A/N: You cannot imagine how extremely sorry I am for taking so long to update. I wrote one version of this chapter, hated it, rewrote it, and this is what it ended up being. And after I finished writing it, I realized that it was supposed to be a Sunday which ruined my whole plan. So lets just pretend this is a special Sunday that requires the Sundae Inn to be open. How stupid is it that the Sundae Inn isn't opened on Sundays. It makes no sense to me. I just don't want to rewrite it again and you know I'd take forever to do so. I don't want to keep my readers waiting that much longer. So in advance, sorry guys! Chase's POV

Disclaimer: I don't own Harvest Moon, the characters, the places, or any of the songs used in this story. Basically, in case I've missed anything, I own nothing but the plot.

Had it been this hard for Christopher Columbus when he discovered America? He had a place to go back to, Spain, but he had left to go to the US at Spain's expense, coming back to Spain after naming some crude islands (Yes, I'm talking about the Virgin Islands. Honestly, who would name an island Virgin Gorda? It means fat virgin, after all! Got something on your mind you're not telling us about, buddy?). Had it been this hard for him to decide to go back to Spain?

I could be considered an explorer, right? Well, maybe a little along the lines of Dora and not Christopher, but none the less, they're both annoying and Spanish-speaking so it's basically the same.

"Stand up everybody, stand up!" Goddess, I would kill myself if I were Dora. I'd just end up strangling that monkey dude first. Then maybe I'd proceed to murder the kids watching who aren't listening to my every command. Then both the explorers in question would be violent.

But, back to the subject. Even if I'm not an explorer like Calvin, I moved out of the country regardless. So, I consider myself an explorer. And, as I'm imagining it would've been for the dead America founder, this decision was a lot tougher than expected. Was history the way to go? Or was it better to learn from your mistakes and not repeat them?

I'm sure most people would say the second choice. It's the obvious reasoning that most parents teach their children. But, as I am not Dora, this rule does not apply to me. My parents had never taught me that rule before dying when I was a little over seven years old. They were the type of parents who would rather have fun and live in the moment rather than worry about the future. Maybe that's one reason they died. And maybe that's one reason I don't like to be that fun-loving. Because I know how it will turn out in the end if I follow their footsteps.

Now, you may be asking what Columbus has to do with me. Well, his decision to go back to Spain could in fact be symbolic to the decision I am making at this very moment. Should I stay with Maya and risk never telling Angela how I feel about her, that I love her? That I still love her?

While you're in the question-asking mood, you might even be asking how I got to the subject of Christopher Columbus in the first place. Maybe it was the fact that the mayor had ordered a dish so disgusting, it must've been fed to the Native Americans as torture devices by Christopher Columbus and his crew. Maybe it was the Spanish sounding song Yolanda was humming while slicing the heck out of our shipment of fresh vegetables. Then again, maybe it was being able to hear Hamilton saying what a wonderful contribution Calvin was to the island after making all these discoveries about some kind of seedling. Who knows, it could even be a mixture of the three.

The combined forces of the oven and the sun pounded on my skin as if it was still summer. For such a normally cool season, it was blazing hot. It must have been a little after noon for the sun to be so high in the sky, the heat hugging me as if it had no one else to hug. The Sundae Inn was packed with people, people who all wanted food. And I, I and Yolanda, we were the unfortunate people who had to serve them.

"Order up!" I shouted after wiping a bead of sweat from my brow, placing the torture device on the counter for Maya to deliver to Hamilton. Before she even had time to come and talk, I turned around and started cooking the next dish, which just happened to be Bamboo en Papilotte. Great, more use of the oven to make me go into hyperthermia. And here I thought the townspeople were starting to like me. Well, like me enough to not kill me at least.

"Chase, I need to tell you something," came a voice from the kitchen's entryway.

"Not now, Maya," I said a little roughly. It's not that I didn't want to talk to her per se; it's just that I always believed the kitchen was a work place. A place where miracles could happen if you were patient enough. A place where all hell would break loose at the simplest of errors. A place where I could just think and not have to say anything to anybody.

"Do I sound like a Maya to you?" the voice asked, sounding like whining and anger were put in a blender together. I slowly turned around to see a short, purple-haired girl with her hands on her hips.

I don't know why I get aggravated so easily, but just seeing somebody in the kitchen who wasn't supposed to be there, let's just say it was not a pleasant feeling. The heat in the kitchen combined with the heat in my head, even worse of a feeling. Maybe it was just that my personality was sort of contradictable. The optimism thing just does not cut it for me. If you can't have more than one emotion, you are not an interesting person. And I'm not afraid to voice my opinions either. If you get me angry, you'll know that you have.

