Not Just Me Anymore

Sequel to Lost on the Road of Life

By toddmanningfreak1112

Chapter 1

Lily Vickers could not believe how much could change in a year. A year ago, she had wandered into Llanview trying to make a life for herself although she was barely fifteen. She had thought that her brother, sister, and mother died, and her adoptive father simply did not want her. She thought that no one in the world loved her; little did she know that Llanview, what her Uncle Todd often referred to as "Devil's second Hell," held the key to all of her healing and happiness. The fact was that her mother, sister, and brother were alive, and her biological father (and pretty much all of her extended family for that matter) were there in Llanview all along! While there were many speed bumps along the way, Lily had almost forgotten life in Baltimore with Richard Patterson. Almost.

Still, not all things were positive in that past year. One of the negative things was her friends; sure, she had a lot of them in the past year. Lily and these girls Leigh, Sandy, Connie, Ginny, and Farah were all in a clique that the school nicknamed "The Gossip Girls" because they were always giggling and whispering down the hallway. Although they were all extremely close, the group had dissolved over the summer. Leigh was accepted at Interlochen Arts Academy and planned to go there for the remainder of her high school education. Connie's father's company had relocated to Los Angeles, and she moved across the country there.

"It's okay," she had told them excitedly when she broke the news. "I'll finally be able to pursue that modeling career that I always wanted."

Sandy, meanwhile, had completely lost the trust of all of her friends and her boyfriend when she tried to seduce Ginny's boyfriend, Steve. After Steve exploited her, she sort of disappeared over the summer, and everyone had to wonder if she would be back at Llanview High for their sophomore year. Ginny was still there also, but she started to hang out less and less with her sister, Farah, ("I see enough of her at home," she joked.) and their friends and started to hang out with her own friends

While some friends had drifted away, Lily still had Farah, Jade, and her boyfriend, Granger. They had all been there for her when she needed them most, and she loved them for that. Even they were changing. Jade, who broke up with Connie when she moved, started to be more flirty when it came to Lily, and Farah, whose boyfriend died in a snowboarding accident, had taken off a gold band that he had given to her.

"It's not an engagement ring," she had explained. "It was just a sign of commitment that I was his and he was mine, that's all. And now that I'm over him, I'm over this ring." With that, she had tossed the ring into Llantano Lake, but Lily could swear that she could still see the ring glistening from the bottom of the water.

After she had taken the ring off, Farah was a little more clingy to Granger. Lily thought nothing of it; after all, they had been friends longer than Lily had even known them. Still, she wished that Granger would step up and remind her that he had a girlfriend whom he loved very much, but of course, that never happened.

"I'm home!" Lily called opening the large door of Llanfair. She did not expect anyone to answer; Sarah and CJ and both resumed their lives and moved out of Llanfair a few months ago, and Tina was simply never home. She had decided to take up the family career of journalism and start her own magazine called Insanity!, but she seemed to always be out with one of her models than in the office ordering people around like Lily's stepmother, Dorian, often did at Craze! Viki was probably in her office at The Banner.

She sighed; she really wished that she had invited Farah over after they had gone shopping, but then she remembered that Granger had promised her to help her study. Lily offered to go, but Granger warned her against it hinting that Farah could be slightly moody today. Today was her boyfriend, George's, birthday, and she felt guilty about throwing his ring in Llantano Lake. Although Lily wanted to be there for her best friend, she decided against it knowing that Granger would know how to handle this.

"Lily, is that you?" a voice finally called from the kitchen. Lily made her way into the kitchen, where she saw her cousins, Jessica Vega and Natalie McBain, smoothies.

"You put too much banana in!" Natalie complained trying to reach into the blender.

"Will you just shut up?" Jessica groaned with a smile. "I know what I'm doing, you're just going to ruin it if I let you be in charge!"

"Hey, Lily," Natalie sighed, finally acknowledging her cousin. "Will you tell Jessica that she's putting in too much banana?"

