Author's Notes: Thanks to Stealth who reviewed the last chapter! I should be getting into the meat of the story next chapter. Also, I've decided to make it a tad bit AU. As in, Eddie never hit Theresa last season and they got married. I might write a story later to explain it all, let me know what you think. Please review! Enjoy!
When I'm Gone
Chapter 3
Maybe I'm just blind….
The blaring of an angry horn jerked Lindsey from her thoughts and altered her that the light had turned green. She switched her foot from the brake to the gas and made her way through the intersection and farther down Macarthur. She was vaguely aware that there was no band of metal on her ring finger to contact the steering wheel. She took a left at the next intersection.
The tears came. She took one hand off of the steering wheel and tried to brush them away. She didn't need this now. She didn't need to crash. If she crashed maybe Ryan would come back.
He had been gone a week now. He hadn't called. Hadn't made any move to contact her in anyway. Not that she had. She had decided the night he left that he was going through a lot right now and so she was going to give him his space. Easier said than done.
The thing that annoyed her the most about Ryan was his tendency to remove her from his past. When they had first started planning the wedding she had asked him if he wanted any of his Chino friends to be involved. Hannah Cody, Lindsey's best friend from grade school was going to be her maid of honor, so she figured that Ryan would someone from his pre-Newport his days to at least be present. He told her that he hadn't kept in touch with any of them
Then the Christmas card came.
Lindsey knocked twice on the door in front of her and waited for it to be opened and suddenly felt foolish for even standing there. All she knew about the person that lived behind the door was that her name Theresa Devalos, she lived in Chino, and had been close enough to her fiancé to send him a Christmas card that Ryan had hid from Lindsey and that Lindsey had found the envelope for and had map quested the return address for.
The door opened and reveled a gorgeous girl with long, dark wavy hair. Why did Lindsey always feel so intimidated when she met one of Ryan's ex-girlfriends?
"Can I help you?" Theresa asked obviously a little surprised to see a complete stranger on her door step.
"I'm Lindsey…I'm Ryan Atwood's fiancée…You do know Ryan Atwood, right?…I mean I didn't drive all the way out here to just make a fool out of myself," Lindsey stumbled through, "Which I am so totally doing…I'm really sorry…I'm just gonna go now,"
"No, it's ok," The other women said quickly and gently, "I've known Ryan since I was eight years old. He's a great guy isn't he?"