Time stood still when the door slammed.

All she could do was stare at the wood of the front door. The thunder seemed to get closer and the rain seemed to fall down harder.

And she couldn't move.

He had just walked out on her and called her a whore. She began to see red. Her jaw locked and before she knew it, she was slamming the door behind her herself and being immediately soaked with rain.

He was jogging through the front yard, trying to figure out why he didn't walk through the garage to get to his car.

She screamed through the rain. "YOU THINK I'M A WHORE? IS THAT IT JUSTIN? HAS THIS ALL BEEN SOME GAME FOR YOU?"

Justin stopped and turned, growling at her. "You don't have a CLUE as to what I think, so stop trying to figure me out!"

Her hands and arms waved through the rain as she yelled. "WAIT A MINUTE! You are the one that once said you wanted to figure ME out. So when I try and do the same you get all pissy?"

"You need to mind your own business. I have had a hell of a lot on my mind and here you are all up in it. Just get AWAY!" He turned back to go to his car.

"So now you want me to LEAVE? WHAT IS THIS? Just two days ago you were bragging about our sex life."

He turned back around and stared at her. "ALEXA-" Her voice and a flash of lightening and thunder interrupted him.

"OH SHUT UP FOR A SECOND! So FIRST YOU BRAG ABOUT IT AND NOW YOU ARE ALL WORRIED. WHAT THE FUCK JUSTIN? I DONT KNOW WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS BUT I'M NOT SOME DAMN TROUPHY ON YOUR MANTEL JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE. YOU CANT BRAG AND POINT TO ME LIKE AN AWARD YOU WON. THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS. I DESERVED TO BE TREASURED AND CHERISHED AND LOVED LIKE A HUMAN BEING NOT SOME PIECE OF METAL MADE BECAUSE THOUSANDS OF LITTLE GIRLS WANT TO GIVE THEIR VIRGINITY TO YOU." Her eyebrows were lowered and eyes narrowed and her breathing was heavy.

He chuckled a bitter laugh and looked up and down the tight shirt that was clinging to her body and his boxers that were sticking to her hips. "Well you gave yours up to me pretty easily."

She crossed her arms over her chest and growled at him. "So NOW I'm just a person for you to get off with? You don't even care about me. You never loved me. I was just some chick you could fuck. Wow you are sooo smooth Justin. Got it with the baby-sitter. You are so full of shit Timberlake."

"SO NOW YOU DONT THINK I LOVE YOU? YOU THINK ALL I WANT OUT OF YOU IS SEX??" He spat at her, unbelieving the words that were coming from her mouth.

Her arms went wide as she screamed. "WELL YOU SURE AS HELL DONT ACT LIKE IT. I MEAN OBVOIUSLY YOU DONT LOVE ME IF YOU THINK I'M A WASTE OF YOUR TIME!!!!"

He pointed at her accusingly. "YOU DONT KNOW WHAT THE FUCK YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT."

"AND YOU WOULDNT KNOW WHAT THE FUCK LOVE WAS IF IT BIT YOU IN THE ASS."

He screamed in the storm that they were being drenched with but not caring at all. He hated this. He hated this more than anything. "JUST SHUT UP ALEXANDRIA. YOU DONT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT. YOU DONT EVEN REALIZE HOW MUCH I LOVE YOU."

"EXACTLY BECUASE YOU DONT LOVE ME AT ALL." Her voice was no longer that of anger. She seemed sad as she spat out her sentence and her body began to convulse with sobs.

"You don't even know." Justin spoke in a low voice. He turned on his heels and jogged to the driveway and into the garage, shouting. "YOU DONT EVEN KNOW ALEXANDRIA!"

He got in Mercedes, cranked the engine and peeled out of the garage and down his long driveway. He caught her image in the rear-view mirror.

She was on her knees in his front yard, hands covering her face.

He shook his head and turned back to his driveway, not daring to look back.

--------

Alexandria shut the door behind her with a shocked look on her face. She didn't take notice of the water puddling at her feet or the trail of rain she left on the hardwood floor as she walked to the kitchen and sat down at the table. Her eyes remained unfocused into space as she tried to make sense of what just happened.

And it all came down to one thought.

He left her.

He left her cold, wet, and seemingly unloved.

Her eyes trailed to her bird when he started to chirp along with the thunder. She languidly slid out of her chair and took all of the toast that Justin had on the kitchen table and threw it in the cage. Then she walked over to the refrigerator, pulled out a Snapple and sauntered back through the foyer and into her bedroom. Water was in various puddles all through the kitchen and foyer where she once had walked.

She was in a state of shock as she pulled some dry clothes from her dresser. Her mind wasn't really working; her body just moving subcontiously.

She tugged on her clothes and walked over to the small dresser beside her bed to get out some socks. She stopped when she looked at the picture on her dresser. It was of Justin and Jon. She picked up the frame and ran her fingers over his smiling handsome face. Her shock state ended and as gasp sounded from her mouth. She felt blindly for the bed so she could sit down. She held the picture frame to her chest, curled up into a ball and cried until her nose was sore and her eyes were red.

