~

On a train entering that same town, a woman stroked back a piece of hair from her face. Again she looked at the paper, taking in the words that had made her lose her breath and balance… how could she be sick? The last time they had met she had seemed so healthy, the new mother, still fresh with the aura of birth. The woman on the train glanced out the window, trying to see a sight long enough to grasp any change that had come to this old berg. But the train's speed blurred everything too much to accomplish this. It didn't matter, ever since the letter came everything had seemed like a blur anyway.

Elsewhere on the train another woman sighed as she looked up form a laptop screen. He hated the smell and look of death. And she could feel it already. No matter how much hope and faith in medicines the letter had tried to convey, reading between the lines showed that this was the last time the offer to meet altogether again would be given. Not because no one would want to, but because one would be missing- forever.

~

On a plane a woman said a silent goodbye to her sunny and happy home. When she returned to it, things would not be the same. Actually, more appropriately, she would not be the same. Time could freeze at home, but when she came back things would be different because she would be different. It seemed too soon. Too soon for one of the group to have this fate looming so imminently. They were young yet. In fact, the woman on the plane knew that her friend had only in the last few years had a child. A stewardess noticed a woman scrunching her eyes up tight as a tear escaped. The poor child the woman thought. We will have to help. Help her remember the mother she will not get to have.

~

A woman, in the same small town, walked briskly down the street. She was lucky enough to not receive the gruesome news in some impersonal letter. She had known. She had possibly known before the woman in the hospital had. Something in her aura had changed. Slowly something… something bad had crept in. She watched the child whenever she could- the hospital was no place for children- and tried to help. She was the one who had sent the letters, even though the poor doomed soul had asked. She wanted for them all to be together- one last time. Also she wanted for the child, the poor thing, to have many people to turn to when her father just didn't get it. The father- he hadn't been around when they were the charmed group- he had only met all these childhood friends of his wonderful wife and thought that it was wonderful that his wife still knew them. The magic and rarity of this group's bind had been lost on him.

The woman sighed as she continued walking down the street. She hoped the others would come.

~

A woman slowly pulled into a driveway of the very same town. She sighed as she rung the doorbell of the house- her old house. The sensation of having to ring the bell was a mixture of homesickness and wonderment at change. But seconds later that all disappeared when the door opened and she was enveloped in her mother's arms. When the mother convinced herself that her daughter was till whole she shuffled the woman inside. Lowly the girl took in the familiar front hall as she hung her coat. Suddenly she was a teen again, coming home to supper after a meeting. She could almost sense the simplicity of life back then. How she had taken it for granted. Shaking her head she continued in, knowing she was stalling, not wanting to face the reality that had come with the letter- they were no longer in middle school, so the problems no longer came in middle school size.

~

A slightly annoyed woman bumped a baby up her hip. The rides today had been exhausting so far, and she wasn't done yet. Resignedly she continued waiting for her taxi. When it finally arrived she loaded the seemingly ten million pounds of baby things into the trunk and backseat and finally relaxed into the front seat. I would figure she would need to go on a sudden trip the second her husband left for Europe. He glanced at her driver as she named her destination. The driver looked surprised said she also lived there and proceeded to tell the woman and child much more than either cared to know about people that neither had known, nor cared to know. But sitting was better than standing and the ride could only last so long. She glanced at the baby. Such a sweet child. Had only cried once during the many hours of travel today. She thought of the baby announcement she had received five- or was it six? – years ago. She tried to imagine how it would feel to leave her child slowly when they were so young. She couldn't.

~

Another woman, looking rather uncomfortable in her stiff seat, slowly tried to maneuver through the traffic in her neighbor's van. More correctly, her neighbor's teenage son's van. The thing was falling out of itself. She fondly remembered another teenager's car from years ago. The owner of the vehicle she was driving now was equally proud of the piece of junk. On the other hand, the woman was under no circumstances letting her offspring in this van. Her husband could drive up with the girls this weekend- giving me time to take care of this more unpleasant business. She slammed on the brakes as another car cut her off. She let loose a string of curses that were enough to make a trucked blush. Smiling ruefully, she thought of another excellent reason to travel minus the children. She might as well let them think their father had the potty mouth. The smile grew as she read the exit sign and began to pull onto the off ramp for the same small town that the others had been traveling to. A place that the mother, wife, and woman used to call home.

~

A/N: Any questions can be asked in reviews or email. They will be addressed either in future segments of the story or future author notes. I've had this idea for a while, and I feel I have set it as well as I currently can. But if you have suggestions on writing or plot, please review. Also: A cookie or possibly fanart to the person who manages to guess who they are. Note: No associate members were addressed. I do not plan on including them due to plot and function incompatibilities. The mother daughter bond is an important theme, and Logan could not connect to this while Shannon was never as important to the circle of friends. No offence to Shannon, we actually had a lot in common, but she has no lace in this. Please review.