The girl with blonde hair and green eyes stepped out of her home at 5:45 in the afternoon, heading for her friend Carla's house for a party.

She started up her car, turned on the radio, tuned it to 99X, and drove out of her neighborhood. She turned onto Towne Lake parkway, and drove west for a mile and a half to the on ramp to the freeway. She turned on her left turn indicator, and turned left as indicated.

As she headed down the freeway, an unexpected thought entered her head. Some stops are longer then others, babe. The voice belonged to James. She hadn't thought about James, for a couple weeks now, and was just beginning to think she was over him. Now, it didn't seem like it at all. It all came back, threatening to inundate her with tears. What had happened with him swept through her, and she barely contained it. It hadn't really been her fault. She wasn't even sure what had happened.

He had been her boyfriend for a year and a half, and he had been the sweetest most caring person she could ever have hoped for. She spent a lot of time with him, gave him a lot of attention and never told him "No." Well, almost never. There was that one area where she would draw the line, but he never seemed to mind.

Every time they met, they did something romantic, and then went somewhere secluded where they could be alone. She liked being alone with him, and he liked being alone with her, she was almost sure of it. Was Ninety-nine percent sure of it, in fact.

It was during those moments of seclusion that he would whisper breathily in her ear that he loved her, and would always love her, and that he wanted to be with her always.

She would whisper back that she loved him too, and while the wind picked up outside the car, shaking branches and howling, they sat safe and warm (and get warmer all the time), showing each other how much they cared.

Still, for all that, something had happened. It was on one of those trips that her mind jumped back. The last one in fact. This was one of those memories that she remembered with picture perfect clarity.

As she drove down the freeway, she turned down the radio (the group was Garbage, the song was "The World is Not Enough"), and reflected on that sad, stupid... somehow... blue and orange night.

They had just finished one of their sessions, and James had been graceful, yet somehow distant about how it had ended. She sensed it in him. He had never been that way about it before. He had to have known it would end that way, and yet he continually tried. He should have known, but...

As they drove, he merged into the turn lane, braked the car, and came to a stop behind a huge lumbering winnebago. The red brake lights of the 'Bago were bright enough to have come from a lighthouse. He leaned over, and tilted her face to his, and whispered, "Some stop lights are longer then others, right?" She smiled back and nodded, and they kissed.

And they continued to kiss, sliding their hands over each other's faces, until the brake lights suddenly dimmed down, and the winnebago moved forward.

James went after him, and turned onto the freeway.

They drove in silence for a while, listening to Sam the Sham singing about Little Red Riding Hood, who sure was lookin' good, and might be everything that a big bad wolf (only he pronounced it woof) could want. James had always like the Oldies, as opposed to the alternative music that she liked.

Halfway down the freeway, he turned to her, and began to speak.

She started from her reverie at the honk of a horn. She darted her eyes up at the rearview mirror, and saw the truck that she had accidentally cut off.

"Sorry," she muttered to no one in particular, but the truck in general.

The truck, or more accurately, the driver of the truck, didn't seem to care about her apology and flipped her a peace sign. He must have been ill-informed about the proper way to make a peace sign, because he forgot to raise his index finger along with the middle one.

She watched him, her attention half on the road ahead of her, and half on the mirror, and raised her hand, and stuck up her pinky finger. "Here's your change, jackass," she said.

He didn't seem to notice or care, and continued to drive.

Neither of them noticed the vehicle behind the truck. The second truck hauling a load of mirrors, that swerved when the first truck hit his brakes. Neither of them noticed that the truck went into the grassy median on the side of the road, and neither of them noticed that one of the mirrors on the left side of the truck bounced up and off the side of the truck, and shattered right in the middle of the northbound lanes of the freeway.

She continued on, and merged onto Interstate 75. She continued south, and got off just after the 285 Atlanta bypass. At 6:30, she pulled up in front of the house of Carla Seldon, and got out. She looked around at the lack of other cars on the street, and then at her watch. She was early. nearly half an hour early. That was alright. Carla was her best friend. She wouldn't mind. Might, in fact, be insulted if she hadn't shown up first.

So she walked up the front walk, and knocked on the door. Carla answered, and admitted her, and they sat talking about different things, until the rest of the guests started showing up.

The party wasn't that big, nor was it small, it was just right. The guests congregated in the backyard, around the grill where Mr. Seldon was grilling some hot dogs and burgers.

" Hey!" A male voice called out from behind her, over the thumping of the extreme bass of the music. She turned, and regarded Alex Stephens with wary eyes.

