Chapter 16

May, 1987

Alex and Gene sat on the couch next to each other, revelling in the unusual quiet that the house had taken on.

"Do you think we did the right thing?" she asked him.

He gave her a small smile and brushed the hair out of her eyes. She had grown out her hair from 1983, and her perm was back. It was not as harsh as the one she had had when she arrived in 1981, but it was a perm nonetheless and he had teased her endlessly about it.

"Of course we did the right thing, Bolls. We're both old and knackered and need our sleep."

She laughed. "You seem to be contradicting yourself with the 'need our sleep thing.'"

"What do you mean?" he asked innocently.

"Seems to me you were intent to keep me up all night last night."

He grinned. "Waste not, Bolly. In fact..."

He pushed her down to the couch and she squealed. He pressed his lips against hers, but she pulled away.

"Take the phone off the hook, Gene," she murmured, grinning.

"I like the way you think, Bolls."

Gene reached over to where the phone sat, but just as he was about to pull it off the receiver, it started ringing.

"Bugger," he said, getting off Alex and standing to answer the phone. "Hunt. What the bloody hell do you want?"

Alex grinned as she heard his grumpy greeting, praying to hell it wasn't someone important he was speaking to.

The phone was suddenly in front of her face and she looked up at Gene.

"It's for you," he said, his voice as confused as his face.

"Hello?"

"Alex?" the voice on the other end said anxiously.

"Tom? What's going on?"

"I'm at the hospital. Charlie, Jimmy's little sister?"

"Yes?" she said, wondering why he was telling her about the girl she'd only met a handful of times.

"She was walking by London Road today when she saw a woman get hit by a taxi. When she went to help the woman, she..."

"What about the woman Tom?" Alex urged.

"It was Molly. It was like she materialised out of thin air right in front of the taxi, apparently."

Alex nearly dropped the phone. "Where is she Tom?"

"St. Thomas'."

"I'll be there in just a minute."

Alex hung up the phone and stood quickly.

"What's going on, Alex?" Gene asked, noting the concern on her face.

"Molly," she said worriedly. "She's been hit by a taxi."

"Bloody hell! C'mon Bolls. Let's fire up the Quattro."

They rushed out the blood red Audi that was still in perfect condition. Gene took off in his normal high-risk driving style, it being somewhat worse today. Alex remained silent. He noticed this and gave her leg a squeeze of reassurance.

"I'm sure she'll be fine, Alex," he said.

"But if she's not..."

"Oh, no, Bolly. You are not allowed to blame this on yourself. You had no idea she was in the bloody city."

Alex nodded, knowing it would be better to just agree with him. Finally, after an eternity, they pulled up in front of the A&E. Alex ran inside, finding Tom pacing frantically in the waiting room. Charlie was waiting with him, her features much more grown up than the last time they had met.

"What's going on Tom?" she asked.

"I don't bloody know!" he said, frustrated. "They figured out Molly and I weren't related and won't tell me a fucking thing!"

A moment passed.

"Sorry for the language."

Alex grinned, hiding her nerves. "It's not a problem. I'll see if I can wheedle anything out of them." She walked up to the desk, where a nurse sat, sorting through papers. Alex merely waited until the nurse looked up, knowing that not interrupting her would make their relationship start off better, and thus, she may be able to get more information.

"Can I help you?" asked the nurse sounding stressed.

"Yes. I'm sorry to disturb you, but my daughter was brought in. She was in a car accident," Alex said, controlling her panic and trying not to sound brash.

"We've got three here today," the nurse said apologetically.

"Molly Drake. She was hit by a taxi."

The nurse's eyes lit up. "I suppose you'd like some information?"

No, I just came here to chat, she thought. "It would be lovely if you could give me an update," she said sweetly.

"I'm not entirely sure on the details, but I know she was brought in in stable condition. She was unconscious, however. I'll let the nurses know you're here and one of them might be able to come out and tell you more."

"Thank you so much, er.."

"Janice," the nurse said, smiling.

"Thank you so much, Janice. You were a great help."

The nurse grinned even wider and scurried away. Alex turned and smirked to herself. Almost too easy. You just had to be polite and considerate. Or, if that didn't work, have Gene come in and flirt shamelessly. That's how they were able to interview suspects in hospital so easily.

Alex walked back to the waiting room where she heard Gene's voice.

"Don't worry. She'll use her psychotwattery and sort the nurses out."

"Psychology works a lot of the time, Gene," Alex said, trying not to let the panic show in her voice.

"What's going on?" Tom asked, standing immediately.

"She's stable. She was unconscious when they brought her in. The nurse didn't know anymore but she was going to get someone to tell us what was going on."

"Thank god!" Tom said to the air.

No nurse appeared, but within the hour, a doctor appeared at the waiting room door. Worried, Alex jumped up immediately, ignoring the other people in the room.

