And I Love You, Too

A/N: Hey everybody! Here is the first chapter of a pretty long novel. One thing you should know however, is that this chapter doesn't set the tone for the whole story. This is in the past, a whole year has gone by in chapter two. So don't think this is another pratical girl misses boy story PLEASE! I'd love to hear what you think. :)



Regan's Pov:

I sat there with my legs pulled up to my chin. Icouldn't think; my mind was one big hazy fog.

With a heavy, over exaggerated sigh, I rested my chin on my knees and wrapped my arms around my legs, hugging myself as my only comfort. The same bothersome question that had been buzzing in my head all day was growing close to pain now, as the sunset turned the sky from a dark red to an orange glow.

"Asher," I sighed pathetically again, "where are you?" My eyes swept across the deserted beach and I tried to fight back the fear that was builidng inside of me as it grew darker. I really wished he would show up before darkness took over. Could I make myself go home then? It wouldn't feel right - going home alone.

I was getting chilly now, and the goosebumps rising up on my legs warned me to go home. Along with the dimming light in the sky, my hopes dimmed right along with it. In just a few more minutes, they'd be extinguished like the sun on the horizon. Fear, with a mixture of pain and anxiousness passed through me, making my blood turn cold, until I finally heard what I was waiting for.

Soft, barely, audibile footsteps shuffled in the sand, just clumsy enough to reassure me so that I didn't even need to turn and see who it was. I stood up so quickly that all the blood rushed fast down to my legs, and I became dizzy from it - also from the overwhelming relief that was drowning me. Nothing was said between us as I brushed the dried sand off of my legs, and while trying to calm my heart down at the same time.

I was angry and upset with him, but it wasn't enough to stop me from holding my hand to my chest to keep my speeding heart, from falling right out.

"Why you down here waiting for me?" Asher asked in a rude tone. I knew that he would of prefered to find me away from the water, maybe in an alley sitting on the curb of a deserted street. Away from people or noise. But mainly, away from water. And when his coal black eyes scanned the ocean uneasily behind me, I knew I was right.

He hated water almost as much as he hated for me to talk to any other person that lived on this island.

"I wouldn't be here, if I weren't having to wait for you," I snapped back quickly. But even the bitterness I was trying to use, failed. Couldn't he just give me a hug, and we could leave the beach together? I'd promise him never to come back if he made a promise in return to never leave me all day alone again.

Asher moved his eyes to my face wearily. "Hi Regan," he said quietly, knowing that I was upset.

My shoulders sagged with exhaustion. Waiting for him all day had not been easy, and by now, all of my energy was drained. "Hi," I answered back plainly.

Something wasn't right, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary as I checked over my boyfriend for a brief moment. Like always, his thick black hair was plastered to his sweaty forhead. His cheeks were pink from the heat, and his eyes were black and cold as stone. So why did I still feel like something was wrong?

Asher cleared his throat, drawing my distracted attention back to him. "I aint want to say this. I gone and told you I was goin' to be leavin' sometime. Aint I tell you that?"

I froze. Not just my movements, but my breathing too. The waves stopped, the sound around me stopped. Everything stopped.

"You never told me when..."

"Now."

His bad english wasn't hard for me to figure out anymore. I had figured out how to understand him quickly. But, for some reason, I stared at him with my mouth gaping open like I didn't understand at all. To be quite honest, I didn't understand.

"Tonight?" I blurted out on the verge of breaking down.

He squinted his black eyebrows together and his inky eyes darkened-If that was even possible. "We leaving now. I came to say goodbye."

My legs began to shake from under me, and my lips trembled. Goodbye? He reached for my hand, but I jerked it out of his reach.

"You can't leave me," I whispered numbly. Now everything was coming back to life. The feeling was returning back to my body, although I wish it wouldn't have. Paiin...shallow breath..stabbing. Oh God why did it hurt so mcuh? Breakups didn't hurt like this; they didn't feel like you were being stabbed or beaten with a shovel repeatingly over the head. Maybe the pain, was a breaking heart in process, and I just hadn't experienced it before. "No, Asher. Listen to me, you can't leave me....not now..." My voice was rising with fear. "Not at all."

Fear. Not sadness, not anger. Fear. What a strange feeling to feel. But, I guess I wasn't surprised. Everything was strange about me and Asher.

He attempted to grab my hand again, but that time I let him, and he pulled me tightly to his chest. I could feel his strongly built chest muscles flex nervously. My body seemed to fit naturally against the invisible indention I had made throughout the summer. The way my head rested directly on his chest, and one arm wrapped around his waist, the other ride beside my head so I could feel the steady beat of his heart. Natural as breathing is what it felt like when we were in this position.

