~Story based around a bunch of different songs. If you recognize the characters from the books. Well then their not mine but are instead JE's. A Few of my own characters thrown in the mix as well. Not making anything from this just letting my mind run free. Enjoy and let me know what you think. :)~

During our lives, we have a moment of complete and utter clarity. Where things just seem to all of a sudden appear to us and show us where we went wrong. Today, I had this happen.

I heard a song playing on the radio today while I was in the mall that stopped me in my tracks. I didn't know what exactly in the song that called to me but something did. It made me think of all the things that I used to love and do while I was away from the Burg in college.

Everyone who knows me now, doesn't know the person I was then. Those who I call friends now would be shocked if they knew me then. I was a completely different person then.

Remembering how life was then made me focus on the common factor in thinking of back then. How I WAS! I'm not that way anymore.

What am I now? That's the question plaguing my mind as I drove myself back to my apartment. I don't remember the drive to my apartment for I was too wrapped in old memories. The joy I had felt during those few years. Where did I go wrong? Walking up to my door I was replaying one of my favorite memories.

It was pouring rain outside in the middle of August. The summer had been a brutal one. This was the first rain in weeks and we needed it badly. I was in my dorm room studying for a test coming up at the end of the week.

My best friend J.J. opened my door and said "Baby girl come with me now please. I need your help with something."

The look in his eyes told me that it was definitely something I didn't want to miss. He had a look the same as a small child on Christmas morning. So I got up and followed him. He grabbed my hand and started to run down the hallway and right out the doors with me laughing at his child like joy.

I kept asking him what we were doing but he wouldn't answer just kept on pulling me. We ran across campus to the practice football fields. I thought J.J. had completely lost it. Here we were running to an outdoor field in the pouring rain. He finally stopped and just looked up in the sky, arms stretched out wide and started twirling. I couldn't moved. I was mesmerized by his pure joy of just being in the open rain.

He stopped and looked at me with the biggest smile I had ever seen on him. He said to me "Come baby girl. Enjoy natures way of balancing everything. Of cleansing our lives and the lives around us. Share my enjoyment of the simple things with me. Let me see the real you as you forget yourself within your studies. Cleanse those harsh habits for the time being and enjoy the rain. Such a simple joy that every child loved and every adult forgot."

I couldn't help but to do just what he asked of me. We ran in the rain together around the field. Enjoying the clean free feel of the rain coming down on us. Slipping and sliding across the field. Just as we would have done if we were ten years younger.

That memory brought forth many more enjoyable memories I had spent with J.J. Along with those memories brought me the feeling of regret. I had allowed myself to change and forget the simple pleasures of life. Regret for the wonderful friendship I had let die.

I started to wonder what ever happened to J.J.

When I married the Dick, J.J. joined the Navy. Said he needed to sail the world and make something of himself. When he shipped off to boot camp he promised to write to me so I could write him back. However, I never heard from him again. I don't know if he did write and I just didn't get it or if he just didn't have time or want to write to me now that I was married.

I tried to go back the following semester but just couldn't do it. Without J.J. there I couldn't find the joy in it that I had. Not to mention my mothers constant nagging of me that now that I was a married woman I needed to stay at home and take care of my home and husband. I caved into the pressure. I couldn't hold my own against everything. I didn't have my best friend there anymore to stand at my side.

All thru college I had a great love for music. Since the time that I was a small child my mom pushed me into music in some form. Whether it was playing instruments or singing in the choir, I had to partake in it. I was ok with this. As I said I had a huge love for music. When I left college, I left music and my friends with it.

Entering my apartment I decided I needed to find that song again and listen closer to it. Something is trying to send me a message I can feel it. What or who I don't know but something is there. I sat down at my computer and pulled up google. I knew by the sound of it that it was a 3 doors down song. After searching thru their songs I found the song. I pulled up my Itunes player and set to play it on repeat so I could listen to it. Then I pulled up a copy of the lyrics off the internet so I could read along with the song.

I guess I just got lost being someone else

I tried to kill the pain, nothing ever helped

I left myself behind somewhere along the way

Hoping to come back around to find myself someday

Lately I'm so tired of waiting for you

To say that it's okay

But tell me please, would you one time just let me be myself ?

So I can shine with my own light, let me be myself

Would you let me be myself?

I'll never find my heart behind someone else

I'll never see the light of day living in this cell

It's time to make my way into the world I knew

And then take back all of these times that I gave into you

But lately I'm so tired of waiting for you

To say that it's okay

Tell me please, would you one time let me be myself?