"Yes?"

"How you doing 'Lissa?"

"Don't call me "'Lissa,' please."

"Okay, no prob. So how you been?"

"I've been okay. Busy with school and all, you know. Oh wait, you don't, you're never there..."

"Hey, no need to be so mean to me. I'm trying to be nice..."

"Well, all things considered I think I have a right to be mean to you."

"Say what?"

"Remember when you tried to grope me at the dance last year? Or how about the time you slipped those pictures into my locker?"

"What pictures?"

"The ones of you. The 'adults only' pictures."

"Oh, those pictures. LIsten, that was just a stupid prank. A Frat thing, you kn-"

"Frat? We're in high school! There are no Frats!"

"You know what I mean!"

He took a swig of the beer he had in his hand, and in a detached part of his mind, she wondered what beer was doing at an "End-of-the-summer-beginning-of-the-Senior-Year" party, then dismissed it. One of his idiot friends had probably brought it.

"Look, Alex... nothing against you, but just please, leave me alone... okay?"

Alex nodded sagely as if agreeing with her, and then continued on as if she hadn't said anything at all. "You know what you need? You need a beer."

"I don't drink."

"No, but you should. You're way too uptight. You need to relax. Here, I'll get you one, okay?"

"No Alex, don't-" But it was too late. He had already gone his own way, determined to get her a beer.

She rolled her eyes, gave a sigh of disgust, and then stalked over to Carla. "Why did you invite him?"

"Who?"

"Stephens."

"Because he's a senior this year, just like we are."

"So you just invited all the seniors, no matter how idiotic they are?"

"Well, yeah, I mean... If I hadn't, someone would have been put out, and then where would we be?"

"What about that dweeby kid? Where's he?"

"What dweeby kid"

"Maloney."

"Dan Maloney?"

"Yeah, him. Aren't you afraid of him feeling put out?"

"No. He's a jerk who smokes pot. There aren't going to be any drugs at my party. No way."

"But there's drinking?"

"That's different."

"How is that different?"

"I don't know, but it is," she replid matter-of-factly.

At that moment, Alex decided to reintroduce himself to her. "Oh my sweet darling! For a moment I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Now I see that I am very much alive, and heaven has been brought to me! Please say you'll be mine!" He held out the beer he had gotten for her.

She turned, smiled very sweetly, and pushed him away. She turned on her heel, and walked off.

"Melissa! C'mon, all I'm asking is for you to dance!"

She wheeled on him. "Listen! I don't want to dance with you! I know about you, and how you always just want to screw the girls you dance with. I don't want to, so just leave. Me. Alone!"

He blinked, and backed up a step, and she took that oppurtunity to dart away from him and into the house. She heard him walking after her, no doubt to persuade her to his line of thinking, perhaps even use the worst pick-up line she had ever heard (You're name must be Mickey, cause you're so fine), and she didn't want that. She hung a quick left, and went into the bathroom. She closed the door behind her, and locked it.

She sat down on the edge of the toilet and dropped her head into her hands. She closed her eyes, and let her thoughts drift. Again, they returned to James, and what happened on that night that started off so nicely, then went blue, and then, in that final rush of imagery, went red.

"Is it me? I mean, is that it? Am I going to fast? Am I not gentle enough?"

She looked quizzically at him. "What? What are you-?"

"I thought we were in love with each other. I'm in love with you. Aren't you in love with me? You said you were. But, when we kiss... I don't know... I mean, I can feel your lips, and I can feel how... excited you are... but, you never let me have sex with you. I mean, that would be the ultimate expression of how much we love each other wouldn't it?"

They were going past the Bells Ferry exit now, heading north toward Towne Lake parkway, and the speedometer was inching forward. She was about to reply that she thought marriage would be the ultimate expression, but for a number of reasons, the foremost being that he didn't stop talking, she didn't.

"So, here, I thought that after tonight, you would want to, and still, you didn't, and now, I don't know what to think. I mean... do you love me? Did you ever love me? I loved you."

Her head spun around at the past tense verb. He stopped to take a breath, and she used that minute to get a word in edgewise.

"I do love you. I do. And I want to continue to love you. I just don't... want... to... do that. It's nothing against you, or against what we have, it's just a step I'm not ready to take. Not yet."

He looked at her, and then back to the road. He took a deep breath, let it out, and let silence hang for a few minutes. Then, the hand that was resting on the gear shift turned over, and opened. She put her hand into it, and held it.

He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. He brought his hand back down to the gearshift, and with his left hand, flipped on his right blinker and began to change lanes.

