A.N.= hey guys! Please, please review this! Ur support means everything to me!

"You sleeping?"

Well, I was sure trying to, at least. Still couldn't. As usual. "Uhm, I guess not. Come here."

I love the way Charlie groans as she nuzzles her face in my neck, she always does that when I try to wake her up in the morning, most of the times to no avail. "Jason…" she rises up on her elbows to stare at me for a bit. One quick tip for husbands: when the wife says your name in the 'we need to talk' kind of tone, be ready for some serious, overemotional conversation no matter what football match is on. Actually, don't think about football at all during those moments if you don't wanna end up filing divorce papers the day after.

"Yeah?" I sit up, taking a look around the room. I'll probably be spending a whole lot of time lying in this bed here in the next few months so I might just want to get my butt off of it as long as I can do that. Pushing myself up from the matrass quickly, I head to the wardrobe, and trust me, do her eyes burn on my back. "Just speak your mind, Charlie, I know the cogs in your brain must be working hard..."

She doesn't respond. Uh, that's probably not good at all. Just as nasty as going through your wardrobe every day and never finding a single shirt of yours because it's so damn full of her clothes. "Baby, we do need to make some room in…"

Before I can finish the sentence, I feel a pair of tiny arms wrap tightly around my chest from behind, and her lips pressing urgently on my left shoulder.

"I know. I promise I'll stuff all my clothes up somewhere else. I don't care. I really don't care. Just as long as you're ok… with it."

I can feel her body tense behind mine as she's standing on her toes to kiss my nape. I bet it used to be better when my hair wasn't down to stubble yet, but she never seems to bother.

Ok, time to be the strong husband here. And play it dumb too, if she expects me to believe that she's really going to make some room in the wardrobe for my stuff too. I turn around, setting myself free from her embrace. She's giving me the weakest smile ever and it might sound morbid but it's sort of funny to think that seeing her like this is actually killing me. Definitely more than anything else.

"Hey. It's ok. I don't care about the wardrobe."

"Yes, you do."

"Not at this very moment, though. Look, Charlie, uhm… I think we both had some serious shocking news last night. I'm not saying it's gonna be ok, 'cause most likely it won't be… but… uhm… it is right now. I'm still here. I'm still me. And I even have some hair!"

She smiles widely and that just keeps the world turning for me.

"I'm still gonna stick around for a while, honey."

She nods to herself, leaning in so that her forehead is resting against mine. Her warm breath washes over my cheeks and I can't help but smile at just how perfect we've always been. Sometimes I'd just think there had to be some sort of a cosmic force, something invisible and invincible that would always manage to draw us close to one another, as for my whole life I've never actually kept myself away from her for real, not even once.

The day after we got locked in the orphanage, at school, I had been standing in the corridor almost all morning, waiting for her to show up. My feet were hurting like crazy when she finally got there with her friends and noticed the envelope I had placed on her locker.

"Somebody likes you…" Gosh, I remember the sing-song voice Jess said this with. It was the first time somebody actually spoke my feelings for Charlie out loud and I can honestly say the few seconds that statement echoed throughout the corridor have probably been the longest of my life.

"What's there to like?" Yeah, I know, worst reply I could've possibly come up with. But she didn't even seem to take in what I said and simply looked at me. And that was the moment I simply knew she never really hated me. I could've kept smiling at her from afar for another millennium at least, exactly what I'd like to do now. But then again, life always kicks in at some point and I just left, and she turned back to her friends - who had been squealing over the concert tickets for the whole time, by the way. That sure helped ruining the moment a bit.

Days passed by and the only thing that had changed was that my Mom was constantly screaming at me since my room was a mess of drawings and sketches scattered everywhere. I'm pretty much sure she saw whom all the portraits depicted, but she never really mentioned anything about how creepy it was of her son to be so obsessed with a 14 year old girl. Which actually came out as a big surprise to me, seeing as my Mom never turned down any opportunity to get into someone else's business.

But anyways, I was drawing like crazy even if nothing new would be happening. Well, up until the Cinderella play, at least. A Cinderella play. Now the only reason why I had agreed to take part to ANY school play was that I thought there could've been a chance to end up playing Charlie's partner. When I suggested playing Jason and the Argonauts I had actually intended Charlie to be Medea. But then of course I had to keep it real and let it look as if I was only being self-centered.

Much to my dismay, Charlie ended up being the director and Krystal played Cinderella. Well, truth to be told, the brunette was totally gorgeous, anyone agreed to that. But for some reason I'd always keep glancing behind the scenes, only to find Charlie proudly smiling at me.

