Disclaimer: Not mine, all Disney's. Yeah, I know that you guys are waiting patiently for "Broken", and it's started, I swear. I should have it out by the end of this weekend--I'm sitting myself a quota, and I am going to fill it. I have about five more stories/chapters to fill it with! Anyway, this is another of my depressing fics, though it will be happy for awhile...hopefully, this story won't confuse you to much...this fist chapter doesn't make a lot of sense, but trust me, it will work. Anyway, without further ado...

Forever and A Day

Chapter 1

The cold wind prickled at her skin, making her shiver and wrap her arms around herself. The breeze caught her long black and swept it up and away, swirling around and dancing in the wind, like a tumbleweed caught in a whirlwind. A piece of jet black hair fell across her face and stuck to the dampness that covered her cheek. Sniffing loudly, the young woman reached up to brush back the hair, tucking it securely behind her ear.

How could this happen? This wasn't suppose to happen. They were suppose to live happily ever after. They were suppose to get the fairy tale. They were suppose to be together.

He was meant for her, and she was meant for him. They were entwined in ways she didn't even understand, and she thought she had understood everything about their relationship. He completed her in ways that no one ever had, made her whole in body and in spirit.

He was everything to her, and now he was gone. How was she suppose to live without him? She couldn't do it--because she didn't want to live without him. It hadn't been her choice, and she knew that she would never ever get use to the fact that when she woke up in the morning, or walked into school, or looked across the hallway, his amazing eyes wouldn't be there, looking back at her with such tenderness and love and need and longing that she felt that she could fly.

He was gone now, gone to Heaven or Hell or Purgatory, or maybe even somewhere else entirely. Gone to the stars, so that he could always look down on her and the rest of them, and send them his love and give them his protection.

He had always been her protector. From the very first time she had meet him, he had protected her--from the school bully, from the world, from herself. When she felt that she couldn't, he made her believe that she could. He had inspired her, loved her, needed her, wanted her.

She wanted him. She wanted to feel his smooth skin beneath her fingertips again, wanted to look into those dark eyes, so deep that she was afraid that she would drown in them if she looked long enough. She wanted to feel his lips press against her, wanted to feel his silky hair brush against the palms of her hands when she helped him tame his wild mane. She wanted him, complete and whole and healthy and in her arms, where he had always been meant for.

His place was with her, now, then, in the future, always. He was for her, and she was for him--that was the way that it had always been, that was the way that whoever controlled fate had intended for it to be. It had been meant to be since the day they were created. Their souls were one; their hearts beat together; they were linked in ways that most people could never even hope to fathom.

Love wasn't a strong enough word---she had felt more for him, and he had felt more for her. He was her lover, her best friend, her angel and her devil, her soul mate.

She'd heard his mother use the phrase once, and it had seemed to fit, because that was what she felt for him. She felt that he was the other half of her that she had been searching for since before she had known that she had been searching for it. When she had found that other mysterious other half, in her best friend of all people, she thought that she was, for once, truly blessed.

He was hers, and she was his, and she had thought that was how it would always be. That was how is should have always been. But Fate was cruel, and that wasn't how it worked out...

******

"School...is completely...pointless." Catie Roth emphasized each point she made by chucking a book or notebook into her locker and then slamming the heavy metal door.

"Oh come on now Catie---you can't say that it's *completely* pointless." Jamie Waite teased her, from his position leaning back against the lockers.

"Yes I can." The dark haired girl muttered, spinning the combination on her locker, and then kicking the door for good measure.

"How can you say that?" Jamie challenged, grinning his slow grin at her.

"I move my mouth." Catie shot back, opening and closing her mouth a few times to demonstrate. "See?"

"Oh, yes I do see. That's very good." He laughed, reaching out to lightly tap her mouth. "How do you make it work? Batteries? Nuclear fission?"

"I don't remember--I failed biology, remember?" Catie laughed, swinging her black hair behind her and shifting her bag a couple of inches higher on her shoulder.

"Oh yeah--I remember, because I sat right behind you and copied off your papers. But amazingly enough, I managed to pass." Jamie reminisced, rubbing his chin.

"I think you must have copied wrong." The pale brunette informed him, chuckling.

"Yeah, only I would manage to pass a class by copying the wrong answers." The dark haired youth laughed, running a hand through his spiky hair.

"Fate smiles upon you." Catie allowed cryptically, lifting a dark eyebrow and grinning at him, her eyes shining mysteriously.

"I would say so." Jamie snickered. "Wonder why?"

"You were born under a good star." Catie explained knowingly, nodding her head sagely.

"Which star was that?" He wanted to know. "I was born during the day!"

"Then it would be the SUN, dingy! The SUN is a star, remember?" Catie teased him, rolling her eyes and giggling. "You must have not passed earth science."

"No, you weren't in there for me to copy the wrong answers from!" Jamie laughed, and after a second Catie joined in, her eyes glittering in amusement.

"Is that all you want from me? Someone to copy the WRONG answers from, Waite?" Catie charged, stopping in the middle of the nearly deserted high school hall and poking a finger into his well muscled abs.

