Jamie Jung woke up in a sweat, his lungs heaving as he attempted to catch his breath. He could feel his limbs shake and heart race as he attempted to remember the dream that had sent him into such a state. It was rapidly fading, only flashes of red and the memory of a scream remaining, but he could recall that it had scared the absolute shit out of him. He glanced at the clock on his bedside table and let out a groan. 5:45am. There was no point to going to sleep when he would need to wake up soon to get ready for school anyways. After spending a fair five minutes hyping himself up, he finally swung his legs over the side of the bed and dragged himself into the bathroom to take a shower. He tilted his head back and let the hot water wash the remnants of the nightmare from his body, soothing the tensed muscles and goosebumps that persisted.

He'd been getting bad dreams for a few months now. They had really started when his best friend, Bella Swan, moved from Phoenix to live with her dad in Washington. She was really the only friend he had, and when she had left, Jamie had never felt more alone. His school days were spent drifting from class to class and sitting alone at lunch, and his nights were devoid of any bedtime calls that would last until the early hours of the morning. He would still get texts from his best friend, and occasionally a call after school if he was lucky, but he could feel her slipping from him. He had learned just a few days ago that Bella had actually returned to Phoenix sometime in the spring briefly, but she hadn't felt the need to call him or pop up to say hi. His grandmother told him that things like this happened, especially when they were young, but it didn't make the pain hurt any less. It was hard being younger than everyone else in his grade, with the only attention he received being from the underclassmen, but Bella had never cared for that. They were both loners, but together they were an inseparable pair. He had thought they had an unbreakable bond.

A sigh left his chest as he walked back into his bedroom after his shower and caught sight of the present he had gotten for Bella's upcoming eighteenth birthday. Maybe they weren't on the best of terms with each other, but he still considered her his closest and dearest friend, and he wanted to send her something before she completely let him go from her life. He had managed to get an edition of Pride and Prejudice from the early twentieth century that he knew Bella would go crazy over, and he made a mental note to get it in the mail later that day so that it could get to her on her birthday. As he tugged on a pair of jeans and towel dried his silver dyed hair, he could hear his grandmother start to move around downstairs. Her nurse would be showing up soon so he could get to school, and he quickly threw on a shirt before he walked down to the kitchen and shocked the nurse by being half naked... again. Maybe his grandmother wasn't the only one losing her memory. He stuffed a couple of his notebooks and textbooks into his bag and shut the door behind him as he finally made his way downstairs.

"Morning, Grandmother," he greeted with a sift kiss to her cheek. "Did you sleep well?"

Mrs. Jung hummed and nodded as she packed his lunch into a bag for him. This morning routine, one that hadn't changed since he first moved in with her when he was ten, had yet to be forgotten, and for that he was glad. Her condition hadn't progressed very far yet, and it gave him hope, stupid hope that he knew wouldn't come true. There was no cure for Alzheimer's, so it was only a matter of time before his beloved grandmother would be unable to care for Jamie.

"Stella should be here any minute," Jamie told her, reminding her of the nurse they had hired a couple months back to help her when Jamie was at school during the day. "What are you guys gonna do while I'm gone?"

"We like to watch Desperate Housewives," his grandmother replied.

"Oh yeah? I was expecting y'all to be more into soap operas."

The elderly woman rolled her eyes and zipped up his lunch bag. "They're too bright, and the actors too stiff. Desperate Housewives has Eva Longoria."

"Your crush on her is adorable, Grandmother."

"Good morning, Jung family!" a bright voice called from the entryway. "I come bearing gifts!"

A gasp escaped Jamie at the sight of the cheese danish from his favorite bakery. Before she left, Bella would always bring one for him to devour before the first bell since it was super close to her house. Jamie hurried forward to engulf the nurse in a warm hug before taking the bag from her hand.

"Stella, I think I'm in love with you."

The nurse, a pretty woman in her forties with a curly brown hair, shook her head and laughed, showing off her lovely laugh lines, as she placed her coffee on the counter.

"I think you should set your sights a little younger there, honey. I have children older than you."

Jamie sighed dramatically," The stars plot to keep us apart, dear Stella. In another lifetime, perhaps."

Mrs. Jung lightly smacked her grandson's head and snapped, "Stop making my nurse uncomfortable, dove, and get on to school. We have some Housewives to watch."

"Alright, alright. Take good care of her today, Stella. I'll see y'all after school."

He shouldered his bag and slipped his sneakers on at the door before heading out to the bus stop. He'd just started to get used to riding alone and had perfected the whole "earbuds-in-ears-hood-up-I'm-sleeping-don't-bother-me" look since Bella had moved away. He could just hear her calling him dramatic with how he would lean his head against the window and imagine he was in a music video for whatever song was playing on his walkman. It helped him forget it was the beginning of his senior year and how he would be spending it with no friends. He just really missed Bella.

The final bell rang, and Jamie loitered by his locker as kids filled the hallway. He didn't want to get stuck dealing with all the bodies knocking against his, so instead he spent time double checking that he had everything for the homework assigned that night. If he forgot anything, he couldn't text Bella for help anymore. He was once again hit with the realization that he was all alone his senior year, and he leaned his head against the frame of his open locker, closing his eyes and taking a moment to pretend that this wasn't his reality, that when he opened his eyes, his best friend would be leaning against the locker beside his, making some snarky comment about their English teacher. He took a deep breath and opened his eyes, yet all he saw was the hallway beginning to empty out, leaving him all alone once more.

