A/N: So, this is my second FanFic story. Thank you soooooo much for reading!
Hope you enjoy my crazy ramblings about the lives and loves of the Twilight characters. PLZ NOTE that they of course belong to Stephenie Meyer and are her property; no copyright infringement is intended nor will any money be earned by me from them. I'm just living in her world for a little bit... However, the plot for "What Is Forever" is mine.
"Ah, nothing comes to us too soon but sorrow." Bailey
CHAPTER 1: SORROW TOO SOON
Forever.
It was a difficult word for me to think about. I knew, more than anyone else around me, how fleeting it could be.
Two words not normally connected—forever and fleeting…
Confusing. That's the word that best described what forever meant to me at the time of my college graduation.
As I got ready, I mulled over all the things that had happened to me that had brought me to this specific point in my life.
One minute everything's going along pretty well; you even think you understand living a little bit. Life may even have seemed a little boring.
Boring. I snorted. Boring would have been pretty great. I sighed. I definitely would have taken boring over frustration, loss, anger, depression…
Just over five years had passed since Jacob's death. It seems like forever ago… I snickered at my sick joke. I shouldn't be so morbid. I shook my head at myself. I had a lot to be thankful for. My college graduation was happening because of him. Because he'd cared enough about me to worry about our future together if it ended… Badly.
And it had. He'd been a soothsayer in that regard. I smiled grimly as I thought of his sister, Leah. Not a word she would have used to describe Jacob. Then again, it wasn't one he would have picked for himself either. Being a member of a small Native American tribe that had been located in a small coastal section of Washington State for… Well… A long time...
Wow. I needed to stop with this dark sense of humor-thing I'd picked up. I pursed my lips and gave a small shake of my head.
Jacob, being not only a member but the only son of the Chief of said tribe, would have many responsibilities coming his way. He hadn't thought about them seriously throughout high school, though. After we'd started officially dating in our sophomore and junior years, respectively (I was one year older than Jake), he started telling me some of the more sacred stories of his tribe. He was sort-of breaking the rules but he hadn't taken many of the tribe's Storytellers very seriously as he'd grown up on the reservation.
Until his senior year.
Everything seemed to morph and change at that point. He became reserved, a little more serious. It was a side of him I'd never seen; and we'd been best friends since before I had turned five years old…
A long, relaxed friendship was what we had; that had started shortly after he'd come on the scene after my mother died. My dad, Charlie, and his dad, Chief Billy Black, were best friends and Billy would be up at the house a lot to help my dad through one of the most difficult periods of his life. He would sometimes even bring his obnoxious son with him. I grinned at the memory in spite of myself.
Jake and his dad had been there when my last grandma, my maternal grandmother, had passed away just two years after my mother. Charlie's parents had both died before I was even born... Jacob was there when we made mud patties in the dirt by the river behind my dad's house, and subsequently rubbed the dirt in my hair. He was there when I went skinny dipping, on a dare from him… Was there when I discovered I loved reading and when I knew I could write better than anyone else we knew. He was there when my first crush made me cry.
He was always there when I really wanted him to be and, of course, I was always there for him. It was inevitable really that we'd end up together. We fit together, like those puzzle pieces for young children. No rough edges. Easy. It was natural for us—effortless.
When he was 17 and I was 18 we graduated from high school and got engaged. When he turned 18, we took a road trip to Las Vegas, Nevada and eloped. Our families weren't surprised.
His sister Leah was not amused when we took over the family's small cabin only ten minutes from their father's house on the reservation. She had liked to hang out there with her friends and to have somewhere to go to get away from Jake and Billy.
I laughed at the memory of the look on her face when Jake had painted the tiny kitchen a bright yellow just because I'd called him my own personal sun. That's just the way he was—spontaneous—we were like that together. Even though we seemed impulsive to the people around us—his family, my dad—life moved along at an easygoing pace for us. Surprisingly, or not so much, since we'd both lost our mothers at very early ages, we were both pretty mature, however.
We both had aspirations and lofty goals.
Jake wanted to go to an automotive technical school to get certification as a mechanic and open his own repair shop, as well as continue to help his dad and sister manage their small but profitable commercial fishing family business.
I of course had wanted to go to college but we couldn't afford the tuition for the school's I really wanted to attend...
I had always had a real fascination with reading and literature in general. Especially the American and English classics. Since the school's that had any kind of worthwhile English Lit programs were outrageously expensive—at least for a newly married under 20-year old—I'd dismissed the idea quickly.