"You know, you had just the right amount of whininess in your voice to be the actual Maya. I commend you for that much at the very least," I said with the usual smirk on my face.

Suddenly, her eyes veered off to the left as if looking at someone behind me. My heart started thumping wildly at the possibilities it held. "She's standing right behind me, isn't she?" I asked. Luna slowly nodded her head in agreement, purple pigtails bobbing up and down.

I turned around, preparing to duck just in case Maya was holding anything that could 'slip' from her hands and somehow end up hitting me in the face. But, to my surprise, Maya was on the other side of the room, striking up a conversation with the Inn's next customer.

"Okay, that was really not funny. You need to get out of my kitchen before I kick you out," I said.

"No, no. You're right," she said.

"When am I not?" I asked under my breath.

"It was hilarious! You should've seen the look on your face! Priceless!" she said, laughing so hard I thought she would begin crying. Suddenly all laughter stopped as her eyes veered to the right this time. Then it was followed by a finger pointing in the same direction.

"Nice try, but there's no way I'm falling for that again," I said. "You hate me just as much as your husband does, don't you?"

"Chase, did I just hear you call this your kitchen?" asked a booming voice from behind me. I gulped and slowly turned around to see Yolanda staring at me. If I was as short as Luna, I probably would've thought her menacing and scary too. Heck, if I was 7ft tall I would still think her as menacing and scary. But I'm used to her by now.

"I just want to get this pest out of here before anything disastrous happens," I said.

"I better not hear that happen again. You are just an apprentice," she said. Luckily, the Inn was too busy for her to take it any farther.

"Okay, I'm going to forget you calling me a pest because that may even be funnier than the first time," she said, laughing hysterically again.

"Why are you even here?" I asked after the laughter had died down almost completely. She had said she wanted to tell me something, right? Well the only thing she had told me so far was that I was hilarious when frightened. Yes, very important matters to disturb me with while I'm in the kitchen.

"I have… a message to deliver. It's from Angela," she said, the laughter totally gone from her voice and replaced by what seemed like sadness.

My mind went scrambling around rapidly at just the mention of Angela's name. I was really pathetic, wan't I? After all this time, I even remembered when we first met.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"Honey, I'm so sorry," said a woman at the front desk. "But all the kids in here know what you're going through. You will feel so much better if you make some friends, I promise." In all honesty, that woman scared me. I wished my parents could've had siblings so I could live with them instead of staying in this run-down orphanage."Follow me. I'll show you around to the other children," the lady said, stepping out from behind the counter and waving for me to follow. Although her face held a small smile, it wasn't very welcoming. "Right around this corner, dear," she said, motioning for me to go first.

I sighed and turned the corner to see a room full of joyful kids. They were all playing a game. It must've been duck, duck, goose because there were only two people running around. The rest, maybe ten of them, were sitting in a circle on the floor. There was a woman sitting in a rocking chair in the far corner, watching happily as everybody was having fun. There was a sharp pang in my heart. Everybody was having fun except for me. She stood up as soon as she saw me enter and the children all stopped playing. Not caring what people thought of me anymore, I silently stalked into the room. The front desk lady followed closely behind.

"Everybody, this is Chase. Let's give him a hardy Little Treasures Orphanage welcome!" she said.

If I had ever heard a pathetic excuse for a welcome, it was that one. There were mumbled "Hello's," jumbled "Hi's," a few "Welcome's," but only one "Hey, Chase."

The owner of the voice sounded like... well, an angel.

"I'm going to leave you here with Mrs. Linda. If you have any problems, come and get me at the front desk." I nodded vigorously, not wanting to seem like a baby. Boys were supposed to be tough no matter what. "Make Chase feel welcome and introduce yourselves to him, kids," she said to the entire group.

After she left, the first person to come up and talk to me was a girl. She had short, brown hair and brown eyes. She was wearing a t-shirt with the orphanage's name on it and a pair of jeans. "Hey," she said, coming up to me. Right when she said that, all I could think was that she was the owner of the voice. The one who had sounded like an angel. It was... heavenly.

I had never been so self-conscious in my short seven year life. My tear-stained face was probably turning red. My sullen expression hadn't changed much over the past few weeks and I could fairly remember my parents telling me that if I rolled my eyes too much they would get stuck like that. I wondered if the same was true for expressions.

"My name is Angela," she said. I couldn't help it. I burst out laughing. Angel with an 'a' at the end. It fit her. Apparently you couldn't be sad for too long. She looked at me like I was crazy.

