Meant To Be
I do not own charmed or any of the characters of the show, so don't sue me.
It was Sunday morning. Chris Halliwell was in the attic of the Halliwell Manor looking through the book of shadows, marking every demon that could be a threat to Wyatt. The sisters were trying to de-junk the attic, which they did every year without any noticeable success.Suddenly a triquetra-shaped, blue portal opened up in the wall and two young women and one young man stepped through it into the attic.
Piper was already lifting her hands to blow them up, but Chris quickly stepped in front of her: "No, no, its okay…I know them," he turned around to the three people who had observed the whole scene interested, "What the hell are you doing here?"
"Oh, it's nice to see you too Chris," the brunette one of the two woman replied sarcastically.
"Sorry," he stepped forward and gave her a quick hug.
"Where's Ryan?" he asked and looked behind her at the others, than back at her. A pained expression crept across the brunette woman's face and she turned her face away from Chris to hide the tears that welled up in her eyes.
"Where is he?" Chris asked again his voice slightly panicked.
"This is not the place to talk about this…" the young man, who was still standing in front of the wall where just until seconds ago the portal had been, replied evasively.
"Hello, we're still here, who are these people?" Paige interrupted the conversation.
"Ben, Rachel, Jessica," Chris said pointing from the tall athletic young man, to the black haired woman, to the brunette woman who was still standing besides Chris with her head slightly bent so her hair was covering her face.
"I'm Paige, this is Piper and Phoebe," Paige introduced themselves.
"Yeah, we know," Ben answered and grinned.
"Right," Piper said and lowered her hands that she'd left in the air frozen half through the blowing-up-motion, "So, what are you doing here, who are you?"
"We're friends of Chris we thought we'd stop by and visit him," the black haired woman replied.
Paige gave her a look, "Are you being sarcastic or not, because I can't really track."
"Why don't we all go downstairs and talk…or whatever, everybody follow me," Piper cut in. She started walking towards the door, "But I guess you know your way around the house too, right?" she turned around and smiled cynically at Ben.
"Yeah, we do, actually," Rachel answered for him and followed Piper out of the attic.
After they all sat down in the living room, each with a cup of tea in their hands, Jessica started talking."It was all really stupid," she said and looked up at Chris, "We were driving in his car and we were arguing over something, I can't even remember what it was," she gave a small laugh, but Chris could see her blink back tears, "and I look out his window at the driver's side and this truck comes towards us and I start screaming but it was too late…" After nobody spoke she continued, "And he died and I didn't….and it's just so stupid because those things, they happen to normal people, right? They shouldn't happen to people like us, it's like we haven't been put through enough already they have to dump that on us too."
A few tears tripped down her face but she wiped them away angrily. Chris expression was blank; nobody could've known what was really going on inside of him. "Well anyway now I didn't have a reason to stay anymore, except them, and they decided to come with me," she nodded her head towards Ben and Rachel.
"What about Bianca, is she okay?" Chris suddenly asked with a tone of guilt in his voice full of concern, as if he'd just remembered there was a Bianca.
"I wouldn't know, haven't talked to her since she called me a slut and I slapped her," Jessica smiled at him sarcastically.
Ben shot her a look, "She's doing okay, she missed you like hell though."
"Oh it's so nice that you two are still friends," Jessica said and turned around to him with the same sarcastic smile of before on her face.
"Jess…" Ben started but Rachel cut him off, "Okay let's not talk about Bianca, because in a minute you'll all start screaming at each other run off, not talk for days and leave me sitting here not knowing which side to take so just leave it, please?"
"Sorry," Ben said and gave her a quick kiss. Chris's eyes widened.
Jessica looked at him and laughed despite herself, "Right you don't know about that well they got together after you left, I still don't know how it happened though, they just came to me one morning and were like 'tadaaa'!" Ben and Rachel burst out in laughter. "Okay fine they didn't go tadaaa; honestly I don't really know what they told me, because I was still half asleep, all I registered was that they were holding hands, maybe they saved their speech for you."
Ben nudged her in the side and Rachel blushed. "Oh come on you guys it was cute," Jessica giggled and looked at Chris who was grinning slightly.
After everyone stopped laughing, Chris spoke, "Back to Bianca, why didn't she come with you, now…he…will take it all out on her."
"She was afraid he'd follow us if we all went," Ben replied.
Suddenly Piper cut in again, "Hey, I don't want to interrupt you're whole reunion-catching-up-thing but if you keep saying "he" one more time, careful not to let his name slip, I'll just go crazy, if you're talking about Wyatt you can use his name…we know he turned evil in the future and that Chris is here to prevent that."
"Well, you never know, future consequences," Ben replied and shrugged.
"At least now we know where Chris got that smart-ass sentence from," Phoebe grinned but immediately turned serious again, "Uhm, if you don't mind me asking, who's Ryan?"
