His hand trailed over her face slowly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ears as he stared hard into her face. "John?" she asked, "what's wrong?"
"Not a thing," he said in wonderment. "I'm not used to that. I just can't believe that you're here."
"Of course I'm here," she said, "where else would I be?"
"You can't stay," he said looking at her curiously.
"What do you mean?" she asked, "you want me to leave?"
He shook his head sadly. "No," he said, "but you need to wake up now."
Natalie jerked awake, her irritation at discovering she had been dreaming pushed aside when she realized there was someone beside her with his hand on her shoulder. She looked up into the smiling face of Dr. Spencer Truman and felt a sudden jolt of unexplainable fear. "Dr. Truman," she said, blinking sleep from her eyes, "I'm sorry, I must have fallen asleep."
"It's quite all right," he said with an unchanging expression, "You obviously needed it. The human body is a remarkable thing that way—when we don't give it what it needs it tends to demand it of us."
"Yeah, I guess," she said standing up and smoothing her clothes. For some reason she felt incredibly uncomfortable with him looming over her like that. "How is he?" she asked indicating John with a tilt of her head.
Spencer sighed. "Well as you know it's remarkable that he's even alive. He's stable for now and barring any further setbacks I would say he's likely to survive but…"
Natalie's heart started to race when he trailed off. What about John's condition didn't he want to tell her? "But what?"
"Well brain injuries are tricky things," he said, "even if he does survive there's no guarantee when or even if he'll wake up. And even if he does wake up it's hard to predict what the impact of his injuries will be. He could have lasting brain damage."
Natalie took a sharp breath in and steadied herself against the edge of John's bed. "Are you all right, Ms. Buchanan?" he asked putting a hand on her back. She resisted the urge to flinch away from it.
"I'm fine," she assured him.
"I'm sorry," he said, "it was insensitive of me to say that, you're obviously very concerned about Lieutenant McBain-"
"No," she said defiantly, "you don't know John. He's going to be just fine. If for no other reason than proving everyone else wrong." She walked briskly from the room meaning to head back to the waiting area to find someone else to sit with John but as she walked she had the sudden sensation of being smothered. Unable to think of anything but a need for fresh air she broke into a run and didn't stop until she made it out of the sliding glass doors at the front of the hospital. She steadied herself against one of the columns supporting the front awning, gasping for air.
"Natalie?" she heard a voice behind her say and turned to see her uncle Bo with a cell phone against his ear. She stared at him in response, still trying to catch her breath. "I'll call you back in a minute," he said to whoever was on the other end and shut his cell phone as he walked towards her.
"Natalie what's wrong?" he asked, "Did something happen? Is it John?"
"He's fine," she gasped, "there's no change."
"Okay," Bo said putting an arm around her shoulders, "so what happened?"
"Nothing," she said.
"Natalie you're on the verge of a panic attack," he said, "that doesn't look like nothing."
"I don't think I can do this," she said suddenly collapsing in sobs against his shoulder.
"Do what?" he asked gently.
"John," she said, "I was just with John and the doctor came in and- Bo what if he never wakes up?"
Bo backed up enough that he could look her in the face, "Natalie, John's not going to die."
"I know," she sniffed, "but what if he just doesn't wake up? He has a brain injury and they don't know how bad it is—what if it's like Ben? Uncle Bo, I saw what my mom went through, him being in a coma for so long, visiting him every day, just watching him there but not there. Praying he would wake up one day and then having him die anyway. If that happened to John, I don't think I'd be strong enough to make it through. I don't think I could handle that."
"Listen to me," Bo said firmly, but still gently, "first of all you're a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for. And secondly, you can't think like that. John's strong and he's stubborn and we both know that when he sets his mind to something there's no talking him out of it. So you just sit there and talk to him and you make him want to come back to us."
She was gone again. Had she really been here? There was a moment when she'd seemed so close he'd almost been able to touch her, but he couldn't quite reach. And now she was gone again. He'd lost her again and this time he didn't even know what he'd done. She'd run away. No less than he deserved in the end.
He saw her at a distance. Way over on the shore, sitting in the sand her knees pulled up to her chest. She was watching a little boy playing in the surf. "Sweetheart," she called, "don't get too dirty. We have to go see your dad and they'll kill me if you track in all that sand." She smiled at the little boy, she seemed happy, but there was something obscuring her smile. Like a fog. Like she couldn't quite see her way to smiling fully.
Was she happy? He wondered. Even if he couldn't be part of her life he wanted her to be happy. Even if it couldn't be with him.
"Johnny," she called, "are you listening to me?"
The little boy looked up at his mother and for the first time John got a clear look at his face, and suddenly he realized who he was. That boy was their son. His and Natalie's. They had a child. So why wasn't he part of their lives?
When she had finally calmed down Bo looked her in the eyes again and said, "Now I know you're not gonna want to hear this, but I think you need to go home for a while. It's been a long day."
It had, she thought. Looking around she realized it had gotten dark—it was night already. It felt like only minutes ago that Bo had called her this morning and at the same time this morning seemed so far away. "No," she said softly, "I need to say here. I need to be close to John."
