Prologue:

April 1995

Jeff's POV:

"Tamara, please, just give me time to figure things out," I begged her. "I think I can become a great father, especially with my father's help, without compromising who I am as a person. Please, give me a chance to prove that to you. I really want to be there for our child when they're born."

"Jeff, how can I trust that you'll even be here for the two of us?" Tamara asked. "You quit the wrestling, football, and baseball teams so that you and Matt can go be the guys who get beat up every time they enter the ring in WWF. You're choosing to do something that can seriously injure you, even though the teams you were on could've helped you get a scholarship to college. You didn't even apply to college, Jeff! What happens if, while you're doing this for the WWF, you get seriously injured? You don't even have a contract with them!"

"Tammy… I get why you're worried. And I'm sorry that I chose this over the teams at school, but they told me I had to. They told me that if I kept going to work with the WWF, I was no longer eligible for the school teams. It's my dream to be a wrestler," I replied to her. "I didn't apply to college because kids go to college to figure out what they want to do with their lives. I already know, Tammy. I'm sorry you don't like my choice, but I promise, even if I got injured, I would always find a way to take care of you and the baby."

"My father never liked me dating you, Jeff!" she exclaimed. "He felt that you were someone who had too many passions, like you couldn't pick just one thing that you could stick with for your life. He's never really approved of us, but since he found out about all these adrenaline-fueled things that you do, that you started working for the WWF, it's been worse! He thinks it's best that you not be in the baby's life, Jeff, because you aren't mature enough to put our child first. Daddy wants to move away right after graduation, to make sure that you can't be part of the baby's life."

"Move away, Tammy?" I asked her. "I may not be the perfect kid, but we're both still kids, Tammy. How can he expect either of us to do anything for our baby in the first few years without our parents' help? Even I was going to college like you, we'd still need both of our parents to help us so we could go to school and take care of the baby. Why is my following my dream any different than either of us needing help to go to school? I get paid for what I do. I would think that he would respect that I'm doing this to try to get my wrestling career started so I would be able to take care of the two of you better than I can right now?"

"Because, Jeff, with everything you do, you're putting your body, your life, at risk every time you go out there," Tammy replied. "What if you just gave up motocross? Just for a while? Maybe if you focused on wrestling, your art, music, and poetry I can convince him to let you and I stay together?"

I was completely shocked. I didn't know what to do, knowing that her father was against us to begin with, let alone now that we had a baby due in September.

"Tammy, I love you. You know that I do. We've been together for three years, friends for even longer and I've always been like this. I'll be 18 by the time the baby is due. Please, just stay by my side. I will find a way to be a great father and partner to you."

"How, Jeff? You don't make enough so we could live anywhere but with our parents. So, do you expect me to move in with you, your father, and Matt?"

"Not for long, Tammy. My father has been talking about building a house for me on the property, especially since he found out I got you pregnant. If he did that, we could move there and I could continue to work while you went to school."

"What about the baby, Jeff? How are we supposed to take care of her while you work and I go to school?"

"I work in the evenings and weekends. If you went to school in the morning, I could watch the baby while you went to school. My dad could watch the baby if you needed help so you could do your assignments."

She sighed in frustration. I knew how much control her father could exert over her. It had been an issue in our past before. But this time, he was trying to tear us apart, keep me from ever knowing my own child, and I couldn't just sit back and allow this to happen.

"Tammy, tell me the truth," I began speaking again. "Are you pushing me because you want me to be there for you and the baby? Or are you pushing to see if your father is right? To see if we really can't be parents together? That it's best to find a way to force me out of our child's life?"

She looked away from me. That was a bad sign. She already made up her mind about everything. She was just trying to push to see if there's any chance that I would change enough to satisfy her father. I shook my head, breathing out in frustration.

"Jeff, how can I rely on you, how can our child rely on you, if you won't even try to do something that will mean you can be there for us?" she started. "Following your wrestling dream isn't a stable choice of job. Even if you managed not to get seriously injured, if you got that WWF contract you want so badly, you'd be on the road so much, not with me and the baby. And if you don't get that WWF contract, are you just going to work randomly at wrestling shows while you continue to try? How is that stability?"

