Was kind of excited to do this chapter. It's unusually long but there was no way I could separate it into two or even three.

So I hope you like it. REVIEW :D

Alex

A flood of memories consumed me, surrounding me like the encroaching bright white light around my body. They drew into me, welcomed back like an old friend and suddenly...I remembered.

July 23rd, 2010

"So did you guys enjoy the movie?"

Both Mason and I ignored Harper's question. It's not that we didn't want to talk to her; it's that we didn't want to talk to each other. We just sat down at a table in the substation which was now like a ghost town and Harper once again sat between us, like she'd taken to doing ever since we'd decided to be just friends.

"So…." She said, hoping to start some kind of conversation between us. But we both sat there, distinctly not looking at each other.

She sighed and checked her phone to save from boredom. "Oh a message from Zeke. Excuse me, I'm just going to go ring him."

She got up and left as if she couldn't wait to get away fast enough. Finally Mason and I were forced to lock eyes.

"Is this how it's going to be?" he asked and I just looked away again. "Because to be honest, I'd rather us not be friends."

"Fine then," I snapped, kicking aside my chair to ascend the staircase.

He caught me before I could go. "What is with you lately? Why are you acting like this?"

I didn't really have an answer. All I knew is that I was angry; I had been for the past few weeks. But there were parts of me that the anger didn't reach, parts that just felt too many emotions to distinguish from them all.

I swallowed. "This isn't easy for me, us being friends."

"And you think it's easy for me? I gave you a solution and you didn't want it. Now you pay the price just like me."

"Your solution is crap," I spat back at him and I couldn't even believe we were having such a huge fight. When that whole Juliet thing happened, I was more sad than angry. This now made that drama look like nothing at all.

"I know you feel that you can't beat Max now that he's ahead or even Justin but if it's the only way-"

"Don't turn me into the bad guy," I said, "Because I'm not. You think I don't love you, that I don't want to be with you?"

He just sighed and loosened his grip. "We said we'd be friends, but….this isn't working."

"I agree," I said in a monotone.

"So what do we do?" he asked, his eyes searching mine. I decided then I couldn't take looking into those eyes anymore when our long loving stares could never lead to more.

"We don't….be friends. We don't be anything."

"Nothing," he said softly.

I nodded. "I'll be Alex. And you'll be Mason. But we won't exist anymore."

He pressed a fleeting kiss into my forehead. I closed my eyes.

"Is this what you want?" he whispered.

"No. But it's what has to happen."

He broke away and I wished I could go after him as he swept out of the substation.

Harper walked back in, looking out the window. "I just saw Mason leave. Everything alright?"

I just shook my head and walked upstairs. Nothing would ever be alright.

October 16th, 2010

I rapped my knuckles on his door harder and harder every time as seconds ticked by. Precious seconds.

He finally opened the door and his face barely had time to register surprise before I flung myself into his arms, breathing in that familiar smell of his cologne mixed in with his earthy wolf scent.

"Alex, love, what are you doing here?" he murmured into my hair.

I didn't answer, just held tighter. Finally he pulled back from the embrace. "Alex, you know you're not supposed to be here."

"I miss you Mason, I miss you every day, every minute."

"Alex," he sighed. He'd heard it before but he knew as I did, there was no changing those stupid rules. He brushed my hair with his fingers. "You should go."

"No," I said defiantly, moving into his arms again. I pushed my head up and kissed him softly at first before it grew more intense. My hands found his and I guided them up his stomach to his chest. He sighed quietly into the kiss.

Then he unwound from the kiss, putting his back to me to gain some distance. "You'll get in trouble Alex, just go please."

"I'm not going without you," I told him, spinning him back around to stare him down.

He looked torn, between wanting me and obeying the rules. But his mind seemed to be made up pretty quickly. "Alex, please go home to your family."

"I'm not going back without you," I repeated. "I don't think I'll go back at all. They won't want to see me after tonight."

He was on me in a flash, holding me tightly at arms length. "What happened? What did you do?"

Tears started to spill as he shook me. "Tell me," he implored.

