"Emily the phone's for you," I heard Trace yell from the couch downstairs. He and Justin were really overstaying there welcome. They hadn't moved there asses off of the couch since Jake left for work five hours ago, and hearing them scream at each other and the television was really putting a damper on what was suppose to be a relaxing night of my brother and I catching up.

"Take a message," I yelled from the bathroom door, "I'm getting in the shower." At that I heard Justin whistle and I added, "Shut up you perverted freak of nature. What the fuck are you even doing in my house?" I heard him yell something back but didn't pay any attention to it, instead I turned the radio on really loud and stepped into the shower letting the hot water hit me from all angles. I was dancing in my new spacious state of the art shower when I heard someone knock on the door a few seconds later. "Leave me alone you-"

"Em," I heard Trace say out of breath, "You need to take this..." I popped my head out from behind the shower curtain and saw a look of utter fear on Trace's face. I grabbed a towel off of the rack next to me and wiped my hands looking at him with questioning eyes. "It's the hospital." I started shaking, and I'm sure the color drained from my face as I snatched the phone out of his hand and put it up to my ear.

"He...Hello?" I said deathly afraid of what I'd hear come from the other end of the phone. Trace stayed put right in front of me, staring waiting for answers. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Justin standing at the door, normally I would scream at him to get away from me especially since I was in the shower, but I couldn't even find my voice at that point.

"Emily Logan?"

"Yes this is she...what's wrong?"

"We have Jacob West here, you are his emergency contact. He was hit by a car a couple of hours ago-"

"He's alive right? Tell me he's alive," I cut her off the minute I knew he was seriously hurt. He had to be alive; we were getting married in two weeks. We just bought a house; things were finally going our way, "Please tell me he's alive."

"Miss Logan he's in surgery right now, things are not looking very good. We'd suggest you come down to the hospital-"

I hung up on her. I hung up the phone and threw it at Trace as I started wrapping the towel around my body and getting out of the shower. I didn't say anything as I barged through Justin standing in the doorway and I don't think I've ever gotten dressed so quickly before in my life. We'd suggest you come down to the hospital. What does that even mean? Why don't you be a little more vague about it? He's alive and in surgery why does she have to make it seem like he's going to die? He would never leave me, not now.

I couldn't think straight. Her last sentence just kept running through my head over and over again. After a few minutes the questions started popping up too. How could I have not noticed that he was gone for so long? I should have known something was wrong when the house phone rang...no one ever calls the house phone. Did I tell him that I loved him before he left? Does he know that he's the only one for me? Was he alone when he got hit? Is he scared?

I ran around the house frantically looking for my purse with my keys in it. No one asked me any questions, they both just trailed behind me knowing that something was terribly wrong. They could have been talking, but I wouldn't have known because the minute I heard that woman say it wasn't looking good I went deaf, I lost all of my senses. Finally I felt Trace pull my arm back and he handed me my purse but not before taking the keys out of it. He was right in assuming I probably shouldn't be driving right now. Not in the state I was in. I sat down in the passenger's seat of my own car looking straight ahead until we parked at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis. Justin and Trace said not one word to me, but they knew, they had to know.

Before Trace even put the car in park my door was open and I ran into the hospitals Emergency Room searching like a crazy person for someone to talk to. I spotted a nurse behind the desk helping someone else and I ran right over in front of the patient standing in front of her, "Jacob West," was all I could get out.

"Miss you're going to have to wait in line," she replied pointing to the line of 5 people standing in front of her that I had just cut off.

"Just tell me where he is!"

"Miss-"

"TELL ME WHERE THE FUCK HE IS!!" I felt a hand on my arm pull me back and I turned around and found Trace standing there pulling me away from the counter. He sat me down in a chair in the waiting room and I immediately stood back up, which forced him to literally push my shoulders down and hold me there. It was only then that I noticed tears filling his eyes. I looked to my left and Justin was sitting there with his face in his hand, and I saw behind Trace stood a tall lanky doctor.

"Em," Trace started to say before I saw a tear slide down his face. I knew what he was going to say but I didn't want to hear it so I just started shaking my head. This wasn't happening. This wasn't real life.

"No," I said looking at the doctor behind Trace, "No," I said again pushing Trace off of me and getting in the doctors face. "You will go back there...and you will fix him RIGHT NOW!" I was using my finger to pound his chest, "You are a doctor and you can fix him...GO FIX HIM!"

He placed his hands on my shoulder and looked at me dead in the eye like nothing was wrong. Like the words that were about to come out of his mouth meant nothing. This was just another day for him. He'd go home to his wife and kids tonight and forget all about me, forget all about Jake like we never even existed. "I'm sorry," he said with absolutely no sincerity in his voice at all, and with that he patted me on the back, turned around and walked away.

I stood there motionless. It was like someone took a vacuum and sucked the life out of me. I no longer had a reason to live. Jake was gone. Jake was gone and there was nothing I could do to get him back. "I'm sorry" I could hear him saying it over and over again as the tears started falling down my face. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what to say or what my next move was supposed to be. All I knew was that I needed to go see Jake, and I needed to feel his arms wrap around me and his lips on mine. I needed to go lay next to him and put my head on his chest to hear his heartbeat. I needed Jake, and he was gone.

