Jandre, Romance, Songfic to "Lost In You" by Three Days Grace

Dedicated to: TricksterColor

***Note: T rating for some minor cursing

I always knew you'd come and get me

And you always knew it wouldn't be easy

To get back to the start

To see where it all began

Or end up at the bottom to watch how it all ends.

Everything started in 4th grade. It was my first day of elementary school in Los Angeles. I was the only student who came in the middle of the year. Sounds strange, I know, but when you're the child of a dad whose job moves around a lot, you get used to it.

It was strange, being in a school where many celebrities had graduated from. I had attended a boarding school in Canada, suffered the sweltering heat near the equator in Mexico, but never had I come across a land of opportunity as great as this. Sure, I was only nine years old at the time, but by then I had already figured out my destiny: to become a princess.

Nah, I'm just messing with you. If you really knew me and you heard me say something like that, you would collapse on the floor laughing your ass off. Trust me- I'm nothing like a princess. Princesses are weak, spineless creatures dressed in frilly, pink puffballs and sit around wailing, "Oh, Prince Charming! Come sweep me off my feet! I'm ever so desperate!"

Anyway, back to the flashback. From the day I picked up my very first book, I knew I wanted to become a writer. A screenwriter, to be exact. I wanted to determine what the actors did on stage. At night, I watched the visions come alive in my head- lovers dancing, soldiers fighting to the death, zombies sucking out people's brains- and I wrote them all down in a special journal each morning.

That morning, I brought the journal with me to school. Usually, I'm a very bold person when meeting new people, but this time was different. I kept to myself and feared what people would think of me. All these kids seemed stuck-up and snooty, clothed in the most expensive-looking clothes I had ever seen. Their eyes were judgmental, their demeanor haughty and rude. My parents didn't have much money and scraped by when buying me clothes to wear, let alone paying for me to go to private school.

So at recess, I sprinted to the big tree standing in the corner of the playground, pushing past piles of children laughing and throwing balls at each other. Ignoring the whispers of the other children, I sat down against the tree trunk, dug out my journal from my backpack, and started to write furiously. I got so caught up in my writing that I didn't notice when a big, ugly sixth grader snatched it right out of my hands.

"Awww, how cute is this?" he exclaimed, his grubby hands leaving slimy fingerprints all over the shiny leather cover. "Looks like we got ourselves a little nerd here!"

Some of the other children around him heard what he had said and started to laugh. I stood up and tried to grab it out of his hand, but he held it just out of my reach. "Give it back!" I shouted. "Go pick on someone your own size, meathead!"

"But this is so much fun!" he cooed, clearly mocking me. "Now let's see what the nerd was writing about!"

He was just about to open the book when I couldn't take it anymore. I let out a scream of anger and kicked his shin hard. He howled and dropped the book in front of my feet, and I picked it up quickly and ran away before he could recover.

This time, I sat down under a tree on the other side of the playground, far away from where the bully had ambushed me. Still shaken by the sudden invasion of privacy, I cradled the book and hugged it gently against my chest. Tears started rolling down my face, but I wiped them away with my fists. I couldn't cry there; it was a sign of weakness. And Jade West wasn't weak and never will be.

"Hey." I looked up to see a dark-skinned boy about my age standing in front of me. "You okay? You look upset."

"Oh yeah? What makes you think that?" I retorted. "For all you know, I could be perfectly fine and content sitting alone underneath this tree."

"Well first of all, you're clutching your book like you're gonna die if you let go of it," he pointed out, sitting down next to me. "Second of all, you're crying. And I also saw what happened over there. That was pretty brave, what you did. No one has able to stand up to Xavier until now."

I turned away from him. "No, I'm not crying," I said stubbornly.

He sighed and dropped the subject. "I'm Andre," he said, standing up and holding his hand out to me. His dreads shook as I took his hand and he helped me up.

"I'm Jade." We tentatively shook hands. I guess he was afraid I was going to hurt him or something.

"So Jade…" He smiled at me. "What's in your book?"

My heart froze and I instantly reverted to panic mode. I didn't know what to say. "Why should I let YOU read it? We barely know each other! Are you going to call me a nerd, too?"

"Whoa whoa whoa, calm down! I'm not going to make fun of you. I'm just really curious. You seem different from the other kids."

I looked at him warily and he chuckled. "Don't worry, I mean a good kind of different. So whadaya say?"

I debated what to do in my head, than meekly handed him the book. "Okay."

We sat down and he opened up to a random page and started reading. And that is when our friendship blossomed.

