Robert rushed out the emergency room doors, looking for Sean and Maren. He spotted them leaning on each other about 100 feet away.

"Sean! She's awake, mate!" Robert yelled.

"Just now?" Sean said as he and Maren rushed over.

"Yes, the doctor's with her now," Robert said and his lack of enthusiasm concerned Sean.

"But…" Sean queried.

"But, there might be some complications," Robert said.

"What complications?"

"She recognized my voice, but I don't think she really saw me. I think she's having trouble with her vision."

"Oh no!" Maren cried.

"Don't worry, baby. She took a pretty big blow to the head. Two of them, in fact, and it's normal to have some dizziness or some kind of visual difficulty after that, believe me I know," Sean said, trying to downplay his concern. "I want to go in there. Robert, will you stay here with Maren?"

"Of course. Far be it for me to turn down a lady."

Sean hurried back into the emergency room and over to Room 4. He whipped open the door, but Tiffany wasn't in there. No one was. Sean crossed over to the information desk.

"Where's my wife?"

"And your wife's name?" the unhelpful clerk asked.

"Donely. Tiffany Donely. She was in Room 4 two minutes ago. I'd like to know where she is now if that's not too much trouble."

"Of course, sir. One minute, please." She punched the keys of her computer until Tiffany's file came up.

"She's being admitted and they're prepping her for a CAT scan, sir," the clerk said.

"Would you mind telling me what room she is in, then?" Sean asked.

"She'll be in 305, but you probably won't be able to see her until after the CAT scan," the clerk said.

"Great, that's just great," Sean said dryly. "Nice of someone to come and tell me that."

"I'm sorry, sir."

"It's not your fault. After all, I sit here for an hour and a half and then get up for five minutes and, in that time, something finally happens. I would like to see a doctor or a nurse who knows what is going on with my wife, please. Can you please locate such a person for me, thank you," he said curtly.

"Yes, sir. I'm sorry, sir."

Sean rolled his eyes and stepped away from the desk. A couple minutes later, the nurse he had talked to when Tiffany first came in approached.

"Mr. Donely, there you are," the nurse said. "Your wife's in ICU and she's going to have a CAT scan as soon as they're able to stop the bleeding. Dr. Weinstein says there's definitely been some hemorrhaging into her brain. She's conscious now, but apparently her vision has been adversely affected."

"What does that mean?" he said.

"She told us that she's only seeing shadows. It's really not uncommon in situations like this, the swelling is probably pressing on the optic nerve. We just need to take a look at that and pinpoint where the problem is."

"Can I see her?"

"For a minute. But we need to monitor her closely and we can't have her agitated in any way."

"I'm not going to agitate her, I just want to see her," Sean said forcefully.

"I understand," she said, leading him down the hallway. "But right now, the slightest thing can agitate her. When we say 'agitate,' we're not talking about something stressful, we're really talking about any excessive emotion at all. With a brain injury such as this, even positive things can overstimulate a patient and be harmful. So you can go in for a minute, just to let her know you're here. Don't talk at all about what happened to her, OK?"

"Yes, I won't."

The nurse handed Sean a sealed envelope. "We had to take off her jewelry, everything's in there, you can doublecheck to be sure."

Sean peered into the envelope. He saw her gold necklace and the brightly colored rainbow earrings that he always teased her about. Her wedding ring, her engagement ring and the diamond ring that he gave her were nestled at the bottom of the packet. He tucked the envelope into his inside jacket pocket and patted it for safe keeping.

The nurse pushed open the door to the intensive care unit and Sean stepped in. Tiffany was lying on the bed, all kinds of tubes and monitors protruding from her hospital gown. He stepped in closer, her blue eyes were staring up at the ceiling almost blankly.

"Sweetheart?" he said softly.

Tiffany's brow furrowed. "Who's there?"

"Baby, it's me."

"Who are you?" The fact that his voice didn't register on her face bothered him.

Sean turned and looked at the nurse.

"It's me, Sean." Still no flicker of recognition.

"I'm sorry, do I know you?"

Sean stiffened. The nurse turned to lead him to the door.

"We're going to have to stop there," she explained when they were outside and the door had closed. "I'm going to get Dr. Weinstein."

"My wife didn't recognize my own voice," Sean said.

"This isn't unusual in cases like this," the nurse said.

"What do you mean in cases like this? It's unusual to me," Sean responded, grasping her arm.

"Let me get the doctor, he needs to know about this," she said, pulling herself away.

Sean looked through the door again at his wife in the bed. His hand reached for the door and he wanted to push it open and try to talk to her again, but the nurse's words of warning just a few minutes ago kept him from doing so. He gazed through the door for a few minutes, until the nurse came back with Dr. Weinstein.

"Dr…" he started.

"I need to go in there and see her, Mr. Donely," he said. "I'll come back out in a couple of minutes, OK?"

Sean watched as the doctor walked into the room and over to Tiffany's bed.

"Ms. Hill, it's Dr. Weinstein," he said.

"Someone was just in here," Tiffany said. "I didn't know him, but he seemed to know me."

"It's nothing to worry about, he just had the wrong room," the doctor said.

"Oh," Tiffany said, and she would have pondered it further but she had a serious headache.

"How do you feel right now?"

"Well besides not being able to focus very well, I feel terrible," she said. "My head is just pounding. Do you know what's wrong with me?"

"We're going to be running some tests very soon and that should give us a better idea," the doctor said.

"I don't know if I was dreaming this or not, but I could have sworn I heard my friend Robert's voice a little earlier," Tiffany said.

"No, you weren't dreaming," the doctor said gently. "I asked him to wait while we ran some further tests on you. He told me to tell you he won't be going anywhere until he knows you're all right."

"That does sound like Robert," Tiffany said.

"OK, you rest. I'll be back in a couple of minutes."

"You're the doctor," Tiffany said, leaning back on the pillow.

Dr. Weinstein exited the room and Sean all but tackled him when he came out the door.

"Well?" Sean asked.

"She seems to be suffering from a bit of lost memory, Mr. Donely," Dr. Weinstein said as gently as he could.

"A bit of lost memory? She doesn't remember her husband of 21 years, doctor."

"That may be temporary. A lot of times when there is swelling on the brain, it can affect the memory adversely. We're going to have to wait and see. The CAT scan will tell us more."

"Wait and see? Wait and see! Fabulous," Sean said.

"If you want to take your daughter home, I can give you a call as soon as the results are in," Dr. Weinstein said.

"I'm not going anywhere."

"This could be awhile," he said.

"Then I will be here awhile," Sean retorted.

"Very well. I'll page you when I know more or if there is any change in your wife's condition," Dr. Weinstein said.

"Fine, thank you."

Sean took a last look through the window at his wife. And he wondered how he was going to explain it all to his daughter when he didn't know what to do himself.