NotxxWhatxxItxxSeems - Sweet! Do you have lots left to do on your story? Good. I absolutely agree. And yes, it made perfect sense lol. Why, thank you :D.

Coachkimm - Thanks!

xMaNdYxx - Thank you :)

Conscious - No worries! Aw, you were full of love. You're nice when you're being...nice. :D

lexj - Next one is right about here :P

DeadWitchReading - Aww, I'm sorry! I know, it's terrible. I'd like to think that ghosts are real. Not just because I wrote a story about one, but because it's depressing as hell to think that life ends with...this. Still love that you're enjoying this. About the new story: I'm not sure my friend I've co-written a fic with would want me to post it on here, but if you like, I can PM you with a link to where the story is posted (you don't have to sign up anywhere). Just let me know :)

That's my pen name - Haha, T! I wondered who the hell you were all through reading that. Until I got to the end, of course :P. Sorry, it isn't. I didn't want to write it. Thank you ^_^. And thanks for the heads up on the faulty link. I think it's all sorted now :)

xvolcom11x - Yeah, I definitely put Ashley through the ringer on this one. Thank you! You have lol. Thaaank you, though!

jtsec9143 - I'm glad you think so. Originally I was a little worried both stories would be too similar and I definitely didn't want that. Thank you very much. Sorry to have depressed you lol.

My eyes open facing toward the window and —almost as if Spencer has brandished me with her kiss— my entire body feels like it's on fire. It feels like it's been scorched to the point where it's unnaturally smooth and marred. In an attempt to cool down, I kick the almost dead-weight of the covers off me.

Pressing our bodies together, kissing her how I've always needed to, her kissing me back has ignited something inside of me. I literally feel like I'm on fire.

Thirsty and only half-awake, I reach for the bottle of water she's always sweet enough to leave for me and drink more than half of its contents in one go. It helps. It cools me down.

And then I notice that I can't feel her eyes on me. I can't feel the slight dip to the mattress where she rests. Turning my head, I'm met with just the sheets.

Now I'm wide awake.

"Spencer?"

Silence.

I wait long seconds, trying to be patient.

"Spence, if you're pulling a really, really stupid prank, you need to tell me."

Deafening silence.

I listen intently for any signs of her and my heart thuds in my chest a few seconds after when I don't hear anything. I'm across the room so fast that I bump into the closed door. Not being able to force my way through it, I reluctantly step back enough for the door to open and then I'm through it.

I'm moving down the stairs so fast it feels like I'm almost flying down them.

I know it hurts her more than anything to touch and kiss me. I can feel it every time our bodies are pressed together. I see it every time I look at her.

I see how much she wants to kiss me even more and I wonder if she knows how much that's returned to her, tenfold. I wonder if she knows how careful I have to be not to just push her down onto the mattress each night, cover her body with my own and wish for her moans to be of pleasure, rather than pain.

I wonder if she knows how scared I am right now.

The living room door is almost knocked off its hinges with how fast I opened it. Unsuccessfully, my eyes scan around in a vain attempt to meet her gorgeous eyes.

That's all I need before I'm out of there. There are other places to search. She has to be somewhere. I have to find her. I have to find her and then force myself not to kiss her.

Walking toward the kitchen, the mere memory of the kiss shared with Spencer just a few, short hours ago is making insides feel molten. It's making even my bones feel weak; like a gentle poke in my ribs would cause them to crumble.

And, as I push open the door and see Spencer shaking on the floor with sounds leaving her lips that certify she's in more pain than I could ever imagine, this body incinerates.

The heart that has been tortured-yet-healed for months turns to ashes. The mind that is mostly filled with exquisite images of Spencer from the past few months turns to ashes. The organs which kept me alive for the past few months when my heart was too full to beat turn to ashes.

The bones which were miraculously able to hold solid after each time I've kissed Spencer — and could surely remain strong against the most ferocious tornado— turn to ashes.

All because seeing Spencer in such pain is a more devastating image than this body can cope with.

Falling to my knees —almost as if I can't quite believe the metaphor wasn't a reality— I gently guide Spencer's face to look at me and try to ignore that her hair is wet from tears by her temples and her back is agonizingly arched.

"Spencer," I feel my lips form the words as I touch her. Their sound is lost to me. Any sound that isn't Spencer's pain is lost to me.

I see her flinch harshly —as if I've smashed a glass bottle across her face— and grit my teeth, a deep frown creasing my forehead.

"Ash, it hurts," she confesses.

And I'm crying.

I'm helpless.

"Tell me what to do. I don't…I don't know," I ask of her desperately, moving my hands to hold hers that won't stop shaking. I have to help her. I have to make it stop. If I hold her hand and concentrate hard enough, I can take her pain away.

