It has been more than six months since I have posted a story, yet there are still an average of almost 1300 hits to my stories every month. Still. Do you know how much that means to me? I might have been gone, but you beautiful readers didn't go anywhere.

I just wanted to let you all know that I love you still. Words are futile though, so how about a present? A new story? Just for you?

This is not a Camp Rock story. However, it is a spin-off from Escaping Gravity which was a Camp Rock story. You might recognise one of the characters. I thought you might like it. If not, that's okay too. I hope you do though. :)

Here we go... again.

Only Time

"'So tell me darling, will you wish we'd fall in love?'

'Yeah, all the time.'"

Owl City – The Saltwater Room

"Riley, can I bring you something to drink?"

I can hear Taylor calling me from the kitchen, but my sleep soaked brain has a hard time deciphering his words.

"Sorry?"

Taylor appears in the living room doorway. "I'm making a drink. Would you like one?" He smiles at me.

I smile back and half sit up, running my hands through my messy sleep hair, blinking groggily. "Yes please. Just water would be nice."

He laughs because I'm still half asleep and disappears back into the kitchen. "One water, coming right up."

In a minute he is back and he ruffles my hair affectionately as he hands me a glass of iced water. He sits down on the couch opposite and looks at me as I drink. "Had a nice sleep?"

"Yes," I look at him. "Thank you." I run my fingers through my hair again. His place is the only place I can sleep. Home feels like school – books piled on top of each other, papers strewn across the floor, roommates who fight with their boyfriends in the middle of the night.

Then there is me in the centre of that mess. Just trying to get through college; through Juilliard. Trying to do my best to make my family proud, trying to make something of my life. To be someone, anyone, to be me. Whoever that is.

But Taylor's place is quiet, peaceful, restful. He doesn't have roommates; he doesn't live in the college dorm. He says the reason he has his own apartment is because he needs the peace and quiet to practice his music.

He's my best friend, but I know he's lying. The real reason is because his parents are loaded and they gave him this apartment as a peace offering when they moved to Boston two years ago.

I've met Taylor's parents. I've been to Boston with him during summer break. They're nice. I'm sad that they've moved away. They are stable, a normal family. Not like mine growing up.

But that's another story. One that's not entirely mine to tell.

And now I have a family and now I have Taylor. He is everything to me. He's just a friend, but I love him more than I thought was humanly possible. But not in the lovey-dovey, Valentine kind of way. Just in the way that he's my friend and I love him.

I met Taylor in my first week at Julliard. I was feeling lost after all the orientation lectures, so I snuck away, thinking that maybe I'd find somewhere to get a coffee or something. Instead I found one of the practice rooms. They were a novel idea to me then. They are an everyday sight now. All the practice rooms are soundproof – so you don't disturb other people and they don't disturb you I suppose. But they have glass doors.

And through the glass I could see a man, hardly more than a boy, wearing a white shirt and dark blue jeans, playing the piano.

I didn't notice the fact that his shirt wasn't ironed or his hair hadn't been done that morning. I didn't notice the satchel slung carelessly by the door. All I noticed was his fingers, flying over the keys, the way his body moved in time to the music and the pages and pages of music notes strewn around the room, covered in pencil marks.

I wanted to knock, but I didn't want to disturb him so I just opened the door, slipped in and quietly shut it behind me. He didn't look up. I didn't expect him to. I was as lost in his music as he was.

I have always known that there is music inside of me. It makes me do things that no one else can. It made me want to live at a time when no one else could convince me that life was worth persevering for. The music drew me to him. It created a bond between us that told me we would be friends long before his fingers stopped moving and the piece finished.

When the last note faded into silence, he looked up. I half expected him to be startled, but another part of me said that he wouldn't be because the music had connected us. And I was right.

Our eyes met. He smiled. And we were friends.

So I have known Taylor for three years now. His house has become my second home. He's become the one person I can rely on no matter what. Sure, my sister and her husband and his brother and wife and all their children live in the city. And I love them, but they are not there for me in the same way that he is. They do not go for midnight coffee runs with me, or stay up all night helping me compose a new song, or sit out on the rooftop of the apartment building in the middle of winter, just because the stars are pretty. He does.

He is my sanity.

Taylor leans forward then and picks up one of my books, rousing me from my thoughts. He flicks through the music score and I can almost see the notes playing in his head. He frowns at one part and then goes back over it, mentally replaying it until he's worked it out. He nods, satisfied, when it's clear in his mind.

Then he flicks his blonde hair back – that hair that always looks perfect even when it's messy or he's just gotten out of bed – and flashes a crooked grin at me.

"Shall I play you a song?"

"Mmm," I murmur, lying back on the couch and watching him through half shut eyes as he goes to sit at the piano. His fingers touch the keys softly, reverently and then he begins to lose himself in the music.

I watch the way his hair falls in his eyes and his fingers dance across the keys, letting the music consume him, take over him, empower him. They are one – the music and him.

And sitting there watching him, I wish that I could love him as more than a friend. But I don't. At all. And it's strange because we would be so perfect. Music brought us together, as friends, but nothing further has happened. Why?

I can tell that he is thinking too because his fingers start to slow, even though I know this song and I know that it's not over yet. He has wondered the same thing before too. He has mentioned that all his friends think we're together already. That's not exactly surprising considering the amount of time I spend sleeping on his couch. But it's also not true. Because we love each other as friends, as musicians. But we're not in love.

Then his fingers stop completely and there is quiet in the room. Not heavy, overpowering silence. Just quiet. Peace. Then he looks at me and smiles, so I get up and walk across the room and sit on the piano stool next to him.

How many times have we sat like this? Side by side - him playing, me singing; or both of us playing; or writing a song together. It's comfortable here, just enough room for the two of us on the stool. As if it were made for us.

He puts his left arm around me and I lean into him. With his other hand he starts to play softly, tinkling out a tune on the high notes. I can tell he's thinking.

Then he stops and looks at me. I know he's about to say something. He reaches up and smooths a piece of hair back from my face and I smile because this is what he always does.

"Tell me something," he says softly and I look at him and nod.

"Anything."

"Do you ever wish we'd fall in love?"

I smile at him. "Yeah, all the time."

He smiles back. "Me too. But its not happening, is it?"

I shake my head slightly. "No."

He looks at me searchingly. "You're my best friend Riley."

"You're my best friend too."

Then Taylor leans forward and brushes my hair back from my forehead, caressing my cheek with his thumb. The next thing I know is that his lips are touching mine softly. I smile and move mine against his. It is nice. Warm, soft, sweet. A very compatible kiss. Born out of being completely at home with who the other is.

But there are no fireworks, no spark – just comfortableness. And after a minute we pull back and smile at each other. Then Taylor looks at me and laughs. "You know we were made for each other Riley."

I laugh too, "I know." I pull my hand back from his cheek and he takes his off my hair and places both hands on the keys. He starts to play softly. I put my hands on the low notes and we begin to harmonise together.

Then Taylor stops again and I can feel him looking at me even though I'm focusing on the way my fingers are moving over the keys. "What will it take," he says softly, "To make this into love?"

I pause and look at him. Then I smile gently. "Only time." And he smiles back and puts his hands back on the keys and begins to play again.

After a minute I begin again too and the notes mix together perfectly, completing the song, completing us. The music is in us and of us. Together we are complete. I smile at the keys and even though I'm not looking at him, I can tell Taylor's smiling too.

Only time.

Was that a good enough comeback piece? Or should I not come back? I can't decide. You let me know.

I love you.

-Hannah