VII

This was it; the day had come. Abbey's heart was drumming violently in her chest, and she thought she was going to throw up. It wasn't fair, it was too soon, the last few weeks had gone so fast...

She hadn't felt this ill in the build up to any of her exams, or even opening her college acceptance letters. Then, it had been a nine in ten parts irrational fear of disaster; now, it was cold, hard reality. Jed was going away. Not forever, but for the summer, and that sure as hell felt like forever from where she was standing.

If she'd been the kind of girl to indulge in weeping and wailing, she'd probably have done some, but histrionics had never been her style. Besides, what was she going to do, rant at Jed for leaving her alone? He felt just as wretched about it as he did, and he was the one going back to some kind of hellish family situation that she didn't really even know about. It was obvious his father treated him abysmally, although he wouldn't openly admit so.

"I'll call you every day," Jed promised, face a study in misery. "And I'll write, and I'll- I'll get my brother to take pictures and send those, and..." He shook his head. "I'm gonna miss you so much."

"I don't want you to go," she admitted. Despite best intentions, tears were prickling at her eyes. Jed was so much a fixture of her daily life now. How could she go a whole summer without seeing him smile, without curling up in his arms to listen to the radio, without sitting on the back step kissing under the stars?

She hadn't thought it was possible, but Jed's look of distress grew even deeper. "Don't cry," he said, in a soft, dismayed tone that warmed and broke her heart simultaneously. Abbey closed her eyes as he brushed the tears away with his thumbs, and kissed her before pulling her close against his chest. "It's gonna be hard- so hard- but it's okay. I love you, and I'm coming back." She looked up in time to catch him smiling his most determined smile. "There's nothing in the world that could stop me coming back."

She smiled helplessly back, drawing strength from his conviction. "You'd better," she said, expression still fragile. "Somebody's gotta kick my father's ass at chess."

"I'll practise," he said dryly, raising one eyebrow in an arch. And then they were both laughing, for no particular reason, just leaning against each other and laughing, because it was better than crying, and you had to do something.

"You'll call me every day?" she asked, leaning her forehead against his.

"Twice a day," he promised extravagantly. "Three times! I'll call you three times."

"You'll get kicked out of the house when the phone bill comes through," she warned.

"Then I'll hitchhike back here and turn up on your doorstep."

She grinned at him quickly. "Just make sure you don't get picked up by any strange girls in pickup trucks."

He put on that deep, playful voice that made her knees weak every time. "Oh, believe me, I learned my lesson. I still haven't recovered from the last one."

"So I should hope," she said archly, and spoiled it by smirking. He planted a series of little kisses all over her face, until it tickled and she had to push him away, giggling. "What are you doing?"

"Sensory memory," he said, with great seriousness.

"Exactly how much of me are you planning to memorise?" she demanded playfully.

"As much as I can get to without your parents kicking the door down," he said, kissing the side of her neck to prove it.

All too soon, there was an knock at the door. "Ah, dammit," he grumbled, pulling away.

Her mother's voice floated through the door. "Okay, kids, you've got thirty seconds to put your clothes back on, and then I'm coming in."

"Mom!" Abbey blushed, and Jed chuckled.

"We're decent, Mrs. Barrington," he hastened to assure her.

She came in with a distinct smirk. "Well now, where's the fun in that?"

"Oh, mom," Abbey repeated helplessly, burying her face against Jed's neck in mortification. Possibly the only thing worse than a mother who disapproved of your love life was one who was entirely too enthusiastic about it.

Her mother gave Jed an affectionate kiss on the cheek, and straightened his collar for him as she was always doing to Matthew. "Now come back to us whole and healthy, young man, and try not to do anything incredibly stupid over the summer."

"I'll try not to," he promised, and Abbey snorted sceptically.

Jed gave her mother a hug. "Thank you, Mrs. Barrington, you've been so kind and generous to me, I couldn't have asked for half the things you and your husband have done for me."

She smiled. "Well now, my Abigail thinks you're worth it, and she's usually right about these things." She tilted her head somewhat regretfully towards the door. "Car's waiting."

Jed and Abbey exchanged a pained glance, and linked hands. Almost time to say goodbye. They headed out to the car.

And now here they were; the station, the platform, and the train arriving any minute. No more time for pretence and procrastination. Dr. Barrington, instead of performing his usual glowering chaperone duty, had discreetly retired to the car to give them a moment alone.

"I really will call," Jed assured her earnestly.

"Not if I call you first," Abbey corrected.

He chuckled softly. "We'll both get chucked out of the house when the phone bills come in."

"Then we'll meet in the middle, and camp out."

