Please Remember Me

Jon was left completely dumbfounded, alone and embarrassed. He tried talking to her, he tried to put himself out there but unfortunately, it didn’t work out as well as he had hoped. Cameron left him standing there by himself, more vulnerable than ever. She ran away from him. Again. He could feel his cheeks turn red with embarrassment as he looked up at the people standing in the busy hospital hallway. He shoved his hands in his pockets and look down at the ground, completely defeated. It was bad enough that this was happening, it was made worse just by knowing that everyone around knew exactly who he was.

What was he even doing? She clearly didn’t care to see him, so why did he even try? Why did he continue to torture himself?

Unaware of what just happened, Sharpie walked out of the room and walked up to Jon. “She looks good.” Patrick said referring to Cameron. “She looks like she’s in a good place.”

“Yeah.” Jon replied. He took a step closer to the nurse’s desk to get the attention of the young brunette sitting there. “Uh, excuse me.” He said.

She instantly looked up at him. “Hi!” she said.

“Hi. Uh. Can you tell me what time Dr. Lewis’s shift ends?”

“Um. I’m not really supposed to share that information.”

“Please?” Jon begged. “I’m not going to do anything crazy here.”

“Tazer.” Patrick said.

“Sharpie. I need to just talk to her. She’s driving me insane. She keeps me up at night just thinking about her. Even when I’m sleeping, I’m dreaming about her. She’s got my head spinning, man.”

“I get it, Tazer. But she’s at work right now. This isn’t the time or place.”

Jon shrugged his shoulders. “Fine.” He said.

“Abby’s waiting to sign the discharge papers for Maddy right now, you coming back to our place?”

Jon looked beyond Patrick, looking for any sign of Cameron. “No. I think I’m just going to go back home.”

Jon walked past Sharpie and back into the patient room. He grabbed Madelyn from Abby and held her. “Sorry you’re sick kiddo.” He said giving her a little kiss on the cheek.

“Jonathan, are you okay?” Abby asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” He said smiling down at Madelyn.

“Okay.” She smiled.

“Sorry about this, guys.” He said handing Madelyn back over to Abby.

“It’s fine Jon, better safe than sorry.”

“Yeah, thanks, Tazer.”

“See you, tomorrow Sharpie.” Jon said. “Bye, Abby.” He said giving her a kiss on the cheek.

He walked out of the room and headed towards the exit. There had to be a reason why he ran into Cameron. Especially after dreaming about her the night before. It had to be a sign. It was the only way to explain it. There was no way that it was just a simple coincidence. He pictured her small frame in those scrubs again. Her blonde hair fell in gorgeous locks just below her shoulders. She was just as beautiful to him now as she was back then.

____________________

Cameron let out a long sigh after looking at the clock. It was 10:30 and she had been at the hospital for almost 16 hours. Now that she had signed off on her final papers for the night and did one final check on her patients, she was ready to grab her stuff and go. She changed out of her lab coat and scrubs and into a pair of jeans and a loose fitting black sweater. She said goodnight to her nurses and then headed for the front door. She was exhausted and all she wanted was to go home to her bed. The day was more than she could handle emotionally and physically, she was spent. Ever since she had seen Jon she was all out of sorts. She had a hard time concentrating but she figured these problems were all curable with a glass of red wine.

Cameron made it out to the front lobby and was immediately stopped by the receptionist at the large front desk.

“Dr. Lewis!” she said.

Cameron stopped and walked towards her. “Yes?”

“There’s a man over there. He umm, he’s been waiting for you.” The receptionist said pointing to Jon who was sleeping on one of the chairs in the waiting area.

Cameron rolled her eyes. “Thanks.”

She marched over to Jon and stood in front of him. “Jon.” She said sternly. She shook his knee. “Jon, wake up.”

He stirred and shook his head. He let out a small yawn and looked up at her. He gave her a soft smile. “Cammie.” He said.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, cold.

“Waiting for you.” He reached over to the chair next to him and picked up a bouquet of pink roses. “I got these for you.”

“Why?” She asked, folding her arms and not accepting his gift.

“I want to talk, Cam.” He replied slumping back into the chair.

“And what if I don’t want to talk to you?”

“Well, some part of you must want too, otherwise you wouldn’t be standing here right now, would you?” He smiled at the frustrated look that came across her face. “Let me take you home?”

“No. I live like 2 blocks away, I don’t need a ride.”

“Then at least let me take you to go get a bite to eat or something. It’s late. You must be hungry.”

“Jon, I-“

“Cam, nothing fancy. Let’s please, just talk.”

She folded her arms across her chest and thought about it for a moment, weighing the options of what could possibly happen. If she didn’t give him a chance, then would he ever give her another chance again? If she didn’t go with him right now, would she ever see him again? Those were two things she was too scared to risk. But what if she did go with him? What would happen? Would it just prove to her that she was still completely in love with him? Would she become completely vulnerable to him once more?

“Jon. It’s been years. Why all of a sudden now?” she asked.

“Because, for all these years, Cameron, I haven’t been able to get you off my mind.” He said softly. “I never knew where to find you. There is no other woman in this city, in this world who gets me the way that you do. Seeing you, I -, I never knew what I would say, but seeing you today, it just made it all seem like it was now or never.”

She would never admit it to him, but she was melting with every word that came out of his mouth. The look of sadness mixed with desperation, mixed with hope, it killed her. She had never seen him this way.

“Okay fine.” She said, finally giving in.

Jon jumped up from the chair immediately. ”Really?” he asked.

“Don’t get too excited, I have no problem walking home right now.” She lied. She wasn’t going anywhere. “But, this is on my terms. I want a glass of wine. If this is what we’re doing, this whole ‘talking thing’ I need wine.”