Instead, with Jake's enthusiastic support, I started taking evening classes at the community college in Port Angeles, which wasn't that far from our little home and my dad's place in Forks, Washington. I'd started thinking excitedly about just getting my Associate's Degree and then a teaching certification in elementary education to teach at the reservation's small school. But that all changed when Jake… Don't cry… Don't cry… A few tears escaped before I could pull myself together.
I took deep breath.
After I turned 21 we had begun talking about starting a family; his responsibilities to the tribe had increased tremendously and it seemed a natural next step for us.
And then, one Sunday morning, he passed out without warning while helping his dad with their fishing boat. A quick trip to the hospital, a CT Scan… And our world was turned upside-down. Grade three. Malignant. Anaplastic Astrocytoma. A brain tumor. Surgery was not an option.
Several months of radiation therapy, followed up with chemo… The treatments had no real affect. Jacob stayed optimistic all the way to the end—for both us, his family, even the doctors. But… It really had been hopeless from the start. And because the chemo made him feel so sick, we never even contemplated trying to get pregnant during his seemingly endless rounds of treatments.
It seemed as if I made the mistake of looking away from him for only a moment and... He was gone.
I closed my eyes to keep the tears in. I needed to be strong for his family.
Charlie had always called me brave and resourceful. Billy called me stubborn and clever. Both of them were right up to a certain point, I suppose.
I was glad they had decided come to my graduation.
Four years and five months after I'd lost my husband—I was a college graduate. Oh, there had been times I didn't think I could do it... And then I would remember how I'd gotten into Arizona State University in the first place.
I felt a tear escape from behind one of my closed eyelids. I let out a shuddering breath.
Before we'd left to go to Vegas to get married, Jake had taken out a life insurance policy without telling me, in case something happened to him. It was really, really cheap since he was so young. It ended up being enough to cover four years at almost any college or university I would want to attend.
Now, here I was, 26 years old, graduating with a Bachelor's Degree from ASU. I'd majored in English Literature, with a Minor in Technical Communication. Amazing. I'd made it.
If I'd wanted to still believe in the real meaning of forever, this would be why: So I could believe that Jacob would be happy for me, proud of me, from wherever he was now. That, perhaps, forever did exist on that side of the hereafter even if it couldn't on this side.
That thought helped me to pull myself together again. I went to the bathroom of my off-campus apartment to look myself over in the mirror above the sink. I quickly splashed some water on my face, drying myself off with my hands since I'd already packed all my towels and attempted to smooth out my hair a bit. Well, here goes… Everything.
~~:::~~
As I closed the door to my apartment for the last time, I did get a little sad. But honestly, I was ready. Ready to move on with my life, to try and find some meaning to everything that had already happened to me.
I was moving to San Francisco the very next day and Jake's family was not happy about it. Even though I had come home from college every holiday break and for the summers, they'd hoped I would come back to Forks and stay with Charlie for a bit before I made any job decisions. But I had already decided I wouldn't be going back. My dad supported my decision knowing, I think, it was what I needed. Change, a fresh start. I'd started to feel my independence grow as I'd attended college away from my family. Away from Jake's family. Of course, San Fran was a lot closer to Washington State than Phoenix, but it still wasn't close enough for his family.
Sometimes Jacob's family made me feel… Smothered. They couldn't help it. I was a tangible connection to Jake in a way. But I couldn't be that for them anymore. I had to move forward. I needed to learn how to be completely on my own.
I'd taken a job as a copy editor for a very small publishing company, Libellus Publishing (their name even means 'little book' in Latin), which was actually owned by a much larger Canadian firm. As my new boss had explained it to me, they made all their money off of the 'fluff' works of fiction and they had a few small firms like hers to handle their 'important' authors. Sort-of like controlling their business losses while still appearing to be a 'serious' publishing house. I laughed a little at the memory.
That was a rude awakening. Discovering that everything I'd spent my entire college education learning about regarding significant pieces of literature was considered a business loss. Nice. I smiled involuntarily again… Well, time to go…
I turned my back on my apartment, my 'home' for the last four years to meet my dad at the graduation ceremony. I was ready.
