Prologue
Jen was Joey's best friend. They had a connection that no-one could ever think of breaking. Even when they were apart they thought of each other when times were rough. It was that kind of thing that you knew would last a lifetime and nothing could shatter.
Joey's mother had died of breast cancer when she was 13. That had been bad enough but then her father was busted for drug dealing. Her sister, Bessie, was 21, and Social Services didn't feel like she was fit to raise her. Joey almost ended up in orphanage but two kind neighbours, friends of her grandmother's, decided to take her in. Joey was very tough at the beginning but Grams and Gramps (as she called them) were stubborn enough and Joey ended up closer to her than to her own family.
When Joey entered highschool Gramps suffered a stroke and was placed in bed. Joey knew, although no-one had told her, that he would never get out of there. She had seen it already. And just then she was faced with her first competition: Jen was Grams' and Gramps' real granddaughter, and she had been sent to the small town of Capeside to live with her grandparents because her parents couldn't handle her in New York. Joey felt threatened but soon she realized that Jen was just like her: lonely and in need of a friend. Soon they became inseparable. And by the time Gramps died, at the end of their freshman year, Jen, Joey and Grams were a family. Blood didn't matter anymore.
Of course, they were very different. Jen was wild, Joey was silent. Jen had everything going for her, while Joey had virtually nothing. They didn't let that come between them, though. They had their fun together, rubbing off on each other, Joey letting her wild side taking over sometimes while Jen allowed Joey to lead her towards academic excelency.
The first step towards separation came when they went to college. Joey got into Worthington, an Ivy League, while Jen got into Boston Bay, a good college, but still no Worthington. It wasn't that Jen wasn't smart enough, she just didn't see the point. Joey had always thought Jen was smarter than her but she could never understand the point of studying all the time when you could go to parties and hang out with boys. They kept in touch, after all they were both in Boston, but suddenly they were moving in different circles.
At Worthington, Joey met Dawson. It was almost love at first sight and it all happened pretty fast, at least for Joey who was used to thinking things through. They moved in together after half a year and after another year, Dawson proposed and Joey said 'yes'.
Jen didn't understand why Joey was in such a rush to get married. At first she took it gracefully, but soon after that she started being meaner and meaner to Dawson, started acting really possesive towards Joey, like trying to keep her for herself. She and Dawson could not get along and Joey found herself stuck in the middle.
Then Grams died. That was a shock for both of them, but Joey seemed to accept it easier, since she was more used to loss. Jen on the other hand was devastated. She started cutting classes, she failed her exams, and then when summer holidays came she just left. She didn't tell anyone where she was going or when she was coming back. Not even Joey.
Joey married Dawson soon after that and finished college the next year, majoring in Architecture. She always had had a thing for drawing and thought Architecture was a practical way to do what she liked. Dawson had become a teacher and they both lived a quiet life in the Boston suburbs.
And then Jen showed up again. Joey could tell she was a lot different from the Jen that she used to know, but the connection between them was still there, there was no doubt about that. She took Jen in, much to Dawson's dismay, who knew very well that he and Jen were not bound to become friends in this lifetime. And then Jen found out she was pregnant. Joey tried to ask her about the father but Jen stoicly refused to talk about it. She gave birth to a baby girl, Amy, got a job, got an apartment, and lived her life totally isolated from anyone but Joey.
The real shocker came when Amy turned two. They went and bought ice-cream, and celebrated in the park and that's when Jack showed up. Jen grew pale, Joey grew confused, and the next thing she knew, Jack was Amy's father, but no-one knew how he and Jen had met and what exactly went on between them. He moved in with Jen and sulky Jen became happy Jen again. And Jen had a great family and a beautiful life and for the hundredh time in her life, Joey wanted to be Jen.