"I am not!" Jessica shot back.

"What are you two doing here?" Lily wanted to know. Both of her cousins were married and lived with their husbands.

"Well, Jessica's blender broke, and John and I don't have a blender," Natalie explained. "We were going to go to the store, but Jess obviously thought that I made a better smoothie."

"Yeah right," Jessica replied rolling her eyes. "Do you want to join us, Lily?"

"Sure, I'm starved."

"Hey, where are your friends?" Natalie wanted to know. Usually, Lily had come home to Llanfair with Jade, Farah, or Granger. Today, she had shown up all alone.

"Oh…umm…I went shopping with Farah, but she decided to go over Granger's."

"I thought you were Granger's girlfriend, not Farah," Jessica observed turning on the blender. "Why aren't you at Granger's with her?"

"Is everything okay?" Natalie added.

"Everything's fine," Lily sighed resting her head on the table. "Everything between Granger and me is fine. It's…it's Farah's boyfriend's birthday; you know, the one who died in the snowboarding accident? Well, Granger and Farah wanted to celebrate it. I offered to go and be there for him, but Granger insisted that I shouldn't. I don't know, things between Granger and me haven't been the same since…" Her voice trailed off.

"Since what?" Jessica asked.

"Never mind."

"Knock knock!" Lily called playfully while quietly rapping her knuckles on the door of Granger's apartment. She had just gotten back from her Sweet Sixteen birthday party that David and Dorian threw her at Capricorn. Somehow, they had managed to convince Antonio to close the bar for the night, serve non-alcoholic drinks, and turn the whole place into a pink fantasy.

"Only for you," Antonio had told her.

"Who is it?" Granger's voice sang from behind the door.

"It's me," Lily sang back in perfect harmony. "I'm here for the 'other' birthday present that you promised me. So come on, let's see it."

"Hold on, I'm almost ready!" She heard a crash and smiled to herself.

"Well, hurry up, will ya? I look like such an idiot just standing here!" She looked around, cautious about someone finding her here. Granger is eighteen and entitled to live on his own, but how would it look if someone she knew found her at his apartment close to midnight? Rex and Adriana had a loft upstairs, and Michael, Marcie, John, and Natalie lived in the Angel Square hotel. She shivered and hugged her white sweater around her glittering pink dress. "Granger, come on!"

A second later, the door opened a crack, and Lily could barely make out Granger's coffee colored eye. "What's the password?" he asked in a whisper.

Lily giggled. "I love you."

"Correct." He opened the door wider and Lily hurried in.

"What were you thinking making me wait out there so long? Like, half of my family lives here! Would you imagine what would happen if John caught me out here? He'd tell my parents! And I mean, maybe my mom and dad wouldn't freak, but Dorian? Oh, that's another story." She took off her sweater and threw it onto the couch. She finally looked up and saw the dim scene around her. "Oh…" she gasped.

The room was dimly lighted by a thousand red candles giving off a warm, cinnamon scent. "Oh my god," she whispered taking a step forward. "Granger…it's…it's…" She could not find the words, but she knew exactly what she had in mind.

Granger shook his head. "I should've known you wouldn't like it," he grumbled making his way over to the candles and attempting to blow them out."

"No, I love it!" Lily replied taking Granger's hand. "And I love you."

"Ugh…" Lily set down her smoothie and clutched her stomach. She was feeling nauseous again, the same way she had been feeling that morning.

"Are you okay?" Natalie asked rubbing her cousin's back.

The nausea had stopped by now, taking Lily by surprise. "Yeah," she replied sitting back up. "I just felt sick for a minute, but now I'm fine. It went away."

"See, Jess, I told you that you put too much banana in those smoothies," Natalie groaned jokingly.

"Oh, come on, bananas are good for your stomach," Jessica argued.

"Jess, seriously, it wasn't your smoothie. I've just been…off today."