"Ms. Drake?" he asked.

Alex nodded. "What's going on?"

"The taxi hit her pretty hard," the doctor said. Her fibula, that is, the smaller of the two bones in her lower leg, is broken. Some ribs are cracked as well, but those aren't serious. The only thing we are really concerned about is the fact that she hit her head as she fell and has remained unconscious since arriving."

"But she'll wake up?"

"It's impossible to tell the extent of damage that the brain received. We are fairly certain, however that she should be waking up within the next several hours. I can take you to see her if you'd like?"

Alex nodded, trying to control her emotions. Her daughter was unconscious and might not wake up. However slim the possibility, it was about one hundred times more prevalent to her than it was to the doctor.

Alex was led to Molly's room, Gene, Tom and Charlie following behind. As she entered, she was aware of Gene holding the other two back.

"Let her go by herself," he said softly.

Alex walked in, seeing the quiet figure on the bed and walking over quickly. She smiled softly, reaching out and touching her daughters face. It had been three years, but she had not forgotten this time.

As her happiness over seeing Molly started to die down a little, the wounds became more evident. Her cheek was scraped up and there were bruises darkening on her arms. One eye was bruised and there were a few plasters on her arms, covering up cuts that must have been there.

Alex stroked Molly's face. "My baby," she whispered, continuing to take in Molly's features. Her hair was brunette now instead of the jet black it had been three years previously. It was styled just a bit differently than it had been in 1983. Now, one could almost describe it as a perm.

Tom entered the room with Charlie and Gene a few moments later. "She looks so different," he whispered.

"I hardly recognised her," Charlie said. "If it hadn'tve been the birthmark and the scar on the forehead, I wouldn't have recognised her at all.

Tom grabbed her hand and smiled. "C'mon, Felicitá, wake up. I think you're just an attenzione cercatore, an attention seeker. First night I meet you, you hit your head on a step, first night you're back you get hit by a taxi. C'mon, Ira. Stop faking us out," he said teasingly.

Tom glanced up to see the rest of the group smiling as well. They sat in silence for a while, all lost in their own thoughts. A low moan brought them all back to attention immediately. Alex's head snapped up from where it rested on Gene's shoulder, nearly connecting with his chin on the way up. They all looked at the bed where the young woman's eyes were flickering. Gene stood, going out to find a nurse to alert them. Meanwhile, Molly's eyes opened a crack. She blinked a few times before her eyes stayed open.

"Welcome back, Molly," Alex said, smiling and patting Molly's hand. Molly frowned and her eyes flickered over to where Alex was sitting before they became wide in disbelief.

"Jesus Christ," she said. "Oh my God. I've gone mad."

Alex frowned. "Molls?"

"Fucking hell. Holy, fucking hell."

"Molly, are you okay?" Tom asked, still holding her hand.

She wrenched it out of his grip looking at him in confusion. "And who the bloody hell are you? What's going on?"

She was almost shouting now, kicking off her bed linen with one leg and trying to get out of the bed. A nurse entered, her face one of concern. She gave Molly a shot of something that started to relax her. Alex held on to her daughter as she slowly started to flicker out of consciousness.

"I don't understand," she murmured. "You're dead." Her eyes closed as she went limp in Alex's arms.

Alex frowned as she set Molly down on the bed. Tom was staring at the girl, dumbfounded and Charlie's expression was not any different. Only Gene stood without an expression.

The nurse left the room and came back a few minutes later with a doctor.

"I'm going to have to ask you to leave," he said apologetically. "Obviously, your presence here has distressed her, so until we can do further tests, I'd like it just to be us and her. We'll ring you with any development.

Alex nodded, staring at her daughter. She stood, brushing her hand over Molly's cheek and kissing her forehead. Tom and Charlie exited a few moments later and they walked toward the Quattro together.

"What's going on with her?" Tom asked.

"She seems to have memory loss," Alex replied softly. It's probably a result of her hitting her head."

"But she'll be okay, won't she?"

To that, Alex had no answer.

~(*)~

The phone rang that night at 9:06. Alex picked it up after the first ring.

"Hello?"

"Yes, is Alex Drake there?"

"Speaking."

"Ah. Miss Drake. This is Doctor Tesput from St. Thomas'. I have some results regarding your daughter."

"What's going on?" she asked worriedly.

"Molly seems to have memory loss related to her concussion. She's reasonably confused, and was unable to tell me even what year it might be. When asked what age she was, she was unable to give an answer. The only thing she seemed certain of is that you were not supposed to exist. Can you explain that?"

"She lived with her father who liked to pretend that," Alex replied bitterly. She could almost hear the doctor's head nod in understanding.

"She has no idea who the boy, girl and man are that were with you today. For this reason, if you come to visit her, please come alone for the first few times. Get her used to the fact that you're around first."

