Author note at the end so I don't spoil anything. Please read though 3

"Are you sure you don't wanna come with us?" Amy asked softly as she slung her bag over her shoulder. She and Michael were stood in their room around dinner time.

"I think you need some girl time," he smiled at her. He had told her to go shopping with Mallory and Coco. And whilst she enjoyed spending time with her best friends, she also didn't like being away from him.

"What are you gonna do?" she asked carefully. She wasn't sure if he was planning on going out or not. He'd only left to see his new 'friends' a handful of times since she'd been back.

"I'll just stay here. Read or maybe study for history," he shrugged. She nodded, chewing her lower lip. There was something off about the whole situation but she couldn't put her finger on it. She just had a weird feeling in her gut. She tried to ignore it.

"Alright, I won't be too long. You know how Coco gets, I don't think I could be out shopping with her all day," Amy snorted wryly. He smiled again, but it didn't reach his eyes. He stepped forward and he looked… upset? Pained? She was confused. She knew he hated being away from her but he was the one insisting she go.

"Michael-" she started, about to ask him if he was okay. His hands cupping her cheeks stopped her mouth though as she blinked up at him.

"I love you. So fucking much," he murmured. His eyes were intense though and she found herself at a loss for words.

"I never thought I'd ever meet someone who cared about me. That just… accepted me for who I am. I don't know what I did to have to you in my life, but I'd do it a million times over. You're so… you're so fucking good to me, Amy. And I just want you to know how much I love you," he implored, voice cracking midway as his brows pinched together.

"I love you too. Are you… okay? I don't have to go if you're upset. You know you can talk to me right?" she asked warily, wondering what the hell was going on with him. He gave her a watery smile, sniffling as his thumbs stroked her cheeks.

"I'm okay. Just feeling emotional I guess," he muttered softly. Before she had a chance to respond, his lips descended on hers. The kiss was slow and tender and she melted into it. Loving how he always left her breathless no matter how he kissed her.

It felt like the kiss lasted forever, but when he pulled away, he rested his forehead on hers as he inhaled a shaky breath. She was worried about him if she was honest. Something was bothering him and she knew it.

"Are you sure your okay?" she whispered as her hands stroked his chest. He nodded, opening his glassy blue eyes and giving her a sad smile.

"You should go, they'll be waiting for you," he said as he took a step back. Her eyes glanced to his fists that were clenching and unclenching by his sides. Something was definitely bothering him. But clearly, he didn't want to talk about it. She respected him enough to do as he asked. She wondered if he'd tell her when she got back. She didn't like seeing him upset.

"I'll miss you," she said softly with a small smile. His lower lip trembled at her words and it made her frown. He lowered his head, jaw clenched tight as he swallowed thickly.

"I'll miss you too. Now go," he ordered. His tone was a little harsher than she expected but she figured maybe he didn't want her around if he wanted to cry. It was unusual but nothing about the boy was normal. She nodded, giving him one last look before she left the room.

The few hours she was out with Mallory and Coco, she just felt off. The state of Michael was bothering her and she couldn't focus on anything. Coco even called her out on it when they were in a store getting clothes. She just said she didn't feel too great and not long after they all made their way back. She felt bad for ruining their shopping trip but she couldn't focus. She was worried about Michael and she wanted to check on him. She only had one bag with a few things in as she jogged up the stairs to their room. She opened the door and he wasn't there. It was reminiscent of when she came back from Misty's cottage and she didn't like it. He had told her he would be here and studying. But then she realised just how stupid she had been to ignore a giant red flag in the first place. He had told her he was studying for history, something that she knew he didn't really care about at all. She hadn't really thought much into it at the time. She frowned to herself as she went to leave the room, going to see if he was somewhere else in the school before she got mad at him for lying to her again. But something caught her eye on her pillow.

She glared at the envelope with her name on it and a pit started to form in her lower belly, growing at a rapid rate. She walked over slowly, feeling her heart hammering as she sat on her bed and picked it up. Her name was written in cursive on the front and she'd recognise his handwriting anywhere. She knew this wasn't good. She'd felt the whole situation being off from the get-go and like a fucking idiot she had left anyway. She opened the letter with shaky hands as her eyes scanned the page.

My love,

Please, please don't be upset with me. I hated lying to you but I needed you to be gone so I could go. I love you, more than I'll ever be able to put into words and that's why I needed to do this. I know you'll be angry with me, but I never wanted to hurt you. Please just remember, everything I'm doing, I'm doing for you.

I'm still haunted by losing you, by seeing what I saw in your personal hell. The fear of losing you again plagues me and I can't shake it. I can't bear losing you again. I can't go through that all over again because the pain would kill me.