"He is…was my brother…" Jessica answered the smile fading from her face.
"We're sorry," Phoebe said carefully, "I know how you feel, at least I know how Ben and Rachel feel. You're not, by any chance, an empath too are you, Jessica?"
"Yeah, I am," she gave a small smile, "first thing I did was learn how to block all those feelings from outside out, including other empaths."
"You don't mind me calling you Jessica, do you?" Phoebe quickly questioned.
"No, that's cool."
"Okay good, and you two aren't….you know," Phoebe looked from Jessica to Chris and back to Jessica.
"What…like together?" Chris asked. Phoebe nodded.
"No…that was a long time ago, he has Bianca now," Jessica answered for him and gave Chris a look before quickly changing the subject, but he saw the hurt in her eyes and sighed silently.
"So…I think we should go find a place to stay."
"Hold that thought, Piper, Paige, kitchen now."
"See first thing that goes after living together for so long are full sentences," Paige grinned and followed her sisters.
In the kitchen Phoebe turned around which almost made Paige bump into her, "So, we trust them, right? I mean we trust Chris now, don't we?"
"Uh, yeah I think," Paige replied not sure where this was going.
"And now all his future friends don't have a place to live so…"
"You want them to stay here!" Piper interrupted her who had figured a little quicker then Paige.
"Yeah, why not, I didn't get any evil vibes from Rachel and Ben and you seriously don't think Jessica would hurt us?"
"No but…" Piper trailed off.
"We have all this extra room, well not that much but anyway, Paige could move in with me and Jessica and Rachel could share Paige's room and Ben could sleep on a mattress in Chris's room at P3." Phoebe smiled at them enthusiastically, "Or, they could sleep on the couch in the attic."
"I don't care what they do or wherever they stay as long as they don't disrupt my life," Paige stated.
"So I guess that means they'll be sleeping on the couch in the attic," Phoebe said knowingly.
"This might not be such a bad idea, maybe they can help Chris with the whole Wyatt thing and when they're here we can keep an eye on them," Piper finally gave in.
"So its done and agreed on and all that?"
"Yeah, yeah, but why are you so perky again?" Piper asked bemused.
"Uh, I don't know," Phoebe fanned air to her face with her hand, "Rachel and Ben, they're just so…in love and happy and all that you know, I can't really control all those feelings."
"Uh, huh," Paige smirked at her and went back into the living room, Piper and Phoebe right behind her.
"So, we've decided that you guys can stay here," Phoebe gave them the good news.
"Are you sure?" Rachel looked at them uncomfortably.
"Yeah, it's fine, believe me."
"Thanks," Jessica said quietly.
"Ben you're staying with Chris at P3," Phoebe informed him.
"Ok, why don't we get you all settled in, and meet at the club at 8:00 which is in 2 hours, all right?"
"Okay let's go," Chris stood up took Ben by the arm and they disappeared in a swirl of blue lights.
At 8:00 the girls were pushing their way through the mass of people that were either trying to get out of the club or in. As they finally got in they made their way to the bar were the guys were already waiting.
"Hey, you look great," Ben stood up and gave Rachel a kiss. She was wearing a simple black tank top and jeans and her wavy hair fell loosely over her shoulders.
"You look great too," Chris smiled at Jessica who was wearing a white neck-halter-top, jeans and her hair was pulled up in a loose bun, practically the opposite from Rachel.
"Where's Leo," Rachel asked and looked questionably at everybody.
"Up there or wherever," Piper replied evasively, "You guys want anything to drink?"
"No thanks, I'm fine, I'll be back later there's this really cute guy on the other end of the bar," Jessica winked at a handsome black haired man who smiled back at her, stood up and made her way through the crowd.
"So I'll guess she's off for a while," Ben laughed.
"Is she still on that kick?" Chris raised his eyebrows at him.
"What kick?" Paige asked curiously.
"Not like you're temp job thing," Chris grinned at her.
"Oh shut up." Paige replied.
"She's just been burned badly by many guys and now she's just looking for a fling, where she basically hooks up with random guys and dumps them later, she's just getting it out of her system…" Rachel replied and nudged Ben for even bringing up the subject.
Suddenly Jessica popped up behind again, "He's so cute! I just wanted to grab my purse, see you guys."
"Jess, wait." Chris grabbed her arm.
"What?" she looked from one to the other.
"What are you doing? You can't just hook up with guys here, what if it turns serious and then you have to go back or he looks for you and can't find you anywhere because you already went back?"
"Relax, I'm not looking for anything serious and from now on my name will just be Isabelle or something."
"Do you even think about that you might be hurting peoples feelings here?"
"Yeah, like whose?" Jessica replied suddenly hot headed.
"That guy's for example! You'll exchange him for someone else after a few days anyway like he's a pair of shoes or something!" Chris said just as angry.