So I can shine with my own light, let me be myself

For a while, if you don't mind, let me be myself

So I can shine with my own light, let me be myself!

That's all I've ever wanted from this world

Is to let me be me

Please would you one time let me be myself?

So I can shine with my own light, let me be myself

Please would you one time, let me be myself

So I can shine with my own light, let me be myself

For a while, if you don't mind, let me be myself

So I can shine with my own light, let me be myself!

Would you one time, ooh, let me be myself and let me be me?

(Let me be myself : 3 Doors down)

Upon listening and reading the lyrics I understood now why it brought back memories from college. The person I used to be and enjoyed being. The true me. The one that no one now days know. I miss her. I miss me! I miss my friends who enjoyed being with me for me. Not because they needed something or because they wanted a good laugh.

I decided I needed to find me again. The song made me think of my mother and my relationship with the people I thought were my friends. They don't know me. They don't want to know me. All they know is that I can take punishment like no other.

I'm like a cat with 9 million lives instead of just 9. The laughing, the betting, the constant nagging for me to marry and have children needed to stop. I needed to get out of here and find me again.

Knowing this I called a number that I had not called in almost ten years. I called the one person I knew who could tell me of my old friend. The one who always showed me how to be myself and told me to never forget who she was. I called J.J.'s dad hoping and praying he was still around and at the same number.

"Hello Martin residence, this is Miguel" said an older man.

"Mr. Martin, I don't know if you remember me but I'm Stephanie Plum. I was a good friend of J.J's during college. Do you have a minute?"

"Steph? Is that really you baby girl? Of course I remember you. How are you?

" I laughed and replied "I'm good papa, I've missed you. I'm so sorry it has taken me all these years to call you. How have you been? How's the family?"

"Baby girl don't be sorry. You are calling now that's all that matters. Things are going well for us. The kids are all grown up and some of kids of their own. We're still waiting on that silly boy of ours to get out of the navy and come to us. He was home for a very short visit a couple months ago but its just not the same as having him home for good. He's still in the service traveling all over the world. He asks me if I've talked to you every time he comes home though. Even though its been so many years."

My breathe caught in my throat and tears sprang to my eyes. I didn't know what to say. I missed him so much and I couldn't believe how i could have been such a horrible friend to him.

Papa must have heard me because he said " baby girl don't you be sad now you hear me? Joshua loved you very much you were his best friend. He told me he never tried to contact you because he didn't want to cause any trouble between you and your husband. He wanted you to be happy and knew that if he did contact you that there was a high chance your husband would become jealous over your friendship since he was a male. How has married life treated you baby girl?"

"Papa I was divorced within 6 months of getting married. Dickie for whatever reason wasn't happy with me. I don't know what I did wrong. I tried to do everything my mother told me to do. I even dropped out of school so I could make a home and keep it for him. But it wasn't enough I guess. It seems I can't do anything right. I caught him cheating on me with another woman on our dining room table." I was on the verge of crying again and I think papa heard me.

"Baby girl you listen to me on this. You are a wonderful woman. Any man who could do something so cruel to a wonderful woman like you doesn't deserve you. Not for even a second. Which brings me to another question. You don't sound like the baby girl I remember. Has life not been kind to you? What has gotten you so down? Your not as happy and cheerful as you were."

"I guess you could say I lost myself papa. I tried to be someone else. And I left myself behind. That was kind of the reason I called you out of the blue like I did. I was wondering if you had a way I could get a hold of J.J. He always was able to point me in the right direction to find who I was. And I need that help again papa. I can't go on any longer being the way that I am."

He gave me a number where I could reach J.J. providing he was within the states and not gone over seas. Then he asked me one question that I was ashamed to answer.

"Are you still playing your beautiful music baby girl?"

I didn't want to tell him that I gave that up as well but I could never lie to him.

"No papa I gave that up when I married because my mother told me it was silly nonsense that I didn't need anymore now that I had a husband."

"Baby girl! Music is part of who you are. You need it like a fish needs water. It's no wonder you are lost child. Find your music again baby girl. Pick up a guitar and play. I know you have a song playing in that wonderful mind of yours. Play it. Let others hear you. It will help you find your way and for those who matter most to find their way to you."

With that he told me to scoot and find my music. My soul. I told him I would and that I would make sure to call him again sometime soon. After I hung up the phone I decided I needed to find myself a used guitar again and do just want papa told me. He had never told me anything wrong, just like his son, he had always been able to set me straight and find my direction. So that's what I did I went to a pawn shop and bought myself a used guitar.