AN: It's been years since I've submitted anything on fanfiction, but this was a story I had always loved, and I just wanted to add more to it. It's now being told from the girl's point of view, and it will probably switch back and forth throughout the chapters. More will be added, and I hope to complete a full story. Just review and let me know if you want me to keep going! Thanks.

I try not to look at his photograph. Mostly, I try not to think of him, but I always find myself daydreaming that he's back from wherever he went to – that he came back for me. Out of all the flings and broken promises I've had over these few months since he's left, there hasn't been anyone I've loved like Alan. I don't think there will ever be.

My room is filled with memories of him. The pictures, the gifts, the letters – they are all signs that he had once been a part of my life. I'm not going to throw them away or get rid of them because I know he's not gone for good. I know he didn't leave me for someone else. I know he had lied, I just didn't know why. And I want to see him again because I need him, like I always have.

Most of the time, it feels like it's raining, but I know it's not. This is Alabama; it doesn't rain here often. I keep the blinds down and don't turn on the lights in my room.

When someone like Alan enters your life, it is difficult to describe the feeling you have. It's a mixture of joy and warmth, of complete understanding and contentment. There's finally someone there to share your laughter and your sorrow – someone that knows you completely and loves every ounce of you. It's as if he has latched on to a part of your dormant heart and made it live once again. He hasn't stolen your soul; he let you keep it, but with his embrace, he has only made it better. He gave me reason to wake up, to smile, to tell secrets, to have inside jokes, to go to the movies, to call in sick for work, to watch romantic comedies, to make love, to live.

I went to his mother's house last Tuesday. She was drunk, incoherent, and didn't talk much about where he was, just complained. All I could get out of her was "at the lake, on vacation, away from you and all these goddamned people that keep asking about him. Just leave me the fuck alone. He ain't coming back." I don't talk to her because I think she's a pleasant woman. I talk to her to find Alan. Something was wrong when he left. There was something going on that he wasn't telling me, but I was too upset at the time to notice. My emotions always got the best of me.

After the day he left me, I didn't talk to anyone. I didn't make an effort to call him. A mixed feeling of both anger and utter sadness filled me, and it wasn't just something I could shake off. It was like he had died. It was a loss greater to me than anything I had known. I didn't try to make contact with him until a month later, but by that time, he had been long gone.

"We haven't seen him in a couple of weeks," Joey told me. Joey had been Alan's best friend since kindergarten. "We figured he was with you..." He looked at me, staring at the floor. "Did something happen to you two?" He asked carefully.

I looked back up. I was surprised by this. "He didn't tell you?" I asked.

He shook his head, confused.

I then told him what had happened the day that he left me, and that I was looking for him for the first time since it had happened. "I haven't seen him or talked to him in over a month," I said.

Then Joey looked truly concerned. "Me either."

We both looked everywhere we thought he would be. We called relatives, old friends, and drove places that yielded no results. He had left without a trace. After a while, Joey gave up, saddened and disheartened. I kept looking and asking questions, but no one ever knew what happened to him. He disappeared.

And after a while, my heart went dormant.