There was a sudden squeal of brakes, and then the loud honking of a horn, and after that, everything sort of jumbled together.

Knock knock knock. "Hey, you in there, Melissa?" It was Carla, and not, thankfully, Alex.

"Yes, I am."

"Did you fall in?"

"No. But I'm trying to avoid Alex."

"It won't be that hard anymore. He went home."

"He went home? Good."

"Yeah, he said he felt bad about driving you off or something. Either way, he's gone. You can come out now."

She sighed, opened the door, and stepped out. For the rest of the party, she socialized nicely, talking with old friends, and meeting some of the new students (those unlucky dupes- she was glad she didn't have to start at a new school her senior year).

As the party wound down, so did some of the guests, and more left as the hour got later. Melissa didn't decide to leave until almost one A.M.

And that was how she found herself driving down the freeway, at one-thirty in the morning of August 28, 1999.

She was doing perfectly fine until she got back onto 575. She was awake, and alert, and the sound of Green Day and Beck coming out of her radio kept her awake enough.

Then, she hit a bad patch of road, just after the exit to Bell's Ferry. She was cruising along at sixty miles an hour, and in the glow of the headlights, picked up a twinkle in the road, and just as she realized what it was, the glass of the broken mirror was slashing through her tires, and her car was skidding out of control.

She got shaken around as the car jumped and spun, and when it came to a stop on the side of the road, the worst of the damge was to the tire, and her leg, which had been bumpd, and would probably bruise in the morning.

She climbed out of her car, surveyed the damage, and then began to walk down the side of the freeway to the nearest exit.

Unfortunately, that proved to be almost three miles away, and she wasn't relishing the idea of the journey. Still, she walked, because she had to get to a phone and call her parents, or her friends, or someone.

So she walked. She had been walking for nearly an hour when it happened. For the past hour, she had been alternately singing snatches of some song or another, and then counting her footsteps, but the lateness had been creeping up on her, and soon, she was stumbling. Then, her stumble took her a foot more then she wanted to go, and she fell.

She fell for what seemed like a long time, and then something hit her in the side, and darkness fell around her.

When she awoke, it was just beginning to lighten in the east, and there were several cars zooming around upstairs. She blinked, groaned, and then tries to push herself up.

Piercing pain gripped the left side of her body, and she cried out. She stopped moving, and gritted her teeth, as she waited for the pain to fade. She took a deep breath.

Okay, be cool. This is not a problem. Something's wrong wth you ribs, but you're on the side of the freeway. Someone will be able to see you, and when they do, they will rescue you, and everything will be cool, so just. Don't. Panic.

She raised her head enough to look around, and saw that she lay at the bottom of an incline. The road, and the sounds of the cars were coming from the top of it. The problem, as she saw it, or rather, didn't see it, was that she couldn't see the cars and thus, they probably couldn't see her. Which presented a problem. If they couldn't see her, how were they going to rescue her?

Alright, okay. This is still no big deal. Everything will be alright. The cars can't see you, but they'll be able to hear you, so don't panic. They can hear you, assuming one of the cars is driving with his windows down, and going slow enough to hear you, and not listening to anything else. Oh God, I'm going to die here aren't I? Right here, at the bottom of this incline, so close, and yet so far, and I'm going to die here!

Despair swept over her, but she refused to be inundated by it, and set about trying to figure someway out of the predicament. Making a lot of noise seemed her best bet. Maybe somewhere, somehow, something would work out. Something would present itself.

She began to make noise.

"Oh Crap! Crap!"

"What?"

"Damnit! Crap!"

"What!?"

"Shitfire and save matches!"

"What are you yelling about?"

Chris Turner jumped up from where he had been reclining on his bed. He dropped the phone, felt the headset part of it drag down his face, and then he picked up the base of it, readjusting the headset as he did.

"It's eleven-thirty at night! That's what!"

"So? Got a hot midnight date?"

"Yeah, matter of fact, I do. Her name is Jennifer and she works at Blockbuster." He began rushing around the house looking for the four tapes he had rented. "If I'm not there by midnight, she charges me late fees."

"Oh, you gotta return some videos?"

"Good job, Sherlock, how do you do it?"

"Don't mock me, Rimmy."

"Don't call me Rimmy, Mange." One, two, three, where was the fourth? It wasn't with the rest of the videos. The box was, but a box alone does not a video make.

"Mangeria."

"Whatever. There it is." He had just spotted the video lying under the couch. How had it gotten there?

"There what is?"