"Tonight's the night," I whispered. It only took a few seconds for him to connect it all together. His eyes widened in horror and he clapped his hand over his mouth.

He released me and grabbed his keys before taking a hold of me again. "Come on, we're leaving."

I refused to let him drag me along. "No, I'm not going back. They can have the powers; I've already lost everything that matters to me."

"They can't do the test without you Alex," he yelled, and it was the first time I'd ever heard him raise his voice around me. "You'll all lose."

I didn't even have the capacity to care anymore, pulling against his furious grasp. "Fine then, they can lose like I have."

Mason groaned, fed up. "This isn't you Alex. You'll regret this later. You have to go back for your brothers. For yourself."

I shook my head, my stubborn need to be right overpowering me. "No, no I'm not going back."

He hesitated for a split moment before leaning down and scooping my legs out from under me. He hauled me over his shoulder like I was a sack of potatoes and trudged out the door. I screamed, louder than I ever had, pounding my fists on his back but he just trudged away.

I quietened down on the trip there, my throat feeling raw. He finally opened the car door for me and I stepped out, ignoring him. Mom, Dad, Justin and Max stood there waiting for us, all with the same look of disgust, especially reserved for me. How fortunate.

"Where have you been?" thundered Dad. He saw Mason a few feet away and advanced on him. "Were you responsible for this?"

"No he wasn't," I said, jumping to his defence. "It's got nothing to do with him."

"Do you realise what you've done Alex?" Justin asked, his voice low and dangerous. "None of us get powers because you weren't here for the council to administer the test. No one gets do-overs Alex. "

My heart started to drop like lead; stupid Mason for being right. But I was still defiant as ever. My head wouldn't let me be wrong. Or feel bad about it.

"We'll change their minds," I said confidently. I didn't want to do the test but it seemed so damn important to them.

"No, we won't." I turned to face Max who'd been oddly quiet up until this point. He looked a subdued kind of angry. This kind of emotion was ever scarier on Max than Justin, because he hardly was ever furious like this. He was easygoing, calm, to see him like this made me….nervous almost.

"This isn't something you can fix Alex. Because of you thinking of yourself before everyone else like always, we all lose. Especially you."

"That's right," jumped in a still incredibly livid Justin, "You've not only lost your one chance to keep Mason. You've lost us too."

I just looked at them, failing to understand the words coming out of their mouths. "You're…not…serious, right?"

"This isn't some practical joke that we can forgive you for. This is real life. And you went too far."

And just like that, I started to drift away. For years, I'd been living on the edge of the family, some times hanging by a bare thread. But I'd always managed to reel myself back in. But not this time. The ties that bonded us had been cut. And it was my brothers who had cut them.

My feet started moving my heavy feeling body, moving away from the noise with no real idea where I was going; just knowing I had to get away from here, from what I'd done.

Noise echoed behind me, mostly my mother's. I heard loud footsteps and a face came into view. "What are you doing?"

"I'm leaving." The words were simple. The idea was not.

"You can't go," Mason pleaded. "They're angry, they'll calm down."

"No," I whispered. "It's…over."

I tried to walk again but he stopped me. "You leave now and it will be. Don't make another mistake."

Mistake. It seemed like my life was just a series of those. And what was the harm in making one more.

"I have something to do," I said suddenly and his face seemed to feel with relief, like he thought I was going back.

I pulled out my wand. "Goodbye Mason. I won't call or see you ever again. I'll leave you alone."

"Wait, Alex-"

"I don't want to call or see you again."

His hand dropped from my arm like a sack of bricks had hit him and he just stepped back as I waved my wand and disappeared.

January 6th, 2011

"I'm so glad you came Alex."

I just put on a smile as Mom hugged me. She was trying so hard; I owed her this. But as I stepped inside, a wave of nausea washed over me and I was almost ready to make a run for it. But she put her arm around me and shuffled me closer inside.

"Hey Mom, I can't find my-"

Justin cut off as he came down the stairs and saw me. Max came bounding down the stairs behind him and stopped as he saw me as well. It was an ever icier reception than I'd expected.