~~:::~~
I thought my dad was going to have a stroke from excitement and pride when everyone threw their caps into the air. I could just barely see him and Jake's family in the huge crowd. Afterward, Leah and Charlie found me as I was saying goodbye to some of my school buddies. We all excitedly talked about staying in touch. However, I knew, and I think Charlie did too, that I was only being polite. I wouldn't stay in touch with anyone from college. It just wasn't my way. And I was so, so ready to start my new life. To move forward.
However, I felt old. Too old. I could tell that Charlie could see it in my eyes.
We managed to only have to spend a few hours with Jacob's family since they were heading back to Washington early the next morning. My dad was staying overnight in a hotel with me, since he was helping me drive the small moving van I'd rented. He would also be helping me move into my new apartment.
I was glad he'd been able to get the time off of work. My dad was Forks' Sheriff but had a dependable Deputy who promised he would keep things under control while my dad was visiting with me. How difficult could it be anyway to 'manage things' in a place as small as Forks? I gave a little snort.
Luckily with my new job also came a new, single floor apartment. Well, not really new… It was upstairs from the offices that were on the first two floors, which was extremely convenient and inexpensive. It was apparently a perk of being able to work day-to-day in one of the 'Painted Ladies' that were the architectural icons of San Francisco. They were in the Victorian/Edwardian style, with many painted in varying hues of pastels; the one I would be calling 'home' soon had been built in 1855 and was in deep blues and maroons.
Since someone would be living in the home and no one actually came to buy anything like they would if it had been a book store, it apparently wasn't a problem with the city's ordinance codes that there was actually a publishing company inside of what most people considered to be a historical monument. It was a win-win for the publishing company and the city; since the company saved money from not having an expensive office building downtown, and the city knew that someone owned it that had the financial ability to take care of a historic building that was over a hundred years old—apparently a rather costly pursuit for the average home owner. At least that's how it had been explained to me.
Ultimately it really didn't matter, since all I knew for sure was that I had a light and airy place to live for only the cost of the utilities. I was extremely lucky in the first-job department. And the pay was great. I mean, what else do you call a $42k a year, straight out of college job?
I'd decided to sell my old but beloved Chevy truck, since I didn't need to travel at all to get to work and the Bay Area was well known for its easily accessible public transportation. I hadn't driven it much while I was at college anyway. I'm really going to miss that old beast... I'd thought wistfully.
The next morning, as we were getting ready to head out, I thought about how much I was looking forward to starting my new life. The city was incredibly energetic. Beautiful and busy. I giggled. I was happy. The happiest I'd been in… Well, quite awhile. I heard Charlie laugh at me behind my back as he headed for the van.
Moving to San Francisco and taking this opportunity had definitely been one of my best decisions; and had the potential to be one of the most successful.
My dad was proud of me and I was really thankful for that, but I was also really proud of myself.
~~:::~~
I settled into my new place quickly, which surprised me a little. And then I remembered something Charlie had told me as we had set the last boxes down in my new apartment.
"Hun, you've done real well. I'm so proud of you." He was grinning from ear to ear. My normally stoic father was beaming, he was that happy for me. We'd both always had difficulty expressing our emotions with each other. When I was little, it seemed easier to not call attention to deep emotions since it had the potential to make him sad. I always tried my best to be supportive and happy for him, even if I wasn't really feeling that way myself. He of course overcompensated by not telling me how he was really feeling so as not to burden me with his own sadness. But time moved forward and we both healed. Perhaps the silence was good for us, perhaps it brought peace into lives that had been so touched by grief that there were no words to make it better anyway…
"I want to tell you something."
Uh-oh. "Hey, dad, no mushy speeches, o.k.?" I tried to turn and move one of the boxes quickly, so I wouldn't have to watch him struggle to share something with me that he'd obviously been thinking about for a while.
"No, no, I just wanted to tell you that I know that things, obviously, haven't been easy for you…" I turned to look at him and realized my mistake too late. When I saw the look of tenderness on his face, the tears automatically began flowing down my face.
"Aww, dad… You don't have to tell me how much you love me, I already know…"
He stopped me by walking over and placing his hands on my shoulders. "Let me get this out before I… Before I can't." I looked up into his eyes and could see that there was something vitally important to him that he wanted to share with me. So, I stayed quiet so he could get it out more quickly. No reason to torture him. Even though it appeared to be of great consequence, it was still a struggle for him. I nodded up at him silently to continue as I attempted to dry my eyes with my fingers.
"Look, sometimes… No. Not sometimes." I could see resolve suddenly settle into his features. "Bella, things always happen for a reason. Even if, at the time, we don't understand… Couldn't possibly understand what that reason might be."