"The video I couldn't find."

"Didja find it?"

"No, I just said there it is for the hell of it."

"Don't get an attitude with me."

"Well, I have to get it with someone."

"So find yourself-"

"Shit! It needs to be rewound!"

"-a girlfriend."

"Yeah, right. That's gonna happen."

"It will..."

"Yeah, when I'm old and decrepit and probably the only sixty-five year old virgin."

"Hey! Nothing wrong with being a virgin!"

"Don't get- where the hell are my shoes now?- Don't get started on that."

"Too late. You opened Pandora's Box. I think being a virgin is an admirable thing to be. It shows a stregth of will and character that's lacking in most parts of the world. More character then sleeping with any girl that comes to call, anyway."

"I have to go now. Gotta return these videos."

"You know, it pains me to say it, but if you keep trying, and if you really want it, you'll probably go and get yourself laid someday. There's someone out there for everyone. I would go out with you but, well... I live in Montana."

"Yeah, but you wouldn't be the kind of girl I'd want to go out with anyway."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means you want to go to your marriage bed a virgin."

"Yeah, so? Are you into relationships just for the sexual aspect of it?"

That brought him up short. He paused in midtie of his shoelace, pondering.

"Well? Are you?"

Was he?

"I don't know. I mean, it depends on the girl. If she's fine, then yeah, I'd be in it for the sex. However long that lasts. But if the right girl were to come along, then maybe. I dunno."

"You need to think about that Chris. Besides, aren't you a Catholic?"

"Yeah, so?"

"Isn't there some sort of Catholic rule about not having sex before marriage?"

"That's why there's confession."

"But isn't that more serious then just confession?"

"Beats the hell out of me, pardon the pun."

"Ha ha. Not funny."

"I know, sorry. Look, I really gotta get going now."

"Yeah, alright."

"I'll call you when I get back, okay?"

"Okay."

"It'll be ten minutes, I swear."

"Okay. Talk to you soon."

"Right. Bye."

He hit the button, hung up the phone, and grabbed his keys. Two minutes later, he was walking down the driveway to his car. The night was warm, with just a slight breeze blowing, and very few clouds in the sky. The tail end of August was always that way.

He got into his car, started his engine, rolled down his windows, and went on his way. Three minutes later, he dropped the videos in the drop box, got back in his car, and drove home.

When he got out of his car, he stood for a second, enjoying the night, and then walked up the driveway.

He didn't notice that he had left his windows down. If he had noticed, he might not have rolled them up, but then again, he might have and if he had, things would have been very bad for a girl that Chris Turner had never met.

Chris walked into his room, kicked his shoes off, picked up his phone, and dialed Mangeria's number. "Mangeria" was actually Miss Sarah Shaver of Helena, Montana, who frequented the "#Teen_chat" room on an IRC server.

They had met a couple months back and had hit it off really well. Sarah wouldn't have cyber-sex with him, the way Chris might have liked, but then, their relationship was totally different somehow.

She had interested him from the start by singing a snatch of a Third Eye Blind song. Well, not singing- typing. She wrote up part of a Third Eye Blind song, and had noticed. He had started sing/typing along, and pretty soon, they had a duet going. After that, they just seemed to become friends.

The exchanged URL's, and email addresses, and soon they were as close as kin, which was kind of how Sarah saw him. As a brother. He might have wanted it otherwise, but she wouldn't be interested in something other then being a friend.

So, they stayed as friends, and somehow, Chris was fine with it. After a couple months of e-correspondence, he asked her for his phone number. She hesitated a bit, made him promise to never call without her permission ("Okay," he said, "no prob. I'll just call up and see if it's okay to call before I call." She responded "You know what I mean," in that tone of voice that only females seem to be able to reach, the one that says "Quit arguing right now, or pay the consequences."), and then gave it to him.

He called her that night, and they talked for almost three hours. Which was kind of amusing, all things considered. Usually, when he talked on the phone with someone, he had trouble coming up with something to talk about, and the conversation usually was consumed in silence. However, with Sarah, he had absolutely no problems.

So, they talked for a couple weeks, and the weeks became months, and two months after he started calling Sarah and talking to her two nights a week, came the night when he remembered that he had videos due back.

"Hello?"

"Uhhh, yeah, is this Ms.... Uh, Shuh-veer?"

"It's Shaver, and yes it is."

"Ahhh, I see. My name is Ike Turlingdrone, and I'm calling on behalf of a survey company, would you like to take a survey?"

"Uh, I guess so..."

