So, I know this wasn't the second most popular in my poll, but I've been working on this one for a while and I'm kind of dying for feedback. I have a few chapters written already, but I'm kind of having writers block on it. ABOUT THE RATING: it could probably be considered T, but I just want to be safe. Well, here goes nothing....

"The darker the secret the harder you keep it,
But it's no victory always running away like I do
I always know that I'll come back to you"
- At Full Speed, Jack's Mannequin

Chapter 1: Reunion

FLASHBACK

It was the last week of summer and Miley and Nick were lying in the sweet New Jersey grass looking at the stars. They were fourteen and they were best friends who had just had the best summer of their young lives. Every day was spent at each other's houses or taking trips with their parents (whom were also best friends) to the good old Jersey Shore.

Every summer night for as long as they could remember being friends (which was, in fact, forever since they were born just two months apart) they had laid there looking at the skies. At one point their parents used to come out here and point out the stars and constellations to them and they had been entranced. Long after their siblings stopped this tradition, they continued it, mystified and humbled by the heavens. Now the parents sat on the porch talking late into the muggy nights as Nick and Miley lay in the grass still in awe of the stars above them.

But tonight was different than other nights. In fact, tonight was the night Nick was finally going to tell Miley how he felt about her. He had been in love with her forever it seemed, but he had only just this summer realized it. The way she laughed, the way she talked, the way she loved everyone and everything, the way she just was. It was all that Nick had ever needed in his life.

He turned over in the grass and propped his head up on his elbow facing her.

"Miley"

She turned to him, her beautiful blue eyes meeting with his own and he was lost for a second. He was young, but he knew that if he could just see those eyes everyday for the rest of his life he could be happy forever.

"Nick" she said smiling, her pink braces showing. Something she only did around him and her family, around everyone else she was too embarrassed to let those braces show.

"Miley, I need to tell you something" he said very seriously.

"That's funny 'cause I need to tell you something too" she said equally serious.

"You first" he said graciously.

"No, you. You brought it up"

"Okay, me first than" Nick agreed. He had a speech already prepared, but as he looked at her it completely slipped his mind, "Miley, you're my best friend."

"Thanks, captain obvious" she said rolling her eyes.

"No, seriously. I've never had a friend like you ever. And I never want anyone to replace you..."

She smiled. Nick had always been kind of shy and didn't really express his feelings like this ever. She knew that he appreciated her, but it was nice to hear him say it.

"I guess, what I'm trying to say is, Miley, I think, I think I might be in love with you."

Her huge blue eyes opened wider if that was possible and she stared at him in shock.

"Please say something" he begged of her.

"I-" she started.

"Miley!" her father called from the porch, "Time to go!"

"One second!" she called back.

"No, Miles, now. It's almost midnight!"

She looked at him helplessly and shrugged her shoulders, they were still young and completely under their parents jurisdiction.

"I gotta go" she said turning to leave.

"I'll see you tomorrow." he said walking back with her to the front of the house though the fence where her parents were waiting for her. She gave him a funny look and he saw a flash of a distant emotion cross over her face, but it quickly left her delicate features.

"'Bye Nick" she said and impulsively gave him a kiss on the cheek before hopping into the car.

He stood there in the humid air for a long time staring at the darkness her car had disappeared into. He brought his hand to his cheek and it felt very warm. It gave him hope that whatever she was going to say to him before they were interrupted was definitely going to be good.

END FLASHBACK

Nick sat up suddenly in his bed, waking from a dream that he knew had been a reality.

That was the last time he had seen her. Four years ago. She had left without telling him goodbye. Even now as he thought back to that night, he wondered if what he had said to her had anything to do with her leaving even though he knew that wasn't true.

She had jetted off to New Hampshire to attend a fancy boarding school. It was all part of her obtaining her life's goal: Get into Yale.

Yale was where her parents had met. Yale was where Nick and Miley's parents had met. To Miley it had seemed like a magical place, and if there was one thing that girl wanted she set her mind to it until she got it. She had spent her summers in France working on her accent and fluency and had rarely ever come home. All of it to insure her future at Yale.

For the first year of high school the future had never been on Nick's mind. Nick lived for lazy days spent lying in the grass. He liked playing his guitar alone in the woods and trying pot with his friends. However, somewhere between freshman and sophomore year it occurred to Nick that he might never see Miley again. That thought made him feel very, very lonely and he had spent that week lying in bed getting stoned in his room and blocking out everyone and everything.

He tried to forget Miley, but not even the drugs could chase her out of his mind. She was like a part of him, like an arm or a leg. He couldn't get rid of her.

And then he had another revelation: Yale. Yale was the one certainty in her life. If she wanted to get there, she would. And so Nick picked himself up and got his act together. He quickly shot to the front of his class and had graduated second best. He had received the same early acceptance letter from Yale as Miley had. And after this summer that was where he was headed.

Nick got up and sighed. It was another Jersey summer, which meant another barbeque with his parents and all their friends. Another thing Miley used to be part of. But now Joe would invite people from their old school over and Nick would pretend that he was interested. It wasn't that Nick didn't have friends, in fact he had a lot of friends, everyone wanted to be friends with him. He had managed to stay on the cool side of smart and it didn't hurt that he didn't mind getting buzzed on the weekends as long as he didn't have anything else going on. The problem was Nick hadn't found the same effortless friendship he shared with Miley. And maybe it wasn't possible to find that. They had grown up together; no one could be quite the same as her.