You tried to lie and say I was everything

I remember when I said I'm nothing without you.

After that, we were inseparable. He was fascinated by the stories I could write and I was amazed by the tunes he could play on his guitar. He soon expanded his horizons to various other instruments such as the piano and the drums while I started writing in other genres. Usually, I wrote horror stories and science fiction because that's what I was most interested in. But soon enough, I found myself writing love stories and happy endings, expressing my deepest hopes and dreams through words.

As we transferred to middle school, I found out that my family and I were staying in Los Angeles for good. To celebrate, Andre and I went to the new bowling alley that had opened two weeks ago, along with our new friends Beck, Cat, and Robbie. They had come from the other elementary school on the other side of town. Andre befriended Beck, I somehow became friends with Cat, and Robbie- well he was just part of the package deal.

It was a fun night. We went to the midnight bowling session so we could glow in the dark. I hated wearing light colors (and I still do, for that matter), but I willingly wore a white t-shirt and jeans just for that one night. We played a bunch of two-on-two games and decided to have a contest to see who the best bowler was in our little group. Robbie pulled a hamstring while playing and Cat kept getting a bunch of gutter balls, so it was really me and the boys competing at the end.

Robbie and Cat cheered us on as I bowled against Andre, beating him by 25 points. He looked a little disappointed but pleasantly surprised by the loss. He still gave me a high five and hugged me at the end, which made me blush a little bit when no one else noticed. Then, in the "championship game," as we liked to call it, Beck beat me by a whopping 90 points. No surprise there- he told us that he used to play against his dad all the time- that is, while his parents were still married. They stopped when his parents got divorced a year ago and his mom gained full custody of him.

It seemed like the time flew by so fast that night. By the time we finished, it was two o'clock in the morning. Beck, Cat, and Robbie were able to walk home because they lived so close to the bowling alley, but Andre and I had to wait for our parents to come pick us up.

We waved goodbye to our friends as they left and huddled close together on a metal bench outside. It was a little on the chilly side and I had forgotten to bring a jacket. My fingernails dug into my pale arms, now covered in goose bumps, as I tried to prevent my body heat from escape. I stopped shivering at the feeling of something covering my shoulders.

I pulled his jacket up and over my arms, almost neglecting to realize why he had given it to me in the first place. Now he was the one stuck in the short-sleeved shirt and forced to brace the cold. "Thanks," I said softly. "You didn't have to do that."

He looked at me with his warm brown eyes and shrugged with a sheepish smile. "Anything for a friend. You seemed cold; I thought that you needed my coat more than I did."

I didn't say anything back. I focused on becoming warm again as I felt the heat rise up to my cheeks. Guess it would be easier to do than I thought.

He then playfully punched my shoulder. "And how could we be friends all of this time and you never told me you were good at bowling?"

It was then my turn to shrug. "I dunno. Tonight was my first time bowling."

He stared at me in shock. "It was your first time and you ended up beating me?" He whistled. "Damn girl, that's some natural talent you've got there along with your mad writing skills."

I snickered. "Oh yeah, like bowling and writing would get me far in life."

"Maybe if you wrote a story about bowling?"

"Seriously dude? You can't come up with something better than that?"

"Well the jokes have to get old sometime, I guess," he sighed in mock disappointment. "But I wasn't kidding about the talent part."

"Really?" Wow, he rarely complimented me. Not because he was a mean guy or anything like that, but because we joked around too much to get around to doing so. "You mean it?"

"Yes, I do."

"Good, at least someone appreciates me. My dad thinks my dream is stupid and my mom's barely around anymore."

"If it makes you feel better…" He hesitantly put a hand on my leg just above my knee, and I jumped at the warm touch of his dark-skinned hand. "You're my best friend. You mean the world to me, Jade."

I gulped and looked at his hand with watery eyes. My response was a soft whisper as I struggled to pull myself together. "Thanks, Andre. And I'm nothing without you."

I finally forced myself to lift my head up and look at him, and butterflies swarmed in my stomach as I suddenly realized how close our faces were to each other. Before we knew what was happening, he snaked an arm around my waist, I locked my hands behind his neck, and we were kissing like nothing could stop us.

Somehow I found a way to get lost inside you

Let me inside, let me get close to you

Change your mind, I'll get lost

If you want me to

Somehow I found a way to get lost in you

We never spoke of the kiss again after the incident happened. We thought it was gross and blamed it on cooties. Our little joke was that the "cootie monster made us kiss" or that a fairy put us under a spell that caused the kiss to happen. We were only in sixth grade then, after all; we didn't know what love or hormones were. Kissing was for adults and adults only. Or at least that's what we had thought.