"Great thanks... Uhhh... Do you like Harrison Ford?"

"Yeah."

"Do you like beans?"

"Uhh.... yeah."

"Do you like Movies?"

"Umm, some of them."

"Would you like to see Harrison Ford in a movie?"

"Sure, I suppose..."

"Would you like to see a movie about Harrison Ford?"

"Not really..."

"Would you like to see a movie about beans?"

"Uhh, no..."

"Would you like to see Harrison Ford eating beans?"

"Not really."

"Would you like to see a movie about Harrison Ford eating beans?"

"No. Is this-"

"Would you like to see beans eating Harrison Ford?"

"Is this Chris?"

Chris laughed. "Yeah, how'd you guess?"

"It was a bit obvious."

"Oh, right. Didja miss me?"

"Oh yes. I want to hear your voice. I need to hear your voice. Oh baby," she replied in an utterly dry voice.

"Yeah, I can hear it in your voice. Your longing for me is as evident as your desire for-"

"Don't say it."

"-me to come out there and make sweet love to you."

"I told you not to say it!"

"Yeah, I know, but it was begging to be said. Besides, you know I don't mean it."

"Do I?"

"You should."

Silence reigned supreme in the kingdom of the phone line.

"Hello? You there Sarah?"

"Are you done?"

"yes, I'm done. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you."

"Yeah, well, you did."

"Sorry. So how have you been?"

"As discussed earlier, I'm okay..."

The conversation lasted for another hour, at which point Chris had to say goodnight, since it was nearly two a.m. He hit the hang up button on the console of his phone, took off the headset, dropped it on the floor next to his bed, hoped he wouldn't step on it when he woke up in the morning, turned on his radio, clicked off his light, closed his eyes, and fell asleep.

He only awoke once in the night, at about four, from a bright flash of some sort of light outside his window. It faded almost before he knew he was awake, and then there was a crash. A rumbling roaring kind of boom, and then that was also gone.

He came most of the way up to consciousness with a lurch and a chug, felt his pulse calm down again, and then fell asleep, never noticing that during the brief few minutes he was awake, he was hearing the sound of rain falling on the roof right outside his second story window.

When he awoke the next morning, he yawned, felt his jaw crack, and looked at his watch. It was almost eleven in the morning. No wonder he felt so tired. He looked out the window, noticed the sun was shining, and blinked, wishing he would get off his lazy butt and fix the blinds on his window.

But now, it was mid-morning, almost afternoon, and he had things he needed to be doing. He mentally ran over the list of things he had to do. Check on his work schedule, make sure he really had the day off of classes today, and pick up a few things at the grocery store, then disregarded the whole list, deciding he had all day to do it. He did some work around the house (Well, not really work, unless you consider getting through a few levels in his favorite video game work), and read some of the book he was reading (The Fires of Heaven, by Robert Jordan), and at about four-forty-five, decided he had better go get his errands done.

So thinking, he walked down the driveway, and stopped as he set foot on the street. He looked down, and noticed that the street was wet, though it looked like it was drying up, no doubt due to the sun. It was warming up, and quite quickly. Did it rain the night before? It must have, for the street to be wet.

The memory of the night before, almost like a dream remembered, came back to him. The flash of light, and the boom. Lightning and thunder. It had rained last night.

Well, no biggie. It wasn't like it really would affect him. He didn't like driving in the rain, but it wasn't raining now, so he didn't think he had anything to worry about.

And he didn't. Until he got to his car, and looked at the driver side window.

"Ooooohhhh shit," he muttered.

He had left the car window down last night. This was definately not cool. Hopefully, the rain had just fallen straight down, and not slanted. That way, the only part of the car that would be wet would be the inside of the door, and the armrest.

He opened the door, and felt the seat. It was wet.

Crap on toast. Crap on dry, stale, moldy, day-old, toast. He walked over to the trunk, and opened it, shuffled some of his school books around, pulled out his jacket, which he kept for when cold days came out of nowhere, and there was the piece of cardboard he saved for just such an emergency.

He pulled it out, and put it on the wet seat, then sat down, hoping it would dry itself up before the cardboard soaked through.

He sat down, started his car up, turned the radio on, upped the volume, and began the drive to Kennesaw State University, just a couple or three exits up the freeway. As he went down the freeway, he noted that traffic was slowing, and beginning to pile up. This was not good either.

He slowed appropriately, and then came to a stop, as did the rest of the traffic. What the hell is this? He thought.