My tears fall faster as her entire body racks with pain I can't even begin to imagine. It's my fault. If I had more control, this wouldn't have happened. She wouldn't be in pain because of me. "I'm sorry," I whisper, wishing I could yell it from the top of my lungs. "God, I'm so sorry."

I don't think she even heard me.

"My ears hurt."

Oh, god.

I dart across the room for the phone and I'm back at Spencer's side before I can think. Staring at the handset, I don't remember the number I need to call. "What the fuck is the number?!" I yell, as if someone standing by will help me out.

"They can't help me, remember?" leaves her lips, sounding so foreign that if I didn't see her lips move and form the words, I would have never believed it was her.

I see the phone clatter to the floor the same time I see Spencer's body spasm again and a strangled, pained cry escapes her. My vision clears and I know the tears have fallen from my eyes. It's blurred again before they've even made their tracks down my distraught face.

Spencer and I are lost in a foreign country and no matter how loud I scream or how fast my tears fall, no-one can understand me. No-one understands just how imperative and severe this situation is.

My hands are gentle when they're back on her face, trying to wipe away the evidence of her pain before it kills me. "Please tell me what to do, Spence. I don't know how to help you," I plead frantically, grasping at her shoulders and pull her body onto my lap.

I won't let them take her away from me. She's mine.

I don't understand how her body can be so tense, yet so limp at the same time. She convulses again and I hold her tighter. If I hold her tight enough her pain can transfer into me instead. I kiss the top of her head, almost as if her feeling how much I care for her will be the antidote to whatever poison is inside her body.

I don't even think it registers in her head.

"Stop touching me," she whispers.

I can't do that. If I let go, someone could take that as a sign it's okay. They could take it as a sign I'd willingly give up the best thing that's ever happened to me. Still, I know how much my hands being on her must be adding to the agony.

I'm so torn.

"I can't," comes my strained response.

"Ashley, please," she begs.

"Spencer…." Please don't leave me.

Her voice is almost inaudible when she says, "You need to leave."

How could I ever leave you?

"No." I move closer, pulling her tighter against me. "No, I'm not going to just leave you."

I'm not just going to let go and let them take her away. Tears are on her face again and I brush them away, still not wanting to see more evidence of her pain. I kiss her face. I can keep her safe like this.

And then she jerks away from me and the harsh reality comes crashing back down.

"You're making it worse," she admits as more tears fall from her eyes.

More fall from mine and I manage to pull my hands away from her face, keeping them poised on my lap, ready to shoot out and keep hold of her should anything try to take her away.

"Leave," she insists.

"No."

Damnit, no. They're not taking you away from me.

"Get away from me!" she screams.

And her eyes are screaming to me louder; screaming to back off just a little. The signal from my brain to tell my lips and tongue to say "no" gets lost and scrambled. Instead, I move away from her.

And I can't move back toward her.

I feel like I'm in one of those nightmares where a car is headed right for me and my feet are glued to the earth, and regardless of how much I try to move, I can never get out of the way.

Somehow, I don't think I'm going to wake up before the car reaches me this time.

Spencer's rigid body slackens, her tremors stop, and her back isn't bowed like it was seconds ago. Her breaths are non-existent instead of erratic. With her hands limp by her side, palm facing upward, she's staring at me. Her eyes are so vacant that I question if she can even see me.

For the first time ever, she almost looks….

"Are you okay?" I ask her, terrified.

I'm back inside that nightmare, except now it's Spencer and she's on a railway line with her feet glued to the tracks.

And as the train slams into her and I hear her scream, I still can't move closer to her. All I can do is squeeze my eyes shut so tightly it hurts and cover my ears to block out the haunting echo, feeling tears squeeze out from behind unwilling-to-believe eyelids.

"Ashley," I hear Spencer whisper seconds later, sounding more frightened than I can stand.

I'm back inside this harsh reality that is too much like a nightmare.

My eyes open, ready to comfort her and assure her that it's going to be okay, that I'll do anything to ensure she stays okay, but the words die on my tongue.

I failed.

Seeing nothing but the cold tiles of the kitchen floor where her body lay mere seconds ago makes me want to walk to the deadest part of town and lay down in that small box with her, rest my head on her chest, and cry like the lost little girl I know I resemble.

For a second, I want it so much that I can almost smell the wood.

And then I hear Spencer's practised breaths and I'm transported back.

This can't be happening. "No, please, not again."

"I think…I think it's over," she whispers.

Knowing there's a large possibility I'll never see her eyes again makes me cry even harder. "Baby, I can't see you," I confess to her.

"Yes, you can."

"I can't," I reiterate reluctantly.