I can't tell you much more than that right now, but I will come back for you, I swear. You can scream at me all you want when I do, I'll gladly accept it for hurting you this way. But this needs to be done.

Please don't forget me, and I hope when we see each other again, you'll be able to forgive me.

I love you, Amy. Never forget that.

Michael.

She glared hard at the page, her whole body trembling as bitter tears stung her eyes. He… left? He just fucking upped and left on her and all she got was a fucking letter? She was upset, but she was also angry. She didn't understand. What the fuck was he talking about? Where was he and what did he have to do that he was doing for her? The vagueness of his letter only served to upset her more. Not understanding why he had just left her like this. He said he still loved her, that he would come back for her. So it wasn't like he was just done with her. Nothing made sense. She stood on shaky legs as tears fell down her face, her glassy eyes scanning the room. She noticed then things she hadn't before. The strip of pictures that was usually in his nightstand was gone. And when she walked over to his wardrobe, it was empty. A searing pain ripped through her chest as she fell to her knees, realising he was indeed gone. And she didn't know when he was coming back. She didn't understand why he had gone in the first place. Everything had been going well with them now and it felt so out of the blue for him to just leave. But his letter made it clear that he hadn't been okay. That what happened to her still bothered him.

She was confused, upset. So many things. She was on autopilot as she walked out of her room with tear-stained cheeks and the letter clutched in her hands. She found herself at Cordelia's office and walked in without knocking. She was in a meeting with Myrtle and Zoe and they all turned to look at her.

"What's wrong?" Cordelia asked with a frown as she saw the state of her. Zoe jumped out of her seat and ushered her inside. Amy couldn't even form a coherent sentence as she sobbed like a child and Zoe took the letter, giving it to Cordelia. She read it out loud for them all to hear as Zoe held Amy tightly in a hug. Her sobs only got harder hearing someone reading the letter. Each word settling like a heavy weight around her neck.

"I don't understand, where would he go?" Cordelia asked confused. Amy sniffled, standing up straighter to face her.

"I don't know," she muttered. It was a lie. She knew he was with the Satanists. She knew this whole thing had been a bad idea but she had been too selfish to say anything. Worrying what might happen if she told people. But now he was off with the enemy and she had no idea what was going on. But even still, after her deep feeling of rejection and betrayal at his abandonment, she couldn't bring herself to tell them. Worried what they might do if they found out. Just because she was hurting deeply by his actions didn't mean she didn't love him.

"Maybe the boy needs some space. He mentioned in the letter he was having a hard time with everything that happened. Maybe he'll come back?" Myrtle suggested. Amy looked at the floor feeling the guilt bloom inside of her for lying. She tuned out their murmuring as they tried to figure out where he might be and if they should wait. Cordelia said they would give it a week and give him space, then they would try looking for him.

"Let's get you back upstairs," Zoe said softly, taking Amy's hand and leading her out of the room.

Amy's brain felt numb as the tears still flowed, letting Zoe take her back upstairs. She retreated into herself, seemingly going to someplace in her head as the woman helped her lay down in bed. She was broken. Completely broken. He said he would come back for her but it didn't ease the pain she was in at all. He'd left her. She had given her heart to him and he had thrown it on the floor and stomped all over it. She couldn't believe he'd do this to her and it was only made worse by not knowing what the fuck he was doing that was supposedly for her. Not knowing when he would come back. If he would come back.

That night after laying in bed for hours but not sleeping, she grabbed her phone. She texted him, called him multiple times but each time it went right to voicemail. She sobbed down the phone, pleading in every voicemail she left him to come back. That whatever he thought he had to do, he didn't. That all she needed was him coming back to her. She fell asleep in the end from sheer exhaustion, clutching her phone in her hand as she lay in his bed. It still smelt like him and it was the only comfort she found herself in.

The days passed by in a blur of misery. She locked herself away in her room, barely ate or slept and didn't speak to anyone. Her brain had fractured as she just lay there once again realising how little she meant. He hadn't replied to any of her messages or calls. She stopped sending voicemails after the sixth day. It was still going to voicemail and she wasn't sure if he'd turned his phone on and ignored her, then turned it back off. Or if he had discarded it altogether. Either way, the hollowness was eating her alive and she felt like she couldn't breathe. Cordelia had enough on the seventh day, and as she said she would, she started trying to locate him. Everyone was confused and Amy still wouldn't utter that she knew he had been in contact with Satanists. She figured maybe he was at one of their houses hiding away. She tried to hold onto the hope that maybe he just needed some space like she had with Misty, and that he would come back when he was in a better frame of mind. As much as she wanted to tell Cordelia what she knew, to make it easier for them to find him and bring him back, the fear of what they might do to him if they knew was enough to keep her lips sealed on the matter.