He turned down the radio, and switched the station to Star94 Fm. He listened to Vertical Horizon (Everything You Want), Enrique Iglesias (Bailamos) and Matchbox 20 (Bent) before they managed to get to the weather, news, and traffic.

It was going to be a hot day, with a pollen count of about 420, low 76, high 97. It felt pretty close to 97, now, and he wished that he had taken his car in to get the air conditioner fixed.

The news came next, and there wasn't much going on in the world. Al the terrorists had taken the day off, there was still a manhunt going on for a cop killer. A sixteen year old biking up in Canton had been in a freak accident when a man in a car had hit a deer, the deer had gone flying, knocked him off his bike, and killed him on the spot. The last little bit of news was that the Tomlinson case was still unresolved. sixteen year old Melissa Tomlinson, last seen leaving the Seldon residence, had disappeared off the face fo the earth. her car had been found abandoned on the freeway with a blown out tire, but she was gone. Most probably, someone had picked up her, and then simply driven off with her.

Then came the traffic.

Mike Oliver reported several smaller accidents down around Atlanta, and then another accident up by Powder Springs, and then finally came to Highway 92.

"Highway 92 in Woodstock. There's an accident with fatalities on the 575 entrance ramp. A white toyota camry, and a green saturn collided across the westbound lanes, blocking the lanes, so if it's at all possible, avoid Exit 4 from 575. I'm Mike Oliver, Star 94, real time-"

His radio began to fizz and crackle. What was this?

The crackling static continued, until he couldn't make out what was being said, and switched the channels. Static here, too.

He flipped through the channels, but got nothing. What had happened? He looked at his radio, saw the numbers on the clock beginning to fade, and began to get a bad feeling about it.

"No... no... don't die on me... please..."

He hit it a couple times, momentarily brightening the lights, then they faded again.

"Please.. stay alive.. c'mon baby... how long we been together? Almost a hundred thousand miles. we'll be there by the end of the year. Please.. just stay with me..."

The car's radio, like a cold and unfeeling ex-girlfriend, gave him one last electronic raspberry, then left him for good and all. At least until the next best thing came along.

At any rate, he was stuck in the traffic jam, with no music at all to listen to.

He propped his hand on the window, and laid his head down on it, waiting for the traffic to clear as it inched forward. People seemed to be avoiding Mike Oliver's advice, and wanting to get off on exit four anyway. Idiots.

He found himself remembering the past as he glanced out his window. Almost five years gone now, he had lived in California. He had elected to go to college out of state, because he didn't like the memories that California had for him. Memories of his mother.

She had been one of the best people he knew. She had a quirky habit of being dead serious one minute, and then flitting off on some tangent, that resulted in something humerous the next. She wasn't like most of the other mothers he knew. She didn't listen to peach 94.9, or even Star 94, she liked listening to the alternative stations. 99X, and Mix 106.

It was on July third of nineteen-ninety-four that she had gone off to give blood. She had been type AB, and the doctor's absolutely loved that. "You could never have too much AB," they said. Chris supposed he agreed with that, but that didn't change the fact that these doctors, the men who pledged their lives on the Hippocratic oath to do everything they could to save lives, let his mother die.

She had gone in on that day, just like she had every two months for as long as he could remember, probably longer, and had come back absolutely fine. It was only a few weeks later that they begin to notice something wrong.

She felt listless and irritable, and in general not well. When she finally succumbed and went to the doctor's, she had a blood disease. Chris couldn't remember what it was called, or how it worked. All he knew was that it worked slowly and he had to watch his mother die.

They took care of her for almost six months, and then, mercifully, she died. It was on a Saturday, he remembered that, and it had been cloudy that day, he remembered that too, but not much more then that. Not about that day, anyway.

He sat for almost an hour as the traffic inched forward, and just as he drew even with the exit ramp, and was almost home free, the screams reached his ears. Attention grabbing, heart rending screams of despair, that somehow, in some way, sounded familiar to him.

She had been laying there, for almost three days. It seemed longer. The party that Carla held must have been about five or six years ago. Had to have been. The first day had been spent yelling for someone, anyone to help her, but no one had stopped. No one had even slowed down, as near as she could tell by the sound of the engine.

The second day had mostly been spent yelling, but she was getting thirsty, and her throat was beginning to hurt from all the yelling. If she stayed out here much longer, she would die of thirst. The tail end of august was always hotter then the rest of the summer, and this one had been no different.

Add to all that, that she had picked the worst place in the world, short of a mountain cliff, to fall down. Here, she had absolutely no shelter from the sun, except at early morning, late evening, and nighttime, and no one was able to see her down here.