"Ummm...yes?" Jamie chuckled, before ducking away from her hand and running down that hall.

"That's it! Jamie! Come back here!" Catie yelled, chasing after her best friend, her long black hair flying out behind her.

Each step he took, his heavy combat boots thumped against the tile of the building, leaving behind a trail of sound that Catie could easily follow. The young woman hustled after her much taller, and faster friend, her purse banging against her hip softly, just enough to get her attention, but not to hurt. He ducked around a corner, leaving her sight.

Suddenly, the sound of his boots stopped, and Catie slid to a stop on her soft slipper shoes as she reached the conjunction where she had last seen Jamie. Very carefully, the young woman looked around, expecting her best friend to jump out and scare her out of her skin, and she was determined not to let him get away with it.

However, he got away with it anyway. He had somehow managed to hide himself in a little corner, keeping himself away from her searching eyes. He grinned in the darkness, watching her look around for him, wondering what was going through her mind right now.

"Jamie?" She finally gave up looking for him and called out his name, hoping that he would answer. "Jamie, I know your out there, and your going to jump out and scare the living daylights out of me, so would you please just go ahead and do it? I'm really very buseeeeeeeeeeeeeccccccckkkk!!"

Catie never got to finish her tirade, because Jamie took her up on her offer and leapt out of the corner, and grabbing her from behind wrapping his long around her body, pinning her arms to her sides and twirling her around and off her feet.

"Jamieeeee! Put meeee dddddoooooowwwwwnnnnn!!" Catie laughed, wiggling in his embrace, trying to pull herself out of his arms.

"Never! Your mine now, Caitlin Roth, mine forever!" Jamie cracked up swinging her around one more time before setting her on her feet.

"Yours forever huh? What are you going to do with me for forever?" Catie wanted to know, looking back at him with twinkling eyes. Jamie smiled down at her, and let her go.

"I'm going...ummm...shower you with gifts and my undying love!" He declared passionately, throwing himself down at her feet and wrapping his arms around her knees.

"Oh really? That's cool. I've always want some one to buy me stuff." Catie smirked, patting the top of his spiky hair. His hair felt good against her fingers, and she had to fight the urge to run her fingers through it again.

"And to love you undyingly?" Jamie prompted from the floor.

"Is undyingly even a word?" Catie asked, tapping her chin.

"Well?" Jamie demanded.

"Well what? I'm sorry, were you saying something?" The girl asked him, her eyes glittering wickedly.

"Ooh, your a bad girl Catie. Crushing my heart like that!" Jamie mocked wailed, throwing his head back, and pushing one hand to his fore head, while keeping a sturdy grip on her legs with the other one.

"Yes, yes I know. I am a very bad girl." She admitted, nodding her head.

"Well, you know what we do with bad girls in this state don't you?"

"Elect them to high ranking offices?" Catie tried, smirking.

"Not quite." Jamie laughed, wrapping his other arm back around her legs. This, Catie realized in retrospect, should have been a tip off to his intentions.

"Then whhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaattttttt?" Catie found herself squealing for the third time in the last half hour as Jamie lifted her clean off the ground and slung her over his shoulder, carrying her fireman style. "JAMIE!! PUT ME DOWN NOW!"

"What what that? I thought I heard something." Jamie called back to her, heading off down the hallway.

"Jamie! Where are we going!? Put me DOWN!" Catie couldn't help but laugh--she felt so silly, hanging over his shoulder and staring at his... "Hey, you know, you have a NICE butt."

If she had been hoping that that little comment would be enough to make him put her down, she was sadly mistaken. He just laughed at her, and continued on toward his destination, where ever that may be.

"Where are we GOING?!" She finally had to ask, her voice shaking with laughter.

"We are going...somewhere else. Somewhere that is not...here." Jamie said decisively, before laughing again at Catie's indignant sequels.

"Don't you have to work today?" She asked, debating on whether or not pinching him on the behind would make him put her down or not.

"Yes I do, but first I'm going to have my way with you!" Jamie told her firmly.

"Oh, that sounds promising..." Catie laughed wickedly.

"Oh yes...I was thinking, maybe in the garbage can out by the bleachers?" He snickered.

"Oooh....kinky..." She laughed, banging one of her fists against the small of his back in an attempt to get him to put her down.

Jamie didn't answer back, he just laughed and continued his stroll down the hallway. Catie giggled and kicked her legs carefully, trying to keep from hurting him to bad.

"Excuse me?" A man cleared his throat and then asked. Jamie stopped and winced, before turning around.

"Um... hi Vice Principal Carson..." Jamie began, as respectfully as he could manage, with Catie hanging over his shoulder.

"How are you today?" Catie asked VP Carson, as sweetly as she could, even though her words were slightly muffled by Jamie's back.

"Miss Roth. Mr. Waite. My office. Now. I believe you know the way." Carson ordered the duo. Jamie nodded and began walking toward the office, Catie still slung over his shoulder.

"Put Miss Roth DOWN, Mr. Waite."