CHAPTER ONE

Six years. It had been six years since I last saw him. Jesse. Just the sound of that name brings back so many memories...so many broken dreams.

Ever since that kiss in the graveyard, we were inseparable. Jesse stayed in my room–against Father Dominic's wishes–for six months. Six months of sunny, love-filled days and beautiful nights. Jesse brought out a part of me I never knew I had, and those months we spent together were the best of my life.

He promised me he loved me and would never leave me. We never spoke of the future, or marriage, or kids or all those other things people take for granted but we could never have. But none of it mattered to me. I had Jesse and that was all I would ever need. Young love is like that. Its so powerful it will wipe out any common sense that will get in the way of being together. Thinking of the future was too profound and depressing, so I put it out of my mind and decided firmly to live in the present, and cherish it.

But soon the future would be thrust upon me without any given warning.

I'll never forget the day he left. It was the morning after another night of endless lovemaking and warm embraces, and the sun was shining valiantly through the bay window, tickling my cheek with its warmth. I smiled and rolled over to greet Jesse, but instead found an empty space on the bed, the covers tosseled and unmade. He was already up.

This wasn't like Jesse. Though he himself didn't sleep, he would always wait patiently in bed for me to wake, to begin each morning with even more of his sweet kisses. I at least expected to find him perched on the window seat, absorbed in some Czechoslovakian book, waiting for me to awake. But the window seat was left unoccupied.

I told myself not to panic, but couldn't help but suck in a sharp breath. I wrapped a sheet around my unclothed body and stirred from the bed.

"Jesse?" I called out, my voice trembling. No answer.

"Jesse!" I called out again, only to be answered by the chirping of some nearby seagulls.

And that was the end of my world as I knew it.

I waited for him for months and months. There was still a part of me that told me he would come back. Call it denial, call it stupidity. But it was the lie I told myself each night before I cried myself to sleep, in hopes that the next morning, I would be in his arms again and everything would be alright.

But soon, months turned into years and I had given up hope.

By the time I graduated from the Junipero Serra Mission Academy, I was a completely different person. I was no longer the sixteen year old girl I was when I moved to Carmel, with everything in the world to look forward to.

After Jesse left, I let myself go. I became dark and subdued. My already less than satisfactory grades slipped, and I lost touch with Cee Cee and Adam. Everything in my life became so insignificant and dull, and I no longer remembered what it felt like to be happy.

Pain became a general term for me. It could be the sting I felt in my arm when I'd cut myself to forget about Jesse for a few precious moments, or the pang I felt when I saw happy couples together on the beach and remembered what I used to have.

No one could figure out what was wrong with me. My mom put me through several therapists, all of which had given up on me. I couldn't blame them, though. There was no way anyone could cure me of the wounds Jesse left on my heart.

I don't know if he moved on, or if he just got up and left. But wherever it is that Jesse went, he took my heart with him.

END OF CHAPTER ONE

Notes: I know this chapter is not at all like the beginning of The Notebook. If it was, Jesse would have broken up with Suze because he knew they couldn't be togther. But I wrote this chapter before I remembered that. Plus, it has to be this way to make sense in future chapters. It doesn't seem like The Notebook at all now, but once the story gets moving it will.

love,

Linds