Weren't they mounting a search party? Weren't they looking for? Her car was just a few miles up the freeway, three at the most? Why hadn't they found her yet?

At the end of the second day, most of her hope had abandoned her. She laid down in the grass, and closed her eyes, and decided she wouldn't open them until she was dead.

Beneath her closed lids, visions mixed and swirled, and she found herself thinking back to that night, when James had asked her if she really loved him... and what happened after.

He flipped on his right blinker, and began to change lanes. There was a sudden squeal of brakes, and then the loud honking of a horn, and after that, everything sort of jumbled together.

There was a crashing bumping feeling, and then the car seemed to leap in the air. She screamed, and felt her body pitch forward, and slam against the seatbelt. Her head whipped forward, and dented the dashboard. She sat up dazedly, just in time to see the side railing of the road coming at her. They hit it, scrawled along the side, and then back into the flow of traffic, where they were immediately broadsided by another car, and pushed off the road.

Melissa had lost consciousness a few seconds earlier as a result of banging her head on the dashboard, and so she didn't see the tree that was the car's final destination.

James saw it though, and screamed.

When Melissa woke up, or some semblance of same, she was in a hospital ward, or something like it. There were people scurrying everywhere. One of them had a bottle filled with some sort of red liquid. She could make out some of the words on the bottle, but didn't understand most of them. Long technical words.

There was something else on the bottle though, a name, and a date: "M. Turner, 9-15-95" The nurse with the bottle attached it to something above Melissa's head, something she couldn't see, and then the red liquid was flowing down a tube and it was going right into... her arm?

She was temporarily unable to cope with this idea, and passed out. When she awoke again, one of the doctor's was looking at her, holding her arm, checking her pulse, she thought.

"What...who...where...?" The doctor shushed her, and then Melissa's mother stepped into view.

"Oh, God, honey, we were so worried..." SHe broke down into sobbing, and just held Melissa. Melissa looked up at her father, asking questions with her eyes.

He stepped over and hugged her too. They held each other for a few minutes, and then she finally found out what had happened. They had changed lanes, and cut someone off, who had been unable to stop in time. The car hit rear-ended them, and they had bounced off the side railing, directly into the path of another car who had smashed them off the road into a tree.

James had been killed, and it had been a close thing with her also. She had had to get a complete blood transfusion, and several stitches on five different places on her body.

She closed her eyes as each new bit of news hit her like a load of bricks, and finally, she just... fell asleep. James, dead. Her, with none of her original blood in her body... it was just wrong.

Drip drip drip. She opened her eyes, and caught a raindrop in her eye for her troubles. She threw her arms out to the side, winced at the momentary pain in her ribs and legs, and then just waited for the end.

While she was waiting, she opened her mouth, and let the rain quench her parched mouth.

When she woke up, she was soaking wet, but hopefully, the sun would dry her off before she got sick. The third day was dawning, and a little over nine and half hours from now, a guy that Melissa had never met, nor ever would meet, would be walking along Highway 92, and cause an accident between a green saturn and a white toyota camry.

She almost decided not to try again. Just lay her until she died. No one would find her anyway. Still, she found herself hitching in breath for a scream, and let it rip.

She wouldn't be able to keep this up for long.

She had kept it up for about an hour, when she saw the best thing she had ever seen in her life.

Chris Turner's head jumped up, and he nearly banged it on the top of his door, as he heard the screams. He looked around, but everyone else had their windows up, probably with air conditioning and radios on. They wouldn't be able to hear it.

He looked behind him, saw a long line of cars, and then looked up ahead. Brake lights as far as he could see. Traffic must really be mangled somewhere. It must have been one hell of an accident. He reached up on teh steering column, flipped on his hazard lights, put the car in park, pulled up the parking brake, and then turned the car off. He stepped out, and listened again.

There was another scream, this one fainter, and then it was gone.

He trotted a few steps down the road. "Hello?" he called.

There was a third scream, and he trotted a few more steps down the road. "If you can hear me, keep screaming!" he called.

Silence greeted him.

He continued down the freeway, heedless of the weird looks he was getting from the people in the cars.

A fourth scream, from somewhere nearby, and he ran toward it. It seemed to be coming from underground, which was really weirding him out.

He kept moving though, and then he saw her. She was laying at the bottom of the incline, one leg twisted in a totally unnatural way, and something looked wrong with her side.

She looked up, caught his eyes, and screamed again, then her head collapsed, and she passed out.

