Summary: Meghan Donovan is a girl no one pays attention to until the day Ty Borden discovers something about her that so closely relates to his own life he finds himself becoming attached to her. But the closer he gets, the worse things become. And no one makes it through unscathed. The first installment of the Ty Chronicles saga. Set pre-Heartland/pre-juvie/pre-group home. Told in first-person through Ty's point of view.
Rating: PG-13 for swearing and domestic violence.
Author's Notes: I was going to make this a one shot but decided to break it up into a few parts so you weren't waiting forever for something new to read.

Her name was Meghan Donovan. She was a pretty girl, shoulder-length brown hair and green eyes so light they looked almost grey some days. She wasn't like a lot of other girls in my high school who dressed to the nines and acted out for the attention of a guy. She was quiet, reserved, and essentially invisible. Even to me for a long time.

Now, I know what you're thinking. That this is going to be a romantic love story where the bad boy falls for the good girl who changes him for the better. Well, maybe the end of that is partly true at a stretch, but this isn't a Nicholas Sparks novel. Besides, that story is one you already know and there is no sense in retelling it. This one is a story of unbridled courage from a soft spoken young girl who's death (yes, she dies; there are no surprise endings here) put my life into a startling perspective.

As I previously stated, I wasn't aware of her at first. It was one of those instances where you are so used to seeing something, or in this case someone, every day that you never acknowledge they were ever there until the day they're not. Suddenly you're thrown because something is missing. It's like the old textile mill that used to sit back behind the tracks I'd walk along as a short cut home. I would pass it day after day with an occasional passing glance, not putting much thought in it. Then for a few weeks I took a different route when I got my first under-the-table job. During those weeks the mill had been gutted and razed. It wasn't until I got myself fired and returned to that old path did I realize the mill existed - too late. The remaining lot was barren, nothing but a graffitied slab of cement foundation left behind. The open space made the path look foreign.

The day Meghan Donovan didn't cross my path enroute to her social sciences class as I bypassed the security guard stationed at the rear entrance of the school by cutting through wood shop to sneak in my daily smoke break, was the day I first noticed her. I never realized until that moment how routine it was to skirt around her and her fuchsia Jansport bag while avoiding the eyes of the guard to slip into the classroom. I'd never taken a shop class in my life, but this guard must have thought I was in line to be a carpenter.

I remember hesitating in the hallway in front of the door, trying to figure out why my typical skip-out felt wrong that day. The feeling was strange to me but I shook it off as nicotine withdrawal. Once I got outside with a fresh cigarette things would he right as rain. They were. Until the following day.

I ran into Meghan coming out of the principal's office. It seemed customary for them to pull me in every few weeks for a lecture about the importance of my education and how skipping my classes would result in failure of my courses, perhaps high school as a whole. They didn't know I didn't even plan on hanging on that long to find out. For their benefit, I learned to perfect my solemn "so sorry" face, even more so the specific combination of words to fabricate an apologetic explanation for my self-deprecating behavior and how I'd try to do better. I'd get a hard calculating stare for a few long seconds before being sent off with yet another warning. They quickly figured out that suspensions weren't punishments that worked for someone like me as it gave me an excuse not to be in school. Anyway, I digress. The point is, it was after one of those heart to hearts with Vice Principal Bash that I crossed paths with Meghan on her way into the office.

"Don't worry, I softened him up for you." I murmured into her ear as I held open the door for her to enter. She smiled softly in acknowledgment. She had a pretty smile. It was a shy smile befitting to the girl. I had never seen her smile before. All those times we passed in the hall and I don't think I ever even saw all of her face as her head had always been bowed, keeping her in her own little world.

I paused when the secretary asked her to have a seat. She sat like a perfect lady, feet on the floor, legs pressed together with her hands folded in her lap and her back as straight as the chair without leaning against it. Her head was bowed toward her hands that were the only giveaway to her unease. She was rubbing her fingers and picking at her chipping green nail polish.

"First time?" I asked kindly, stepping back into the office to sit in the empty seat next to her, hoping to help ease her fears a bit.
She nodded but didn't look at me.
I slouched back in the chair, legs spread eagle out in front of me. "It's not so bad. They're always lenient on first-timers. It's the repeat offenders they go hard on. But after a while you figure out the sweet spot."

The secretary glanced up from her computer to give me an annoyed look. "Don't you have somewhere to be, Mr. Borden?"
I fixed her with my wide, charming smile. "No, ma'am. This is my free period."
"Mmhmm, seems you have a semester of those."
"A whole year, more like," I quipped.
She shot me a look of disapproval over the top of her classes - obviously I was lying - but said no more. There really wasn't much they could do to me anymore to be a better student. All the pep talks in the world wouldn't sway me if I didn't want to be swayed.

I returned my attention to my companion. "So, what'd you do?"
She was silent for a long time. Like, a long time. I wasn't sure if she was going to answer, or if she even wanted to. Or if she just didn't want me bothering her as I was. We didn't know each other, after all. At that time I didn't even know her name.
"Too many unexcused absences," she finally answered in that soft voice of hers. I wasn't sure she was capable of speaking any louder.
"Oh." I blew raspberries. "That's nothing. Last year I didn't show up for an entire month and didn't get much more than a shake of the head. How many days did you miss? Three? Four?" The limit was three before grades started being altered, but usually with solid excuses it was easy enough to slip by that rule.
"Twelve."
Whoa. That was a lot for your average student and I wondered how I never noticed them except for the one yesterday. "Still doesn't beat my record." No one probably ever would.
"I have about forty latenesses, too," she admitted.
That surprised me and I stumbled over a thought for a moment. "If your grades are good they really won't do much. That's all they care about." That was my saving grace. I knew I was a smart kid and I could learn the material. I just had no patience to sit in a classroom for seven hours out of my day. Which is what frustrated the hell out of my teachers.
Meghan shook her head. "I'm too far behind. They want to hold me back."
I cringed. "That's rough. What about your folks?"

I had the feeling before she even answered that her situation wasn't very different from mine with parents who didn't care what their child did with her life and would rather her be out making money to help with the bills instead of wasting it in school. But it was the law all kids had to remain in school until they could legally drop out at sixteen. I still had several months to go and was counting down the days.

Meghan shrugged and I knew at that moment she didn't want to talk any more on the subject. I also knew at that moment that my suspicions were most likely correct. Sometimes silence carried the loudest voice.