it's the anaesthetic that is making you feel confused" Miles said, in an attempt to reassure more himself and Kitty, rather than Tom.

"Could it be that?" Kitty whispered alarmed.

"Mostly, I feel very tired" Tom said "And the rest is just an empty page"

"Tom! This is your name, all right?" Miles started "I'm going to consult another doctor and see what we can do. Kitty come, I need you to do something for me in the meantime" He said.

Kitty and Miles came out of the tent and he rushed to lean on the nearest fence.

"Bloody Hell" He said sharply.

"Miles...Miles, please tell it's not what I think it is" She was even afraid to word it.

"We need to talk to Colonel Brett, Kitty. But yes, if there isn't any immediate change, I'm afraid Tom has amnesia"

Shivers ran through Kitty's spine while they hasted toward Colonel Brett's office. It took him a while to digest the news, as if having Tom severely wounded wasn't already enough.

"Good Lord!" was the first thing he managed to say.

"We need to figure this out. If Tom has lost his memory, what caused it? Was it the blow, or the operation?" Miles asked.

"The operation eased the situation. A severe head injury like his might have damaged the brain, and consequently caused the loss of memory. Unfortunately this is something we couldn't predict before"

"Is there something we can do?" Kitty said.

"The memory loss could be temporary or permanent but we need time to figure out the extent of it. And anything else connected" Miles explained.

"He didn't recognize us, and he seemed unaware of where he is and what had happened" Kitty said on the brink of tears.

Tom needed to recover from the surgery and once in a better physical condition, it would have been time to work on his memory. Colonel Brett warned both Kitty and Miles of the unpredictability of the situation. They needed to be patient and avoid pushing on him with stories or trying to make him remember. As far as he had experienced they needed to gradually tell him about himself. And then pray for the memory to come back, if it was coming back, as soon as possible.

Miles and Kitty left the Colonel's office and went back to Tom. Miles told Kitty that he was going to talk to him first. They also agreed to not tell him exactly what had been going on between him and Kitty.

He winked at her and said "Come on Kitty, let's face this!"

Tom was sitting up in his bed; a VAD was feeding him some light soup. He was very hungry but he was too weak to eat. The VAD gave him some tea and then, at the sight of Kitty and Miles left with a nod.

They both took a chair and sat near him.

"How are you feeling? I hope the soup has given you some energy, you need it"

"I would have eaten more, but I can't really, not yet"

Miles glanced quickly at Kitty; he was unsure how to begin. She gave him a nod of encouragement.

"Tom, do you feel like you can talk with us and answer some questions? It looks like we know what is going on and we are here to help you"

Tom looked at the doctor. He seemed a funny man, and he was evidently concerned for him. The woman sitting near him seemed equally concerned, he had noticed that from time to time she was giving him a different kind of look, but he didn't know how to read it. She had called him dear, that he remembered.

"Yes of course. Although I don't know what I can answer, because I don't...I don't remember anything"

"We believe that the trauma you have suffered has caused you amnesia. But it's too early to give a definitive diagnosis about your state and how long it's going to last. You are absolutely certain you don't remember anything, even about what has happened to you?"

Tom stayed still for a moment.

"No"

"Then we have to start from square one" Miles tried to say in the most sympathetic voice he had. He tried not to look as someone who was feeling sorry.

"You can start by saying who you are!" Tom asked with a sarcastic tone.

"We are..." Kitty had to decide which word to use, for both of them. "We are your friends. My name is Kitty Trevelyan and I am VAD nurse in this field hospital. We met here, two years ago. He is Captain Miles Heskett-Thorne and he's been your friend a bit longer. You also share the same tent"

"It means I'm a doctor too?"

"Yes, and a very good one" She said proudly.

"You're a Scottish lad from Glasgow. Your full name is Thomas Alexander Gillan. You are surgeon, a trauma surgeon and have been in France almost since the outbreak of the war. You...you know there is a war going on?" Miles continued.

"Yes, yes I know that. What year is it?"

"It's 1917, today is October 16th"

"So I have been at war for the past three years?" He asked.

"Yes you have. A few months ago you left this field hospital to work on the front line"

"Why?"

This was another difficult question to answer. Kitty brushed his hand on Miles's arms, and he understood that she wanted to say it. She tried to stick to the truth as much as possible.

"Because you wanted to do more, and the situation has been very, very bad lately. Unfortunately you were caught in an enemy shelling at the casualty clearing station you were working at. You were hit in your head and suffered other wounds" "They brought you back here; he is the one who performed the operation"

"I see. Thank you...Miles and thank you Kitty" He didn't know what to think. He didn't know how to react to this information, because he didn't recognize anything of it. He knew he could trust Kitty and Miles because he felt a connection. Miles must have been like a brother to him, while Kitty, well that was something else.

When Kitty stood up and had told them that she needed to go back to work, she had touched Tom's hand lightly and he had felt a shiver running up his arm. The quick longing look, followed by a fond smile, settled into his mind. She was a beautiful woman.

"She isn't a friend" He thought.