-------

That afternoon around 2

Justin parked his car in his garage, sighing. Her car wasn't there. It was a good thing, because ever since that morning he had been thinking and he came to a decision about what he was going to do. And he didn't know if he could tell her to her face.

Once he was in the house, he searched the kitchen island for a note from her. They always left notes for the other on the island if they had gone out. But this time there was no note. He rubbed his forehead, feeling just a bit of worry. He knew he was a little cold and mean this morning, but he was angry. She knew he had a temper, right?

He shook it off, figuring that she was at school.

Justin opened up the junk drawer in his kitchen and pulled out the phone book, after searching and searching the pages for the number he had circled once before he dialed the numbers and waited for the call to go through.

He sighed at the sound of the voice that hit his ears. He was immediately relaxed and relieved. This was just what he would need to get his mind off things and be able to clear his head and figure out what he wanted.

When he was done with his call he ran up his steps and into his bedroom to pack. But he stopped as soon as he stepped in the door. The sheets were all crumpled; some of her clothes were at the foot of the bed. Suddenly he didn't want to do this. He didn't want to be away from her.

He and the guys were taking a week break from recording to relax. And he was going to do just that. But he wanted to be with her while he relax, but at the same time he felt stressed out whenever he was with her. He was getting confused, very confused.

He was thinking with his brain and not his heart. Or maybe he was using both and that's what was messing him up.

He knew dragging this out and pulling her along was not fair to Lexia. He knew he loved her, but he needed to know how much. That area was so vague for him because he had never had a relationship like this before.

In his mind he had only one option.

He went into his closet, walked to the very back, and pulled out his huge duffel bag.

---------

"NO!!!" Alex screamed, putting her car in park on the shoulder of the highway, and pressing the hazard lights. She growled with rage and didn't bother wiping away her tears as she opened her car door and looked outside at her front tire that was completely flat. She stared at it as she cried. "God, do you hate me or something?!?! I DO NOT NEED THIS!"

She got back in her car, not caring that her seat was being drenched in water as she sat. She looked at her cellphone and pressed the "on" button. It said 'low battery,'

"Well isn't this swell I lose my cellphone, my car, my boyfriend, MY LIFE ALL IN ONE DAY!!!" She screamed and banged on her steering wheel making her car horn beep several times. She finally gave up...she just gave up on everything.

The rain knocked on her window and the thunder boomed. Lightening lit up the fairly dark sky as cars sped past her, not daring to stop and help her.

After a few more helpless sobs echoing in her Jeep there was a knock on her windshield. She jumped and opened up the door slightly.

"Hey ma'am. Do you need some help?"

She nodded and sniffed, taking in his uniform. "Ok, my name is Officer Loggins. I see you got a flat tire here..."

She interrupted him. "And my battery in my phone went dead and my boyfriend hates me and I hate myself and my car is ruined and its raining and I'm missing class and..."

"Whoa now..." The older man chuckled and put a hand on her shoulder. "Get your stuff and get in my police car. I'll take you back home and get someone out here to fix this for you. Allright?"

She nodded and got all of her stuff as the police man wrote down her license plate number and looked over her tire for a few moments. She walked slowly to the car behind her not caring about the pouring rain and sat in the passenger side, waiting for Officer Loggins to come back.

He jogged to his car and got in. "Whew...what a storm." He looked over to see her holding her purse to her chest and tears streaming down her face. "Hey now...everything will be ok. You said your boyfriend hated you? I doubt that. No one could hate such a pretty gal like you. Don't worry about him. He must not be THAT great of a guy if he hates you."

"That's where you are wrong, sir. He is the greatest guy. He's...perfect."

----------

Justin's duffel bag hit the floor when he saw the answering machine light blinking. He had forgot to check it before. He pressed the play button.

"Hey, Alex? Or Justin...but anyways...um, this is Jen. I was just wondering if you were ok Alex because well duh you weren't in class and we still need to work on our project before next Monday gets here. Umm, well I'm guessing you are just sick or Justin has you swept away somewhere. Justin I'm serious stop spoiling the girl. She has SCHOOLWORK to do!! Hehe, whatever...so just call me and tell me you are alive. Um ok..bye. oh wait wait wait...here we go. BYE BYE BYYEEEEE! hehehehee." The message cut off Jen's giggle.

Justin stared at the machine. So Alex wasn't in class. And now a knot of worry entered his belly. He had no idea where she was and he prayed and hoped she was safe. The weather wasn't the best and he wouldn't know what to do if she wasn't ok. He would never forgive himself if she wasn't ok.

He shook his head to rid him of his negative thoughts and pulled out a piece of paper and a pen and began writing a note on it.

He bit his lip and wrote in his trademark handwriting, "Lexia,"

He raked his brain, trying to figure out what he could say. How he could tell her what he had going on in his mind, tell her what she needed to hear. Finally it all came down to one thing. Brutal honesty.

Skipping around the subject would just leave her curious mind wandering. And he needed to get this out.

He sighed and the he gripped the pen tighter as he scribbled his first sentence.

"Lexia,

I'm leaving."