"I can visit in the morning?"

"Yes, Ms. Drake. You may visit as soon as visiting hours start."

"Thank you," Alex whispered down the phone.

"You're welcome. Have a good night."

With that, the other end clicked.

~(*)~

Molly woke up as the nurse touched her arm.

"Molly," she said quietly. "I'm just going to get your vitals, okay?"

Molly sighed and nodded, offering up her arm for the blood pressure cuff. She was already growing annoyed with being in the hospital, but what she was more annoyed with was the lack of the answers she seemed to be getting. How was her mother still alive? How the hell was she in...1987? 1987 was almost a decade before she was born! And more importantly, who were the other three with her mother? The young man with a slight Italian accent acted like he knew her. He was holding her hand. But she was certain she had never seen him in her life!

As the nurse bustled out, someone else walked in. Molly looked up to see her mother, giving her a small smile. What should she do? Obviously this woman was a construct of her mind. But what had happened to cause this? And why would she stick herself in a year where she hadn't even been born yet? It made no sense.

"Hi, Molls," her mother said softly.

Molly looked at her cautiously. Alex smiled softly and looked down. "It's a bit weird, isn't it? You're convinced I'm dead, and yet, here I stand before you."

"Obviously something's happened to me in the real world," she said superiorly.

Alex nodded. "Right in one."

"So where am I?"

"The line between living and dying."

"I don't understand."

"What's the last thing you remember from your world?"

Molly thought. This was difficult. She remembered vaguely a few notebooks and a boy. Ignoring them, she thought back to the last clear memory she had. "I went to visit your grave. I was drawing there. I hadn't left, I don't think."

"Do you know what you were drawing?"

"The same thing I always draw. You. I wanted to get back to you, but I didn't think it was possible."

Alex frowned. She was obviously speaking from the viewpoint of fifteen or earlier. Alex cringed, imagining the piece of work Molly had been at that age.

"The last age you remember yourself being?"

"Fourteen."

Alex smiled softly. "I think you're a bit older than that, sweetheart."

"How much older?"

"Three to four years."

"How could I just lose four years of my life by receding into my mind?"

"This isn't in your head. This is real."

Molly laughed. "This can't be real."

"Molls, you've already been here once."

Molly stopped laughing and stared at Alex. "What are you talking about?"

"When you were fifteen. You told me about it. You tried to kill yourself to get back to me."

Molly was horrified. She had been in this world before?

"So the people with you?"

"They know you."

"Who are they?"

"The boy is Tom, the girl Charlie."

"His girlfriend?"

"No. You were."

Molly just stared at Alex incredulously. "You're acting like I had a life here."

"You did. You ran away and lived with Tom, Charlie and a few other kids for a while. I was shot at work and you came back."

Molly shook her head. This didn't make any sense. How could she not remember this? "Who was the blonde man?"

"That's Gene," Alex said softly.

"Who's he?"

Alex looked away. "I live with him."

"You're joking, right?"

Alex shook her head. "Believe it or not, you approved it when you were here the last time."

"So how did you meet him?"

"He was my boss."

"Mum!"

"It took us over two and a half years to do anything, Molly. It's not like I came here and just decided to sleep with him."

"Ew!"

Alex merely sighed.

"What did you mean, was?" Molly asked finally.

"He was promoted to Super. He had to be. It was either that or be pensioned off. I moved to Scotland Yard to be a profiler. I work part time there now."

"Only part time?"

Alex looked away and Molly knew she was hiding something.

"What's going on, Mum?"

"Err... This may be hard to take, but you've a sister."

"What?" Molly shouted.

"Her name's Amelie."

Molly lay back in her bed processing the information. Her ribs hurt quite badly from sitting up.

"Jesus Christ," she whispered.

"I'm sorry, Molly. I didn't want to drop all of this on you..."

"No, dropping seems to be the only way to get anything in the world. Why wasn't she with you yesterday?"

"She's been staying for the week with her grandmother in Manchester. We were going Saturday to stay the weekend and pick her up."

"You're not going now?"

"I'm not. If they don't let you out..."

"They were talking about letting me out tomorrow. I've just got to make appointments with a psychologist until my memory returns."

Alex frowned at her. "Are you sure you'd be up to driving to Manchester?"

Molly shrugged. "Why not? They're all saying that I've got to deal with people to get my memory back."

Alex smiled. "Do you want me to ring Tom and the others to come visit? They may be able to help."

Molly considered it. "Yeah, I guess so."

Alex stood. "I'll go do that." Hesitating a moment she walked over to Molly's bed and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I did miss you, you know."

Molly sighed as her mother walked away trying to control her overwhelming thoughts. "I did too, Mum," she said softly. "I did too."

To those of you who noticed the time the phone rang, I'm sorry. I couldn't help it. *innocent smile*