Based on the song: "Austin" by Blake Shellton

A/N: So I have like 2 days until V-Day and I'm so stuck that I'm listening to country music, and then this song comes on.... now I'm sure y'all people who read most my stuff read 'Another Night'... well this is sorta different... for one thing it AIN'T Leeki... *gasp from the readers*. It's Jurato.. my other obsession. It's also different because.. I KNOW I don't own this song, okay.... but I changed some lyrics... yeah I know the whole point of the song is he's calling her Austin because that's where he believes she moved but... *inserts Jeri in there*. *cuts the rest of this Author's Note short because it was about as big as Tai's hair* But to finish this up.. this is like ... *counts*.... 8 years in the future or so.

~~

A twenty-one year old Jeri Katou slumped down on her couch, and stared at her phone. Hundreds of thoughts had strolled through her mind that day during work, and as she had eaten dinner that night, but now only one crossed through, and seemed to stick there, no matter how much she tried to rid herself of it. But, watching the phone out of the corner of her eye, she finally grabbed it, along with the address book she kept all the tamer's phone numbers in. She flipped through all the numbers, names not really in alphabetical order, just thrown in whenever she found out the whereabouts of everybody.

Henry Wong

Rika [DEL: Nonaka :DEL] Wong

Suzy Wong

Her finger ran down the page of names, soon coming to a name written in pink ink, smudged from an angry rage when she left him a year before.

Takato Matsuki

She took a deep breath, and dialed the number.

~ She left without leaving a number, said she needed to clear her mind. He figured she went back to Austin, cuz she talked about it all the time.

It was almost a year before she called him up, three rings and an answering machine is what she got... ~

"If you're calling bout the car, I sold it. If this is Tuesday night, I'm bowling. If you've got something to sell, you're waisting your time, I'm not buyin'. If it's anybody else, wait for the tone, you know what to do. And PS, if this is Jeri, I still love you."

Jeri's eyes grew wide, as she tried to not drop the phone, but to no avail as she had been pacing around the house with the cordless phone, and stopped dead in the kitchen. The phone fell with a crash to the hard marble counter.

~ The telephone fell to the counter, she heard but she couldn't believe.

What kind of man would hang on that long? What kind of love that must be...

She waited three days, and then she tried again.

She didn't know what she'd say, but she heard three rings and then.. ~

"If it's Friday night, I'm at the ballgame. And first thing Saturday if it don't rain, I'm headin' down to the lake and I won't be home, all weekend long. But I'll call you back, when I get home, on Sunday afternoon. And PS, if this is Jeri, I still love you."

A flash went through Jeri's mind as the new message played. The same ending. He still held on to that love she let go the year before. How could he still love her? As the beep followed, she took a deep breath and said a few simple numbers, and hung up.

~ This time she left her number, but not another word, and she waiting by the phone on Sunday evenin' and this is what he heard.... ~

The phone rang that Sunday evening, and Jeri's heart went into her throat, she closed her eyes, picked up the phone, and in a strong voice, recited the lines she had gone over in her mind over and over.

"If you're callin' 'bout my heart, it's still yours, I shouldn't send to it a little more, and it wouldn't have taken me so long, to know where I belong. And by the way, boy, this is no machiene you're talkin' to.. Can't you tell? This is Jeri.. and I still love you."

~ I still love you. ~