Three years passed by us and we became a close-knit group of friends. We did everything together. We planned a funeral for yet another one of Cat's dead fish (she couldn't take care of a pet to save her life), we all went to the Poconos for a week once during Christmas break, and they planned a surprise birthday party for me the year I turned fourteen. Given all the shit I had to endure from my parents before I met them, it was the best day of my life.

Every year, Hollywood Heights Middle School held a dance for the eighth graders the day before they graduated middle school. And by the end of eighth grade, the world of dating had been discovered. Tweens were coupling up faster than Brad and Angelina could adopt kids, and gossip about who was going with who to the dance was circulating around the school at lightning speed. Cat had gotten asked by a guy who had been ogling her in her biology class all those months and Robbie wasn't going at all because Rex-his demented little puppet- had insisted on seeing a movie that night and couldn't get anyone else to see it with him.

I, on the other hand, was planning on going whether I got asked by someone or not. I would win either way. Either girls would praise me on being fearless by going alone or I would get to show off my date. Hey, when you're the most popular girl in school, you get certain perks- and I just happened to have the guts and the talent to earn that privilege.

I was walking in the school hallway one morning when I heard two girls chatting by my locker. Not bothering to pay attention at first, I walked past them and opened my locker door.

"So who do you think Jade West is going to go with to the dance?" the stick-thin blonde girl gushed.

I stopped putting my books into my locker and put my ear against the open locker door to eavesdrop on them. "I don't know, Lacey, either one of those guys has a fair shot with her."

"I call the wavy-haired guy! He's so gorgeous! Have you seen his abs, Kelly? He has a six-pack!"

I rolled my eyes. Of course Beck had girls swooning all over him- not that I cared or anything.

"But what about the musician guy? You know, the guy with the dreads who can play all those instruments? They seem pretty close," Kelly, a brunette with a love for fashion, commented.

My mouth dropped open. They were talking about Andre. He was a great friend and everything, but having him as a date? Given the kiss we shared three years ago, things might get awkward.

"Guess we'll find out when she arrives at the dance," Lacey said. And with that, they walked away, not knowing that I had been listening to their conversation the whole time.

I glanced at myself in the little mirror hanging in the back of my locker and chewed at my fingernails, a nervous habit I hadn't been able to break since kindergarten. They had a point. Both of the guys would have made great dates to the dance.

On one hand, Beck was a good friend. We both shared a love for acting and writing. He wanted to be a famous actor someday. Our little joke was that we'd get cast in a movie together someday and I'd write his script. We talked a lot and… I hate to say it, but he was very charming. And he had the most adorable smile…

And if you had told him that I said that about him, I would have killed you. In your sleep. In a verrrry unpleasant manner.

On the other hand, I knew Andre inside and out. He was a talented musician who would definitely go far in the music business. We never got bored of each other and could always cheer each other up when we were down. He was my other half. If I lost him over a stupid little dance, I'd be devastated.

Why do the stupidest little decisions have to be the hardest ones to make?

You always thought that I left myself open

But you didn't know I was already broken.

I told myself that it wouldn't be so bad

Pulling away you took everything I had.

Narrator's POV

At the end of the school day, Andre skipped out of his algebra class with a delicate red rose in his hand. Today was his day; he was going to ask Jade to the dance. Once he saw the song he had written for her, there was no doubt in his mind that she would say yes to him. Nothing could get him down.

He stopped and peered around the corner where Jade's locker stood. He saw Jade packing up her backpack and smiled in relief. Good. No one was around to stop him or make him feel self- conscious. Time to make his move.

However, as soon as he started to round the corner, Beck appeared out of nowhere. Startled, Andre scrambled back behind the corner and watched them talk from afar.

He saw them talking and laughing, and he quickly became jealous. But then, his jealousy quickly turned into despair as he saw him take her hands and step closer to her. Even though Beck was speaking softly, Andre could barely make out the words "date" and "dance."

Once he saw her smile and Beck hug her, he crushed the rose with his foot and sank to the ground. He stayed there, lamenting over his missed chance, until he heard someone speaking to him.

"Andre? Why are you on the ground?" Jade asked him, a confused expression appearing upon her heavily made-up face. Her brown hair dangled in waves, resting on the tips of her shoulders, and blond highlights made her hair look even more beautiful in his eyes.

He got up and angrily shoved the song into her hands. "Take this. Hope you and Beck have a good time at the dance. Together." He emphasized the word "together" and stormed off.

