A/N: Hello! This chapter is more of another look into Ronnie and Darren's lives when they were human, before they were changed. And I was laying in bed wondering these things, I thought it out and decided you need to know too. Okay, so I got 30 reviews, so now I'm updating! Isn't it great how that works? Reviews equal to faster updates, imagine that! So keep on updating! If I get to 40, maybe something special will happen? ;)

A thank you to my beautiful reviewers: RoxyPony, MOONLIGHT-97, MissXMagic, Amela333, Rocky181, Hayley and _!

_: More Steve action is very, very close in the future! ;)

Disclaimer: I don't own anything but Ronnie, you better know that MissXMagic and RoxyPony own Kayden and Cassie.

Listening to: "Haunted"(Will be featured in a future chapter) and "Enchanted" by Taylor Swift

"This is KILLING me!" I groaned through my fingers that I had shielded over my eyes, Darren was working through the Path of Needles and once again, I was a wreck. "I can't breathe." I gasped, putting my head into my hands to try and keep the room from spinning.

"Maybe your corset is too tight, I told you not to wear that!" Cassie joked from beside me, I turned my head to the side pressing my lips into a straight line. She placed a spare hand on my shoulder, the other was secure in Evra's grip, and gave it a gentle squeeze. "Don't worry, he'll be fine."

"You don't know that," I mumbled, turning to the other side I saw Mr. Crepsley, who looked almost as flustered as I had. Kayden had been acting unusually distant, when I asked her how things with Arrow went, she told me that she would tell me when she came back from feeding her goldfish. And it was already too late when I realized that she didn't have a goldfish, no one in the mountain did. I have to make a mental note to go and drill her for information after this.

"Wait, there he is!" Evra cheered as Darren made his way out of the cavern, bloody and bruised.

"I told you he'd be fine." Cassie grinned as we progressed forward, Darren leaned against one of the cave walls breathing heavily, I saw his eyes searching the crowd and his lips parted into a smile when his gaze rested on me. I walked over, and decided against hugging him seeing all of the wounds.

"How was it?" I chuckled, his face darkened and he let out a small grunt,

"Just peachy." Vanez came from behind the crowd and swooped him away to get him rinsed off and bandaged up. It was now the dawn before the festival of the undead was going to begin, but before I was going to begin to think about what to wear, I had to find out what was wrong with Kayden. I bowed my head to a couple of vampires on my way over to Kayden's room I didn't hesitate as I pushed her stone door out of the frame.

"Kayden you dirty liar, you don't have a goldfish, how stupid do you think I am?" I wailed, searching around her room.

"Obviously dumb enough." she mumbled from a pillow where her face was pressed.

"What is wrong with you?" I asked, sitting down on the edge of her coffin.

"Nothing, I told you that."

"Well, if it was nothing, the last thing you would be doing would be laying in your coffin during Darren's trial. Did something happen with Arrow?" I got her there.

"No, nothing happened."

"Well then what's your major malfunction?" I snapped, my temper starting to flare. Nothing bugged me more than trying to help, and then getting shut down.

"Obviously if I could tell you Ronnie, I would!" she countered, eyebrows pressing close to eachother.

"Alright, fine. I'm not going to care anymore." I breathed, looking down at my hands.

"I just can't tell you, and I'm just stressed out, okay? Can we just talk about something else?" As if on cue, Cassie busted into Kayden's room, obviously the knock before entering didn't apply here.

"What are we going to WEAR!" she cried, placing her hand over her forehead for dramatic effect. I laughed, the tension instantly fading from the room and the girl-talk starting.

I looked over at Darren in his hammock, his eyes were closed and his arms were wrapped around his bare chest which was covered in pink tinted bandages.

"I know you're standing there, you little creeper." he mumbled with a smirk, almost causing me to jump out of my skin. His eyelids fluttered open as he pulled me onto his hammock, which rocked back and forth threatening to spill us both onto the ground.

"I didn't want to wake you up!" I defended, turning towards him, trying not to get too close in the fear of hurting him, but he threw that out the window by pulling me close and placing a kiss on my forehead after pushing my bangs out of the way. His eyes rested to close,

"I wasn't asleep, too sore."

"When did you know you loved me?" I blurted.

"Where did that come from?" Darren chortled, not opening his eyes.

"Well, I'm just curious. I mean, even though you didn't know it, I've had a crush on you ever since the fifth grade. But I didn't know that I loved you until I was about 13 when we were at Sarah Kahlan's boy-girl party and it was the first one and such a big deal." I paused chuckling at the memory, at how timid and afraid I was. "And Shellie and Bianca called me out in front of everyone, trying to say that I told Sarah that Nick- well, they lied and when I stormed out, you came after me when everyone stayed. And you missed out on the first big party to sit at my house and watch old slasher movies with me." I hated asking questions like this, it's kind of like the annoying girl whose always asking 'Why do you love me?' that really gets on my nerves. But I was curious, and it was an honest question, not a cry for some reassurance of Darren's affection.

"Well, I always liked you," Darren started smiling at past memories, "but I loved you the second I saw you."

"Oh please," I rolled my eyes, "We met when we were like, seven!"

"Let me finish," Darren frowned, "I fell in love with you the second I saw you when you came back from vacation with your family, when you were gone the whole summer."

Darren's Point of View

It was the last day before the summer ended, I fumbled around with my hands in my pockets looking around Steve's house. It was almost six o' clock and Tommy's brother was about to pick us up to bring us to the fair down at the central park. Steve bolted down the stairs, jumping past the last couple of steps in some sort of effort to save time.

"Alright! I'm ready!" he boomed, looking in the mirror and running his hands through his silver hair.

