Author's Note- All of these characters belong to Kurt Sutter. I own nothing.
Thanks to everyone who reviewed, marked this as a favorite, or followed. Fair warning: this fic may end up jumping around in time.
CHAPTER 1: SUMMER BEFORE FRESHMAN YEAR
Tara reads the same sentence four times and still it doesn't stick. She can't concentrate. She slams her book shut and tosses it away from her. Tara's been in San Diego for two months and today she can no longer fight the desire to dial Jax's number. Her breath sucks in as she punches in the numbers and then her heart drops into her belly where it flutters and pounds. If Gemma answers the phone, she'll hang up, but even if she gets Jax, there's no guarantee he'll talk to her. This could end badly and Tara knows it.
On the third ring Tara jumps to her feet and paces with the phone, trying to walk off the energy cart wheeling through her. Leaving was the right decision. Things are good at Cousin Sue's house, better than she could have hoped. Classes will be starting soon. Tara can see her possibilities, her potential, and her future taking a tangible shape. She's no longer dealing with the whispering, curling smoke of a pipe dream. She's going to learn something, accomplish something, and be somebody. She's not going to end up like Gemma.
But today she needs to hear his voice. She doesn't think she can keep moving forward in a reality where she'll never hear it again. They can't be together, not with the distance, not with the club and his mother standing firmly between them, but he can't just be gone either.
"Yeah?" Jax answers the phone. There's a smile in his voice, like he's having a good time, and Tara doesn't want to ruin it. She doesn't want to be the person who steals the smile out of his voice. Jax's easy grin has always been something she both craves and never completely trusts, but once she decided years ago she could trust the words behind his smile, it was so easy to fall in love with him.
"Hello?" Jax asks, and this time he sounds impatient. He's going to hang up if she doesn't say something soon.
"Jax…" She says, and she hears him suck in his breath as the line goes quiet for a moment.
"Tara, where are you?" He asks, and there is something like hope in the way he asks it. Like he thinks she's changed her mind and come home.
"I'm still in San Diego." Tara says and Jax sighs heavily on the other end. "I'm sorry to bug you. I… I just miss you." She admits and waits, not sure if he'll either hang up or keep talking.
"Oh yeah?" He asks, and there it is again, the grin sliding back around his words. "Hang on a second." He says and Tara can hear a familiar shuffling and knows he's stretching the cord and dragging the phone into Gemma's downstairs bathroom. "Sorry about that. Opie's here. He was just telling me about how he laid his bike down yesterday, LIKE A LITTLE BITCH!" Jax hollers the last part for Opie's benefit. There is a thump and laughter, and Opie's muffled, indignant voice coming through the receiver. Tara's pretty sure Jax dropped the phone.
"No! Don't unplug it. It's Tara!" Jax shouts and the commotion stops. She can hear him settling down and picking up his phone. "You still there?" He asks a little breathless.
"Yeah, I'm here. Jesus, is Opie hurt?"
"Nah, he's fine. He's got a little gravel in his ass, but that's about it." Jax says, and then having run out of distractions, the quiet between them stretches. Jax breaks it first.
"Oh, and Tara… I miss you too."
After the first call, it gets easier. Tara spends many nights on the phone with Jax, catching up, burning through calling cards, feeling like nothing has changed, and knowing enough not to trust that feeling. Most of the time, Tara lays flat on the floor of her room, her feet propped on her bed, and smiling into the receiver.
They are very careful not to talk about her leaving Charming. Jax only brings it up once. The night the club celebrates Opie and Donna's engagement, he calls her drunk, the edges of his words lazy from the alcohol and messy with his emotions.
"Why can't that be us?" He asks her and Tara's heart finds new ways to break because nothing has changed, and she has to tell him no. She won't quit school and come home.
They talk until dawn. Her tears sneak quietly out of her eyes and run backwards to hide by her ears, leaving the hair by her temples damp after she hangs up the phone.
He never asks her to come home again.