"Are you by any chance an angel? My mom used to tell me about them," I said stupidly.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"Yolanda, I'm going to take my break now," I said, leading Luna to a far-off table where we could have a conversation without anybody else listening in on us.

"Fine, but you have to help clean up between five and six then," she shouted out the door.

I ignored Yolanda's shouts and turned to Luna. "What? What is it that you need to tell me? And it's from Angela you say?"

"Well, I wasn't supposed to tell you until after Pascal left, but I figured now would be as good a time as ever to tell you. Maybe we should wait a few minutes before I tell you…"

"What is it?" I asked impatiently. "What about Pascal?" I asked, my mind not being able to comprehend much in such a state, this state of thinking that something was wrong with Angela, that she was hurt. "Is she hurt? What did Pascal do to her?"

"No, he didn't hurt her exactly…" she said, trailing off.

"What did he do to her then? Oh no. Don't tell me he raped her!" I said, starting to get up from the seat.

"What? No! Sit back down!" she called. For some strange reason, I obeyed.

"What's wrong then? Just tell me already!"

"Well, she's leaving. She wanted me to tell you goodbye," she said slowly.

"Leaving where?" I asked, dumbfounded. So naïve was I that I couldn't even understand it when I heard Angela had left. Maybe I wasn't naïve at all, maybe I was just in love. It never even crossed my mind that Angela would move on her own accord, at her own pace. I always believed I wasn't good enough for her, but I never guessed she would leave me just like that, without even saying goodbye. And right after I had made up my mind that I really did love her.

"Leaving the island," Luna said simply. I didn't hear anybody after that, I just ran. Ran out the door, through town and onto the beach.

Being clumsy did not help me in the least. I tripped over a humongous clam just lying in the middle of the beach. In my defense, I could swear that clam was trying to stop me from getting to Angela. I mean seriously, if it weren't out to get me I wouldn't have landed on some stupid pointy seashell and cut the back of my leg open. Couldn't they have gotten beach clean up to pick up all the crap along the shore? But I just got up and kept running. I don't believe I've ever ran faster in my life. Just the thought of the pain made me run even faster.

The only sound was that of my heavy breathing and the whoosh of the ocean waves as I reached the dock. I watched as a boat a mile off-shore got smaller and smaller as it went even farther into the ocean. I didn't care that I could hardly breathe. I didn't care that the blood dripping down my leg had reached the ground and kept oozing from there. I didn't even care about my dignity as the wetness in my eyes found its way to my cheeks. All I could think at that moment was that Angela was gone.

"No!" I screamed at the top of my lungs, willing her to come back. This couldn't be happening. Not now. Not to me. Not again. I couldn't be losing another person I loved.

The sea breeze made me even more aware. Aware of the blood escaping my body in massive amounts, the small beads of sweat on my forehead, the tears trickling down my cheeks. But those were no comparison to the extreme pain in my heart. No comparison at all.

"This can't be happening!" I said, quieter because the limited oxygen in my lungs only allowed me so much volume. "She can't be gone," I said, my knees buckling under me. The effect was that I fell to the ground and onto the dock. "No, you can't be gone…" But she was.

I have so many apologies to do this week, its not even funny.

1. Sorry it took so long to update. If you didn't read the first Author's Note, I had to rewrite the chapter. Also, I was just lazy and wanted to play the game instead of write about it :P

2. Sorry if it takes a long time to update for the next chapter. I might not be able to get it out to you by next weekend. Next Friday is my birthday, so I doubt I'll have time to get it to you before then.

3. Sorry if you have no idea who Christopher Columbus is. I just needed a person for Chase to compare himself to because I love comparisons so much :)

4. Sorry if it's as bad as crap. If you think it truly is that bad, review and tell me that. I can take it. Even if you don't think it is that bad, review and tell me what you thought about it.

5. Sorry if it's extremely cheesy and stupid.

Okay, now that that's over with, onto the fun, suspenseful part :)

What did Angela tell Luna before she left? What is Chase going to do now that Angela's gone? What is the big thing that will happen on the boat? What about that cut on Chase's leg? How has Chase not heard the rumor yet? All this and more to be answered at a later time. Review and tell me what you think the answer to these questions are. I'd love to see how wild your imaginations are :)

Also, I have a question to ask you and I'm to lazy to create a poll. Do you think I should continue to write with these flashbacks? The main purpose of them for me is to give you a little extra something to read. But are they too much? Review and let me know. I love reviews :)