"Doc?" he tried again, "Did he hear me?" Marlena's heart started to race, she had never intended for John to hear her declaration of love. Marlena turned around, and was surprised when she saw a big smile on his face. Did it come from the fact that she had just indirectly told him that she loved him more than life itself, or was it about Kristen?

"John?" It was the only thing she managed to get out, she was to nervous to make a coherent sentence, so she just stumbled out his name and tried to fake a smile. "She woke up, and Lexie said they are going to be okay!" John said, and it was clear that he was happy. "Puh, he didn't hear me." She heard herself thinking, or did he?

"But, I think we need to talk…" he said, and his smiling face had turned into a serious one. "Maybe he heard me after all... What if he can't deal with the fact that I love him more than my own life, what if he feels nothing but friendship and love of me as the mother of his baby girl?"

Marlena was afraid she might have ruined her friendship with John, a friendship that had only grown when obstacles had been thrown in its way. Even when their affair had ended, and everything should have added up the fact that they should have fallen apart or farer away, instead their friendship had only grown stronger, and Belle, she had brought them even closer together, when Marlena didn't think that was possible.

"Doc? Can we go to your office?" John asked, not wanting to talk about whatever was on his mind in the chapel, "Huh? Hmmm... Sure" Marlena said, sensing that John wanted to be alone, and that he didn't want to take the chance of being interrupted.

---

"Doc..." he started, he wasn't sure how to say what he was going say, and he felt like there was so much at stake, "Just now, in chapel, you were talking about me, right?" he had sensed that the words she had said was directed towards him. Marlena nodded, it was all she was able to do, "So he did hear me." She thought. "Then I need you to know.." Marlena almost held her breath in anticipation; she felt like her while future depended on what John were going to say next.

"That there is nothing for me to forgive…" he said, and tried to smile, "Oh, he only heard the last part" Marlena though, she was relieved but also slightly disappointed. It had been good to get that secret of her chest, but she couldn't tell him now. She couldn't risk ruining their friendship.

Then she realized what he said, that it's nothing for him to forgive. "What do mean, there is nothing for you to forgive? It's MY fault that you almost lost your baby! I should never have let you claim my child as your own, John! You're not the father of my baby, and now you almost lost your child because of the responsibility you decided to take upon yourself! I should just have told the truth…" Marlena felt the tears coming again, "Dammit!" she though, she was sick of crying, but everything was just too painful.

"Doc, look at me" he said, looked into her eyes and gave her a little smile," I'm gonna tell you what I told you when you were pregnant with Belle, long before we knew she was mine, even before I knew of the possibility that she was mine." He said, with no regret or anger in his voice over the fact that he didn't know that Belle was his from the beginning, only with love. "I'm gonna love this child, simply because she or he is a part of you, and I do mean that as much right now as I did in that moment. And there was no way I was going to let you tell your family who the real father of your baby is. I see how painful this is for you, heck I even feel how painful this is for you, and so far you haven't told your family or the people Stefano hurt the most."

"I haven't told the people Stefano hurt the most? I told you, didn't I? John, nobody has been more hurt by Stefano then you have. He erased you life, your family, your entire past, just so he could replace you with Roman and give you a life, a family and a past that didn't belong to you, only to take it away from you again."

"Maybe, but Doc, nobody had benefited more from Stefano's evil than I have, maybe except the Phoenix himself. He might have given me a life that wasn't mine, but at the same time, he gave me three children and a wife that made life worth living. I don't care about the past I don't remember anymore, sure I am curious, but what is important is the past I do remember, the one with Carrie, Sami, Eric, Brady, Belle, Isabella and you. All of you showed me what love really is." He paused, and smiled.

"And on top of that I found a friendship so strong that I don't think anything can ever ruin it. I found you, Doc. And that is without a doubt, the moment in my life when everything changed, I was lost before I found you and you made me feel complete. You gave me everything I couldn't remember" Marlena could feel a tear fall down her cheek, not because she was sad, but because she was truly touched by what John said.

"And if I had the chance to get my other life back, the one I don't remember, in trade for the life with you, Carrie and the twinners, I wouldn't, because there is not a slightest chance that that life is better than what I had with you, Eric, Sami and Carrie. Not the slightest chance. We might have hurt, cried and mourned like no other family, but we also laughed, smiled and loved more than I thought possible. We shared some incredible heartaches and miracles, and I wouldn't trade a single moment."

"Wow, "Marlena though, she had never heard John talk about their life together like that before, with such intensity, such passion. "I don't think I've ever heard you talk about us that way before, how much we meant to you. I mean, I know how much you love those kids, I see that every time you look at them. They will always be your children, won't they?" she smiled at him, they hadn't even had a year together like a real family, but it was still the best months of her life.

"Of course, the same way Carrie and Brady always will be yours; DNA doesn't matter when you love someone as much as we love those children, Doc. They are ours in every sense that matters. You might not have given birth to Carrie or Brady, but if anyone asks, you will still say that you are their mother, won't you?" Marlena nodded, John were right. She was Brady's mother, and even if Carrie technically had Anna, Marlena and John had pretty much raised her and she was their daughter by heart.

"You have five wonderful children, John. They might not always show it, but they love you as much as you love them." Marlena said, because she knew how much it hurt John to be so distant from the twinners. But she knew they loved him, because when you first love John Black, there is no way back, you'll love him forever.

"And you'll always have me, no matter what. You know you can always count on me, John" she smiled at him and John felt his spirits rise. She had that power, in way, over him. If she smiled, he smiled, if she cried, he cried, it was like they were connected on a level that was so much deeper than what most people had shared, that was clear, it's always been that way. How else could you explain why he left his and Izzy B's engagement party to go down to the pier, only to find Marlena there, back from the dead after 5 years?

"I know, Marlena, the same way you know you can always depend on me, the same way you knew you could trust me with your secret. We're connected, Marlena. I know when you are scared, or hurt. I can feel it, and it hurts me as much as it hurts you. What we got is special, and I would never do anything to jeopardize that, so you should never be a afraid that you are going to lose me, because I'm not going anywhere."