He slid down the ravine, and knelt next to her. He checked her pulse, which was weak, but there, and her breathing was steady. For all intents and purposes, she was asleep.

He looked back up, didn't see any cars, but he could hear them idling, and began to climb the hill. WHen he got to the top, he knocke don the first window he could find, and told the driver what he found. The man looked at him, then hurried out of his car, and went and looked.

They both climbed down, and picked her up carefully. They were careful of her leg and ribs, knowing that they probably shouldn't be moving her, but doing it anyway. They got her into the back seat of the man's car, and secured her as best they could with the seatbelts. The man started honking his horn, and moving slowly, letting people know he had to get through. Eventually, people began to get out of his way, and he drove along the shoulder until he got up to Highway 92.

Chris held the girl steady the best he could from the passenger's seat, and when they got to Highway 92, they found a place where they could take her. It was an Office Depot, right close to the highway. When they got inside, they called for an ambulance, and some water.

Chris sat with the girl, and stroked her hair, and her forehead. She was quite pretty, now that he could take time to look at her.

She moaned, and moved her head, then opened her eyes. Her eyes seemed out of focus, and then locked on Chris' eyes. He met her gaze and smiled softly.

"Before you start screaming again," he said hurriedly, putting a finger to her lips, "let me tell you what's going on. My name is Chris Turner. I found you on the side of the freeway. Your ribs were damaged and your leg is broken. Right now, you are at Office Depot, and an ambulance is on its way."

She raised a hand, and brushed hair back from her eyes. The movement seemed familiar to Chris, and he had no idea why. She sniffed, and wiped her mouth.

"My name is Melissa Tomlinson. I don't know hwo long I was down there. Probably only a day or two. I lost track." She closed her eyes, and took several deep breaths. When she didn't open them again, Chris didn't wake her.

He visited her in the hospital several times, and once he brought her flowers. They talked for a while, and became very good friends. He met her parents, and they talked, and got to know each other. When she was released from the hospital, he was there with her, helpng her to the car, so she could go home.

She smiled at him as he walked with her, pushing her wheelchair to the car.

He visited her several times, and when she felt well enough, he took her out to dinner and a movie. After that, they went several more times, and soon, they became a couple.

The phone rang, and Sarah Shaver picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Hey." Chris' voice said.

"Oh, hi! What's up?"

"Not much. Same old same old. Work, school, work school, work school, and then, for a little variety-"

"School and work!" They finished together.

"Oh, yeah, you betcha," he said.

"So, are you going to be leaving in the middle of our conversationt og o return videos?"

"Nope. No videos to return tonight. However, I will have to be leaving in a few minutes." A note of satisfaction entered his voice. "I have a date with my girlfriend."

"Oh. Is that why I haven't seen you online in a while?"

"Yeah, that would be the reason."

"Oh, so... okay. I'm not gonig to ask."

"No. None of that."

"Really? You haven't pressed her for sex yet? I'm impressed."

"Well, remember what I said? If the right girl came along?"

"Are you telling me that you have actually found the right girl?"

"Well, yeah. I guess so. I mean, this girl... she's in my mind all night and all day. She's the first thing I think of when I wake up, and the last thing I think of before I fall asleep. She's beautiful, and soft, and warm, and..."

"Alright, alright. I get the picture. So you're really taken with her?"

"Hell yes!"

"Well, congratulations, I'm happy for you."

"Thanks, Mange."

"You're welcome Rimmy."

"RimRunner."

"Whatever. What's her name?"

"Melissa Tomlinson."

"That's a nice name. Kinda weird..."

"What's weird about it?"

"Oh, nothing weird about it, It's just that I have a friend here who writes story, and one of the characters in his story is named Kane Tomlin. That's all."

"Oh. Huh. That is weird. Coincidences are like that."

"You know, I think this is the longest we have ever had a conversation without you cursing..."

"Yeah, well... I told you... the right girl..."

"So I guess she's really got you wrapped around her finger huh?"

"Like a worm on a hook."

"Let's just hope she isn't going to feed you to the big fish."

"Nope. No chance of that, I don't think."

"Well, that's really cool. So how else have you been?"

"Pretty good, but that's really the only reason I called you. I have to get ready for my date. We're going to see The Phantom of the Opera tonight."

"Oh, class."

"Yeah, tell me about it. Would you ever have expected that from me?"

"Not really, no. Kinda funny."

"Oh, well, me neither. And now, I gotta get going."

"Alright. Call me as soon as you get back, and let me know how the date went, alright?"

"You got it. Talk to you later, Mange."

"Nighters Rimmy."