"John would tell you to go home," he said.
"And I wouldn't listen to him either," she sniffed trying to force a smile.
"Just for a couple of hours," he pressed, "get some sleep. You'll feel better. You can come back refreshed, stronger, you'll be a bigger help to John. I promise someone will call you if there's any change."
She shook her head again. "I need to go back in. I need to talk to his mother and Michael."
"I'll walk you to them," he offered, "maybe they'll have better luck persuading you."
Michael, Marcie and Eve were sitting in the waiting area; Michael looked half asleep, his head listing to one side. Eve saw them approaching and sat up straight, a look of concern growing as she took in Natalie's tearstained face. "Natalie?" she asked, "I thought you were with John. Is he-?"
"The same," she answered fighting to keep from crying again, "I just um… I just needed some fresh air."
"Well that's understandable," she said, moving over so that Natalie would have room to sit beside her, "you've been cooped up here most of the day."
"I was actually trying to convince her to go home and rest for a little bit," Bo said.
"That's a very good idea," Eve said as Natalie sank down beside her.
"No," Natalie insisted, "I need to be here with John. What if something happens?"
"Visiting hours are almost over anyway," Michael said, "you'd just be waiting out here."
"Then I'll wait out here," Natalie said folding her arms defensively. She tried to give Michael a meaningful look without the others noticing; if they left John unguarded through the night, whoever had given him the near fatal medication could try again.
As if he heard her thoughts Bo said, "Officer Osterloh is going to be stationed by his door all night. If anything happens I'll have him call you immediately."
"Why are you posting a guard at his room?" Eve asked.
"Dr. Miller requested it," he explained, "she's concerned with John being a cop that someone with a grudge against him—you know someone he arrested who's out on probation or something—might try to take advantage of his condition. It's just a precaution."
Natalie saw Michael breathe a sigh of relief and hoped she was doing a better job of hiding her own. "You see," Michael said to her, "there's no reason you can't go home for a little bit. He'll be fine."
"Why is everyone so concerned about me?" she snapped back, "You've been here longer than I have!"
"But he's not pre-" Marcie clapped a hand over her mouth realizing she'd just said something she should have.
"Not what?" Eve asked.
"I'm so sorry," Marcie said to Natalie, "I know I wasn't supposed to tell anyone. Well I wasn't supposed to know, but I overheard Michael telling one of the nurses—please don't be mad at him he was just asking her to look out for you-"
"Marcie," Natalie said plaintively as she buried her eyes in one hand, "could you please stop talking now."
"Oh, yeah," she said, "I'm sorry, when I get nervous I start talking and-"
"What are you talking about?" Bo asked raising one eyebrow.
"Nothing," Natalie sighed.
"Is this 'nothing' the same reason Michael wanted you to cut back on caffeine?" Eve asked softly. Natalie could tell by her tone she'd figured it out.
Natalie looked at her trying not to panic. "Um… sort of," she stammered.
"Natalie?" Bo asked his eyes widening, "are you…?"
"Yeah," she said softly, "but please, I haven't even told Mom yet so please don't-"
"I won't say anything," he assured her.
"It seems Michael wasn't the only one keeping happy news from me," Eve said.
"John didn't know," Natalie said biting her lip. "I was going to tell him I just- I was waiting for a time that seemed right and it never happened. I told him today I just… I don't know if he heard me…"
"I'm sure he did," Eve said wrapping an arm around her shoulders as another tear fell from Natalie's eyes.
Natalie walked into Capricorn and scanned the room for Rex and Roxy. She'd get one heck of a lecture from Bo if he found out she wasn't at home sleeping as promised but she had more important things to do and, besides, she didn't think she'd be able to sleep anyway. Rex was sitting at a table by himself; Roxy was probably late—no surprise.
As she slid into the chair across from him he asked, "Anything happen?"
"Marcie spilled in front of Uncle Bo and John's Mom," she said.
"Well we wanted the news to get around, didn't we," he said.
"Yeah," she said, "but… in front of his mother I just… I felt kind of trampy."
"Oh whatever," Rex said rolling his eyes.
"Oh," Natalie said remembering, "and Dr. Miller asked Bo to provide security for John's room. She said she was worried some ex-con might come after John while he was incapacitated, but-"
"She knows something," Rex nodded, "I'll check up on her next. In the meantime…"
"Did you find out something about Layla Williamson?" she asked.
"Just that she's suddenly come into enough money it doesn't look legal," he said, "until last month she was hugely in debt, student loans, big balances on her credit cards, the works. Suddenly last month everything was paid off."
"Really?" Natalie asked.
"Yeah," he said, "plus she might have some inkling we're on to her, she tried to hit on me right before you got here."
"You sure it's not just your animal magnetism?" Natalie asked with a smirk.
"Ordinarily that's what I'd say," he said, "but no, her sister warned her about me but good. Plus we don't particularly like each other. If she's changed course this suddenly I don't trust it."
"Speaking of her sister," Natalie mumbled trying to act oblivious to her former rival who had just entered the club. This became impossible when to their surprise Evangeline sat down at the table and announced, "I want to know what's going on."
To be continued.