AN: And here we are, weeks on and the sequal to Unanswered Letters has begun. This doesn't have much to it at the moment, but you can look forward to at the very least some Hanna bashing, as most of you will appreciate, i know Howard will. Some fluffy flashbacks and some angst cause we all know from UL that i just hate that category, :-P

Hope this sequal does UL justice, and i desperately hope you all like it - after all i did start it on my schoolies holiday! I know the title isn't the best, but i found it slightly sweet - never the less if you can think of something better drop me a line.

I want to thank all of you for your support of UL, and this is to everyone who read, reviewed, and rekindled my love of fan fiction. THANKYOU!

A special thanks for Stars of Andromeda, who spurred the mind tank for this sequal - the fact you wanted one made me VERY happy indeed. Anyway i think it's on with the story. Be warned, now i have to start making my own crap up, poor darlin's - be polite everyone and meet Jane, (hanna comes later...) and if she becomes Mary Sue at all SCREAM AT ME! PLEASE. I think i've become displaced after a month of revision notes and essays, so beat me with rods if anything isn't up to scratch. I'll keep them at the door.

Captain Jacq XX

Disclaimer: Once again im playing with other peoples toys - Barratt and Feilding, you cheeky bitches.\

Chapter One

The sun was working its way down the sky as Howard Moon stepped off the bus, a bundle of letters cradled tenderly in his arms. A heavier burden to the thirty something musician than the weight of the paper permitted. Howard had been used to sitting alone on the bus for the majority of his life, even in his school days he reminisced sadly, he'd sat by himself amidst the screaming kids, the seat beside him empty while Vince would perch on the top of the bars of whichever seat he'd been offered that morning. Choosing to clamber over whoever was seated behind Howard to talk when there was a break in the conversation. Howard had never been popular, no one really ever chose to talk to him voluntarily, he was usually dragged into anything by Vince who'd always tried to include Howard until it became painfully obvious that Howard didn't want to be included and he'd give up. Howard's sad smile widened as his vision was filled with the image of a smiling laughing boy with dazzling blue eyes and amber blonde hair, It was this blank filled gaze that left the seat beside Howard empty today. His hands clenched around a bundled collection of unopened envelopes as though they were pure gold and the small creases of smiles and frowns at the blank air in front of him kept everyone shuffling as far as the bus would allow. But today Howard was too caught up in himself to care. He was a long way from the person he'd been back at school; he was a long way from the person he'd been just two years ago. But it was two years ago that haunted him now, now he was further ingrained in the past than just an empty seat. In the two years since he'd last seen those sparkling blue eyes he'd learned to survive on his own. He'd learned much about himself and the world around him. But in almost every respect Howard TJ Moon had still been a child. He'd been a child given a second chance, a second childhood. It had taken a while to realise, but once he had he'd learned to fit in to a point where Howard Moon didn't sit alone on the bus anymore. People would approach him and they'd talk – every day - except today. Today Howard's old life had resurfaced and it had done wonders. The confident man with his gaze pointed forwards, ever afraid of what was behind him, was now firmly facing backwards. He was staring and at the point where he wanted to start screaming. Screaming a single name and run, run until he found him. Until he could reach out and touch him. Prove that he was real and not just something he'd managed to create to sate his unfailing loneliness in the real world. The past had been all about him. Vince Noir. Vince had been Howard's past. His whole past, and now all he had left was forty eight unopened letters. Forty eight unanswered letters. Forty Eight rejections of a past he'd turned his back on when Vince had needed him most. He'd used Vince time and time again whenever he needed it. Like a drug, used him to the point where the drug no longer worked. He'd turned his back on him, and now – like most things in his life – Howard regretted it and wanted to go back and change it. Now he knew better he just wanted to start again, have a second go at his second chance.

But he couldn't.

Now all he could do was sit, a thousand miles away, lost in another time. Lost in a shock of black hair carefully styled, a blue eyed twinkle, a catching laugh, a plot of grass and a marble headstone.

Howard smiled again sadly as the face swum back into focus.

Vince.

A horn blared all of a sudden and Howard blinked, the image of Vince disappearing like smoke in the breeze, making way for the reality of red brickwork and green architraves of the flat he shared.

Howard stared, his stomach lurched unpleasantly and he clutched the pile closer to his chest. He couldn't remember getting off the bus, couldn't remember his feet moving him in the familiar direction of home. But they'd managed it, they'd moved of their own accord and now that he was here he didn't want to be. All of a sudden the complacency he'd been feeling evaporated, paving the way for something almost like fear that left him strangely empty. He didn't want to go inside. Didn't want to have to face everything new. All of it from his new life. There was nothing left of his old one. No photo's or cd's or clothes. He'd started again, piece by piece removing it until he was completely new. Even his moustache had been shaved off and grown anew. All that was left of Howard TJ Moon's past was a name and a face almost forcibly forgotten. Vince Noir.

