Love Across Time

COPYRIGHT

LOVE ACROSS TIME

Copyright 2012 by B. J. McMinn

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead is coincidental.

All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without prior written permission from the author.

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HISTORICAL NOTE

Menzies Castle, built in 1571, stands four miles west of Weem, Scotland. History records that Bonny Prince Charles Stuart rested two days at the castle in 1746 before the Battle of Culloden. Four days later, the Duke of Cumberland’s forces occupied the castle, but there is no record that the Duke had joined his troops.

Jolted awake, Maggie’s eyes snapped open. Her heart hammered in her chest so hard her ribs ached. Deep gasps escaped through her clenched teeth. Panting, she convinced herself that the visions in the nightmare were just that: visions. The reassuring thought slowed her pounding heart. Trembling hands lifted the edge of the white pristine sheet to dab at the moisture beaded on her forehead and the dampness between her breasts.

A sigh of relief wormed its way past her constricted throat as she scanned the familiar room. The glass window
not a narrow slit in rough-hewed rock
allowed the morning sun to sprinkle light across the gray tiled floor of the Crosland Physical Therapy Center. Dust motes danced in the air. Their sway kept beat to the rhythm of the shifting breeze created by the overhead fan.

Directly in her line of vision, a large, closet door
not pegs hammered into a soot-covered wallstood as a sentry to guard her only possessions
tucked away on the top shelf. Behind the mahogany wood, folded into a neat square, lay the tattered nightgown she’d worn the night someone found her on the edge of the freeway. A brooch, with its strangely intertwined design, and a silver ring snuggled into the gowns soft, gossamer folds. Anchors in a world she didn’t recognize.

A puzzling reminder of who she was.

Her eyes burned with unshed tears. She squeezed them shut against the helplessness that engulfed her. Fists clinched the bedcovers. Why? Why had she been out alone at night on the streets of Tulsa, Oklahoma? No ID, no money, but most of all, no memory, except for a name: Margaret
Maggie to her new friends.

Agitated, she supported her pinned broken leg, and swung her legs over the side of the bed. The tiled floor felt cold beneath her bare feet. Fingers brushed back waist-length hair from her face to touch the scar that ran from the side of her left brow to her hairline. She had no recollection of how she’d received the hideous, puckered scar or her numerous other injuries.

Doctors had no explanation other than she’d either fallen off the overpass where she’d been found, or involved in a hit-and-run accident.

Shudders rippled down her back in unrelenting waves. The memory of waking in the unfamiliar surroundings of a hospital emergency room still had the power to bring chills to her soul. It had taken six hours of surgery to repair her broken leg and internal injuries. The doctors hadn’t expected her to live. Without their excellent medical care and the most up-to-date equipment, her chances of survival would have been zilch.

When doctors realized she suffered from amnesia, they had contacted the local media to help locate her family. The name “Margaret” and her picture plastered on several television channels had produced no results. She remained a stranger to herself and to others.

Time ticked away as she sat on the edge of the bed, stared out the window and relived the last seven weeks. First, she’d awakened to the most horrific pain. The realization that she didn’t know what had happened, where she lived, and failed to identify the simplest things in her environment had sent a bone-deep, numbing fear coursing through her. The hardest to endure had been the complete absence of memories. Nothing, as if someone had cast her into a cosmic void with no way to return to a life she recognized.

She tugged at the twisted sheets that draped half off the bed. The pillow tangled in the mess plopped to the floor. Caught in the throes of a nightmare, she had apparently kicked off the blankets that had covered her. This wasn’t the first time such a vivid nightmare had awakened her. Other nights, the strong scent of flowers filled her senses as she’d had hot, feverish dreams of a man’s hands skimming over her flesh. Warm tender kisses tantalized her breasts until they swelled and grew taut under his eager mouth. His tongue lathed her peaked crests. Even now, the memory caused her flesh to quiver and her heart to pound in anticipation. Her phantom lover had no image, just a disembodied specter of hard muscle: a tender lover with the knowledge of how to make her crave his touch.

Perplexed, she massaged her temples to relieve the aftereffects of the strange dream. Had the stories Mrs. Bixby, another patient down the hall, read to her about Scottish history invaded her dreams to the extent she dreamed of old castles and Highland lovers?

Her hands clenched the wet hospital gown that clung to her damp flesh. Her palms grew moist. She glanced down where her fist scrunched the soft material and in a fit of self-pity, yanked it off. Crutches braced under her arms, she hobbled to the bathroom. Girding herself with self-reliance, she refused to wait for a nurse’s help. Seated on a shower stool, she turned on the water and adjusted the temperature.

Her gaze ran the length of her naked, damaged body. The doctor said her leg would heal and not leave her with a limp. The scar across her abdomen
required to repair internal injuries
glared pink against her fair skin, but faded more each day.

Finished with her shower, she swerved the stool toward the edge of the tub and heaved herself to her feet. The gurgle of draining water filled the room while she patted herself dry then donned a fresh gown. She braced herself against the vanity, wiped fog from the mirror with a towel, and inspected her image.

Who was she?

Eyes that Abby, her nurse and oldest-newest friend, said reminded her of blue-lilac periwinkles stared back. Light-brown eyebrows arched above thick eyelashes. Her full mouth, with a pouty lower lip, set above a dimpled chin. Not a memorable face, but not an unpleasant one, either. So, why had no one come forward to identify her?

