Chapter Text
My head lay on his pillow wishing it were his chest instead. Tears streamed ceaselessly down my face as my heart broke further. Jamie had been gone for less than a day and already I could feel myself slowly giving in to death.
“Why did you leave before me, Jamie? Oh, God! How I miss you. I can still see you and feel you, but you’re not here. Why, why, wh—y?” My voice cracked as I screamed at the empty room.
The door creaked open and I jumped up ready to slam into Jamie, only Brianna walked in. Our beautiful Brianna, the spit of her father. Shuddering sobs coursed through me as my only living child embraced me.
“Mama, come downstairs.” Bree begged.
I shook my head. I couldn’t. I couldn’t bear to be in this house and I couldn’t bear to leave it. Reaching out I stroked Jamie’s side of the bed, longing for his strong, calming form to be there, only to be met with the fading warmth of my own body heat.
With tear-filled eyes I looked into her blue eyes—her father’s blue eyes— the eyes I loved so much. “I can’t. I need him. I can’t…”
“I know Mama, I know.” She gently stroked my back, as I had done for her many times before. “Please don’t give up, Mama. Jem, Mandy, Roger, Ian we all need you. I need you.” Seeing Bree cry only increased my tears and guilt. I was ready to leave it all, and I had people that need me, relied on me waiting just down the stairs.
“Can we just lay here for a little while before going down? I don’t think I’m ready to face everyone just yet.”
“Of course, Mama.” Bree said as she rubbed my back and guided us down to the bed.
Bree pulled me up against her and continued to stroke my back. Cuddled into my daughter I allowed myself to grieve and begin to relax.
“Darling,” Grabbing her beautiful face in my hands I whispered my plea. “If something happens to me, take the kids and run. Go back to the twentieth century.”
“I can’t do that, Mama. My family is here. Roger and I have no one back there, everything and everyone we love is under this roof tonight.”
I scoffed and held her tighter. “I love you, Brianna Ellen.”
“I love you too, Mama.”
I must have fallen asleep for when I woke everything was different, the heat was stifling, and the sun was brighter than I had expected, it had to be midday instead of the early morning sun I last recalled. I looked around and found Uncle Lamb was a good three feet deeper into the ground and excitedly dancing and tossing his hat into the air.
Odd… I could have sworn he…no, no this hasn’t happened before.
“Claire! Claire my dear, you have to see what we found!”
“We?” I whispered. My eyebrows scrunched in confusion. We? We found? Who…? A
man with dark hair and a severe face came to mind, but I don’t recall where I could have seen this man before. Shaking my head, clearing my thoughts, and dismissing the severe scowl from my mind.
“Darling, meet historian Frank Randall. He’s come all this way to listen to me prattle about the dig site.”
The man beside him laughed drawing my attention to him. Dear God, it was him. No. No, no no. The fear and surprise must have been evident on my face for Uncle Lamb was out of the hole and by my side in an instant.
“Claire, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing, I—I think the heat must be getting to me.”
“Ah, well only a few more weeks until we’re back in England and on to Ireland! Why don’t you head back to the campsites, get some fresh water and rest? I’ll show you the discovery in the morning!” Uncle Lamb did an excited jig as he patted my arm and jumped back into the pit, admiring his find.
“Shall I escort you back, madam?”
“No!” I said throwing my hands out to halt Mr. Randall’s advance. “I mean, no thank-you. I’ll be quite alright on my own. Good day, Mr. Randall.”
“Frank, please call me Frank.”
I nodded and made my way back to the caravan of tents.
Who was Frank Randall? Why does he send shivers down mine spine, not in a good way either? Whomever he is, I will not allow myself to become too close to him, something doesn’t feel….right.
The following morning after Uncle Lamb showed me his most recent discovery we sat atop a ruin enjoying the simplicity of each others company. Something in me made me antsy, I felt as though something were missing and I couldn’t yet touch on it.
“Mr. Randall asked a bit about you after you’d gone in for the evening.” Uncle Lamb casually remarked while polishing a newfound artifact.
“Mmm, what did he want?” I said, feigning interest, watching as Uncle Lamb’s hands methodically circled the artifact with the scrap of cloth.
“He asked for your hand…”
I turned to look at my uncle’s face, horror-stricken at such a notion.
Laughing, Uncle Lamb held up his hands, “No, no, I didn’t mean that way. He wanted to escort you on a walk or activity of some sort and he was asking my permission. Decent chap, asking for my permission, but I said to him, ‘Frank, if it’s Claire’s hand and company you seek, you’ll have to ask her yourself.’ He wasn’t too happy with the answer but I trust you enough to decide your own fate.”
Sighing, I slumped onto my back throwing my arm over my eyes, thankful that I didn’t have to make false pleasantries with the historian.
