Perhaps the greatest faculty our minds possess is the ability to cope with pain. Classic thinking teaches us of the three doors of the mind, which everyone moves through according to their need.

First is the door of sleep. Sleep offers us a retreat from the world and all its pain. Sleep marks the passing of time, giving us distance from the things that have hurt us. When a person is wounded they will often fall unconscious. Similarly, someone who hears traumatic news will often swoon or is the minds way of protecting itself from pain by stepping through the first door.

Second is the door of madness. There are times when the mind is dealt such a blow it hides itself in insanity. While this may not seem beneficial, it is. There are times when reality is nothing but pain, and to escape that pain the mind must leave reality behind.

Third is the door of forgetting. Some wounds are too deep to heal, or too deep to heal quickly. In addition, many memories are simply too painful, and there is no healing that can be done. The saying "time heals all wounds" is false. Time heals most wounds...the rest are hidden by this door.

It was one of those perfect autumn days so common in stories, yet so rare in the real world. The weather was warm and dry, ideal for taking a stroll down the street. On both sides of the road the trees were changing color. Tall poplars had gone buttery yellow while the shrubbery sumac encroaching on the road was tinged a violent red. Only the old oaks seemed reluctant to give up the summer, and their leaves remained an even mingling of gold and green. You're car sped through falling leaves as we journeyed to the ocean.

Looking back now I know I would give anything to live that day again. Isn't that what everyone says though? Its such a cliche to say 'oh yes, if I could go back and do it all again I would'...

When we are children we seldom think of the future. This innocence leaves us free to enjoy ourselves as few adults can. The day we fret about the future is the day we leave our childhood behind. I wish I could wake up every morning and be contempt with my life. Instead I am plagued by the sadness of what could have been. But enough about my woes, if I could go on all day about my sorrows I would. I am hear to write about everything that should have happened, that would have changed the past and most likely fixed the future. So without further ado I send you back to that blissful autumn day.

You're finger tips across my skin made my stomach churn as I lay in you're lap. My blond hair spilling messily over you're legs. You softly stoked my cheek as I stared at the ground, playing idly with a fallen, red leaf. In these moments together I knew what happiness was, and I knew that it was what I wanted to feel for the rest of my life. I cocked my head to the side to watch the waves crash against, swollen, rough rocks. As the waves struck a sick slap would echo through the air. Foam flew into the crisp air before cascading back into the angry ocean.

I smiled softly as you're hands began to lace through my locks. You sang to me then, like you used to when we were happy. You used to say that a poet is a musician who cannot sing. Words have to find a mans mind before they can touch his heart, and some mens minds are woeful small targets. Music touches their hearts directly no matter how small or stubborn the mind of the man who listens.

I remember that after you finished with that song you lent down, you're head hovering over mine before you began to subtly kiss me. I remember you're kiss tasting like I felt, sweet and bitter and sullen. It hurt me to realize that "us" was never an option, never a future possibility. "We have a reputation to uphold Brittany", you used to say whenever I addressed this issue. I remember thinking that that was a stupid logic. If popularity was so easily breakable, that you couldn't openly love who you wanted to without it being harshly ripped away...then who wanted to be popular? I knew that I didn't, but I also knew that you did and it broke me, emotionally of course. To know that you held your school reputation on a higher scale than you held me.

I remember that evening as a wonderful blur of warm emotion, tinged in bitter. At some point you swept me up, grabbed my hand and danced with me, in a great spinning circle. You're hair and skirt spun around me as you twirled. You're laughter sang out like music trailing in the wind. You smelt comforting, the way only lovers do. That smell, and the quick laughing kiss you gave me did more than ease the dull ache of thinking that we could never officially be together.

That night you dropped me off at my house. Quickly you checked over you're shoulder to make sure that nobody was watching before you lay a chaste kiss on my grape lip gloss coated lips. I drew you in closer to me, tangling my hands in your soft, dark hair that seemed to shine under the moonlight.

I do not remember what I said to you before you left. But I know it felt woefully inadequate. I watched as you retreated to you're car. Before driving off into the night you gave a silent wave goodbye that made my heart break.

Once you were out of sight I began to shuffle my way to the front door and as I got closer I moved slower and slower, like a machine winding down. Eventually I stopped completely and stood for a long minute, still as stone. Only then did my composure break. And even with nobody there to see, I hid my face in my hands and wept quietly, my body wracked with wave on wave of heavy, silent sobs.

I never want to see you unhappy. I thought you'd want the same for me...

*End of first chapter. This story is going to be set in four different chapters. One for each year Santana and Brittany are going through their Sophomore, Junior and Senior years in high-school and then one year for after high school...and I haven't really decided how far in the future I'm going to base that final chapter. This is going to be a fairly depressing story so you guys are in for a ride. Tell me what you think! This is the first fanfiction I have ever written for Glee so I'm pretty excited. R&R, thanks a lot guys*