Wondering how he had even heard their conversation in the first place, she opened the folded piece of paper and read the title of the song. "Tell Me That You Love Me." She covered her gaping mouth with her hand in shock. Not knowing how to react, she shoved the song into her pocket and ran all the way back to her house.

As soon as she got home, she slammed the door behind her and took off to her room before her dad could even scold her for slamming the door. She flopped herself on her bed, hyperventilating as if she was about to cry.

"What do I do now?" she moaned. And she buried her face into her pillow and cried herself to sleep.

The pain of it all, the rise the fall,

I see it all in you.

Now every day I find myself sayin'

I want to get lost in you.

I'm nothing without you.

Jade's POV

Today is our four-year anniversary and I'm so pissed off that I'm about to explode. I'm sitting alone at BF Wangs and he isn't even here yet! Which is strange because he's always on time. Oh well. Maybe he got stuck in traffic or something.

A half hour passes and I'm still waiting for him. The waiter sees my half-empty table and trots over to ask me once more when he'll be here. "I don't know, okay?!" I scream at him. "Now SCRAM!"

He quivers and runs like he's the Roadrunner speeding away from the Wily Coyote. He looks ridiculous. I love it.

But what I don't love is the fact that my boyfriend isn't freaking here yet! Without hesitating, I dial a phone number and wait for him to pick up.

"Hello?" Andre answers the phone.

"Where. Is. He?" I seethe.

"Geez girl, calm down. I'm sure Beck will be there in a minute."

Wait, why so confused? Ohhhhh, you thought Andre was the boyfriend! I see now. Well guess what? You're all wrong and I'm right.

I just love being right. Happens all the time.

Yes, I took Beck to the dance in the end, even though I felt incredibly bad about it the whole time. That is, until Andre took the stage and started singing a slow song, which just so happened to be the song he gave me.

AND HE WAS SINGING IT WITH ANOTHER TRAMP!

I learned later on that Tori Vega was her name. She went to Sherwood High and was asked to come perform with Andre at the dance. I would've been okay with the whole thing, if he hadn't sang OUR song with another girl!

That was the night where everything changed. Andre and I stopped talking. Beck became my boyfriend. And Victoria Vega became my worst enemy.

Eventually, she moved to my school and she and Andre became best buds, which made me hate her more than I did before. And when she kissed Beck in front of everyone… I swear, if Sikowitz wouldn't have been standing there and we weren't in school, I would've ripped her perfect little head off right then and there. She irks me to no end.

Over time, Andre and I started to talk to each other again- mostly because we were in the same friend group and didn't want our friends constantly questioning "What's going on between you two? Can I help?" But it's just not the same, you know? Ever since she came, everything has changed. And I hate change.

"He better be. He's so dead if he's not," I growled and hung up the phone in response. I then dialed Beck's number. He picked up as soon as the phone rang. "Beck, it's Jade. Where the hell are you-"

"Babe, why are you leaving so soon?" a syrupy voice said in the background. "We just got started."

I heard some smacking sounds and an exasperated sigh. "Lacey, this isn't right. How am I supposed to meet my girlfriend for our anniversary if you corner me at my house?"

I let out a loud gasp and hope he didn't hear me through the phone. Oh my god. Those were kissing noises that I was hearing. I just heard him make out with another girl.

This cannot be happening.

"But we've been going out for over a year now, Beck. When are you going to dump her and get it over with?"

Wait… what?

He was… CHEATING on me? All this time and I never knew? I grip the phone, threatening to crush it into a million pieces.

I wait for him to tell her that he was just hooking up with her, that it was just a fling. "Lacey, you don't understand… I still love her. We've been going out for a while now."

"But you love me more…" I could just imagine her tickling him underneath his chin seductively like I used to do. "Right?"

"…Of course I do, babe."

I stopped breathing for a second. No. No no no no NO. What the hell is going on?

"But wouldn't it be cruel to dump her on our anniversary? I don't want to hurt her like that."

"Well guess what, you asshole? YOU JUST DID!" I scream into the phone. I hear a crash and Lacey's scream. "If you really cared about me like you said you did, you wouldn't have cheated me on with that bitch! Forget about dinner tonight; instead, drive over to my house, pack up your stuff, and GET THE HELL OUT OF MY LIFE!"

"Jade, please, just hear me out-"

"No, you had your chance. Now hang up the damn phone before I hang it up for you. And don't you EVER talk to me again!"

I smashed my phone against the table. I felt my heart break into a million pieces. I trusted him with everything. He was my confident, my shoulder to cry on. I got more and more lost in him with every kiss and every touch. I thought he loved me.