Before the play was over and the curtains were drawn, though, I was the one who got her to join the rest of us on the stage. She sure hadn't seen it coming, and looked surprised to see me coming behind the scenes to walk her to the spotlight.

"Hey, Charlie, come on, time to take your applause here…"

The look on her face as she was actually pondering whether to give me her hand or not was priceless. Eventually she nodded and followed me. I guess it was because she'd always trust me. Even when we were little kids and I was always getting us in trouble… somehow she'd always take my hand and go with whatever I came up with, no matter how stupid it could've sounded.

I think this is the main reason I think that, had cancer not got in the way, we would've probably meant to be one of the very fewest couples to stick together throughout everything. Never getting bored or frustrated or anything that usually turns out to be a one way ticket to divorce land.

She always made sure I knew she believed in me. When I was diagnosed I was yet to turn 20 and with chemo and everything I had to drop out of college. I decided I could go work with my Dad so that I wouldn't have trouble with taking days off due to my treatments. My father is an estate agent and let me tell you that I don't really have the right attitude for such a job. I hate the selling part, discussing prices… basically everything about what I do. And therefore I don't actually look that much committed to it. On the other hand, my Dad has always been a very strict person, and somehow he'd never forget to point out everything I ever got wrong in my life. I mean, everytime I fail a project we're working on or anything, count on him to make me feel shitty about it. After all, no matter how much he loves me, I'm still his 22 year old son, already married toa jobless, still in college 21 year old girl. A total failure as a real estate broker, and with cancer too. As he would kindly put it: "Jase, son, sometimes I think everything in your life was just rushed, you know." Good to know, Dad. Sure helpful.

But Charlie... whenever I get home after a very bad day… she can be still studying , yet she always leaves her desk to greet me home, kiss my earlobe and say she's happy I'm finally back to make her crack a laugh, like I always do. Or when I'm in the attic drawing or painting, she always comes up to me from time to time to tell me my work always seems to amaze her. I think she deliberately uses the word "work" referring to my drawings. I've never explicitly told her, but I know she's wide aware of how frustrated I am over my job. Mostly because I never seem to do it right. So I think that's her subtle way to let me know i'm good at doing "my own thing".

She's always been so supportive to me. Probably my best fan ever. Even when we were teens, and still in the "I hate you" kind of phase, I knew she never stopped believing in me. Whenever I'd be presenting a project in front of class at school, she'd always smile so beautifully, imperceptibly motioning me to go on. And she'd always be the one to first start clapping hands afterwards.

Indeed, the day of the play, after the show ended and almost everybody but the janitors had fled out of school, I stayed back trying to clear out the stage a bit, waiting for her to be done cleaning behind the scenes.

"Nice work, Jase. I loved your voice when you sang."

She had got to the stage, standing still in the middle of it, as I stopped sweeping all of a sudden to look at her. She meant what she said, I could tell.

"Thanks. I had a good director too."

"And thanks for coming to get me on stage."

I cracked a laugh. We were being so pathetic that an old janitor from across the auditorium was looking at us with a puzzled expression.

"Yeah, well, if there's anything else you want to thank me for, go ahead with it, my niceness won't last for much long before my ego kicks back in."

"The tickets for the asteroids' concert. That was nice, too."

Uh, well, I knew we would've ended up discussing the subject sooner or later. But of course a 14 year old with little to no experience with girls was being stupid and had refused to be the first to bring it up.

"Uh… who says it was m…"

I stopped halfway through the sentence as the look on her face told me denying was pointless. I sighed and simply nodded in defeat. Uh, poor young me.

"Uhm, I just… I just wanted you to know I don't really think you're the most annoying person in the world. You may be sometimes, but only if you want to. I…"

"JASEY!"

Oh well, doesn't history just repeat itself. Just like I had been cut off by the girls arriving to rescue us back at the orphanage, Charlie couldn't finish the sentence either, as she was trailed off by the sound of a shrieking voice calling the worst pet name I've ever been given up to this day.

We unwillingly turned around to see Krystal coming right up to the stage. "Oh, charlie, you're here too… Uhm, well, anyways, Jason… I wanted to apologize for before. You can have as many other new songs as me. My Mom just told me you and I are what actually gave the whole play that special sparkle… So I changed my mind."

Me and Charlie exchanged looks, both taken aback from all that unexpected niceness coming from none other than Krystal. "Uh… thanks, I guess?"