"Yes, you can," she replies firmly.

"No I can't!" I yell. "God." My tense body relaxes instinctively. It knows it has to before I literally walk out that door to the deadest part of town. Deader than how I feel inside this kitchen. "I can't see you."

"I'm still here. I'm not going anywhere," Spencer insists. I know she's just trying to make this easier.

It doesn't work. "You are."

"I'm not."

As my eyes close, my head shakes just barely because I still can't believe this. I don't want to believe this. "It's getting worse, Spencer. When I touch you…I can barely pull away. And it's just getting harder. I can't stop touching you and you're fading away right in front of me."

"Don't say it like that."

"Why not?" I shrug. "It's the truth, isn't it?"

"No," she stumbles over her single-word reply.

"We're back to square one. It's nice to meet you, Casper," I say sardonically. It's the only way I can deal with this right now. I'll shut down if I deal with it the other way.

"Don't call me that. Just, shut up. I need to think." She pauses. "You called me baby."

You are my baby; you're my sweetheart; you're just…mine.

"I remember."

She sighs heavily but I know it has nothing to do with my response and everything to do with this current dilemma.

"Where are you?" I ask quietly. I have to be near her.

"I'm where you were sitting when we got home yesterday. In the corner."

I sit down a good distance from her and echo her sigh, deflated. "What are we going to do?"

"I don't know yet."

"There has to be something. This can't just happen…not to us."

Not to people in this situation, not when I care about her this much, and not when I know she cares for me just as much.

"There's got be a way."

If I don't see her eyes or the cute mannerisms that so painfully belong to Spencer, I don't know what I'll do. "I don't know what to do, Spence. I really don't know what to do anymore."

"Last night didn't just mean nothing, Ash. We just have to be patient like you told me."

Thinking of last night and how much I just wish I could take her upstairs and repeat the few minutes where I was more alive than ever makes me angry. Only because I know I can't act on that feeling which is almost becoming an instinct. I almost raise my voice when I say, "Last night is what did this, Spence. When we were stupid and got carried away."

When I did the best thing I've ever done.

"We weren't stupid."

"We weren't? I can't see you and we weren't stupid?"

I can barely breathe because of what's happened, and we weren't stupid?

"I still wouldn't take it back."

"That's exactly why we're stupid. Because I wouldn't either and because even though I heard you screaming in pain, all I still want to do is kiss you. All I ever want to do is kiss you."

Spencer's voice is gentle when she says, "Go back to bed, Ashley."

She might as well have slapped me across the face. "Are you kidding me?"

"I need to think. You're not helping."

"You honestly think I could sleep right now?" You honestly think that if I closed my eyes in the darkness I wouldn't see images that would make even the worst of nightmares seem like the softest of dreams?

"You're exhausted. Don't even tell me you're not."

"I'm fine, Spencer." I'm never too tired to be next to her.

"Go to bed. Please."

"No!" I snap. If I leave…something worse might happen. No, I have to keep her safe. "I told you I'm not leaving you. I can't."

"Ashley," she starts.

I shake my head at the sound of her voice. "If you keep saying my name, I swear to god I'll kiss you again."

My eyebrows draw closer together when I don't hear her reply. If she's stood up and left this room…. "And I swear to god if you've left this room when I'm still talking to you…," I trail off, aware my voice was louder in case she really did walk off in a strop.

"Cool your jets. I'm still here," Spencer answers.

I release a quiet breath, relaxing slightly. "Spence?" I begin softly.

"What?" she asks, just as gently.

"What are we going to do?"

What am I going to do if I never see you again?

"We're going to be quiet and stop asking me questions that I don't know the answers to right now," she answers.

It doesn't make me hurt any less.

"Close your eyes," she asks of me.

I close them instantly. I couldn't do a thing to help her or keep her safe earlier, the least I can do now is acquiesce to her request.

"Think of me."

I think of how, just for a few minutes on that video, I saw her alive; I saw her breathing through necessity; I saw her tired features; I heard her carefree laugh; I saw her dreaming.

I nod, telling her through that small action that I'm doing what she asked of me and now I'm captivated again.

"Can you see me? Remember what I look like?"

For now.

I nod.

I still have her picture in my pillowcase and her family photograph is still hidden in my room in case my parents uncharacteristically enter it, but it's not the same. Photographs never do Spencer the justice that seeing her with my own eyes do.

"If you see a light, you better not walk towards it," I tell her, kidding in the way that isn't really kidding at all.

"If you don't shut up, I will."

I know she thinks I was kidding. "I'll kick your ass if you walk towards it. I'll drag you back," I say, meaning "I'll be right behind you".

"Ashley. Get up."