"Where the hell are you, Bella?" he asked his empty locker before closing it.

He was about to head out to where the bus would be waiting for him when he suddenly felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He checked the caller ID to see an unknown number, but he thought he remembered the area code from the one time Bella called from her dad's landline. He scrambled to press the accept button.

"Hello?" he greeted the person on the other end, hoping that it would be Bella herself and not her father calling to tell him that there had been some sort of terrible accident. With Bella, he wouldn't cross it out as a possibility.

"Uh, is this Jamie?" a gruff voice asked, sounding painfully awkward and unsure. "This is Charlie Swan, Bella's father."

Jamie's heart leapt into his throat. "I-Is Bella okay, sir?"

"Huh? Oh, no, she's fine! I, uh, Renee gave me your number, and, well, Bella is always talking my ear off about you, so I figured I'd give you a call, ask if you wanted to come up to Forks for her birthday in a couple weeks."

Jamie blinked, waiting for the words to process and sink in. Fly up to Washington? In the middle of the semester? He wasn't sure if his teachers would allow it, if his grandmother would even allow it. Oh, his grandmother. Could he really leave her alone like that? Even if it was for a few days... but on the other hand, he could see Bella again, for the first time in months.

"Jamie? Son, you still there?"

"Oh, yeah, I'm still here! I, uh, I have to talk to my grandmother about all of this, and, you know, my teachers and everything, but, um," he fiddled with the strings on his hoodie as he thought about the offer, "I would really like to come surprise Bella for her birthday."

Bella's dad heaved an audible sigh of relief, making Jamie smile. Maybe Bella did miss him as much as he missed her.

"I completely understand, son, so just keep me updated on everything so I can get you your ticket."

"Oh, I, there's no need for that, sir! I can buy my own tick-"

"Don't be ridiculous. I'm the one flying you all the way out here for a weekend, so it just makes sense for me to pay. You just make sure you can get yourself on that plane."

Jamie recalled Bella telling him that things were really awkward between her and her dad when she first moved, mostly because the two of them were so similar, and he could really tell in this moment. The two of them were awkward, had trouble talking to people and showing their emotions, but underneath that gruff, or in Bella's case snarky, exterior laid two very warm people. Now, Jamie didn't hate Renee. How could he when she was the one who took him and Bella on an impromptu weekend to Vegas that one time? Yeah, he and Bella were stuck in the hotel room most of the time, but it was still fun. But he wouldn't exactly classify Renee as a parent, not when Bella was the one who seemed to be raising Renee, so he could only hope Charlie was different.

"Thank you, sir, I really appreciate it. I'll get back to you soon."

"You have a good day, son."

"You as well, sir."

Jamie slide his phone shut and slipped it back in his pocket before shouldering his backpack and hurrying out to the bus. He didn't want to have to call Stella for a ride, especially because that meant leaving his grandmother alone, and she was getting worse. If he was gonna travel to Washington, he was going to have to talk to Stella and the company they hired her from about getting someone to stay with her at night while he was gone.

He managed to slip through the bus doors before they shut, and unfortunately there was no seat he could take alone, so he resigned himself to sliding into one beside a freshman. He could feel them shift to look at him, and so he quickly popped his earbuds in and pressed play on his walkman, effectively shutting down any conversation before it could start. Was it rude? Oh, yeah, absolutely. Did he particularly care? Not really. Someone needed to humble the freshmen, right? And having to talk to a freshman on a bus being the only conversation he's had with his peers in a while was not gonna do wonders for his ego. And he knew he was being hypocritical considering he should technically be in the year below the one in which he actually was, but, well... Bella had been his only friend. He wasn't amazing at communication, aside from, you know, the occasional flirting that never led anywhere, and at this point, in his senior year of high school, he figured there wasn't much point in trying to make new friends now. He would save all that for college.

The bus rolled up to his stop, and with a brief nod to the kid next to him-he did feel a bit bad about ignoring them-he exited the bus and hopped off the last step, letting out a small giggle. He made his way down the street, kicking a rock here or there. The stop was only a couple houses away from his own, but he liked to walk the other way around the block for just a few more minutes of time alone before he had to go back into his house. As much as he loved his grandmother, as much as he would do absolutely anything for her, it was stifling in there. To be stuck in there with the woman who raised him, the woman who was slowly losing sight of who she was. Who he was. These walks he took under the clear Arizona sky with his favorite mixtape blasting in his ears, they were the only time he actually enjoyed being alone. Gave him a sense of peace that he couldn't afford at home where he always had to make sure his grandmother took her meds or ate her meals or went to bed or didn't wander off in the middle of the night. He knew at this point she couldn't even really count as a guardian, but he wasn't ready to let her go. He wasn't ready to face the world completely on his own. As he approached the front door of his house, he made up his mind. He was going to do whatever he could to make it for Bella's birthday. For one last weekend where he could pretend everything was back to the way it used to be before she left and Grandmother started to get worse.

a/n: hey i'm back! i hope y'all enjoyed the first chapter of the rewritten "The Forgotten Ones." obviously, as you can see from this chapter, things are gonna be a bit different in this one. same characters, slightly different backstories and plots. so, it's not a completely different story, but it isn't the exact same either! that means anyone who has read, or will read, the original story will still be surprised! i hope y'all enjoy this! also the full story (including intros and cast list) is uploaded on my wattpad bisexualpuff