I stared at him for a few more seconds, not knowing how to respond, as he dropped his arms from me. He searched my eyes for something… I think he wanted to make sure I understood. I'm not sure that I did at that precise moment but he seemed to find whatever it was he'd been looking for in my eyes. "That's… That's it really. I just thought it was really, really important that you know that." He turned from me then, to start getting his things ready for his departure. I could just make out the moisture on his cheeks as he turned away.
We were fairly quiet during the remainder of his time with me, only getting a little emotional as I saw him off the next morning. I wasn't able to tell him then but I knew in my heart that I would miss him.
~~:::~~
Time passed at a nice, even pace. My life found a pattern that suited me. I had a great job, good friends, and family that loved me.
My dad and I became closer than we'd ever been at any other point in my life. They say that distance makes the heart grow fonder and that was definitely the case with us. We talked on the phone with each other almost every Sunday evening; never for very long but it was enough.
He had been right. Even with all the memories I had of my pain, in spite of everything that had happened to me, I felt at peace. I knew that I was where I was supposed to be.
My job with Libellus Publishing was a little tedious but exciting at the same time. The drama, the suspense, the romance… It was all varying shades of absorption for me. So many different ideas, cultures… And levels of writing ability. Some were so much better than others, while I had to turn to my boss on occasion to work out what to do with some the more mediocre works.
My boss, the managing editor Angela Cheney, lived with her husband Ben and their three children only a few blocks away from the office. Ben worked from home as a video game development artist for a gaming company in Palo Alto. The office manager, Carolyn Rodgers, lived with her daughter about fifteen minutes away. They shared a floor of one of the Chateau-style mansions that had been converted into several apartments in the exclusive Pacific Heights neighborhood. Carolyn's daughter, Misty, who was only five years older than me, was an art teacher at one of the elite private schools in the same neighborhood. Both Angela and Carolyn were very nice ladies; it was like working with a good friend and an extremely observant aunt—not nosy mind you, just really observant.
Angela was pretty and kind, only a few years older than me. She'd also married her high school sweetheart. They'd both gone to college right out of school and managed to start a family at the same time. She was truly amazing.
Carolyn was a clever and quiet lady, always listening and only speaking when she had something rather dramatic to announce to us. But she loved books, her job, and her daughter. She was the glue that kept the office running smoothly while Angela and I worked on proofreading and editing manuscripts for publication. Angela also had the formidable task of dealing with some of our rather eccentric authors. I loved it all.
My 27th birthday had fallen on an unusually warm Saturday (for September). It had not been thrilling in any way. I was so glad. It had been really relaxing, however.
My dad had flown down for the day from Forks and we'd done the usual site-seeing around the Bay. We had an early dinner with Angela, her family, and Carolyn at one of the intimate bistro's in Pacific Heights. We had ended up talking and laughing for hours about some of our more eccentric authors, about some of the stranger and sillier manuscripts we'd read, the craziness but also the vibrancy of the city… But nothing about my past. It was probably the best birthday I'd ever had. At that moment, I really couldn't imagine things getting any better. I was… Content.
~~:::~~
Having breakfast everyday next to a double-window with large, white lacy curtains, with a breathtaking view out over San Francisco, in a house that oozed character from another time (namely the Victorian Era), tended to help your mind be in tune for editing stories that were dramatic or romantic in nature. I sighed as I finished my orange juice and got up to rinse my glass out in my miniature but very cute and functional kitchen.
Even though the house had been brought into the current century so that we had all the modern conveniences, it still maintained its Victorian charms. My loft apartment, which had been the attic over 50 years ago, was decorated very girlishly. Which I was o.k. with—it fit the charm of the home perfectly. The Laura Ashley-style wall paper that covered every wall surface except for the ceiling, with its bright white background and tiny bunches of pink and lavender flowers geometrically placed every ten inches or so, actually helped to brighten the already cheerful space.
Since it had previously been the attic, the walls followed the slope and shape of the roof of the house, with the ceiling at the center of the room being about twelve feet high and the lowest parts of the ceiling being in the corners of the room at about five feet. At least I hadn't hit my head on any of the sharp angles yet. There were two dormers, one with a bay window full of glass shelves above the kitchen sink and the other, directly across the room from the first, overlooked a seating area just to the right of the stairs. To the left of the stairs was a tiny bathroom with a Victorian-styled pedestal sink and elegant mirrored medicine cabinet directly above it. The toilet was even Victorian-looking, even though it had been purchased at one of the large home improvement stores only a couple of years previously. There was no tub, only a white-tiled corner stall shower that had a wonderful rain-type shower head.