"Why?"

If she tells me to go to bed one more time, I'll scream.

"Put on your coat."

I look to where she told me she was sitting and arch a brow. "To sit here with?"

Does she really think a coat will keep this cold out?

"No, we're going out."

"You feel like taking a walk right now?"

I see my coat in thin air, almost floating toward me. My face barely reacts.

"Put it on and be quick," Spencer demands.

And I'm powerless to deny her, so I put an arm through one of the sleeves and then see my scarf in mid air, moving closer until it's thrown to me.

"It's cold," she explains.

It's warmer out there in the twenty-four degree weather than in here.

Pre-occupied with how she looked on Christmas morning surrounded by snow, I barely hear myself ask, "Spence, I really want to figure this out. Can't walking wait?"

I hear her say "No" clear as day.

Spencer tells me to hurry up when I'm walking as fast as I can when all I feel like doing is standing still and screaming until my voice is too raw to continue.

And then, as we round the corner, my body comes to a halt. "Oh my god," leaves my lips like the first time we were here. "I can't believe I didn't think of this."

If I was given more time to get over the crushing shock, I know I would have eventually.

"Wait here and close your eyes. In a minute, I want you to look again, okay? Look straight ahead."

They're already closed. "Okay."

I'm praying to whatever higher power is out there that this works. I'm praying I'll be able to see her looking at me with that shy look in her eyes that she wears so well.

She tells me to open my eyes.

And I'm terrified.

"What if it doesn't work?"

"Open your eyes," she repeats.

After taking a deep preparing breath and making sure I'm looking lower than her eyes would actually be, I do. I open them and I fight not to gasp and smile widely before rushing over to her and kissing her in relief that I can see her again. Instead, I focus my eyes on her chest that I had to force myself not to touch a few hours ago.

"Have your boobs grown?" I ask her, genuinely wondering.

"How could they have?" Spencer replies.

I meet her blue, blue eyes. "I don't know."

And then it clicks for her. "You idiot! I thought it didn't work!"

Not being able to help myself, I smile, never taking my eyes off her. Never wanting to. Everything makes sense again. "You don't know what your eyes do to me, Spencer."

"Probably something like what yours do to me," she answers.

God, I hope so.

Spencer steps closer and continues, "Let's just go home. We can figure everything out tomorrow."

Reaching up to a high shelf for the blankets and pillow I plan to sleep on tonight, I feel Spencer's eyes staring fixedly at the stretch of skin that is now visible where my top has risen up. I'm quick to grab what I was looking for and pull them out. I can't be trusted to keep in control when she looks at me like that. At least, not yet.

"I'll sleep on the floor tonight," I state.

"It's your bed."

"I know."

She has a teasing glint in her eyes when she says, "I won't kiss you, Ashley, if that's what you're worried about. Do you want me to promise?"

My head shakes. That wouldn't be the problem. The problem would be that I wouldn't be able to resist kissing her goodnight. The problem would be that I wouldn't be able to stop. "I can't promise I won't, though. And I know that you're kind of kidding when you say that, but you can't joke around with this. What happened tonight…I can't not see you, Spencer. It was barely for thirty minutes and I was going insane."

"You were threatening me."

"I was going insane," I insist.

She pulls a cute, determined pout. "I'm sleeping on the floor."

"Nice try," I offer as I throw another spare pillow to the floor.

The only reason I don't ask for my own pillow is because Spencer was the last one to rest her head on this one and I might be able to smell her on it. Maybe it will help me to sleep easier.

"Ashley," she starts, firmly.

How could I ask her to sleep on a cold, hard floor when I can still hear her screaming in pain? How can I ask her to sleep on a cold, hard floor when I can still see her screaming in pain?

I grip the blanket that will never keep me as warm as she does and look down to avoid Spencer's eyes. I quickly busy myself by setting up my makeshift bed.

"You were screaming in pain tonight. There's no way you're going to sleep on this floor. Get into bed," I say the last three words gently.

"I'll drool on your pillow," she tells me.

I know I've won the battle.

I nearly smile as I lie down on the floor and move the pillows around to an uncomfortable angle so that I'll still be able to see her when I open my eyes. I know my neck will be stiff in the morning. "No, you won't."

"I could if I wanted to."

My smile is finally there. Sometimes she really is too precious.

She leaves the lights on and I couldn't be more grateful. Knowing all I'll have to do is open my eyes to see her relaxes this tense body. If she doesn't leave, that is.

"Spence?" I whisper, feeling my eyes suddenly heavier than ever.

"I'll still be here," she answers, reading my mind.

It's all I need to be able to sleep.

"'night."

"Goodnight," she responds, sounding like she wants to say something else, too.