It's midnight and he's sure she's been in bed for hours, but he dials anyway. He's too scared to sleep; he needs reassurance. He needs to hear that they're okay. "Hello." Her voice is tired but loving, and he wonders how she knew it was him. "Hi, it's me." "What are you doing?" she asks, her voice groggy with sleep. "What time is it?" "Ah...midnight." "Is everything okay?" "Yeah," he whispers. "I just miss you." She's quiet for a second. "I miss you too," she tells him, but there's something more in her voice, something that causes his heart to skip a beat. "I'm scared." "Brian," she sighs, sending goosebumps down his spine by the way she says his name. "What are you scared about?" He hesitates. He doesn't want to sound stupid, but he wants her to know how he really feels. He wants to tell her everything he's been keeping back from her, and somehow words find his lips. "What we have, it's so right," he tells her desperately, as if he were pleading. "I know it's right because I love you, I love you so much, and when I look into your eyes, I can see myself in them. I can see the future we have together. But when I'm not with you it feels like everything's falling apart and I start to freak myself out because I can't hold you and see you and understand what you're feeling because you're just not here. "I get scared when I think about what's going to happen in the future. I don't know if we can last the way we're going, being away from each other so much. I just...I don't know what's going to happen, and it's killing me because what if this falls apart? What if we can't make it work and we fall apart? I know we're strong and in love, but...it's just...in this world you just never know." When he finishes babbling, there's a moment of silence, and he wonders if she's fallen back asleep or if she actually listened to everything he said. Finally he hears her breathing, and he doesn't know whether to feel happy or scared. She still hasn't said anything, and he's wondering what exactly she's thinking. "Brian." She speaks softly, sending goosebumps down his spine again. "I believe in dreaming," she tells him. "When you're gone, and I'm at home, all by myself, I sit outside with the stars, and sometimes I'll talk to them, pretending you can hear me. I'll tell them how much I miss you and how I long to hear your voice and how I'm hoping that you're thinking of me at that same exact moment. "And you know what else? When I'm looking up at the stars, imagining you somewhere out there underneath the same sky I'm looking at, I can't see where we'll be in five or ten years. I can't see the house we'll be living in or the kids we'll have, but I can see one thing." There's a pause, just long enough to make Brian's heart quicken. And then she says, "I can see being with you forever." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ I call her up at midnight I say I'm feeling scared Boy you've got to let it go I tell her what we've got is so right Can it last out there In this world you never know Then I close my eyes and I wait Imagining what she might say Here comes your goodbye And then she says She believes in dreaming And then she says She talks to the stars And then she says She can see forever from where we are "And Then She Says" by Evan and Jaron ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~