Only now he didn't want to forget anymore. He didn't want to have to be Howard Moon, Jazz Man. He wanted to be Howard Moon, Jazz Maverick – small eyed freak, social outcast, wardrobe defiler. He wanted for the first time in two years to just disappear in the light of someone brighter than himself.

He wanted something he couldn't have.

But lacking that he wanted to turn around and run away. Run back to the once glittered shop and pretend nothing had changed. Surround himself in everything that could remind him of a past he had tried to erase. Drown himself in useless artefacts and overly bright familiarity, coloured clothes and electro noise, rather than necessities, muted tones and carefully constructed matching outfits balanced with cool jazz and classical orchestral scores.

He wanted to run back to where nothing had changed. But there was nothing there. No one to run back to. Nothing but an accessorised grave plot and a Shaman at odds with how he felt about what was happening. Still, even that was closer to everything he'd had and lost than anything he surrounded himself with now.

"Howard?" Howard jumped as the door opened and a pair of large brown eyes peered out from under a barely tamed bush of hair.

"Howard you okay?" Jane asked tentatively, Howard blinked rapidly.

"Yeah," he muttered. Tears brimming at his lids unconsciously. He barely knew where he was anymore. He sure as hell didn't know what he was doing. He clutched the bundle of letters close to his chest. They were all he had. All he had left.

"You sure Honey? You've been out here for five minutes just staring at the door."

Howard cleared his throat, mind buzzing with what to say, reply that he was fine, but the tears he'd kept in all day seemed to choose that moment to appear and everything that came with them rushed up in a wave that felt similar to vomiting. It erupted in a cascade of tears down his face and a small half controlled sob.

"Oh Howard!" Jane whispered pulling him towards her, her slim frame enveloping him as he fought to disappear. Normally Howard towered over her, but he shrunk in on himself and allowed the three steps to make her taller than himself, her cheek resting on his head and her fingers in his curls.

"Oh Howard, honey – come on. Inside." She whispered, stroking his hair. He didn't care. He barely noticed, but complied, allowing her sure hands to pull him inside and guide him to the couch. All he could do himself was cry. Let tears fall he'd felt since that morning, when he'd first unconsciously opened Naboo's letter and pulled his past sharply into focus, directly into his hands so he could feel it disappear. Feel everything crumble beneath him, everything, all the memories he'd used as a foundation for his new independent life collapse under him. A frame covered with a layer of concrete and hidden, forgotten, but always there. Feel those foundations shatter and collapse beneath him, leaving him winded and unsure of where he stood. Of where he was going. Of who he was even. In the old days he'd been Howard Moon, Jazz Maverick and Vince Noir's best friend and ugly shadow. Then he was Vince Noir's best friend who'd run off and was too afraid to go back. Now, now he was Howard Moon. Just Howard Moon. Howard Moon, Jazz man is what the others called him. What he'd been that morning before and after he'd drank a cup of coffee, read the paper and bent down to open the mail. Five minutes later everything was different. The Jazz Man disappeared and he was Just Howard Moon.

He'd always been a Jazz Man. But the name represented so much more. Represented independence and freedom and purpose. What did that absence tell him now? What did it mean when everything old was gone? Everything that really mattered, was gone? There wasn't any Vince anymore. There hadn't been for a year, but now Howard knew Vince was gone. Now he knew there was no more Vince. He knew. That morning Vince Noir, everything he had been, everything Howard had constructed in his head to combat the guilt of leaving and the content he felt in his new skin, had evaporated. Vince Noir ceased to exist and Howard felt alone and scared.

It had been fifteen years since he'd just been Howard Moon, Just Howard Moon. And he didn't like what he remembered at all. It wasn't like what he was, or had been, yesterday. It wasn't like what he'd been two years ago. No, he'd just been Howard Moon. Howard Moon with no Vince Noir and at a point where he didn't know he'd ever get one. But now he was Just Howard Moon again, no Vince Noir to save him, Vince had disappeared from his past – evaporated and he needed Vince Noir to be Howard Moon, Jazz Man. He didn't want the Jazz Man to disappear too. Not like Howard Moon, Jazz Maverick had.

"Howard?" Howard looked up into Jane's face, her small heart shaped face, swimming in and out of focus with his tears.

"Honey, it's okay."

"S'not." He retorted bluntly, and if he admitted, just a little rudely.

"It's not, Jane." He drawled, trying to meet her gaze only for tears to brim over his eyes again and he sunk back into the couch, covering his face with his hands, the letters still resting, unopened, in his lap. Her fingers reached out tentatively and played with his hair. Her fingers toying over the strands as Vince had done on occasion.

"I like your hair Howard. It's soft – like brown smoke, an yeh do nuffin wif it. But it's nice."

"It's fine. Not, 'like smoke'." He huffed. Vince giggled.

"You're such a nonce Howard."

He pulled away. Disgusted with himself,

"I'm sorry, Janie." He muttered, knowing she was looking at him oddly.