"Justin, your shirt's in your third drawer."

He nodded curtly and moved around Max to head back upstairs, out of sight. Max still hadn't moved.

Mom noticed. "Can you come set the table Maxy?"

He just shrugged and loped down the stairs. Mom subtly pushed me forward to help him, our hands colliding as we reached for the stack of plates. I drew back instantly and waited for the shouting to come. But he just took the top half and I grabbed the last few.

"How have you been?" he asked, fiddling with the cutlery in his palms.

I was almost too surprised to formulate a response. But eventually I caught myself. "Okay. What about you?"

"Great," he muttered and my own brand of sarcasm oozed from the word. "How's living with Uncle Kelbo?"

"Hectic," I answered with a tiny smile. "But we get by. He's hardly around so I get time to myself."

"Mom would like it if you came back."

"How would you feel?" I asked, stopping what I was doing, intensely interested in his answer.

He raised his head, his brown eyes boring into me. "I wouldn't know unless you came back."

I frowned at his pensive answer, wondering when my little brother had grown up. Maybe this whole thing had kind of accelerated it.

We were folding napkins when Justin came down again, looking everywhere but at me.

He grabbed his car keys off the bookcase and headed for the door. "Where are you going sweetie?"

Justin didn't turn around at Mom's sugary voice. "Out. I'm taking Emily to dinner."

"But honey, this is one of your very few weekends home from college, can't you spend it with us?"

"No I can't," he answered harshly.

I slammed the glass that I was holding down on the table. A crack immediately appeared but Mom was kind enough (or perhaps in shock) not to say anything.

"Don't be such a prick," I yelled. "Just because I'm here, doesn't mean you can't spend time with Mom and Dad."

Justin gritted his teeth. "Don't talk to me like that."

I just scoffed. Justin sure acted tough but he was still a little girl on the inside. Time to test his mettle.

I marched over to him, in reach, right in his face. "What are you going to do about it?"

We stood there, staring each other down until I felt a cool hand on my arm.

"Maybe you should go," Max suggested, his face solemn.

I could see right then any progress with him I might have made was gone. I wondered why I had even bothered. I backed away from Justin to face Mom.

"I think it's time I leave."

I walked away and it felt like déjà vu, hearing my parent's cries as I once again left them.

June 9th, 2015

I ran my hands through my hair, attempting to fix my bed-hair but it didn't seem to work. I collapsed on the couch with a sigh and unfolded the day-old newspaper that had been abandoned. Scaling down the announcements, one caught my eye - the marriage of Justin Russo and Emily Walker. It was being held…today.

I gave a mocking laugh just as Kyle emerged from my bedroom; hair crumpled much like my own, pulling a pale blue shirt over his head. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing," I answered.

He gave a shrug and began to rummage through my cupboard. "What do you want for breakfast? I'm an excellent cook."

I smiled. This was the part I hated the most, though it was always pretty good to get a laugh out of. "I'm sorry Kyle but I have stuff to do and your purpose has been served."

"My purpose?" He looked confused.

"I thought you understood the arrangement. Last night was just a one time thing, nothing more. So you don't really have to do anything else other than leave."

He opened his mouth like he was going to say something but then realised it was probably futile. He grabbed his jacket slung over the couch and began to trudge out, looking quite hurt.

"For what it's worth," he said from the doorway, "I had fun last night."

I didn't say anything, looking away and catching a glance of the newspaper splayed out on the coffee table. An idea hit me and I knew it was an opportunity I couldn't pass up.

"Hey Kyle wait!"

He turned sharply, hopefully. "Yes?"

"You want to go to a wedding with me today?"

Kyle cleaned up good admittedly. He pulled back his light brown hair, chucked on a suit and shaved the light stubble on his chin. His jaw dropped when I emerged from my room in a revealing red dress that hung in all the right places.

"You look….wow," was all he said, offering me his arm.

I smiled. He was sweet but he just wasn't what I wanted. I had been afraid before he wasn't going to come but maybe he thought it might improve his chances of getting lucky again.

