My mind could not depart from certain things today, from certain things that were gone forever and only stayed in my head. Reckless I was, reckless was my frickin' middle name. I never thought I could bring such destruction—destruction that hit this hard and literally ruined others, with me being ultimately included.

I looked over at him. His eyes were cast on a book as we sat in the lair. The redness in his eyes and around his nose made it pretty obvious that Justin had been crying. It stabbed with this guilt I couldn't avoid, and it seemed like a hell of a lot of bad luck when it resonated from my brother, one who i was stuck with for nearly my entire life.

"You never let me get out how sorry I am..." I broke out into apology, "It's horrible how much more this is killing me..."

He wasn't the only one hurting from all of this. I lost my new boyfriend, Mason in this scrap, too.

"Sorry doesn't do the dishes, Alex. What happened, happened....simple as that."

"What happened can be FIXED, for me AND you....you don't get that...?" I told him with disbelief, "You can't play this off, Justin. You shouldn't be taking upon yourself to live alone like this if you know good and well that you can get her back."

Justin first was filled with hope, but then his face fell with rejection as he directed his attention back to his reading.

"What?"

"If you're proposing time travel, I suggest you not..." He advised.

I sighed, rolling my eyes, "Sure, I was. What? Are you serious?? Justin, we could have our lovers back--Your vampire and my wolf, don't you see??"

Justin snapped back in an instant. "Yes, I do see, and for days now, I've been thinking of ways to help them...but we're not fiddling with the framework of time, okay. Some stuff could go down and the order could be corrupted here."

I sighed and jumped up. "Well, I want to."

"Alex," Justin said, rising to his feet. He stepped over to me and took me by the hands. "Things happen for a reason…if my Juliet and your Mason were taken away; it only means it was meant to occur. Any change in that outcome could be drastic….very drastic."

For the first time, I was able to see that glint in Justin's eyes that seemed….sentimental. Not only that, but he knew what he was talking about, given the situation. He was as broken as I was, but…at least he was trying to reattach new pieces.

"How…?" My eyes filled with tears, as he sighed and shook his head, "How could any other outcome have possibly been any more….fatal, than this one?"

"What could've been worse?" Justin then stared at me with a distant façade, as if he was thinking about something, picturing something. "I could've been dead…you could've been dead. That's what's a little more heart-breaking to know. That we deliberately put our lives on the line for something so…pointless…"

I felt his words, but the meaning of the last one, as it surged into my head, erupted a fire in me. "How is love pointless?! I finally find someone that I feel so passionate about and you find that pointless?!"

"I still love and care about Juliet with all of my heart, Alex! There's nothing pointless about your relationship with Mason either! What was pointless was risking our lives and our contact with everyone we love because of a FIGHT. All because you needed a stupid necklace to tell you who you're in love with…"

I descended into a cry as I stood before Justin, my legs trembling, hand covering my face from my thumb to my middle finger like a visor.

Justin let out an exasperated sigh. "Okay….so… it had sentimental value, I get that. It may have been worth it for you—personally—but…was it really, Alex? You don't need a necklace to tell you who you're in love with. If you truly love someone and they truly love you….you just know."

I wanted to fight against everything he spoke of in the last 3 to 4 minutes but I couldn't bring myself to think of anything that could oppose his argument. "I—I was selfish…I panicked. If it weren't for that, and how much I needed to know, they'd still be here. I need him back, and I'm pretty sure you do too."

I approached the long study table in a fast walk to retrieve my wand, but, unfortunately, I was held off by Justin's arm and the red and gray striped fabric of his scrunched up sleeves. My view then traced up to meet his face and I glared at the stone-gray orbs that casted onto me from under his unkempt bangs. The orbs' definition struck some kind of condescendence in my direction—some feeling of pity.

"Alex, you don't want to do this..." He reassured with emotion, with sympathy. I could tell there was something in him that wanted him to speak against himself, to allow me to go forth with this and bring him back his blonde, sharp-toothed prize. He shut his eyes momentarily, then fluttered them open as if he regained himself. It was like he was driving the flood of emotions back, he sustained them…no matter the number of images of his vampire girlfriend he had stapled onto his brain.

He was being strong, but I had no reason to stand here any longer in the darkness I made for myself.

"Justin, move." I said sternly, with hard-headed determination.

"No! You have to stop this!" He begged, moving a little closer in front of me.

"Justin…" I tried to be patient with him.

--You don't need this to be happy—

"Justin, Sto—"

--I'll be fine on my own, just listen to me!!--

I couldn't get a single word in with him constantly yammering. A million chords were being plucked constantly in my ears, different pitches, different tones Red. Red was the only manageable color to perceive inside my head, gradually growing more and more intense.

"Justin—"

A single command eased through the scorching fire behind my lids.

"MOVE!"

Instantaneous and startling, a glimmer of light radiated from my fore finger. I traced it around to the direction opposite of me. Justin--skin blanched white, widened eyes set on me in a panicky look—stammered incoherently as his feet started gliding across the floor of the lair. He was led to the armchair with my fore finger as his guide. He was forcefully thrown into the chair, posed into a sitting position.

"WHAT IS THIS?!" He shouted.

I scooped up my wand from the table and spun about to get another look at Justin. He had been trying to yank himself out of the seat, but unfortunately his arms were magically glued to the armrests. It was as if an invisible barricade was blocking him from standing up. It was what I wanted…but I couldn't help but to feel slightly like it was my fault—because it was--smiling nervously and blushing a little as he looked at me with pure astonishment.

"Sorry…" I tried apologizing, "It's a forbidden spell. I can move solid objects and take control of a person's actions…so you're basically like a puppet now."

"HOW DO I COUNTER IT?!"

"Yeah…funny story, actually. You can't. Only I can. Wanna know what's funnier? This."

I chuckled, and on my command, Justin's right hand rose in an instant and he slapped himself across the face, a pinkish-red face print left in its place.

"ALEX! You had better get me out of here—THIS INSTANT!"

"No, okay? You're going to thank me for this later…" I assured him, then got into a standing position and cleared my throat. Justin's yammering barged at my eardrums again, but I was quick to ignore it.

"Pulled a place from my memory, have a scene drawn from my mind, Now take me to this special place, the last I've seen it back in time!"

With a spin of my wand, light crackled at the tip as the spell was casted. In an instant pull, the room began spinning around me. I could only heed Justin's cry of my name before the scenery morphed into the color scheme of another.

Peering around the room for a moment, I was kind of grossed out by all of the knick-knacks that were made up of bright, neon colors, the odd antiques crafted with some kind of fruit or pertained to some kind of vegetable or random concept. Then two people stood in my vision.

One was tall, slender, gorgeous dark brunette hair that was long and layered into waves. Round metallic earrings dangled over her waves. Her style was cute—she stood there in a gray top, underneath a tight-fitted jacket in a bluish-purple. She wore this black belt over that jacket, and below were her jeans tucked inside leather boots.

The other was very peculiar: A redhead, slightly shorter than the other and more stout. Her sense of style made me want to gouge my eyes out. She stood there in a sort of kimono that was blue, with dozens of multi-colored fish swimming over that.

I found it odd that we were best friends.