"He, he. When we, he used to – he's gone, Janie. He's gone." The tears came again and once again he hid behind his hands.

"He's gone and I didn't even know. I didn't know."

"Oh Howard, honey I know." She murmured, reaching out to wrap her arms around him again. Holding him close as he shook.

"I saw the letters on the floor when I got home from work." She whispered.

"How could I not have known, Janie? A year. It was a whole year and I didn't even know something was wrong! I didn't know he was sick! How could I have missed it? She had no right – keeping it from me. No right. I should have been there. I should have known." He muttered into her hair, her hands stroking his own.

"Who had no right?" she asked softly.

"Hanna." He spat back, the build up of venom he'd been bottling up since Naboo had told him suddenly burst.

"She, she kept it from me!" he said, voice building and he jerked out of Jane's grasp.

"She knew! Naboo came – he came to get me! Vince, Vince, he – he asked for me! Me! An' Naboo came to get me, but Hanna told him I didn't want to know! She knew Vince was – that he was – she knew and didn't tell me! She kept it from me, and he died alone, Janie. All he wanted was me, all he wanted… was me. An' she kept it from me. He died alone because of her." His anger diminished in a wave of tears and by the end Howard's voice was barely a whisper. Tears running down his cheeks like rivers and his voice guttural and broken like a baby babbling.

"She probably didn't know everything, Howard."
"SHE DID!" it took Howard a moment to realise he was standing up and had screamed down at Jane rather than the same whisper as before.

"HE CAME, TIME AND TIME AGAIN AND EVERY TIME SHE SENT HIM AWAY – SHE HID HIM FROM ME, HID EVERYTHING FROM ME! VINCE DIED WITHOUT ME AND HE THOUGHT I HATED HIM!"

"You did, Howard." Jane whispered. She was still seated, but Howard felt as though she was towering above him and had kicked him violently in the stomach.

"You hated him for a lone time Howard. It tore you apart. You didn't know who you were when you left, Honey. I know it's hard to hear, but it's true. You hated the way he'd left you on your own and didn't even realize it. You hated the way he was, the way he treated you. He didn't have any respect for you, Howard. And you didn't have any respect for yourself. It's taken you this long to figure everything out, and she, she was just trying to protect you. I," she stopped, her eyes dropped from Howard's for a moment but Howard couldn't turn away. He was rooted to the spot. Staring down at Jane with wide eyes. His tears had stopped but he didn't even realize it. The letters were at his feet on the carpet but he didn't see them. All he saw was the hesitance in jane's face as she looked back up at him and spoke again.

"Howard I might have done the same thing if I'd been my sister as well. You, you didn't need him any more. You don't need him, and it would have destroyed you if you'd gone back."
"In opposed to now? He died Jane. He died, and all he wanted was me. Wanted…" Howard stopped, he didn't know what Vince had wanted. Didn't know even now. Just that he'd wanted him.

"He wanted what you used to have, Howard. He wanted the past where he was safe and wasn't in pain or ill. That's what he wanted, and you were that past. You didn't want to go back to that past, Howard. Why else do you think you sent back every single one of these letters?" she asked, bending down to pick up the pile.

"Why, Howard? He wanted safety and you wanted independence. You couldn't have both."
"But he would have been happy." Howard muttered, voice barely above a whisper. Each of Jane's words sinking into him like a dead weight. The force of them feeding that little voice Howard hadn't listened to all day.

She's right.
"But you wouldn't have been."

"I could have fixed myself again."

"I don't think you could have, if you'd gone back Howard you would have stayed there. You'd still be missing something. Do you remember telling me that?"

"yes." He whispered,

"you'd still feel that whole, Howard. Only it would be deeper. Larger. It'd consume you Howard. Back then you relied too much on him. If you hadn't left Howard, there'd be nothing of you left."
"I miss him, Janie. I've always missed him. Only now – he's not there. He's gone. Forever. It's like-" he stopped, tears brimming again.

"It's like he's just disappeared, an' I don't even know if he ever existed. I got rid of everything. All of it. I threw it all out. All I have are memories and I don't even know if they're all real. Whether he was real. He's just gone." Jane's face was downcast as she stood up and looked straight into his eyes. Eyes filled with pity, with sadness, with something Howard didn't recognize.

"He was real, Howard. You have him in here," she murmured raising her hand to his head, "in here," her hand trailed down to his heart, "and here." She said, pressing the bundle of unopened letters into Howards hands.

"Read them, Howard." She muttered, eyes never leaving his.

"I tried. I went to the cemeta- I, I just couldn't." he managed to reply. He'd had so much strength back at the Nabootique, but it had evaporated by the time he'd reached the cemetery. He'd stared at the gravestone and before he could do a thing turned and ran. Ran as far as he could, until he could barely breathe. He'd failed him again.

This time he wouldn't.

"Try again, Honey. Take your time. Read them as he sent them, listen to what he had to tell you, Howard. Make him alive again. Only you can."