We caught a taxi to the church which was full of people. I made sure to stay at the back of the crowd for fear of getting recognised. I was about to head in when a hand stuck sharp nails into my arm.

"Oww!" I yelped, looking up to see a familiar red-head.

"Alex, what are you doing?"

I got over the momentary pain and grinned at Harper. "Good to see you too bestie."

"Excuse me," Harper told Kyle who just nodded and stood to the side. Harper carted me away behind the back where no one could see us.

"You didn't tell me you were coming Harper," I said to her as she worriedly glanced to make sure no one had seen me.

"You knew I would be Alex, don't lie. More importantly what are you doing here?"

"Supporting my brother on his big day," I said with a smirk. "Speaking of which, we should get inside-"

She grabbed me again. "Don't get me angry Alex. I've put up with a lot from you these past few years but I've still stuck by you. Don't give me yet another reason not to."

"Look if you don't want to be my friend Harper, that's fine. You'd rather be my replacement in the Russo family wouldn't you?"

Her face went sheet white and she looked more furious than I had ever seen her. "How dare you say that?"

I blinked back tears for some strange reason. It's not like this was uncommon. We'd been fighting a lot over the past five years ever since my separation from my family. It had often been the cause of rifts between us and now I was just tired of it all.

"I'm sorry."

I turned away from her and this time she didn't grab at me again. Kyle was by the entrance and ran after me when he saw me leaving. "Where are you going?"

"This was a big mistake, I'm going home."

"Okay, I'll come with you-"

"No!"

He flinched at my ear-splitting scream. A few stragglers to the ceremony started to stare.

"Look, don't you get it? I used you. There is nothing between us nor will there ever be. Go away."

His face went stony. "Fine, just…fine."

He stuffed his hands in his pockets and started to walk away. I felt horrible staring at his retreating figure but I couldn't bring myself to call him back. Instead, I just sat on the footpath.

"Want some company?"

I looked up at a face I hadn't seen in a very long time. "What brings you here Dean Moriarty?"

He pointed to the church behind us. "I'm a friend of the bride. But in all honesty, the only reason I came here was because I was hoping to see you."

Dean smiled at me and I tried to feel something, anything that I used to feel but I didn't. Simple as that. "If you paid any attention to gossip, you'd know I'm the black sheep of the family and that I wasn't invited."

"Then why are you here?" he asked with a smirk.

"Because I like to make my brother's lives miserable."

He laughed and stood up, offering his hand to me. I took it and he pulled me up, an inch away from him. "I don't believe that but anyway….you can imagine my surprise when I saw you on the news six years ago."

Oh, right, I'd almost forgotten. Everyone knew about wizards and that I'd been one, since the debacle with the channel six news.

"It's fine, I get why you didn't tell me. It certainly explains all the times you disappeared."

I just shrugged with an easy-going smile. Talking to him was nice, it made me feel…good, if I even had the capacity still in me to feel good. "Yeah, I'm sorry about all that."

"It's okay." He looked at his watch. "I should get inside. Any way I can get you to stick around?"

I shook my head. "I don't think so."

"That's too bad," he said, kissing my cheek softly before walking off. I watched him duck inside the church doors and to my surprise there stood someone else. Max.

We locked eyes but his face gave nothing away. His face had a hard edge to it almost, like he was warning me to stay away. I just nodded and began to walk down the street with no direction or path to where I was headed next.

November 2nd, 2019

His hands found the hem of my dress, bunching together the flimsy fabric and slowly bringing it up towards my thigh.

"Alex," he whispered, kissing every inch of me he could before rearing his head up. "Wait, we have to stop."

I groaned in frustration. More than anything right now, I needed a distraction and Dean was the perfect one for the job.

"Why?" I whimpered, lazily nipping at his ear.

"I need to tell you something. I have a girlfriend."

He blurted the words quickly and I stopped what I was doing to gaze into his eyes. He looked worried that this information might put me off but in the mood I was in, nothing was going to stop me.