I felt someone put their hand on my arm from behind and I turned around and slapped him in the face. I slapped my own brother, the person that's been there through it all with me. I slapped him and then let out the loudest scream of my life before I started sobbing uncontrollably. Justin grabbed both of my wrists and pulled me close to him and I tried fighting him off. I didn't want him to touch me; I didn't want him near me. The only person I wanted near me was Jake.

"Emily stop it," he said to me sternly holding onto my wrists tighter, "stop fighting it." I attempted to kick him but he managed to back away without letting go of me. I looked to my right and saw everyone in the waiting room staring at me and I wanted to go up to each and every one of them and punch them. With one last attempt I tried to get out of Justin's firm grip on me and failed. My knees were beginning to shake and I was about to lose all sense of control. I stopped fighting with Justin and let him pull me close to him. My head landed on his chest and one of his arms wrapped around my back and his other hand held my head close to him. He walked backwards with me in his arms and sat down on the couch, making me sit down next to him by default, and I cried and screamed in his arms for hours.

Jake was gone. Life as I knew it was over.

***

I opened my eyes and looked over at the clock on the nightstand. 10am. Next to the clock I noticed a bowl of fruit, a cup of juice and the latest issue of Rolling Stone Magazine. I pushed the plush white comforter back to see that I was still in my dress and shoes, and my mood that was slightly better then the one I was in yesterday went back to sour almost immediately.

It's been two weeks since Jake had died. We didn't have too much information on the accident; just that he was crossing the street to get something out of his truck and was struck by a fast moving car whose driver didn't even have the decency to stop after he hit him. There's a huge investigation going on and it's all over the news which is one of the reasons why I haven't turned the TV on since it happened.

The wake and funeral were gut wrenching. People kept coming up to me and saying they were sorry and asking if there was anything they could do to help. You can help by bringing Jake back, I'd wanted to say time and time again, but instead I just shook my head and thanked them for coming. It all felt like an outer body experience, like none of it was actually happening. I couldn't wrap my head around the fact that Jake was gone, I still can't really wrap my head around it. It all really makes you look at your life and question every move you made leading up to that day.

No one really knew what to do with me. I didn't really speak much, and when I did they were all one word answers. Strangely enough I didn't spend most of my days crying. Instead I locked myself in my house, turned my phone off and didn't answer the doorbell that was ringing non-stop, and spaced out for most of the day on the couch trying to figure out what was going to happen to my life now. I didn't do a stitch of work since I left the hospital that day and for the first time ever I was grateful that Justin was my boss because that was the only reason I was getting away with being MIA for so long.

Speaking of Justin, I don't really know what's come over him to start treating me the way he has been. I hate to say this because if he ever knew this is how I felt it would go straight to his head and he'd use it against me for the rest of his life, but he's really been the only one that's been able to comfort me. I feel like everyone has been in my face trying to get me to talk to them, or trying to get me to show them some sort of emotion that I wasn't able to feel yet. It's not there fault that it's not comforting, and I know they're just trying to help but it was driving me crazy. But Justin...Justin just let me do what I had to do, and was somehow always there when I needed someone with me. He wasn't forcing me to talk to him, but let me know that if I wanted to he was there to listen. We didn't say much to each other, but just having someone there with me letting me grieve in a way that I wanted to helped in more ways then one.

I reached for the bowl of fruit just as I heard Justin outside the door talking to someone on the phone. I could only assume it was a member of my family since the tone of his voice wasn't as pleasant as it would be if he weren't so comfortable with them, "She's fine...Look she doesn't want to talk to anyone okay? Just give her some time...It's under control...I'll tell her you called...I promise I'll keep you posted...Bye." I heard him let out a sigh before he knocked lightly on the door. He didn't wait for a response to open it, but he poked his head inside with his hand covering his eyes probably to avoid me screaming at him, "Are you decent?"

"No I'm naked," I lied just to see how he'd respond, and when he backed away and started closing the door I knew that he had a few screws loose in his head. Normally if I said something like that he'd come running in and try to catch me in a pickle, but this time he was actually acting like a civilized human being. Was that even possible for him to do? "I'm just kidding," I said right before the door clicked closed. He walked in rolling a suitcase behind him and sat down on the very end of the bed.

"I went to your house and got some clothes for you...I figured you wouldn't want to stay in that forever," he said pointing at my outfit.

"It's not my house," I said flatly while throwing a grape in my mouth, "but thanks."

"Your parents called to check on you. I know that you said you don't have-"

"I didn't mean that," I cut him off. "I didn't mean half of what I said yesterday."

"I know." I looked up at him and noticed that he was looking down at his hands. This was something neither one of us was use to. I don't think I've ever had a serious conversation with Justin in the 22 years that I've known him. All we do is throw one liners at each other until one of us gets so mad we leave. He stood up after I didn't say anything and walked over to the door, "I've got meetings for most of the day. You know where everything is so..."

He turned the knob on the door and started walking out without any reply from me. I wasn't really sure what to say. To be honest I wanted to ask him why he was being so nice to me. I know that my fiancé just died, but normally even something like that wouldn't turn asshole Justin into someone like this. People see him on TV and they fall in love with Justin Timberlake, so it's often hard for people to believe he's not really that person in real life. However, the way he was acting right now is the way that people would expect him to act if he was that person. "Justin," I said calling him back. He turned around and stood halfway down the hall, "Thank you..."

"Call Trace, let him know you're still alive," was his response.

"I will..."