There had been other girls, of course. He wasn't about to go through his high school years without being with anyone. His current girlfriend, Alex, for instance. She had dark hair and dark eyes and a good sense of humor. She liked partying and being in large groups of people. She was pretty and she liked him so he went for it. And he liked her, he really did. But he also knew that this coming fall he would be seeing Miley again and he wasn't sure if that was good or bad.

Nick got up and tugged on khaki cargo shorts and an orange polo. He looked in the mirror and tousled his curly hair with his hand until it looked just perfectly messed up. He could already hear his parents cooking downstairs. They loved to entertain, they loved people and having large quantities of them over for dinners that they prepared themselves. He strode down the stairs and saw his mom chopping something and his dad making burgers from a huge pile of ground beef. He walked over to his mom and kissed her on the cheek and wished her a good morning.

He then slid out the glass doors that lead into the backyard. Over the years, the Lucas family had installed a pool in the backyard and he found Joe sitting on a lounger wearing ray bans and smoking a cigarette.

"You know, Mom and Dad would die if they saw you smoking" Nick said standing over his older brother.

"Relax, Little Bro," he said, "I'm legal, so what are they going to do about it?"

Joe had always been the one who had the 'I don't care attitude'. It simultaneously made Nick hate him and love to be around him. He was a good boy at heart, but he liked to take risks and he knew that he could charm his way out of anything. He had gone to UCLA for college, but was home because as he put it he "couldn't stay away from a classic Jersey summer" which meant he didn't have enough money to stay in LA and so he was bumming it out at home.

"Sit down" he said gesturing the chair next to him, "Tell Brother Joe all your problems. Any new ladies?"

Nick sat down on the lounger facing Joe.

"Her name's Alex" he admitted resting his elbows on his knees and leaning forward slightly.

"Alex Russo?"

"Yeah."

"Nice, she was like the hottest freshman when I was senior. All the guys were dying to get with her." Joe said approvingly.

"Yup, she's, uh, really something," Nick said back.

"You invite her to the barbecue later?"

"Well, duh, Joe. She's my girlfriend," Nick said annoyed already. He had no reason to be annoyed, Joe was just curious about Nick's life as they hadn't really seen each other that much since Joe had gone away for college, but Alex was kind of a tough subject for Nick.

"You tap that yet?"

Nick cringed at his brother's crude language. He knew he wasn't a bad person by any means; he could just be so insensitive sometimes.

"No, man, I haven't 'tapped that' yet"

"Oh yeah you're saving yourself for Miiiiiiley" Joe said dragging out her name, "Still can't believe you got into Yale, bro. Nice one."

"Thanks, I worked hard. I'm going to go see if Mom and Dad need any help, later" Nick said and went inside just to get away from Joe and his nosiness.

However once he got inside his parents waved off his attempts to help them so he decided to go back up to his room and take a nap before the party began.

---

It was barely even dark when everyone started arriving due to daylights saving time. It had always amazed Nick how this time during the winter it would be pitch black, but now you wouldn't even notice it was night until it was past nine.

He was sipping on a spiked coke, wishing it was beer, but that would be too obvious. Although he was pretty sure his parents were aware of what went down. His arm was around Alex's waist and she sipped her also spiked beverage slowly making conversation with the young folk around them. The buzz of the alcohol and possibly the half joint he had smoked before was making him feel slightly detached from everyone around him… and slightly hungry.

There was a commotion at the door as someone new came into the backyard. Nick looked away disinterested and continued to listen to Alex talk about how she was going to LA to become an actress and tried not to roll his eyes at how ridiculous she sounded.

Then Nick heard a name on his ears that made his head turn so fast he almost broke his neck. Instantly he felt sober and alert.

"Miley! So nice to see you after all this time!" his mother was exclaiming throwing her arms around a gorgeous brunette who hugged her back tightly as if she was her own mother.

She was about five foot five, but her legs looked like they went on for miles. They were accented by her short green Juicy dress and her sun kissed shoulders were also on display as it was strapless. White heels completed the look making her legs look even more tantalizing. Her hair was long and curly and cascaded down her shoulders and back, it was chestnut brown with caramel colored highlights. She was so thin she looked like she could wrap her arms around herself, but she still had enough curves to fill out that dress. She had Gucci aviators over her eyes but when she pulled them up onto her head, he could see the blue shining all the way from where he was. She was absolutely perfect.

There was no way that was the same Miley who was his best friend back in middle school. That girl was awkward and unsure of herself and wouldn't be caught dead in a dress. Her hair was always tangled and she had pink braces on her teeth. As he watched her talk her teeth were white, shiny, and perfect, no more braces for her. She had grown beautifully into her features and she looked truly beautiful.

His hand dropped from Alex's waist unconsciously. She looked up at him with her dark eyes and then followed his gaze to Miley. Her eyes narrowed.

"Who's that?" she asked with a tinge of jealousy in her voice.

"That's Miley" he said matter-of-factly. Her mouth formed the shape of a tiny 'O'. So that was Miley. It wasn't as if she hadn't heard stories about her or seen Nick's face when one of his family members brought her up. And now she knew what all the commotion was about.

"C'mon. Let's go say hi" Nick said excitedly heading over to her leaving Alex standing there. She looked at him perplexed and then followed behind him slowly.

As he walked towards Miley her eyes scanned the backyard as if looking for a familiar face. They landed on him and her smile widened. She rushed down the stairs of the patio onto the lawn and Nick quickened his step as well. His cheeks hurt he was grinning so hard.

"Nick!" she cried out and ran into his arms. He wrapped them around her tiny body, his arms almost circling her twice, squeezing her tightly like he never wanted to let go and she squeezed back just as hard.

They had almost forgotten the rest of the world existed when they both heard a tiny impatient cough. They broke away and turned to look at the maker of the sound.