The bedroom was just barely big enough for the full-size white enamel and brass bed with its big, fluffy down comforter, situated at an angle in the middle of the room. There was a small antique white dresser, which sat next to a large picture window. I also had one the smallest "walk-in" closets I'd ever seen. The bedroom wall was shared with the kitchen, which was in an L-shape configuration with a dorm-sized refrigerator and stove on the wall it shared with the bedroom, and the sink and diminutive dish washer on the outside wall.
There were two corner storage spaces on either side of the main window, which faced out over the street. In the middle of the main room was a cushy love seat with tons of decorative pillows and a TV on a small stand by the door that led into the bathroom. Right next to the front windows I had a three-foot long kitchen table with two comfy arm chairs angled at each end so I could sit like I had this morning, like I did every morning, and read whatever novel I was currently engrossed in while I enjoyed my O.J. after my cornflakes.
I walked down the staircase from my attic 'home' to my office space, taking in the sheer splendor of all the shelves of books that surrounded our work area. What were once two bedrooms with a shared bathroom and a sitting area were now two offices and a large open space with two desks. I occupied the desk closest to the windows, while Angela and Carolyn each had one of the offices. The bathroom hadn't been altered much except to move the door to face out to the main room instead of off of the bedrooms exclusively, to have it easier to be used by three women.
There was an organized sense of chaos to the room, with piles and piles of books and manuscripts everywhere. One of the scariest things about Carolyn was that she knew what was in each stack and what it's importance to the whole was. She could be intimidating but chose not be. She was fully aware of her own abilities but was always able to pull the best out of other people, rather than make them feel inadequate.
Apparently, she was the reason the girl before me hadn't work out. She had just been too intimidated. I respected Carolyn's position and never tried to do her job. I simply kept my nose to my own tasks and only helped her when she asked. Which seemed to suit Carolyn just fine. In fact, I think she liked me because I wasn't intimidated by her but did greatly respect her.
Since the only windows in the room faced out the front looking out over the Bay, all the other walls in the room were covered in bookcases. From floor to ceiling, the shelves were filled with old manuscripts, books and magazines.
The first floor was a large parlor maintained in its original Victorian splendor and the three of us would have afternoon tea every Wednesday there, just because we could. The kitchen was on the first floor situated at the back of the house and had been completely remodeled in the 90's. It didn't match the front room but it was very clean and simple, so it didn't exactly clash, either. The single car garage hadn't had a car stored in it since the 60's and now served as storage for manuscripts that no longer needed to be at Carolyn's or Angela's fingertips.
Speaking of fingertips… "Ouch!" I'd managed to stab myself with a staple remover and was sucking on my finger when the telephone rang. Angela was out of the office at a meeting and Carolyn was picking up supplies for the office on her way in that morning. In trying to make my finger feel better and awkwardly answer the phone at the same time, I'd accidentally knocked over part of a stack of papers that were next to my desk. Oops…
When I'd finished with the phone call, the paperwork that was now suddenly at the top of the drastically shortened stack caught my eye. It was a handwritten manuscript, with lettering so elegant that I couldn't help but pick it up to look at it more closely. I started reading... And couldn't stop. It was a short story, only about forty or so pages long. It was extremely romantic and suspenseful. I was entranced. When I finished it, I immediately started looking for the author's name but couldn't find it. I felt my eyebrows pull together in frustration.
"Hey ho. Any phone calls, Bella?" Carolyn came in and headed straight for her office. When I didn't respond like I had every morning since I'd started working with her, she slowly came back out into the room. Her eyes shifted from me to the altered stack and back again. "Umm, what are you doing?" She sounded curious but I knew that she was worried about the 'new' order of that stack.
"Well, I'd stabbed myself while answering the phone this morning, and accidentally knocked this stack over by my desk… You know what's in this stack, right?" I didn't want to sound inconsiderate about the stack I'd 'rearranged' but I had to know who this author was.
Carolyn cocked her head to the side and placed her left hand on her chin. "Hummm. Those are old manuscripts from authors that we now have long-term contracts with. Why? You weren't going to try and put that back in some kind of order were you?" Her hand moved from her chin to wave in the air in front of her as she quickly moved to the stack to take a look for herself.