He frowned, considering. "Where would the middle be? Somewhere in Pennsylvania, maybe? Hang on. If it's-"

"Jed." She placed a finger over his moving lips to still them and looked him in the eye. "Are you actually spending our last minutes together doing math in your head?"

He grinned unrepentantly, and gave her a playful look from under his lashes. "If I left Manchester on a three o'clock train going fifty miles an hour, and you left South Bend at five o'clock going sixty miles an hour, when would we meet?"

She kissed him. "Not nearly soon enough."

The train was coming in. It shuddered to a halt, the wind of its passage ruffling Jed's hair and snatching at her blouse. "I have to go," he said reluctantly, raising his voice to beat the noise.

"I love you."

"I love you too!" He grabbed his suitcases and backed towards the train. "You know it's not too late to stow away in my luggage," he called after her from the doorway.

"I wouldn't fit in with all your economics textbooks," she called back.

"I'll throw them out!"

"You'd dump your books for me?" she asked, placing her hand on her heart and pretending to go weak at the knees.

"I'd dump everything for you. Always!"

"Come back to me!" she called urgently, as the door swung shut between them and the train began to slowly chug back into motion. 'I love you,' he mouthed again through the window, and blew her a kiss. She blew one right back.

Abbey watched him leave, squinting after the train long beyond the point where she couldn't tell which window was his anymore. The train melted into the distance, carrying Jed further and further away from her with every passing moment.

Her father stepped out of the shadows, and placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"Come on, honey. Let's go home."

His brother looked somehow different when he stepped off the train; longer haired, perhaps not quite so skinny, even a tiny bit tanned. Perhaps he'd actually spent some of his time outside this semester, instead of locked up in his bedroom with his books.

Johnny gave him a lazy wave from the platform as his train pulled in. He almost called some kind of stupid line, but something in the firm set of his brother's jaw discouraged him. Teasing his brother was no longer the easy sport it once had been; they were growing apart now that Jed lived away from home, and he wondered how long it would be before his brother outgrew his home and his family entirely. Jed had never been destined to be tied to the small town life, mock as he did even Johnny knew that.

Jed gave him a tight and tired smile as he crossed the platform. "Hi, Johnny."

"Rough journey?"

"Something like that." He looked around. "Isn't there a phone around here somewhere? I need to call Abbey."

Johnny chuckled and shook his head. "Man, has she ever got you on a short leash."

Jed just shrugged him off. "It's called love, little brother, look into it."

He rolled his eyes. "You're sickening."

He just smiled airily, and continued on his way to the phone. Johnny edged closer, ostensibly to guard the suitcases, in reality to adopt the time honoured practise of eavesdropping while pretending not to care in the slightest.

"Hello? Oh, hi, Mrs. Barrington. Yeah, it was fine, I- Yes, I did eat on the train. No, I- Mrs. Barrington, it may shock you to know this, but occasionally I do actually eat." His brother's voice deepened into a chuckle, and it startled him; it was a man's laugh, and quite different to the wry looks and sarcastic snorts that usually passed for Jed's rather bitter brand of humour. He sounded... well, cheerful and carefree, the latter a word Jonathan had certainly never associated much with his older brother.

His tone shifted again as his girlfriend came onto the phone. "Abbey," he breathed, with a warmth that made Johnny shift uncomfortably to be listening in. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm home. I'm at the station. Yeah. My brother's standing about ten feet away, pretending he's not listening."

"I'm not listening," Johnny retorted over his shoulder.

"You hear that?" Jed asked the phone. He looked up at his brother. "Abbey says hi." He turned his attention back to the phone conversation. "Listen, I'll you call you again later tonight. I just wanted to let you know I got back okay. Hey- Hey, not even I can get lost on a train, you know. No, really, I- Okay. Yeah. I'll talk to you tonight. I love you. Bye."

He put the phone down and smiled a brief, melancholy smile before turning to face Johnny, who was looking at him with a frown.

"Yeah?" he asked a little self-consciously.

"You."

"Me what?"

"You've changed."

He shrugged slightly, not denying the suggestion. "I'm doing different things now. I want different things. I've got Abbey, I'm maybe going to London, one day I'm gonna be married and have fifteen kids..."

Johnny snorted slightly, as much in startlement as amusement. "Really?" he wondered, eyebrows raised.

Jed gave him a quirk of a grin, then quickly reassembled his straight face. "The exact number's open to negotiation."

He hefted one of the suitcases, and shot his brother a look. "What the hell kind of negotiation have you been up to down there?"

Jed smirked and shrugged. "Come on, let's go."

Johnny trailed after him, wondering who this new bright-eyed and playful young man was, and what he'd done with the flustered, frustrated brother he'd used to know.