PURE & INTOXICATED

Beta-ed by: Martha Vilson

O/S By: Peggy McDaniel McCombs

Pairing/ Sarah Black

A/N: Tissue's may be needed.

It started so long ago…

I was seventeen years old when I first saw him. Two of my friends and I were walking to the beach to hang out for the day. We were walking in the center of the road giggling and talking about this and that, when we saw them.

I looked up to see the most beautiful set of eyes I had ever seen watching us as we walked by. I smiled, shyly, as the girls and I kept walking.

He was with two of his friends who looked a lot like him, and I wondered if they were his brothers. They were tall and built like professional Linebackers. They all smiled and whispered among themselves, as we giggled as young girls do.

The girls and I sat on a blanket we spread out on the sand, talking and sipping on the sodas we had brought with us, when we saw the boys again. "They must have followed us," one of the girls said, as we watched them started to pass a football around.

We also noticed how they threw the ball farther each time bringing them closer to us until it hit the sand next to our blanket, throwing sand all over us. We squealed as the sand hit our bodies, and the boys ran to our side apologizing for their follies. We all knew they did it on purpose.

They asked if they could sit down and talk for a while. We giggled once again and bid them to take a seat. After the introductions were out of the way, we learned a lot about one another. The boy named Harry asked Sue if she would go for a walk with him. She agreed as he jumped up, holding out his hand for her to take. She slipped her hand into his and they walked away.

The boy called Quil yelled for Harry to wait and asked my other friend to join him as well. Marcy jumped up, giving me a sad smile. I knew she didn't like leaving me alone with a strange guy, but I nodded letting her know it was okay. "Go have fun," I said as her smile grew and the two of them ran off to join the other two, leaving me with the one who had the beautiful smile.

He asked if I would do him the honor of accompanying him to the movies and maybe grab a bite to eat sometime. I smiled sweetly and agreed. He smiled proudly and asked if he could pick me up that Friday. Once again I agreed. I gave him my address and warned him of my parents, telling him that they were very protective of me. He smiled bravely, saying he would face a firing squad if that's what it took to be in my company.

I bit my bottom lip and blushed with excitement at what he would do for me. He met with my parents who loved him from first sight, whether it is because of who he was or was to be, I know not. I didn't care, for if there was a thing called love at first sight, it had happened to me.

We enjoyed each other's company and became very close over the space of a year. We started out holding hands, graduated, to him slipping his arm over my shoulder, which led to a kiss on my cheek. We grew to love one another unconditionally.

He asked me to marry him over a quiet dinner that he and his friends set up just for the two of us. I was so surprised I surrendered to tears, but I fully agreed to be his wife.

It was a small wedding with just his family and mine, and a few friends as he waited for me at the altar. With a proud smile and an irreversible I do, we were wed and on our way to our lives together forever.

He always made me feel special. He loved me and cared for me as if I was a princess. He would be sad at times, and when I asked him what bothered him he would tell me he felt bad that he couldn't give me more, that I deserved more. I smiled and placed my hands on each side of his face and told him I had him and that's all I would ever need. I remember the softness of his touch and how it made me shiver, the way he made me feel complete and how I was entirely his.

The sweetness of his breath, as he lightly and passionately kissed my lips, how he engulfed me in his strong masculine arms and made me feel safe and warm. The way he bedded me and made me feel as if there was more to life than this plane of existence; the love we shared was irrevocably unchangeable.

The day I told him of our pregnancy, he was ecstatically happy. He wouldn't let me out of his sight for one moment. He waited on me hand and foot and when I objected, he would smile lovingly and continued his special treatment of me.

He glowed when the twins were born, it didn't bother him a bit that they were girls, he only said a boy will come in time, and continued to spoil the girls delicately.

A boy did come a few years later, a sweet kind boy, a boy who was the spitting image of his father. He had his kind heart and sweet disposition. He loved his mother and showed me every respect a son could.

We would talk for hours sometimes, as he asked me questions, and I would give him answers the best I could.

I wanted him to grow up to respect women as his father did and he was off to a good start. His sisters would constantly pick on him, but he would only bid them to stop and leave so it wouldn't come to blows.

He would sit and watch as I cooked, keeping me company. I would let him lick the bowl in return.

Some days he would bring a friend over to watch me cook. I knew he had to have told her how I let him lick the bowl or would give him a cookie or some kind of treat as he sat and watched.

