Page 19 of Married By Midnight
“The barn?” Ian croaked.
“Yes,” Sarah responded calmly. “Everyone who stays, stays in the barn.”
“What about this?” he waved his hand around the room.
“This is my sister’s room, and I need to restore it to how it was before you arrived.”
Ian turned and looked out the window. It was plain he wasn’t wanted. For some reason he felt crushed. She didn’t know him, so he understood why she wouldn’t feel comfortable with a stranger in the house. Thoughts raced through his mind of another time he was told to leave.
Images of a large brick and wooden building with a front yard that was more mud than dry dirt came forward. Of a woman in her late forties with light colored hair. She was talking to him, but he couldn’t hear her. He could tell the urgency as she moved her arms while talking.
“Ma,” he whispered under his breath. His own Ma kicked him out.
Ian’s mother was replaced by another figure. A man in a darkened room. This man was younger than Ian. How he knew that, Ian couldn’t tell. He couldn’t see the man’s face; only his back.
The man had dark hair and was tall. The shirt he was wearing hung in tatters against a back crossed with whip marks. The man slowly turned around to look at Ian. Ian saw the man reach for him. He closed his eyes as hard as he could and willed the image away.
“Ian.” He couldn’t respond. “Ian!”
Ian opened his eyes. He wasn’t anywhere near that brick building or near that man. He gulped several times. “Sarah?” She was standing over him with a concerned look on her face.
“Where did you go?”
Ian shook the memories off. “I remembered something.”
“You did?” Sarah looked excited. “The doctor just left but let me run and get him.”
“N - no,” he croaked. “Don’t bother him. It wasn’t anything.”
“How can I help you?” Ian debated on bothering her since she was already put out by him staying in the house. “I can’t do anything if I don’t know what you need.”
Ian swallowed. He looked at Sarah, her brown eyes softening. “Will you sit with me for a bit?”
That wasn’t what Sarah expected to hear. She had been doing everything in her power to avoid spending time with the handsome stranger. Even Dell was getting restless having to stay at the main house so much.
She couldn’t tell Dell that every time she was around Ian her palms perspired and any reasonable conversation went out the window. It was almost as if she had one personality – that of a shrew.
When the doctor told her that Ian was suffering from amnesia related to hitting his head, Sarah didn’t know what to think. Her first thought was that it was some sort of scam, meant to loosen her defenses. Why he could rob her blind!
Sarah scoffed. She didn’t have anything worth stealing. She was no closer to gaining the money to pay the taxes than Ian was to remembering his past.
The doctor said that Ian would most likely remember random information but wouldn’t be able to recall specific events or places until his memory returned.
Sarah looked at the man lying on the bed. Now that he had cleaned up, Sarah could really see how handsome he was. His soft green eyes followed her around the room as she approached the chair next to the bed.
“I can sit for a bit. I’ll need to get supper started shortly.”
“Where did Mr. Dell go?”
“He headed to the barn. Dusty and Jesse need to move the cows to a new grazing area.”
“You have cows?”
“Just a few milking ones. You would think I’d be better at milking than I am.”
“I don’t know anything about cows.”
“Maybe you do, and you don’t remember.”
