"Will I fit in?"

"Yes." He said matter-of-factly, like she was asking if cotton was soft or the sky was blue. How could he not have a doubt in his mind but she had every reservation in the world filling hers?

She was still in her fledgling weeks at APO and felt out of place. True, her family made up a third of the organization's main players but she hardly knew them. Everyone else had worked together and knew each other's quirks and passions. How was she supposed to fit in? But Eric believed in her and that made all the difference.

She didn't reveal her apprehensions to anyone. Eric had caught her at a rare moment of weakness and she had expressed her uncertainty of being in the group and felt silly for it. But that was a fleeting feeling because Eric reached out and wrapped his arms around her. At first, she felt herself tense from toes to head but instantly relaxed and let herself hug him back. It was a good thing.

"Santos, you are an enigma to me."

"Is that a good thing?"

"I don't know. I'm still deciding."

"Oh thanks."

"Santos, if it's not completely obvious to you that I'm utterly and absolutely enthralled by you, then I must be doing something wrong."

"Oh, is that what you call those puppy dog eyes you shoot me in the office?"

Eric snorted as he let her go and crashed to the couch. "If it wasn't the truth, I'd be greatly offended. How can I not like a girl who gets a 38 bowling?"

She threw a pillow at him from the armchair she snuggled into. "You promised to never mention that again."

"Yeah, well, I also promised that no one could be that bad at bowling until I saw you play."

"I think it was the hotdogs."

"You can make all the excuses you want," he said, a grin curling the corners of his mouth. "It doesn't make it better. Ah, Santos what am I gonna do with you? You know what Nadia? Nadia? Nadia!"

Nadia's eye shot open and she pushed off the table she was using as a pillow.

"You were talking in your sleep," Sydney said softly, sliding a mug of cocoa to her sister. It was hard to watch her sister enduring such trauma, but Sydney had faith that Nadia would pull through it. Nadia didn't seem to have the same confidence. Desperation appeared to be fueling her drive, not hope, and Sydney was worried.

"Nad, please tell me your getting more sleep than this."

Nadia yawned and took a sip of hot chocolate. She let that be her answer and added, "I had a meeting with my father earlier. He wanted to talk about what Sark had to say."

"Does he have any leads who the other man is?"

"No. He wanted to talk about something else. About the reference to Eric as being my fiancé."

"I thought you said he already knew? Oh, Nadia, please tell me he was okay with it."

"He discovered it when he read the conversation between Sark and his accomplice. He seemed to be okay. But he was more interested in the fact that the second man knew about it. Someone, he said, must have bugged our apartment. Meaning--."

"Meaning, he's going down the same path we are."

"Yes. But I have a feeling he won't take the same laid back approach as we are. If he comes to the same conclusion, we might never know why."

"Then we need to figure it out before him."

"Hey, we had a dog in high school, right?" Eric asked, taking a drink from his Coke can. "Well you were in elementary school," he amended.

"Yeah," his brother responded, grabbing another slice of pizza from the box.

"Named him Duke for the head GI Joe guy, because I refused to name him Transformer which you were obsessed with?"

"Yeah."

"But, we only had him for a month because it jumped the fence and impregnated the neighbor's award-winning Afghan named Princess Guinevere of the Sparkling Lake and we had to give him to a farm. Now, I ask you, why can I remember that but not a week ago?"

"You will. And I promise, you'll be happy when you do."

John, his brother, had been sequestered as soon as he got off the plane. Nadia and Sydney were waiting for him there, Sydney smartly dressed and Nadia in jogging clothes. They told him all that they could to make things clear and also explained what things to avoid saying.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means," John began, taking a bite of pizza, "every time you'd call, there would be this tone to your voice like at any moment you'd break out in song. I honestly could hear your smile over the phone."

"That happy hunh?"

"Mmm, that much in love."

"Where is she, man?"

"Maybe she's suffering from the same thing you are?"

"Oh, I hadn't thought of that. What if she's out there hurt or something? What if she's relying on me to know where she is and I can't even remember my computer password?"

"I'm sure she's fine. Don't worry."

"Don't worry? Why would you say that if you didn't want me to worry?"

"Don't worry."

"Brother's can be incredibly infuriating."

"Tell me how you really feel."

"I would, but I don't know if you'd know what those words mean."

"Funny."

Taking a bite of pizza, Eric began to think about how he could get the missing years of his life back. No, he was more interested in finding his girl, if she still was, and making sure she was okay. Then he'd ask her to help him remember. What if she was hurt? Lying in a hospital bed, waiting for him to find her? What if she was lost too?