Jon smiled and pulled on his back coat and put on his black toque. “Wine it is.”

“You still wear that?” Cameron asked as they walked out of the hospital. It was a hat that she had bought him years ago when she got so sick of the same old red one he used to wear everywhere. It made him stick out like a sore thumb.

“Every winter. It’s my favorite hat.” He said with a smile. He tried handing her the flowers again. This time she accepted.

Cameron walked out into the cold Chicago night and quickly pulled her scarf out of her purse. “It’s colder than I thought.” She said.

“Cold? This weather is wonderful!” Jon said.

“Okay Canadian boy.” She retorted. “So where should we we go?”

“You tell me.” He said. “This is your neck of the woods.”

“There’s a bar near my building. We’ll go there. Its just like 3 blocks away.” She said.

“Sounds good.” He replied as they navigated their way through a crowd.

He placed his hand on the small of her back. The touch radiated through her body. She missed his touch.

They walked silently down the street. He couldn’t help but to look over at her occasionally out of the corner of his eyes. She looked tired, but even through that, she looked as beautiful as ever. When they reached their destination, she stopped at the door and looked up at him.

“No expectations, okay? No assumptions, no expectations about tonight. Don’t push me, don’t rush me.” She said.

“Deal.” He said taking her warning to heart. He didn’t want to ruin this chance with her. He wouldn’t cross any lines. He opened the door for her and then followed behind her as she walked towards the corner of the bar. She pulled out the barstool and draped her jacket over the seat.

“Hey Chris, a glass of Merlot, please” she said to the bartender with a smile.

“You got it, Cam. And for you?” the bartender asked, completely taken off guard when he realized who the man was with one of his regulars.

“I’ll have the same.” Jon replied.

Cameron suddenly felt awkward. She started playing with her hair to give her self a bit of a distraction from the situation she found herself in. She could feel his eyes on her. A nervous energy filled the air.

“You okay?” Jon asked.

“Yeah. Just. I don’t know. I don’t know what to say.” Cameron replied.

The bartender set two glasses of wine down in front of them. Jon grabbed his immediately and raised it to her.

“Cheers.” He said.

She complied and touched her glass to his. Then took a long sip.

“Cameron, we don’t have to jump right in. Tell me what you’ve been up to. Tell me what’s been going on these past few years.” He suddenly seemed comfortable, relaxed even.

“I mean, I’ve practically been living in the hospital. After I finished school, I just started working and I haven’t stopped since.” She shrugged. “There’s not much else to it. I’m not off winning awards for my city or my country or anything.”

Jon smiled. “So you’re still watching the Hawks?”

“No.” she replied sternly. “It’s just hard to avoid the news when all anyone wants to talk about is the winning sports team. It’s hard to ignore parades blocking traffic downtown. It’s hard to ignore children who come into the emergency room wearing Toews jerseys. You’re everywhere, regardless of whether or not I want you there.”

He wasn’t expecting her to be that blunt. It stung a little, bruised his ego to hear someone who didn’t want him around. “Oh.” He replied, taking a drink of his wine. “That’s fair I guess.”

Cameron suddenly felt bad for what she had just said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. It was very hard for me, for a very long time to see anything remotely related to you, to hockey.” She said.

“I know how you feel.” He said.

“I didn’t want things to turn out the way they did for us, Jon. I really didn’t.” she took another sip and then rested her head in her hand. She was leaning on the bar, her body fully positioned towards him. She was finally opening up to him again.

“Believe me, Cammie. I didn’t either. But I don’t blame you for it either.”

“I do.” She said.

Jon reached over and lightly touched her arm. “Why? I was the greedy one. I put myself before you. Before our future family. I think about that all the time. I think about what we could have had. What a family would have been like, with you.”

She had no idea he felt this way. She didn’t expect the wave of emotion that was coming over her. She could feel tears fighting their way from her eyes. She fought hard to hold them back.

“Cammie, don’t” Jon said, warning her not to cry. He reached over and wrapped her up in his arms.

“Don’t cry. Why are you crying?”

She wrapped her arms around him too. “I just never thought this would happen.”

Jon let out a soft sigh. “I need you, Cam.” He whispered in her ear. He let go and wiped the tears away from her cheeks, delicately. She gave him a smile and reached for her wine, taking another sip.

“I’m scared.” She replied.

“Scared of what?” he said softly.

Suddenly a bar didn’t seem like the best place to be. Cameron was about to lose it, but she didn’t have anywhere else to go at this point.

“Scared of so many things. The feelings I have for you and that they’ll never go away. Scared that I wasted the past few years of my life without you and that I’ll never get them back. Scared that if I tell you what I really want to tell you right now, I’ll just wake up and it will all be a dream and it will all be over. But most of all, I’m scared of you walking out of this bar tonight and never seeing you again.”

“But you never lost me.”

“Yes I did, Jon. Not only did I lose you, I lost a child. Our child. You get lost in the game. You forget about everything and everyone else around you. It was probably better that way, I didn’t want to be a single mother, I would have been.” She said sharply.

Jon winced.

“And that’s the worst feeling in the world, feeling that you lost the one thing thing that you cared for so much, I had nothing but all the love in the world for you, but never felt the same in return. I can’t handle that feeling or that pain again, Jon.” She trembled.

Jon pulled her in close and could feel her whole body shake in fear.

“I never wanted to hurt you, Cammie. I don’t know how I could ever make it up to you. But I want to. I want to try. Please, just let me.” He said. His hands found their way through her hair and he leaned down to kiss her. He pressed his lips to her, praying that he could kiss away all the pain he caused.