Chapter 11
Chapter 11
Harold sat on the end of his daughter's bed and began to pack away her memories.
It felt as if he was laying his only daughter to rest as he began to pack away anything that would make her remember, or cause her confusion.
He had amounted a small pile of stuff beside him that was from her time in the military. Everything else had been placed into boxes and put away in the garage.
Reaching out, Harold picked up her dog tags and ran the pad of his thumb over her name stamped into the metal.
REYNOLDS, JULIA.
Harold's eyes began to tear up, not for the first time, as he slowly lowered her dog tags into an army tin he had saved from his old days.
When his daughter had first enlisted, he had imagined this scene over and over in his head. Getting the knock at the door, not being able to step foot into her room before one day having to begin going through her things.
He thought about all the parents before him who had done it that won't be seeing their children again, but Harold would.
He wasn't packing away her things because she had died, he was doing it because she could never remember being in the Marines.
He was getting his daughter back, that's what he had to remember.
The next thing to join the pile were a bunch of letters, tied with a ribbon. It reminded him of something you would see in the movies. He did not read them, they were private, but he was fairly certain he knew who she had been writing to.
Harold thought about Marcus. He had been flown back to Afghanistan for the last few weeks of his tour, bearing the bad news that his fiancé would not be returning.
That was another thing which had been stolen from him, Harold realised, he would never have Marc for a son-in-law and he wouldn't get to walk his daughter down the aisle.
More things joined the pile, an empty shell casing from her training days, photographs, reports, post cards.
The list seemed to be never ending but soon he was met with an empty bed and a tin filled with cherished memories which had been so easily stolen by a man with an RPG.
Harold had caught up with Marc the next day and asked for the details. He needed to know how his daughter had come to be where she was.
She had been trying to stop a terrorist. His daughter, Harold chuckled, trying to stop a terrorist.
It almost didn't bear thinking about but he was prouder of her than he could ever be, but he would never be able to tell her that.
Closing the lid down on the tin, Harold simply remained there and remembered the time he had driven his daughter to the enlisting office.
Downstairs, Katherine hovered over the bin in the kitchen.
Her foot was pressed down on the pedal lifting up the bin lid, her clasped hand was stretched over the bin, but she froze.
Just open your fingers, Katherine. She told herself, Open your fingers and it will all be over.
She stood there for another five minutes, willing herself to do it, but she couldn't.
She could have stood there for a year and she still wouldn't be able to do it.
Stepping back, the lid to the bin crashed shut, and she lifted her hand up to her face. Peeling her fingers back, Katherine stared at the ring resting innocently in her palm.
Silver with a square-cut diamond, it was beautiful and it was her daughter's. Every mother thinks about when their child will get engaged and hers has, but she could no longer remember the groom.
Katherine remembered when she had gotten the letter from her daughter; the first in a long while.
She still had it in her desk drawer, telling her that she had become engaged to Marcus, and that she was signing up for another tour.
Marcus was already taking her daughter away from in one aspect, and then he wanted to take her away again, to put her in harm's way again.
This ring, before it was Julia's, it was Marcus's. So Katherine would take it from him.
She might not be able to take much, and he may never know it was her, but she would know and that was all that mattered.
Slipping the ring into her trouser pocket, Katherine carried on packing the boxes away into the garage before they had to leave to collect their daughter.
* * *
The man walked into the hospital in London with an air of authority that preceded him.
His hair, once a lustrous dark colour, had begun to sprout grey hairs. It would not be long before his youth had escaped him completely, but he had something now that he never had in his youth; power.
It was what made him walk with shoulders back and head high.
Crossing the lobby of the hospital, he walked straight into an open elevator and pressed the button for the floor where Doctor Barter's office presided.
Dressed in his military suit, which his presumed he lived in, the man stepped from the elevator and progressed through the corridors, remembering the way from the map.
As always people gazed as he walked past, fascinated by the suit he wore and the medals on his breast pocket.
He had gotten used to the looks over the years, revelled in them in fact, so that when he reached Dr Barter's office and knocked on the door he didn't bat an eyelid when the Doctor fumbled for words for a moment.
"May- May I help you, sir?" Barter flustered.
"Yes," The man stepped into the office, removing his cap, "What is the diagnosis for Sergeant Reynolds?"
Dr Barter, now collecting himself, shut the door and walked back around his desk, "And may I ask who you are?"
"Sergeant Reynolds's CO," The man offered his ID and the Doctor seemed satisfied, pointing to the chair behind him to take a seat.
He took the Doctor's offer.
"How is she?" The man applied some emotion to his voice.
Doctor Barter explained her situation, "She is stable for the moment."
"Is the memory loss permanent?" The man asked, running a hand through his hair, as he awaited the news.
The doctor's response was welcoming, "I fear so, yes."
"How long will she have to remain here?" He asked.
"Well, actually, we have good news there. She is stable enough so we are allowing her home today. Her parents are here as we speak."
The man in the suit nodded and rose to his feet, "Thank you for your cooperation." He shook the doctor's hand and left with all the particulars in her case.
Progressing through the corridors towards his next stop, General Ridgeway cursed to himself.
Sergeant Reynolds was leaving the hospital as we speak.
Ridgeway strode through the hallways before locating the room which was hers and peering inside.
To his relief she was still there, packing away her clothes with, who he presumed were, her parents.
Locating the exit sign at the end of the corridor, General Ridgeway stood and waited.
He had read the preliminary doctors notes but he had never heard of such a case of memory loss in his entire career.
He was here to protect his investment.
He had to make sure she did not remember anything about her time in his Special Task Force and there was only one way to make sure she didn't.
General Ridgeway did not have to wait long before he spotted her door open, and the injured but not beaten, Sergeant Reynolds emerge.
He must admit that she did seem less herself, but being blown up could do that to a person.
Biding his time, the General reached out and picked something up off the wall, peeling it open slowly.
When they were close enough, he walked over.
"Hey!" A fatherly voice shouted.
"Oh, excuse me," The General made a show of being lost as he held out the map to the Sergeant, "I'm sorry, you wouldn't happen to know where the reception is, would you?"
Julia lifted her eyes and stared straight into General Ridgeway's eyes, "No, I'm sorry."
"If you ask a nurse I'm sure they'll be happy to help you," Julia's mother touched her daughter's shoulder protectively, ushering her away.
"No worries, thank you!" He called after them, watching them leave, his curiosity satisfied.
Sergeant Reynolds had looked directly at him and not flinched.
And for the woman who blames him for killing two of her friends, that was either superb acting or she had truly lost her memory.
Walking in the opposite direction, Ridgeway dumped the hospital leaflet into the bin and exited the hospital.
Pulling out his mobile phone, he dialled a number and waited for the other end to be picked up.
"Yes?" A calm, collected voice answered.
"We're safe. She doesn't remember anything." Ridgeway crossed the road.
"Good. We're almost finished here."
"I'll be right there," General Ridgeway ended the call and slipped into the back seat of the car which was waiting for him.
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