Seated on the toilet seat lid, she slid a comb smoothly through her hair then draped it forward over her shoulder to braid. Deft fingers separated the soft tresses into three sections then wove it into a thick braid. Thoughts of cutting the strands to a more manageable length had teased her mind, but she couldn’t bring herself to part with the golden mass. She tied a ribbon at the end and flung the wrist-thick rope to hang down her back.

A rap on the bathroom door jarred her fragile nerves.

“Breakfast.”

“Thank you. I will be there in a moment. Please leave it on the table.” Although she retained a slight accent, the words were slow, clean, precise. Her spirits lifted; proud the hours spent each day with a therapist had shed the speech impediment that had inflicted her when she’d first regained consciousness.

The aroma of coffee and bacon seeped under the door and her stomach growled in anticipation. The bathroom door clicked shut behind her as she hobbled into her room.

Using the remote, she clicked on the television to watch while she ate. With her memory wiped clean, her mind performed like a sponge and absorbed every bit of information available. The television proved an invaluable source of knowledge. By mimicking the people’s speech, it also helped her overcome her difficulty in speaking.

She sipped coffee while she waited for Abby. The lively nurse came each morning to check her vitals. Abby’s visits never failed to lighten her sagging spirits.

Several years separated them in age, yet she and the nurse had an instant rapport. In her early twenties, Abby talked nonstop about her overprotective friends, Travis and his brother Colin. Raised in the same neighborhood, Abby told her of the mischief she and the two men had gotten into as children, pulling one prank after another. The daredevil tales kept her laughing from the moment Abby came into the room until she left to continue her rounds.

The tread of soft-soled shoes paused outside the door. After one last sip of the strong, bitter coffee that she couldn’t quite adapt to, she set the nearly full cup aside. Abby breezed into the room wearing a Betty Boop scrub. She wore her shoulder-length, auburn hair clipped at the nape of her neck.

“How are you today, Mags?”

She suppressed a giggle. Only Abby called her Mags.

“Fine.”

“Good. You have an appointment with the physical therapist this afternoon. He’ll have you off those crutches and back on your feet in no time.” Abby wrapped the blood pressure cuff around Maggie’s arm, pumped the bulb, and placed the stethoscope to her inner arm pulse.

“Wait until you see him. He’s a hunk.” Abby’s innocent expression didn’t fool Maggie.

“I really wish you would give up the idea that I need a man in my life. I might have a husband and babies out there somewhere.” She nodded toward the window at the city beyond.

“Babies?” Abby choked on her abrupt laugh, and she had to start the blood pressure pump procedure over. “You mean those little wiggly life forms that perpetuate a person’s continuation on earth?”

Her new friend had a strange way of expressing herself, and Maggie had to sift through her words several times before she understood their meaning.

“Yes, those babies.”

“You aren’t old enough to be married, let alone have kids.”

“I must be at least eighteen. That’s old enough to be married.”

Old enough to make love
if her dreams were true. Or were they the fantasies of a young adolescent on the verge of discovering her own sexuality? Illusions of a heart that desperately wanted something that was lacking in her life: Love.

“Then why hasn’t he reported you missing? Good grief, it’s been nearly two months. If someone loved you enough to have babies with you, he’d have come forward by now.” Abby released the cuff on her arm and made a notation on the chart.

Tears welled in Maggie’s eyes, but she refused to let them fall. Abby hadn’t meant her words to be cruel, but the sickening feeling that had been her constant companion since she woke in a strange world threatened to overwhelm her. She felt lost, empty, confused. She lacked the functioning skills doctors said were not usually absent in amnesia patients: the ability to read well, write legible, knowledge of how the world operated. The nurse at his side had laughed and said her memory card
whatever that was
had been wiped clean.

Abby glanced up and gave her a sad look of remorse. “I’m sorry. That was thoughtless. I love you. That’s all that matters.” Abby patted her hand. “Don’t worry, whoever is out there will find you. You have your whole life ahead of you.” She slipped her arm around Maggie’s shoulders and squeezed.

“Hey, how about I break you out of this place in a few days. You, Travis, Colin, and I will do the town: supper, movie, dancing. The works.” Abby rolled up the cuff and hose and replaced them in the medical cart. Her green gaze flicked back to Maggie. “What do you say?”

Crutch held in the air, Maggie teased, “Dancing?”

“Okay, forget the dancing. I’ll get the boys, and we’ll kidnap you for a day or two while I’m on vacation. I leave tomorrow and won’t be back for two glorious weeks.”

“Who knows, Abby, by the time you return someone may have claimed me, and I’ll be gone.” At her hollow, emotionless laugh, Abby rubbed her back.

“I hope so, kiddo. For your sake, I hope so.”

After Abby left, the room fell quite. Silence disturbed her. She grew restless easily with nothing to fill the void in her mind. No fun filled events in her childhood competed for first place as the most humorous. Nor did she remember her first dance, her first kiss, her first love. A mournful sigh escaped her. Abby shared her memories with Maggie but it wasn’t the same. Her memories of family and loved ones lay scattered somewhere on a deserted street in Tulsa, never to fill the blank pages of her life again.