A/N: I couldn't tell you how I became inspired for this story, but it's Radrian and it's not what you expect.
I'll Always Love You
When Adrian Lee wanted to get something done, she always knew exactly how to do it.
And when she wanted to hurt me, she couldn't have found a better way.
I know it was partly my fault. Well, no, that's a lie. It was my fault. Each time I told her I wanted a commitment and that I didn't want her with any other man, I was telling her the truth, but somehow I couldn't quite grasp the concept for myself. I meant it when I told her that I was sorry when I cheated with Zoe and I wanted to mean it when I said I wouldn't do it again, but I was like an addict at the time. To this day, I don't even know why I kissed Amy, and if there was one thing in this world that I could erase the pain of it would be that.
So she slept with Ben Boykewich. He was Amy's ex-boyfriend and my only real friend. She knew how expressly jealous I was of him when he merely glanced at her, when she spoke to him, when they called each other all summer long, when she slapped him when it should have been me and only me…
And I hated them. Both of them! But it didn't hurt near as bad as the day I found Amy crying in her the nursery the Friday after Leo's wedding, when I went to pick up John. It didn't hurt anywhere as near as badly as the words, "She's having his baby. Adrian's having Ben's baby!"
Of all the people in the world, I never expected it to be her. I knew Amy had to have gotten it all wrong. I knew she had to be mistaken. Gossip and lies and twists flew around this town like a tornado and I knew she was wrong, until that Monday morning, when I saw Ben at her locker as the second bell rang, and as he left and I caught her gaze with those down turned brown eyes, I realized Amy had been right.
I wanted to kill him!
But I wasn't with her anymore. I didn't have the right to be jealous, not when what I had done put this all into motion in the first place. It was funny how karma worked though, for both of us. For two months I couldn't even look at her, but her when her rounding belly began to protrude beneath her majorette uniform, I couldn't help but notice. She was having Ben's baby. She'd always told me she wanted to have mine.
Adrian had only ever been friends with Ben, but she never wanted to be with him. Now was she bound to him for life, as I was bound to Amy. The day she gave birth, I went to the hospital, but I couldn't bare to go in and see her. I wouldn't have even stayed, had it not been for Grace. But she came into the waiting room, with that pink bundle all tucked in her arms. She looked just like her mother: nothing of Ben to speak of, unless you counted the fact that her skin was just a few shades lighter than Adrian's.
The irony was that the thing she'd always been most afraid of never came to fruition; I never ended up with Amy Juergens. I never ended up at all. Amy moved on, not with Jimmy, and over the next ten years her heart got broken over and over again just as expected, until she found a man that accepted her, child and all, and he loved her and John and for that, I was glad…even if she was only settling.
And Ben was never meant for Adrian either. I could've told him that a long time ago, but I didn't need to. He loved Adrian, as a friend and as the mother of his child, but never as anything more. I think, though, that she even managed to break his heart too in a way. Grace did the best she could to try and mend it and not just for what Adrian did to it, but for what Amy did as well. As a friend, I'll always love Grace Bowman Boykewich, but in the end, you can always tell whose hearts belong to whom.
At thirty-eight-years-old, I stood with my face to the sea salt wind of the California coast, the same beach I kissed Adrian on the year we met Maria, and consequently, the same beach I'd taken her to the next weekend, where we had made love in the early twilight hours. I could see an altar made of her favorite flowers – also her daughter's favorite – just out of reach of the tide. I swear, each day she looked more and more like her mother. No wonder she stood beneath that arch with my son, who looked upon her as adoringly as I had once been permitted to do with Adrian.
When the question came, as to who gave that woman away, it was Ben who stood, blubbering a bit as Grace handed him a satin handkerchief.
And when they kissed and we all rose, it was bittersweet, because I could feel myself die a little inside. Adrian and I were finally family – something she'd wanted her entire life – but never under these circumstances.
"You loved Gramma."
"I'll always love Grandma." It felt good to hold Adrian in my arms again. It wasn't the same as before. It never would be. It never could be. But she was beautiful. "And I'll always love you, Adrian Margaret Lee-Juergens."
"What's in there?" she asked, with wide brown eyed curiosity, just like her first namesake.
"It's a letter."
"For Gramma?"
"For you." I patted her on the head with it and she giggled, flinging her dark curls around. I had watched her mother do the same as she grew up, never once having met known that Adrian had done the same, since the day she had been given life, Adrian's was taken in exchange.
I guess the genes in Lee women were strong though, because throughout her life Little Adrian looked as much like her mother as her mother did Adrian, except, of course, her skin, which seemed to become just a shade lighter with each generation.
"For me?"
"For when you're older." Adrian was smart as a cracking whip. Maybe it was something in the same. I don't know. "I wish you could see her now though. She always asks about you. We're grandparents, Adrian, both connected forever to a little girl who's just like you in every single way. Just like you always wanted."
"Why are you crying, Grampa? Don't be sad. I think Gramma will always love you too."
And for a fleeting second, when her face reflected into the polished mahogany marble of that headstone, I could've sworn it was you.