"Well, are you sure you're okay?" Jessica wanted to know. "Maybe we should call Michael and have him check you out."

"No, seriously, it's okay," Lily protested. She pulled out her cell phone. "Actually, I have to be at work in fifteen minutes, and then I'm sleeping over Dad and Dorian's, so I really should go."

"Well, are you okay driving?" Natalie asked standing up from her chair. "Maybe Jess and I should drop you off, just to make sure that you get there okay."

"No, I'm fine. I'm seriously fine. I felt worse this morning, but just now wasn't as bad."

"Okay, well if you're sure," Natalie said uncertainly.

"I'm sure," Lily replied in a rush. "I really have to go…see ya." Without any other word to either of her cousins, Lily left Llanfair.

Lily loved working at Lindsay's Art Gallery more than anything; it was her escape from home and from her friends, for that matter. No matter how messed up her life was, work was sort of like stepping into a different realm. Most of all, she loved working for Lindsay. Lindsay had been sort of like the motherly influence in Lily's life since Tina wasn't always around and Dorian and Lily never got along.

"It's very interesting," Lindsay observed. "Great angle and everything. Cristian, you have undeniable talent with a camera." Cristian Vega had stopped in with yet another amazing masterpiece. Whether painting or taking photographs, Lily always admired Cristian's work. "What do you call this, Cristian?"

"It doesn't have a name yet," Cristian admitted. "I just got finished with it, actually, and I wanted to show it to you before you closed for the night."

"Name or not, I love it!" Lily smiled peering over Lindsay's shoulder to look at the photograph. It was a picture of a canary that was flying into the sunset. The canary looked as if it were trying to escape its life…exactly how Lily was feeling these days.

"It's okay if you're not ready," Granger said quickly. "I mean, I'm eighteen, I'm older, but you're only sixteen--"

"Granger, did you hear what I just said?" Lily smiled taking Granger's shoulders and making him look at her. "I am ready." She pressed her head against Granger's chest and inhaled his scent. "God, I love you. You're my escape from life."

"Ugh!" The nausea was back. "Where the hell is this coming from?" Lily thought.

"Lily, what's wrong?" Lindsay asked putting an arm around the teenager. Cristian quickly set down the photograph and pulled out a chair for Lily to sit in.

"I don't know. This morning I was really sick, but I felt better, and this afternoon I started to feel sick again. I think I caught something…"

"Okay, well I'm going to take you to your dad's and Dorian's," Lindsay declared getting out her keys.

"No, Lindsay, please, I'll be fine. If we just show up, then Dorian is just going to be freaking annoying, and I can't handle that. Correction: I can't really handle her anyway, so--"

"Lily, you should really just listen to Lindsay," Cristian insisted. "Honestly, she's going to end up getting her way anyway, so it's better in the long run just to not waste her time."

"I'm fine!" Lily snapped. She ran her hand through her hair. "Look, I'm sorry, you guys, but I think it's better if I just take care of myself here." She tried to get up, but she still felt queasy.

"Out of the question." Lindsay put on her coat on. "Come on, you just need a good night's sleep, and I'll guarantee you will feel better tomorrow."

"Fine. Fine." Lily knew better than to fight Lindsay on this. Although she thought that she shouldn't make such a fuss over an upset stomach, but she still could not help but wonder if it was more than that.

"Don't you think we should use protection?" Granger asked quickly while Lily was throwing her jewelry into her purse.

"Protection from what?" Lily asked aggressively. She thought that she sounded like a slut, but she did not care. To her, the timing for everything was just right, and she did not want anything to stand in her way.

"Lily," Granger tried to protest while his girlfriend was kissing his chest, "didn't your parents ever give you the safe sex lesson?"

"Safe sex?" Granger could tell that Lily was not listening. She was untying her hair that was done in a tight knot in the back of her neck.

"Never mind, we are talking about Tina and David. All right, Babe. If this is what you want, this is what you'll get."