Eric licked the pizza sauce from the corner of his mouth as he thought about how he could find this girl with only a name. And then he remembered Femi O'Reilly, the investigator for the company he worked at right out of college. He and Femi went way back.

"Do you want anything from the kitchen?" Eric asked as he headed in that direction.

"Nah, you'd probably spit in it or something."

"That would be mature," he said sarcastically, stepping around the counter and opening the bag of chips they had left there.

It was good to be with his younger brother. Things almost seemed normal, somehow, and he could just about forget forgetting his past. Maybe it was something he didn't want to remember. After all, he seemed to only grow angrier if he harped too long on the subject, so maybe it wasn't that great. After all, as he kept rehashing with anyone who would listen, the people from his past weren't busying themselves with him so why should he worry? Life is too short to be wasted on worry.

Yet he couldn't shake the idea of this woman who could be out there waiting for him. He had to do something. He picked up his phone and dialed Femi's old number. He wished under his breath that she still lived in the same place.

"Well, well. Can you imagine my surprise to see the name Eric Weiss on caller i.d.?" She seemed mature with her soft, melodic voice. It immediately calmed his nerves.

"Hey Femi, it's good to hear your voice," Eric said quietly so his brother wouldn't hear. "I'm glad you still live with your parents."

"Oh, Hubb, they moved back to Egypt about five years ago to be with my sister. I took over the house for them. If you had kept in touch, maybe you would know that."

"You mean we didn't stay friends?"

"Laa. After you quit the company to go off and do various and sundry things, you pretty much severed all ties."

"What do you mean?"

"I think you said something about hating the brokerage world and that you wanted something exciting. I don't know. That's the last I heard from you."

Eric sighed and shook his head a bit. Why did he quit a perfectly fine job and why did it coincide with his missing eight years?

"Well, I'm sorry. Because I could really use your help."

"Eric," she began, a smile in her voice, "I will always be willing to pay you a favor."

"I don't know why I'm even here. Yes I do. My punk brother made me come," Eric confessed looking around at the group of people.

He had been roped in and didn't know how to severe the strings. His brother had read about the group in a magazine and called around to find out when it was meeting. Eric knew it was pointless and silly. He felt like a college kid again going before his class to give a report. Naked. Sure, he didn't mind telling strangers on the street his problem, but coming face to face with a group of people with his same predicament wasn't his idea of fun. It took away what little appeal of being unique there was.

"Eric, we're not here to judge you. We just want to help you."

"Yeah, well maybe I don't want it."

The discussion leader took in a deep breath and suggested that the group convene for a few minutes to let everyone catch their breath. She, of course, was a plant. They all were. They knew as much as they needed and knew not to push him. Eric's brother was turning out to be a good plant on the inside but, sadly, Eric had not revealed anything more to him than they already knew.

"This group seems pointless, I know," a voice said, pulling him away from the orange juice he was drinking. He turned around to the owner of the voice and smiled.

"Yeah, but pointless doesn't begin to describe it. I'm Weiss."

"Sydney."

"So how long you been doing this little dance?"

"A few years."

"And you still haven't gotten your missing time back?"

"No, I did. I come merely to offer moral support."

"For people like me?"

"For everyone."

"So how much did you lose?"

"Two years. I woke up and my yesterday was two years ago. It was a shock."

"Tell me about it. I just woke up and it wasn't there. And I'm sick of everyone acting like everything will be okay. Like life is fine and normal. What's normal about being stuck in the past?"

"I understand," Sydney began. "The guy I was in love with got married while I was missing."

"What? You didn't have any contact with the people from your past? Me either. It's like they're avoiding me like the plague."

"They weren't avoiding me. They didn't know. Things were different and circumstances just kept us apart. But, that's in the past. Things became relatively normal after that. I'm sure you'll get things figured out."

"That's what everyone keeps telling me."

"It'll happen."

"Maybe I don't want it to happen."

Sydney just looked back at him not knowing what to say. Seeing Eric like this was opening a lot of old wounds for her and she knew her time was better spent figuring out why it happened and how they could fix it. She was tired of dealing with it. It had gotten old and she was ready for things to be resolved. Everyone was.

Someone entered the big room from the doorway and headed in their direction. It wasn't the last person Sydney expected to see, but she was definitely shocked to see him. Something must have happened that couldn't wait.

"Weiss, I'd like you to meet--."

"Mr. Sloane, I know," Eric said, thrusting out his hand. "Is the mission almost complete?"

Femi O'Reilly is a friend that's Egyptian. Loosely translated, Hubb is the basic word for love and laa means "no" in Arabic.