"First of all: Why would you care? Second of all: Guys don't have feelings, at least not anyone who I've gone out with!" Jessica looked directly at Chris, turned around and walked away as fast as she could heading for the exit.
"Great, that's just great," Rachel gave Chris an angry look and went after Jessica.
Chris sighed, "What?" he asked and looked at Ben, "it would've happened sooner or later anyway."
Ben shook his head incredulously, "You guys really need to resolve your issues."
"What issues, there are no issues." Ben gave him a yeah-right look.
"Are we missing something here?" Paige asked confused.
Chris shot Ben a warning look grabbed him by the arm and pulled him over to the side were they could talk undisturbed.
"What are you doing man?"
"Look they don't know I'm Piper's son yet, so I'd rather you don't tell them all about my personal life, okay?"
"You haven't told them?"
"Nope…"
"Okay but now that we're here you can tell them right, I think the futures been messed up too much already anyway so it won't matter."
"Yeah maybe you right," Chris said thoughtfully, "…come on let's just go find the girls."
After having orbed to the manor, the golden gate park, her house and Rachel's house, they finally gave up and orbed back to the manor.
"Where else could they be?" Ben said confused, "Where is the last place you would look for her?"
Chrisshrugged and shook his head, but after a few minutes he suddenly he grabbed Ben by the arm, "Come on I know where they are."
"Care to fill me in," Ben asked irritated after they reappeared.
"That's Bianca's house right there," Chris pointed to a big, brick-walled house.
"You don't seriously think she's here…why would she be here?" Ben looked around; every house looked pretty much the same. He squinted in the sunlight, looked down the street and spotted a small park.
"What about the park? Maybe she's there."
"Could be," Chris replied, "It's worth a shot."
They entered the park and immediately saw Rachel crouched on the first park bank. Ben quickly walked over to her, "Hey what's wrong?"
She looked up at them, "I'm fine, I lost Jessica though, I thought I'd just wait until she comes back, since this is the only entrance and exit to the park."
"You know what, how about you guys just go back to the club I'll find her," Chris said.
"I think you're the last person she wants to see right now but that's fine with me," Rachel replied.
Chris gave her a look. "Sorry," she added quickly, "Look I'm not mad at you I'm just saying…"
"Come on," Ben pulled her up from the bench.
Chris looked after them as they walked out of the park hand in hand. After they disappeared around the corner, he closed his eyes in concentration and tried to sense Jessica. He got a slight feeling of where she was but it was very weak, normally he couldn't sense her at all but now that she was vulnerable she wasn't able to block him out as good. Finally he decided she was at the lake and orbed there quickly. He reappeared behind a group of trees, because of the risk of exposure, and he finally saw her. She was sitting in the grass with her knees pulled up to her chest and her arms clutching them tightly. Chris didn't know why but he didn't want to disturb her, she looked so lost in her thoughts, he sat down quietly and watched her.
Jessica looked at the lake she'd always loved this spot, that's where she came to think when she didn't want to be around anybody. She wondered what Bianca was doing now and recalled a conversation they'd had at the empty bar at P3.
"What are you doing here?" Bianca questioned Jessica as she came in.
"I should ask you the same question," Jessica replied.
Bianca raised her perfectly plucked eyebrows at her.
"I was just thinking…" Jessica responded evasively.
"About…?"
"Why would you care?" Jessica said aggressively, "Every since you showed up my life's been turned upside down. All Chris and I do is fight, most of the time because of you!"
"Well that's not my fault is it?" Bianca answered just as aggressive.
"The hell it's not!"
"Look, I'm sorry if I'm screwing up your life so much, but you're not the only one with problems!"
"Yeah, right," Jessica gave a small laugh, "You're so perfect, your whole life is so together…" As Bianca didn't answer she kept talking, "I remember as a kid, if I saw a limousine driving, I'd always try to see through the tinted window wondering what kind of life the people inside lived. How glamorous and lucky, who knew right? You knew. You were probably in there staring back at me, which means I've been jealous of you since I was eight." Jessica looked right at Bianca, "But you know I'm not anymore, I'm rather myself than some spoiled rich kid, whose only problem it is that it didn't get a manicure on Friday…"
"You don't know anything about my life!" Bianca shot back.
"Neither do you about mine, about what Chris and I have been through together, all you care about is getting back at me by stealing him away from me for god knows what reasons!"
"I don't need this, not from you!" Bianca gave her a disgusted look grabbed her purse and stalked out of P3.
A/N: So what do you think? Oh and the whole 'limousine' thing I have from the O.C. I just love it! And it fit in the story really good so I used it, so don't sue me, I don't own it I know…please review! And sorry to all Bianca fans I didn't really mind her but she hast to be kind of evil to fit the plot.