One week turned to two and no one had managed to locate him. The sisters worried for Amy's health with her not eating. She had lost a lot of weight and she was more depressed than when she had been down in hell. Both Cordelia and Myrtle had tried to speak to her but she lay there ignoring them. Like she wasn't even registering their words. Cordelia's angle was the coven. Telling her that her sisters needed her and how Mallory and Coco were really worried. As much as she knew it made her a shitty friend, she couldn't bring herself to care. All she could feel was the overwhelming blinding pain that was wrapping itself tightly around her heart. Myrtle's angle was that she was a strong woman and she didn't need a silly boy to make her strong. The old Amy would have agreed. She would have scoffed at a girl lay in her bed for weeks unable to eat over something stupid as heartache. But it didn't help her anguish at all. Then Zoe came to see her. Zoe had spoken to her about Kyle and her heartbreak, making Amy feel a little less alone. And then she asked Amy if she wanted Michael to come home and find her in this state. The words had jarred her. As much as she was pissed beyond belief at him and overwhelmingly hurt and betrayed, she couldn't just switch off her feelings. She was still in love with him and she was clinging onto the hope of him coming back to her like she was adrift at sea and his letter was a liferaft. She didn't want him to see her in such a way. Not only was it embarrassing for her, but she knew how upset he would be to see her this way. And when he did come back, she'd give him hell for this. She wasn't going to let him get off lightly. If he needed a break, he could have told her. She'd have understood. She herself had needed some time and it was the fact he left without a goodbye that hurt her so much.

She replayed their conversation from that morning on an endless loop in her mind. His declaration of love for her, how sad and intense he was. It was obvious to her now that was his goodbye. She was a mix of every negative feeling known to man but she needed to get her shit together and at least try to be normal until he came back. So she let Zoe brush her tangled matted hair, she showered and got dressed for the first time in weeks. By the third week, she was attending classes like normal. Her brain was still in a daze. He still wasn't back and hadn't tried to contact her and no one could find him. With each passing day, there was a voice in the back of her head telling her he might not come back. She tried to ignore it the best she could, because if she listened she would crumble to nothing but ash. So she put on a fake smile, hid her pain in the deepest darkest parts of her as she sat in class, ate dinner with her sisters, sat in the garden with Mallory and Coco. But she felt like every day that went by without a word from him, her soul was slowly dying and her sanity was chipping away. She couldn't believe she'd been so stupid. All this time she had put her walls up and kept people out. The one time she let them down and her heart was shredded into nothing but fragments. He had promised her he loved her, that he wouldn't leave her. He promised her a lot of shit. But in the end, he was just like everyone else in her life who had let her down. She had got by before, she hadn't relied on anyone but herself. But now she had willingly given her soul to him and he didn't want it anymore, the loneliness and sting of rejection were scorching her from the inside out. She had no fucking clue how she was supposed to recover from this. All she could hope for was that one day he would walk back in here. Despite everything she was feeling in that moment, she knew the second he came back she would run into his arms. It was the place she felt safest after all.

One more chapter after this one, my friends, and then it's the end of part one. The next chapter is just in Michaels POV because I didn't wanna end part one with you guys actually not knowing why he had gone because I know it seemed OOC right now. But there is a reason. So the next chapter might be considered an epilogue? I dunno. But it'll probably be a little shorter than normal but explain what's going on in his head and all of that stuff. It won't give too much away but enough for you to understand why things are happening. Then I can start posting this (which if you're reading this then obviously I have lool) and I can work on part two. I have this weird thing where I like to completely finish stories before I post them. I hate playing catch up with stories when I post and they're not done. And then life gets in the way or writer's block and I fall behind and people wait for updates. This way I can post two updates a day and just get it out to you guys. The epilogue will go up today too just because it's shorter and there's no point in making you guys wait for the last chapter.

Once again I'd love to hear what you think about it and if you want to see part two. Even maybe things you'd like to see happen in part two. I'll start it anyway since I have ideas about where I'm going with it to a point, but the rest is just gonna be free written and I'll just see where it goes. It will be darker than the rest though.

And before you think about it, no it won't be outpost Michael loool it's not gonna be like they reunite in the outpost ages later and stuff, I've read too many of them. This is AU so things aren't following the show. It's my own shit now. And as much as outpost Michael is sexy AF, I prefer his shorter hair so lmaoooo

Ramble over, thank you for taking this journey with me. Didn't expect this story to develop into what it became but I'm so fucking happy and I'm in love with these two. It's far from over but expect some darkness and angst in the next book.

Love you all! 3