Shutting the limo door was the hardest thing Simone had ever done. How could she agree to that. Feeling like she had just made the biggest mistake of her life Simone walked into the beach house and poured a glass of wine.

Annabelle sat in her dorm room wondering what had happened, she knew her mother was involved but she couldn’t find out what had happened. Simone was pulled away from her by her mother’s agents. They drove off in the blacked out SUV and that was the last she saw of Simone.

Not knowing what had happened to her was the worst thing; it caused a constant knot in her stomach. Why had she not contacted her? She knew that no charges had been field and yet she had just disappeared. The beach house was empty and then weeks later it was sold. Graduation came and passed along with it her 18^th birthday but there was no sign, no contact, nothing. It felt as if a part of her soul had died that day she gave away her beads.

Time moves slowly when you are missing the one person in the world you want to share it with, even if that person doesn’t love you anymore. One of the conditions of Simone avoiding jail was that she would not contact Annabelle. Once she had turned 18 the senator had promised she would give Annabelle the choice of whether to contact Simone again or not. It was obvious by the fact that Annabelle would now be nearly 19 that she had chosen not.

Simone had decided not to teach any more, it would have been to hard not seeing Annabelle’s face in the class. Selling the beach house was a easy decision, it gave her a chance to escape the ghost of Amanda. Her time was spent travelling around the world taking photographs, like Annabelle had told her to do. Travelling city after city, displaying her photos in galleries secretly hoping Annabelle would see them.

Annabelle had no choice but to attend college and in the holidays she was forced to attend her mother’s rallies and act as the doting daughter who had reformed into the model citizen. To be fair her mother had spoken out and backed several gay rights movements but none of it numbed the pain of her taking Simone away from her.

Two years had passed from when they were torn apart. Both women had tried to move on but neither could fully give themselves to their partner. Annabelle dated but nothing serious ever happened. Simone had drifted into a relationship with a promoter. It was a relationship of convenience she felt nothing for the man but it gave her the opportunity to stop missing Annabelle for a few minutes each day.

It was harder to block Annabelle out because she was always on the telly. Whenever Simone turned the news on Senator Tillman would be giving a speech somewhere. Annabelle was always by her side. Alone in the apartment Simone sat on the sofa with a bottle of wine, the sound muted on the television. She could tell that Annabelle was not happy, the captivating spark from her eyes was missing.

Seeing Annabelle so unhappy messed with Simone’s head. Did she still love her? Had she been happy, truly happy since that day? Unable to find an answer to these questions Simone looked deeper in to the bottle of wine, she had finished yet another bottle and still there were no answers.