Disclaimer: I don't own them, Disney does. This story just leapt out at me while I was sitting in front of my computer, and I really have no idea where it came from. It will make more sense when I get more into it--these first two chapters are slightly confusing, I will admit. :) Anyway, without further ado...

The Road Home

Prologue

Three years. It had been nearly three years since he had been home, nearly three years since he had seen the house he had grown up in, nearly three years since he had been in the town that would never be and at the same time, always be his home.

A lot could happen in three years.

Jamie Waite tightened his grip on the steering wheel of his car until his knuckles turned white. Noticing, he loosened his grip, and tried to calm the fluttering in his stomach. At that moment, he missed his motorcycle--roaring through the streets with the wind all around him was one of the most therapeutic things in the world to him. But he had had to sell his bike when he moved to Maine--there was snow on the roads nine months out of twelve, and it was just plain COLD up there to boot.

A small smile touched his lips--that was one of the reasons that he was excited to come home to Kingsport, Virginia. The high was never in the single digits when the weatherman reported it.

The smile fell off his face as he passed the dark green sign with the words "Welcome To Kingsport!" scrawled across it in fancy script.

He was here. He was in Kingsport.

He was home.

And, at the same time, slowly trapping himself in his own personal hell again.

"Thank God it's only for a week." Jamie muttered to himself, taking his foot off the gas pedal to compensate for the lower speed limit through town.

The twenty one year old man soon pulled up to an intersection, and stopped at the red light, curiosity getting the better of him as he scanned the surrounding area. It all looked exactly the same, Jamie realized, looking at everything around him with a melancholy kind of awe. Nothing in this town ever changes.

The radio, playing softly as to add background noise for the entire seven hour trip, suddenly began to hum an almost familiar sounding song. The light was still red, so Jamie leaned down and twisted the black knob, letting the music fill the small car, and his heart lurched in his chest.

find me here
speak to me
I want to feel you
I need to hear you
you are the light
that is leading me
to the place where
I find peace again

He grabbed the knob and twisted it 'off' so hard he was surprised that the cheap plastic piece didn't come off in his hand. Swallowing, he tried to get control of his rolling emotions, and he ran his fingers through his black hair, looking around the intersection with a sinking feeling in his stomach.

Jamie knew where he was. He went straight to go to his mother's house. He went right to go to...her house.

"The horns of a dilemma." Jamie mused out loud to himself, and shook his head at the phrase. One of his former girlfriends, Kate something or other, had always been at the 'horns of a dilemma'.

That was one of the things he had liked about her, Jamie realized now. She was dramatic--the first time he had ever seen her she was standing on the base of a statue and screaming for some kind of reform in the grading system.

It had been his first month of college, and he was still trying to adjust to being away from home. He'd let himself be drawn in by her dramatic speech, not to mention her petite frame and long dyed black hair, and had gotten her number as soon as she was finished with her rant. That had led to a whirlwind three week romance, that had ended as suddenly as it had started.

And that had been his longest relationship as of yet, Jamie mused to himself, tapping his fingers across the wheel of the cars tunelessly. The light was still glowing crimson, and Jamie looked at his blinker.

Should he? Could he?

Don't do it, a little voice in the back of his head whispered. All you'll do is drag up buried pain, pain you've been running from for nearly four years, and you've just NOW gotten over. Do you really want to go through all of that again?

Do you really want to live the rest of your life with that last image of her? Or do you want to see her now, see that she's happy with her life and has moved on? The second voice to speak up was softer, gentler, and sounded like his mother, he realized.

Don't do it.

Do it.

Don't be stupid!

Do it.

His fingers wrapped around the blinker and pushed up, making the tiny right arrow on his dashboard light up and start flickering.

Fool.

"I know." Jamie answered the first voice out loud, just as the light went from blood red to green.

Taking a deep breath, he turned the wheel, and headed down Oak street, his heart pounding in his ears.

How many times had he ridden his motorcycle down this road? How many times had he passed the bright red house with the black shutters? How many times had he turned this corner and headed down Graymalkin Lane?

How many times had he pulled into the driveway of a two story white house with cream shutters and a gray garage door?

How many times had he knocked on the cream colored door, only to have a bundle of dark hair and hazel eyes throw herself at him before he even dropped his hand?

Too many to count.

Jamie slowed his black car down to a crawl, looking at Catie Roth's former home with pain filled eyes. Tears burned at his eyes, and he blinked them back, before pressing his foot down on the accelerator and heading for his mother's restaurant, hoping to put the past where it belonged.

Behind him.

But the image of flashing hazel eyes and silky black hair still haunted him, no matter how hard he tried to forget.