"Tammy, don't act like this is all about me," I replied. "You've already made up your mind that your daddy is right about me. No matter what I do to try to show you that I'm ready to do what I need to for you and the baby, it doesn't matter, does it, Tamara? No matter what I say or do tonight, you already agreed to move after graduation, haven't you?"

Tamara looked me in my eyes.

"I have, Jeff. You are too much of a wild child, an adrenaline-junkie, for me to believe that you would be there for me or a good father to our child," she said, shoving the knife in my heart. "Daddy is right. It's best if we just called it quits and went our separate ways."

"You can't just nullify my rights as this baby's father, Tamara Adams. I'll fight for the baby, to be able to keep her in my life," I told her.

"If you do, you'll lose," she said to me. "My father is already prepared to fight you back on that, to prove that you don't live a stable enough life to have any rights to be around our baby, Jeff. When he wins, he'll make sure the court not only severs your paternal rights to the baby, but he will ensure that an order to keep you away from us is issued."

"Tammy, please, don't do this. Don't let him do this to us. Our child deserves to have both parents, to know both sides of their family," I begged her. "You know I would do anything for you and the baby."

"Except give up your life of adrenaline, Jeff," she said, getting out of my car to go into her house. "I'm sorry, Jeff. Unless my father sees a serious change in you between now and graduation, you'll never see our child or me again."

She closed my car door and rushed into her house. I sat there in shock.

October 2001:

Tamara's POV:

My family didn't leave Cameron in June 1995 like my father wanted. Instead, because I was ordered on bed rest after graduation, we wound up staying until the beginning of August. I had Jeff's daughter, Taylor Jaclyn Adams, on July 25, 1995. My father had finalized all the arrangements to get us not only out of Cameron, but completely out of North Carolina in the time leading into her birth. As soon as both Taylor and I were cleared to leave the hospital and travel, my family moved away from North Carolina, and my first love, Jeffrey Nero Hardy. Regardless of what he thought about how I felt about him in the end, I did still love him, I just also resented him because adrenaline was more important to him.

Taylor was now a little over six years old and just started first grade at the end of August. I love her with all of my heart, but she has so much energy, and shows how much more like her she is every single day. I tried to make her more like me, knowing that Daddy wouldn't want her to be like him. Still, Taylor fights how I'm trying to raise her, as much as a six-year-old can.

"Taylor! It's time to leave! You have piano in about an hour!" I called upstairs to her.

She didn't respond and I didn't hear her making her way downstairs.

"Taylor Jaclyn Adams, get your little butt down here right now! It's time to go, Little Miss!" I called upstairs to her again.

Again, Taylor didn't reply and I still didn't hear her coming downstairs so we could go. This time, I didn't call back upstairs to her. I went up to her room to find out what was holding her up. What I found when I flung open her door both shocked and terrified me. Taylor was on a step stool that she put on her dresser, standing on her toes, trying to paint on her ceiling. As soon as the door hit the wall, Taylor startled and fell. With my heart in my stomach, I rushed to her side. She wasn't crying, but her arm was bent at an odd angle.

"Taylor, are you alright?" I asked her, even though I was pretty sure she wasn't.

"My arm hurts, Mama," Taylor said, pain and fear in her eyes.

"Let's get you up and to the car, Darling," I started. "We're going to the hospital. I'm pretty sure you just broke your arm."

I picked my daughter up and helped her finish getting ready to leave. Before we left the house, I called her piano teacher to let her know why Taylor would be missing her lesson. Once that was done, I put Taylor in her booster seat and drove to the hospital.

A few hours later, after being examined by the doctor and getting x-rays, the doctor came in and told me what I'd already known. Taylor broke her arm. The doctor set the bones and put a cast on her. When he was done, he gave me a prescription for pain killers in case Taylor started to express pain, worried that she hadn't so much winced in pain the whole time we had been in the hospital.