And then he threw away everything we ever had for some anorexic, slutty cheerleader. That two-faced, sneaky skunkbag. I'll never forgive him, and I'll never forgive myself for trusting him in the first place, either.

The waiter comes up to ask me if I'm okay, but I push past him and run out of the restaurant. I sprint out to my car, not even bothering to hold my tears back, when someone catches me and pulls me to the side. "Let go of me!" I scream.

"Sssssh, Jade, calm down." The voice sits me down and holds me in his arms as I cry. "I'm so, so sorry, Jade," he whispers in my ear. "I never should have left you."

The fact that I figured out the voice's owner so quickly just made me cry even harder because I knew deep inside that I didn't deserve his comfort.

It was Andre.

Somehow I found a way to get lost inside you

Let me inside, let me get close to you

Change your mind, I'll get lost

If you want me to

Somehow I found a way to get lost in you

It took me a while to fully get over Beck's betrayal. Two years, to be exact. By that time, I was halfway through college. After the breakup, I reconnected with the rest of my friends. Tori and I started to actually get along, and she, Cat and I were almost as close as sisters by the time high school graduation rolled around. I avoided Beck completely, I continued to merely tolerate Robbie (because he was now dating Cat- no surprise there), and Tori even let me hang out with Andre once in a while.

Speaking of Andre, we started a duo group right after graduation. We perform at local coffee houses, Nozu, Karaoke Dokie, and once at the Platinum Music Awards during our summer breaks. He writes the lyrics and I sing the songs, which is really ironic because I always thought our roles would be reversed. Pretty funny how the universe works, huh?

My sophomore year of college has just ended, and Andre agreed to come up and visit so we could work on our next song. Right now, he has his "special headphones" on and jamming out to some music he has just put together to go along with the lyrics. His head gyrates up and down as he dances like a spazz to the beat. I videotape him a little bit when he's not paying attention because it's the funniest thing I have ever seen.

He's still listening to the music when his phone rings on my bed. I pick it up and look at the caller ID: Kojeezy. I gasp and almost drop the phone in my moment of shock.

"Andre!" I hiss and shake his shoulder furiously. "ANDRE!"

He glances at me with wide eyes, and I talk to him before he can even ask what's going on. "Kojeezy's on the phone. Answer it!"

He excuses himself and runs into the hallway as I relax on my bed, thinking what the heck they could be talking about out there. Does he want to sign us onto his record label? Or does he just want us to audition?

I ambush him when he comes back. "What did he say? Are we going to become superstars? Does he like our demo CD? Tell me!"

He leans against the wall with his hands in his pockets, a sure sign that he's upset. "He didn't say he liked our CD, Jade."

A wave of disappointment crosses my mind. "Oh…"

"He absolutely loved it."

I usually don't let people touch me, but I'm so caught up in the excitement that I don't stop him when he picks me up and spins me around. "And guess what?" He reaches into his shoulder bag and pulls something out. "I owe our success to you."

I take the object out of his hands and skirt my fingertips over the leather cover. My songwriting journal from when I was little. I haven't seen this in months.

"You… you kept this?" My voice is barely over a whisper.

"I sure did. It gave me inspiration every so often. Reminded me of the old days, the good times." His smile reeks of nostalgia and his mind seems to go elsewhere as he spoke. "It kept me going even when the times got rough."

Then, I bring up something we haven't spoken about in years. "Even when I rejected you like six years ago when you asked me to that dance?"

He stops smiling and stares deep into my eyes, and I feel myself getting lost in them. "Yes."

I step closer to him and wrap my arms around him. "I've always loved you, Andre. I hope you know that."

"Of course I do, Jade. You're everything to me."

"And I'm nothing without you," I whisper in response.

I lift my head up, suddenly aware of the close proximity of our faces. My breath hitches in my chest and I feel his hands clutch my waist. And for a while, reality escapes us and we get lost in each other, kissing as if our lives depend on it.

And the cootie monster definitely isn't to blame for what we have been avoiding all along.

Whoa… I have no idea why, but my oneshots seem to be getting longer and longer for some reason. Maybe because my writing is getting better and more detailed? Lol I don't know.

Sorry I haven't updated in a while. Senioritis is really getting to me- like I don't want to do ANYTHING anymore for some reason, even writing. I just feel so lazy all the time, which is very unlike me. And I just watched Perks of Being a Wallflower a day or two ago, so I'll be able to write that suggestion soon- when I have the time, that is. Please review!