"No! Of course not… I just found this one manuscript of a short story that must have been in the middle of the stack and… Well, I read it and I really, really want to know who the author is." I sounded like a kid with their hand caught in the cookie jar. As I was confessing my crime, she glanced at the manuscript that I'd just finished reading and had left on my desk, separated from the rest of the stack.
"Oh! That's easy." She bent down at the knees and quickly organized the stack back into its proper order, reaching up to my desk and taking back the one I'd read. She glanced at several of the other manuscripts and smiled up at me. "That was written by Elizabeth 'Lizzie' Masen."
"When you say that we have a long term contract with someone, does that mean she's writing new material?" Please say yes, please say yes…
"Yeah. Actually she's written a lot." She got back up and walked over to one of the bookcases. "Hummmm. Yep. Here it is. This was a novel she wrote about three years ago." She came back to my desk and handed it to me.
I took it from here hesitatingly. "Is it o.k. if I take this upstairs to read on my own time?"
"Of course!" She grinned at me. "She's really good, isn't she?" She winked as she headed back to her office.
For the first time since I had started working there, the day dragged for me. It seemed like 4:00 p.m. couldn't come fast enough.
That evening, as I settled into my bed with my hot cocoa and Lizzie's book, I was captivated by the first page and couldn't stop reading until two-thirds of the way through it. I had to force myself to stop—since it was 3:00 a.m. and my normal office start time was 7:00 a.m. Thank God I don't have to go far to get to work… I thought as I drifted off to sleep.
The next night, I finished the book and got to sleep by midnight.
Carolyn helped me find most of Lizzie's other works over the next few weeks. I read them all—from the romance to the scary (she had several Gothic-like short stories that gave me goose bumps)… And I just couldn't get enough.
The middle of October came and I was caught off guard as to how much time had passed since I'd starting obsessing over Lizzie's writings. Angela knew I'd been reading everything of Lizzie's that I could find; all her manuscripts, both published and unpublished short stories and two novels.
"Hey Bella." She came in to the office early and I wasn't surprised. She'd been really busy the last couple of weeks. "You're still reading Lizzie Masen's writings, correct?" She smiled knowingly at me.
"Of course." I looked up at her curiously.
"I'm actually very sorry to say that I've been expecting a new manuscript from her for a new novel… For… Well, awhile now." Angela looked embarrassed. "Her first draft of the first couple of chapters were due almost a month ago." She sighed sadly.
"I'm actually worried about her. It's not like her to miss a deadline. So not like her, in fact, that's she's never even been late before…" Angela's eyes now looked very worried. "I've been working with her for over six years and, even though we've never actually met, I feel like… Well, she's very… Grandmotherly."
Angela pursed her lips and she looked at me enquiringly. I wondered why and then she explained. "Bella, I've tried to contact her and even tried to reach her personal assistant and caretaker… With no luck. I know how you feel about her writing… Would you be willing to travel to her home town and attempt to find out what's happened?"
I was taken aback. I knew some copy editors would sometimes travel to do research… But… "Well, yeah. I could do that." What made me say that? I knew why I was o.k. with it. Because I really felt like I had connected to this author on a personal level.
"O.k.! That's great!" Angela looked so relieved. "You don't mind flying, do you? She lives in Connecticut, on the coast. From some of her descriptions in letters I've received from her, it sounds really beautiful." She smiled at me encouragingly.
"No. I've got no aversion to traveling." My lower lip had suddenly found its way between my teeth.
Carolyn had come into the room by this point. "Hey, to make things easier for you, I'll give you one of the company credit cards we use to wine and dine our authors."
"Oh! That would be great." I was actually starting to get excited. "Um, when do you want me to go?"
"Well, as soon as possible, I would think…" Angela looked over at Carolyn thoughtfully. "Could you make the flight arrangements for her? We should probably set her up with an open ticket."
"I guess I'd better pack for colder weather, huh?" I was nervous but thrilled at the same time.
And so, after all the arrangements had been made, I was ready to go to Old Lyme, Connecticut two days later, to help discover what had happened to who had become one of my very favorite authors.
~~:::~~
A/N: Wow. My first Chap of my second story. Next Chap as well as all subsequent Chaps will be up later this week, since this story is already complete. Thx for reading and please let me know what you think about my writing via a Review. I can't tell you how much it matters that folks review what they've read. :)