30
Maggie slowly wheeled the boys around the edge of the playground for the second time, completely engrossed in her own thoughts. PJ Hasham. Detective Hasham, actually. Tall, blue eyed and with dark hair, if the boys were anything to go by. Friendly, liked a laugh and good at his job, according to Tom and Zoe.
Suppressing a scream, Maggie sighed. If this PJ was so perfect, such a good man, and if she had loved him so much – and he had loved her too, by all accounts – then why couldn't she remember him? What the hell was it that was stopping her from remembering what had to have been the most important person in her life?
It wasn't until she felt a hand on the handle of the pram that she stopped, instinct stepping in as she grabbed the hand and bent it back, protecting herself and her boys. A yelp of pain brought her to her senses, and she looked up to see Dan grimacing in pain.
"Dan, oh hell, Dan, I'm sorry!! I was miles away then. Are you all right?"
Dan gave a grin, flexing his hand. "Fine Mel. No real damage, but I wouldn't like to meet you on a dark night! "
Maggie smiled at him, her smile widening as he squatted down to say hello to the boys, shaking their hands and making them giggle as he then proceeded to tickle them.
"Haven't seen you for a few days, Mel, someone said you were ill? You look better now though." He said, straightening up and smiling at Maggie.
Maggie was silent for a moment, wanting to step back from it all, to take a break from the confusion that had been waging war in her head since Tom and Zoe had arrived three days ago. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit of a tummy bug, is all."
"Good – well not good that you've been ill, but good that you're better now, if you know what I mean." Dan said, before looking more closely at her. "Except that you're not better are you?"
"Hm?" Maggie looked up at him.
"You're not better. Don't take this the wrong way, but you look terrible."
"Thanks 'friend'" Maggie laughed, her smile falling away as Dan stayed quiet." Yeah, well, ok, so maybe I'm not brilliant, but I don't want to talk about it."
"Sure?" Dan prompted, as Joe began struggling in the pram, tired of sitting still. He wanted to get out of there, to go and play with his football on the grass with Tom. Dan looked down at them. "You let them out, and I'll go and get us some coffee" he said, and he was gone before Maggie had a chance to respond.
Ten minutes later, when he came back with two large coffees, the boys were running around happily in the fenced grassy area. Dan took a moment before sitting down, looking over at Maggie, seeing the way her shoulders were tight, her hands nervously picked at an imaginary thread on her jeans, and her eyes stared off into the distance.
"Mel?"
Maggie didn't reply, her old name no longer registering with her. It was funny, all of this, everything that was happening to her – she just knew it was true. She wasn't Mel Draper, widow of Rick, mother of Tom and Joe. She wasn't an office worker, living a quiet life in a sheltered suburb. No, she was someone else all together. She was Maggie Doyle. Ex policewoman, ex Mt Thomas, ex-lover of PJ Hasham. A whole other life, that still didn't feel real, but didn't feel wrong.
"Hey!" Dan nudged her gently, sitting down next to her and waving the coffee under her nose. "You look like you need to talk"
Maggie threw her head back, a tired laugh surprising Dan. "Talk? Talk? I've had enough of talking. It's all I've done for the past three days. Talk, listen, have my world turned upside down. I do not want to talk, believe you me!" she said, almost snatching the coffee from Dan, and flinching when the hot liquid hit the back of her throat.
"Mel?" Dan said, carefully putting his coffee down under the bench, before carefully reaching over and wrapping Maggie in a hug. "Shh, it'll be ok, whatever it is."
Maggie let herself be held for a few moments, before sitting up again. "That's the problem," she said softly. "That's the whole thing. It won't be all right. Or at least not all right like it used to be."
"Mel?"
"Maggie."
"What?" Dan asked, confused by now.
"My name's not Mel, it's Maggie. Maggie Doyle" Maggie said.
Back at the hotel, Tom stood by the window as Zoe sat on the bed behind him. Maggie wasn't the only one to have found the past three days draining, Tom was exhausted, mentally and physically. He'd hardly slept the night before, an idea having come to him in the middle of the night, and refusing to leave.
"Zoe?"
Smothering a yawn, Zoe looked over at Tom. "Mm?"
"What if she doesn't want to come home? What if it's all too much, and she decides to stay here, to keep going with the life she's built here?"
"She won't." Zoe said firmly.
"How do you know?" Tom said skeptically, "She's got everything set up here, a house, a good job, the boys are settled in – "
"PJ's not here."
"But she can't remember him, she can remember us, and if he's not important enough to remember, what – "
"Tom, listen to me. She needs to be wherever PJ is, and he needs to be with her. You saw them before all this, what they had – have – it's unbreakable. Once they see each other, and work through all of this, they'll be back together. And besides, this, all of this, it doesn't suit her, not Maggie. It suits Mel, but she's not Mel. She's Maggie, and I think that's beginning to set in."
"You really think so?" Tom said, hope sparking in his eyes as he came over to sit next to Zoe.
"I really think so, Boss" Zoe said, wrapping an arm around Tom and giving him a brief hug. "Now, I seem to remember a certain shop that rather caught your eye yesterday, something about extra large Vanilla Slices in the front window?"
"Wow. That's – well, that's a lot to take in." Dan said, leaning back against the bench, watching the twins chase each other around.
"You're telling me!" Maggie said, a small smile gracing her lips. "The thing is, I don't know what to do now."
Dan glanced over at her. "You don't?"
"I – the , Dan, the boys are settled here, I've got a good job here, my life is here. All this, everything Tom and Zoe have told me, it's all in the past – "
"Except it's not, is it? You're having to work really hard to convince yourself, but it's not working. You want to go back, to – you want this PJ."
"But I don't remember him. How can I feel like this if I can't remember him?" Maggie bit back a tear.
"Feel like what?" Dan said gently.
"Like he's the one person who can answer everything? Like everything's wrong without him, like – "
"Mummy?" Joe's tiny voice silenced her. "Mummy crying? Hug?" he said, reaching out over the fence, wrapping his small arms around her in an effort to make her feel better, while Tom, having watched his brother's gesture, leant over the fence as well, gently patting Maggie's head. Joe drew back from Maggie, and when she smiled back at her sons, the lure of their football was eventually too strong, and Maggie and Dan were left smiling at them from the bench.
"You need to get this sorted out. You need to go and see this PJ, because until you talk to him, until you actually see the man, you're never going to know for sure how you feel. Mel – sorry, Maggie, you and this PJ, you obviously had something strong – either that or something really volatile, otherwise you wouldn't be blocking it out so much" Dan said with a smile. "And judging by your indignant expression, I'd go with the first one. I reckon you were nuts about the guy, and he loved you just as much – and you're scared it won't be the same when you meet up with him."
Maggie paled slightly, Dan's words ringing true in her heart.
"Mags, you have to go and see – "
"Don't call me Mags, no-one calls me Mags except PJ" Maggie snapped, before gasping in surprise. "Mags, he – Dan, PJ calls me Mags" and a radiant smile found it's way across her face, but you would have to have blinked to have seen it. She ran a hand through her hair with a sigh, leaning back against the bench. "I – Dan, out of all of them, Peej is the one I can remember the least, and that scares the hell out of me. Surely he should be the one I remember the most?"
"Maybe," Dan said, "But you not remembering isn't a bad thing. If it was me, I'd lean more towards the idea that what you had with him was so special, so strong that, like I said before, you're scared of remembering it and it not being as good as you'd thought, so you've blocked it out."
Maggie let his words sink in, before opening one eye and squinted up at him, the sunlight bright in her eyes. "I'm going to have to see him, aren't I?"