“Something about him doesn’t sit right with you does it?”
I shook my head grunting out, “No. There’s something I can’t quite figure out, but it’s as if I’ve known him before…I don’t trust him.”
“Well if that’s the case, don’t accept him when he meets us here shortly!”
“What?” I sat up, blinking against the harsh sun, frantically searching for the man of dread to arrive. “You didn’t!”
“I couldn’t very well stop him. Just turn him down gently, he doesn’t seem the type to take rejection too well.”
Sure enough, a brief ten minutes later the looming form of Frank Randall stood before me.
“Ah, Miss Beauchamp, I—I—uh,” he stuttered and wrung the bill of his hat through his hands nervously. “I was wondering if I may see you tonight?”
The sentence came out all in one breath, as though it were a single word. “I’m sorry?”
“Will you do me the honor of accompanying me on a walk followed by dinner, this evening?”
“Oh!” I looked down, hoping he’d take it for being demure instead of trying to figure out the easiest way to turn him down. He was rather adorable, stuttering and nervous with his seemingly innocent proposal, but still something deep within me told me to stay away form him. “I’m sorry Mr. Randall, but I must decline.”
He was so crestfallen that it gave me a moment’s pause. In a foolish act I placed my hand on his arm. “Please don’t think you’ve done anything wrong, it’s just—”
“It’s just you don’t wish to accompany me, is it?” He cut me off sighing and shaking his head. He patted my hand before pulling away, replacing the brown hat to his head. “I’m sorry for having distressed you in my proposal. Good day.”
“Will you have tea with us?” I stupidly blurted out.
“What?” He looked surprised, and I’m sure I had an equally surprised look upon my own face.
“Will you join my uncle and I for tea. I’m sorry to say I do not wish to accompany you this evening, but there’s no reason the three of us cannot sit and enjoy one another’s company while discussing the marvelous finds of history.”
He smiled, and for once his face looked less severe, and almost handsome. I did hope he would find a woman suitable for himself, I knew I could never be such a woman.
Frank and I kept contact through the years. Every so often he would join Uncle Lamb and I on a dig. He had gone on to become a history professor at Oxford and any of the information Uncle Lamb and I could pass on was that much more he could impress his superiors and tickle the fancy of his students with. The day I decided to go to medical school, he wrote me a letter wishing me luck; this would have been sweet had it not been that he had sealed a second letter in with my on accident. A letter addressed to my uncle stating how he could not believe he would allow such a thing to pass. That school especial school of medicine were no places for a woman.
The anger that coursed through me reading this was enough to burn the building down. How dare he! Who does the righteous Professor Randall think he is?
Ripping up his letter of congratulations up and throwing them into the flames, I kept the one doubting my capabilities and vowed never to speak to Frank Randall again.
Halfway through medical school, the war broke out. Uncle Lamb understood when I volunteered to go on the front lines as a combat nurse, he never once tried to stop me. I wish I could have been there for him to stop him from lecturing that day during the Blitz. The other nurses and I bonded in the muck of blood, feces and grime.
For six long years we triumphed alongside one another over the horrifying battle wounds: lacerations, missing limbs, amputations that had to be done, and the stomach dropping moment of losing a patient. Finally the war was over. Even over, that did not stop the flashbacks of the violence we had seen. Janet had decided that we should all go on holiday together. The place she chose was quite an odd choice, I believed but loved that she did choose the Scottish Highlands. Something about those mountains gave me a sense of peace, at a time such as we had just left, peace was exactly what we needed.
Walking the streets of Inverness had reminded me of the last time I had been here with Uncle Lamb and Frank. I wondered if the Reverend Wakefield still lived nearby? His housekeeper’s stories were delightful and I could use a laugh. Scotland brought me peace while awake, asleep was another matter entirely.
My sleep became steadily more restless each night we spent here. Visions, dreams, and nightmares of a handsome man with eyes like the ocean and fiery red hair. I awoke each night in a cold sweat or with tears streaming down my cheeks, as my heart ached for this man. The situations my subconscious had devised were unfathomable. Terrible things no one should ever endure and love so deep it radiated off of his very being.
Something was niggling at the back of mind. A name, it held meaning, but I could not place it. Why couldn’t I place it or even form the name? As I made my way up the high street I continued to try to solve this puzzle. The inclination started any time I pondered on that redheaded man, who—Fraser.
I gripped the first thing that I came into contact with; A stone pillar in middle of the square.
Jamie Fraser.
The man’s name was Jamie. Warmth filled my chest at the recognition, but why?
I gripped my chest with my right hand, an invisible weight seemed to rest upon it. Oh, dear God, Jamie, please who are you to me?