He and his friend would sit and watch, waiting to see what she would get for sitting as my son did. It was adorable to watch, especially when she would turn and kiss him on the cheek.

He loved his little friend, and I believe there is something special in the making between those two. They may be young now but I just have a feeling about this, we'll just have to sit and watch and see how it all turns out.

That's not to say that he didn't keep his father company as well, he did. His father would teach him to work on cars as he asked questions, and his father would answer. He also taught him about the importance of our responsibility to the tribe and how our people come first in their needs.

Our son was a sponge, he absorbed every aspect of life and lived it to his fullest. For as young as he was, he had a head on his shoulders.

We were a happy family. We shared our love between us as well as with our friends and helped them whenever it was needed. There were bad times, of course. There are always bad with the good but we learn to live with it.

My husband did the best he could to raise our family and was very good at it, but as I said sometimes it was rough.

I tried to help out once. I got a part time job cleaning offices and it was only for a short time. I would fill in when one of the girls was on vacation or called in sick. I would take over for whoever needed me. So twice a week for the next two weeks, my husband would take me to Port Angeles and drop me off at the city bank and pick me up two hours later, nothing to it, right?

He complained saying I didn't need to work, he had it all under control; and, of course I knew he did, but it wouldn't hurt to add a little extra money to the pot, right?

One the last day I had to work, it was pouring rain, it was a Friday night and not fit for any human being to be out. We were on our way home. My husband was making it known to me how glad he was that I was finally done with working and told me my place was at home with the kids. I agreed with a chuckled as he repeated his wishes to make sure I heard him.

I agreed positively once again, as he nodded his head and turned back to the road. That's when we saw a car headed straight for us. My husband hit his breaks and turned the wheel to get out of the way of the oncoming car. But, instead of our car moving out of the way, it went into a skid due to the rain and veered to the right. The oncoming car hit us on the passenger side of our car.

The sound of screeching metal and glass breaking was the last thing I remembered or heard before I woke standing next to my husband's bed at the hospital.

He lay in a bed with bandages covering his body, his eyes staring at the ceiling only blinking every now and then. Our children lined the end of his bed as tears flowed down their cheeks. The doctor stood at the other side of the bed explaining to him and our children how he would never walk again.

I looked to my right to see our best friend standing there with tears streaming down his cheeks as well, his head bowed so the children wouldn't see the tears.

Charlie had just lost his wife. She had run off with another man and took his only daughter and my son's best friend with her. Now he would have to deal with the life I left behind.

He gathered the children, as Sue Clearwater entered the room to take my children to her and Harry's house to care for them until Billy could come to fetch them.

Charlie walked back to the side of the bed and grabbed Billy's hand. Billy looked into his best friend's eyes as he let loose the tears he had held for the children's sake. Charlie cried alongside him as they held one another.

"You know I'm there for you no matter how long it takes?" Charlie told him.

"Thank you Charlie…you're a good friend. You're more than welcome to stay at the house for as long as you wish. I know you've had it rough yourself…what do you say we help one another get through this rough time?" Billy asked him. They smiled mournfully at one another.

It took Billy a long time to get over my death, as it did the children, the girls more than Jake. They were teens when I passed, and as soon as they were old enough they left and didn't come home for many years. They said the house reminded them of me, which saddened me. Oh, I am glad that I am remembered but not to the extent of Billy losing the girls.

Jake was another story. Although he mourned me, he was young and could deal with the situation. His friend Bella came back to be with him during this tough time in his life.

Of course Renee had to be coaxed a little with me whispering in her ear, but she got the message. Bella stood by my little Jake and held his hand, and at night she lay next to him and held him, as he cried his little eyes to sleep. I knew there was something special about that girl. Charlie's little girl will be Jake's one day. I can just feel it.

Yes, my name is Sarah Black, and this is my story. I died when a drunk driver fell asleep at the wheel and crossed the median and slammed into our car as Billy drove us home from Port Angeles.

Would we have lived long happy lives if I hadn't worked for those two weeks? Would we have been safe if I hadn't wanted to help out with the finances? Or was it meant to be?

Is there some force that governs our lives, to be in certain places at the right or wrong times? I don't know. All I know is that I died and my husband lost the use of his legs due to a man who thought it was more important to drive home from a party while intoxicated, than to stay where he was. A man who will lose his family and spend the rest of his life behind bars when all he had to do was lie down and sleep it off instead of climbing into a car and driving.