"Not ever," I sobbed. But, the only difference between my sob and somebody else's, was that my eyes remainded dry. It was one of the strangest things about my relationship with him. I couldn't cry whatsoever. It was impossible. Maybe there was something wrong with me, I couldn't have been sure. But there was something about how when he was around I felt hotter, my mouth would become dry, along with my eyes. It was so frustrating, and even painful.

So instead of feeling hot tears roll down my cheeks, I only felt the sharp painful stabs of breath, and an unnatural heart beat.

"I aint see no tears."

"You know...I can't...cry around y-you," I managed to say. Each word was a stab to the chest. Why, oh why, must it feel so painful?

Asher stared at my blotchy face silently. His face showed no emotion. "Because," he said simply, "I aint ever make you sad."

"You are making me very sad right now," I accused and pulled away from him so that I could rub at my burning, dry eyes.

He smiled smugly and stepped back. It was times like those when I really didn't understand him. He looked so happy that I couldn't cry. How was he smiling right now? Even worse, smiling at my pain? If it were different circumstances, I would have stomped away angrily. But if I did that now, he wouldn't be here for my return.

Asher was leaving. Oh God, he really truly was leaving me.

"Don't fall in love, 'kay? Not with no one but me."

I nodded numbly. Love, what was it even?

"Can't tell you why, wish I could though. But can't." He swept his secretive eyes over the state that I was in, and again, smiled. His pink, full lips stretched out over his teeth, and immediantly I saw the dimples that always seemed to draw me in. But this, no, this was the absolute wrong time for those cute things. Shouldn't I see tears from him? Maybe a frown even?

"I'll be back next summer, so wait for me, 'kay? I'll explain everything."

An explaination would have been nice this summer; I wasn't patient enough to wait for a whole nother year. But wasn't that how it always went? I would spill my guts to him about everything I ever felt. Except on the day that he wouldn't listen to me, and now that I thought about it...

He had a lot of those days.

In return, he would stay silent. Just as much of a secret as he had been three months ago when I met him.

"And if I do fall in love?"

Asher quickly turned his glaring eyes on me. They were frantic at my words, wild and scared too. "Promise you wont?"

I tried to swallow the pain. How was he doing it so easily? I, for one, had never hurt mentally or physically before.

"Of course not," I sputtered out of my trembling lips. "Impossible. I promise."

His eyes went back to being glasssy and bold as soon as he was reassured." 'Kay, well that's all I got to say." Asher kissed my frozen lips one last time. "I love you," he added in an obligated tone. Almost as if it were a drag for him to have to say that. As if every day we spent together, meant nothing.

As if he didn't really love me.

"I love you," I whispered back, fighting against hypervenilating.

The pain was crushing hard against my chest. Not the normal, sorrow depressing pain. This was something else. I knew that it would never go away until I saw him again. Asher, he wasn't normal. Hell, neither was I anymore.

Sliding the back of his warm hand down my cheek, he turned, and that was the last I saw of him.

Only a few minutes after he left, the first tears in three months, ran heavily down my cheeks. It was an unfamiliar feeling, having the wet salty stream splatter onto my shirt. I lifted a finger, just to make sure they were real. When I felt them, I looked into the drop on my finger, and I knew right then that Asher was really gone.

Everybody would wonder where he went. They would ask me questions; questions that I wouldn't be able to answer. Of course, they'd only think I was brushing them away. It was only fair of them to think that, because ever since day one with Asher I had barely looked at any of them. Not with choice, but that's how Asher had wanted it.

My legs began to shake, and then they crumbled to the sand beneath me. I laid back so that I could stare up at the sky. Never in my life had I felt so empty. It was silly, to feel this way just for a boy.

Only I knew what others didn't. Asher wasn't just a boy. What I didn't know, however, was what he actually was. Why couldn't I shed any tears when I was around him? Why did he have some phobia of water and wouldn't let me, or us, go anywhere near it?

Why did I feel like every day when I first opened my eyes, I needed to see him or hear his voice? And when Isaid needed, I meant it. If he wasn't around, my legs felt heavy and my heart wouldn't beat at the normal place. My eyes would feel dry and tired, and I felt almost sick.

People would ask me, how I had fallen in love so quick. They would demand to know why I let him take over my life; after all, I wasn't that type of girl.

So then, I'd have to explain to them how little I knew about a boy that I had spent every single night and day with for the last 3 months. Never got to hear anything about his family or where he was from. I knew little things, like what his favorite color was, and that he didn't like paint when it was crumbing. None of that was revalant, however.

How do you explain what it was, how it felt to be in love with somebody, when it had been so...

Different..