I played with the collar of his unbuttoned shirt. "That's okay."

He bit his lip. "Emily, Emily's my girlfriend."

"Emily?" I wracked my brain for someone I knew named Emily until comprehension finally found me and blew me away.

I got out from under Dean. "Emily? As in Justin's wife Emily? As in my sister-in-law Emily."

He started to panic, like he'd shared too much. "I know it's bad but I never meant to happen. It was only supposed to be a one time thing and-"

"It's okay."

He stopped his rambling and gazed at me. "It's okay?"

I barely believed the words coming out of my mouth myself as I stared at my phone on the table beside us, the words of Justin's angry voice message still burning in my mind.

You ruined me Alex. You're a selfish bitch and you always have been. I was the stupid one to think you could ever grow up. But it's on you now because you're alone and you have nothing. You'll always have nothing.

He may have sounded drunk off his arse but that didn't change the hurtful words, true but hurtful. I may be doing this only to spite him but right now I wanted to.

I yanked Dean closer to me and kissed him. "Our little secret," I whispered. "I won't tell Justin or Emily and you won't either."

He nodded and that was all it took for us to pick up what we'd started again.

March 18th, 2020

"Are you sure Alex? You know this kind of stuff is extremely dangerous."

"I'm well aware Hugh," I said, rubbing my head. I had one hell of a hangover from last night and a serious headache that I could not seem to rid myself of.

"I don't know if I can do this, I mean if I get caught-"

I grabbed his wrist to look him steadily in the eye. "I would never ask you to do this if it wasn't the most important thing in the world. Please, help me."

He frowned and shook himself out of my grip. "We're talking about some serious magic here."

I nodded. "You can do it."

He sighed and flipped open the book he was holding. "Basically what would happen is that when they get here, they would take over your bodies." He looked up to check if I was still following

I nodded. "Yes and you would send us where?"

"I could send you back to their bodies."

I shuddered at the thought of being a teenager again. Bad idea. I shook my head. "No, that's no good."

He sat there thinking, his legs crossed over his knees, strumming his fingers along his chin. "We could send your souls into the afterlife."

I held my hands up in protest. "Whoa, whoa, I don't want to die."

"You and your brothers wouldn't die. Your souls would just be stuck in the plain between life and death until the spell runs it course. You go back to your own time and body and everything's fine."

Sounded simple enough. Ha. Nothing in the world of magic was simple.

I nodded. "Alright. But you have to send me back first to get them into the portal."

"Fine, tomorrow then."

"You can't do this Alex!"

I ignored her, moving around the room like a hurricane. I whipped things up from the floor and stuffed them into my closet as Harper stood angrily in my doorway. I was trying to tidy up before my younger self arrived. I brushed past Harper and she snatched at me. "Don't ignore me."

"There is nothing to talk about Harper. It's none of your business."

"Would you listen to yourself? You are sleeping with a guy who has a girlfriend! Is that fact completely lost on you?"

I stared at my watch. I had to leave. Soon.

"Look, Harper, you need to do something for me."

She stared incredulously at me, as if she couldn't believe her ears. "Why would I Alex?"

"Because you're my friend. You're Harper."

She sighed. No matter how many times we fought or argued, she always gave in. "What? What am I doing?"

"I'm sending my seventeen year old self into the future to take over my body and see how our life has turned out so she can change it."

Harper's face went blank and she started to walk away. She was in the corridor before I caught up to her. "Where are you going?"

"I'm leaving because I don't have time for jokes Alex."

"I'm serious."

"That's what I'm afraid of," she muttered. "And what's my role in all of this?"

"She's going to come looking for you, I know she will and you have to pretend that you don't know. Don't tell her anything that's happened, tell her to find Mason."

Harper's eyes bugged out of head and she rubbed her temples. "You're going to drive me to drink Alex Russo."

Then the light was gone replaced by a blackness as dark as night. The coldest sensation spread through my bones, like I was being doused in ice water. I could hear voices and still feel the remnants of the memories just passed by but they weren't close enough to touch now. They were gone. And it seemed like I was too.