"Trying to impress someone?" I joked, he turned around with a sideways grin.

"You never know, maybe some hot chick from another country will be there."
"Uh huh. Sure Steve, keep dreaming."

"You know, Ronnie's back from California."

"How do you know?" I jumped at the statement, I shook my head trying to recover, "I mean, really? I wish I could have gone to California all summer, this summer was boring."

"Sure Darren, keep trying to cover it up." Steve mocked, being cut short by a car honking outside. "Let's go, you know Tommy's brother never waits longer than 30 seconds."

The park was covered with people, the loud chattering was joined by the sounds of games being won and the rickety roller coasters. I searched around the grounds each time we made it to another section of tents.
"Hey! There's Ronnie!" Alan pointed out, "Ron!" he called over towards the ferris wheel. My heart rattled in my rib-cage when the seas of people parted and I saw her. She jerked her head around quickly to her name, eyes bolting from side to side before finding us. I sucked in a sharp intake of air when she raised her hand above her head, waving it from side to side. Her long white and golden mixed blonde curls were pushed back with a crystal headband, exposing her pools of bright blue light. She was deeply tanned- more than usual- from the California sun, her white sundress swayed at her sides as she trotted over, cowboy boots clunking in the dirt. She thinned out, her face and body rid of the childhood chubby-ness. She was lean, her legs seemed as though they went on for days, but her torso was still short. Her boots gave her an inch, but without them she probably stood around 5'3" making her a little taller than most of the girls in our class. Her body wasn't as developed as most of the other girls around, but I could see subtle curves in her hips that weren't there when she left at the end of the year.

"Hi guys!" She grinned, the lights from the ferris wheel lighting up her silhouette giving her a subtle glow.

"Wow Ron, look at you! You're not a little kid anymore. What'd they do to you in California?" Steve praised, heat rose to her cheeks.

"Nice to see you too, Steve." her voice melodized, as she threw her arms around him in a friendly display of affection that she repeated for Tommy, and Alan. "Darren," she began, hugging me also, "I missed you."

"It's great to see you, Ronnie." I managed to verbalize, blinking as if trying to clear my vision. I always thought Ronnie was a pretty girl, and she was my best friend. No matter how much I denied it, I always had a crush on her. But for some reason, I was nervous- even more nervous than I was around her.

"I changed? Look at you, you're a stud now." she winked, making my words fumble together more. I saw Steve look from Alan to Tommy and then back to me.

"I want to go get something to eat, I'm starving! Just meet us over at the burger place, Darren." he waved, Alan and Tommy following behind him.

"So," Ronnie started, rocking back on her heels "It's weird that we're already going into high school, time flies."

"Yeah, it sure does. How was California?"

"It was great, I mean I missed home, but it was a different experience. I got to sing at a couple of open writer's circles at a couple of cafe's there, so that was cool. But I also got a lot of perspective on things."

"Like what?"

"Well, for one, I'm done trying to make other people happy and I'm going to do more for myself. Two, boys are stupid and all they do is lie. Not you, of course. You wouldn't lie to me, right Darren?"

"Never." I promised, she smirked.

"I also learned to never believe someone who promises something that's impossible to keep." I grunted, trying to assemble something that could help me bounce back again.

"You haven't changed a bit." I laughed, throwing my head back.
"I'm glad you think so. A lot of people that I've seen are treating me different already. They're mean... dumbasses." she mumbled, moving a rock with the tip of her shoe. My forehead creased, it wasn't surprising that she would already be a target to some of the other girls and some guys. What people said was wrong with her were false statements fueled by envy. I couldnt imagine hurting her, and that's what I saw in her eyes, even when they were angled towards the floor. I wanted to reach out and pull her to me and tell her not to care. She changed on the outside but no matter what to me, she was flawless. Even though she was hot headed, hot tempered and sometimes a flat out dork, she didn't play the air headed fool like the other girls claiming to be stupid, with things they knew. She had logic, and was strong willed and painfully honest. She wasn't dependent, she was strong and clever. The things that sent most guys in the opposite direction and towards the easier choice of females: ones that were the same as all the rest. What sent them away send me running towards her, trying to catch up.

"Well, I won't treat you any different."

"That makes me feel a lot better. If you did, I'd have to kick your ass."

"That day?" I gawked, it was crazy how far we had come. We were always able to talk about everything, but I never imagined us to be sitting here, talking about this. We were older now- in a twisted way, being mentally in our mid twenties but physically around sixteen or seventeen- it had been a while since we just had a conversation like we had when we were teenagers; totally harmless and really without a purpose. He just nodded his head and hummed,

"Mhm. You did change a lot, but even though you looked totally different you stayed completely same and having you gone for a whole summer and then coming back and still being so familiar totally had me in awe. And you made me mad, whenever I would say something and I thought it was right, you would switch it around and make it the wrong answer. When I thought I had you figured out, you would do something that sent me right back to square one to try and figure you out again. But that's why I fell in love with you. You were familiar, and different than anyone I had met before, you were never boring or predictable. Whenever I was with you, it was like the most exhilarating feeling ever, you're an adrenaline rush. You were breath taking and original and made me absolutely mad. Just like you still do."

"Alright, I'm kind of sorry I asked now." I snickered, looking up at him and seeing his eyes were now directly locked on mine.

"I love you, Ronnie. You're the best thing that's ever been mine."

"I love you more than you could imagine. If anything happened to you, I think I'd go insane."

A/N: Ack, I don't feel too great about that chapter. Halfway through I started to kind of fall asleep, but REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW anyways even if it is crap! :)