"I'm tired of always having to be the one to give in. For once, I wish someone could put in a little effort to try and understand me."- R.L.

When Tara woke up the next morning, it was because she was uncomfortable. Groaning she rolled over, just in time for a headache to set in. She stuffed her face into a pillow and groaned again. Only this time it was louder as the pounding in her head drummed at a steady beat fairly loudly. Oh the joys of a hangover. Finally, she dragged herself out of bed and decided that a hot shower would do her some good.

After changing into a pair of her pajamas, the brunette walked to the kitchen, the pounding in her head only got worse when she heard the sound of people moving about the kitchen. As she got closer, she could hear bits and pieces of the group's conversation.

"Even Kat can admit that Tara seemed more comfortable serving drinks to random people than she did talking to us all night." Grace was saying and Tara could feel her stomach drop. Had she been more comfortable with perfect strangers than she had with three girls that had been her best friends in a previous life? Her fear was only confirmed when Kat- the one person who had been rushing to her defense since she had stepped foot back in Australia- sighed in a defeated fashion.

"Grace is right. She did seem more content behind that bar counter than she did with us."

Surprisingly though, the person she least expected to, came to her rescue- Ben.

"Well yeah," he said, "She's been gone for three years and besides that, she works in a bar. Of course she'd feel content behind the counter. It's familiar to her."

"But we're familiar to her too." Tara's stomach churned now at the near desperate tone in Kat's voice.

"You were once Kat. But not anymore. We all changed just as she has." Ben was once again the voice of reason.

"Wait-Tara works in a bar?" Ollie asked, surprise clear in his voice. But there was something else in his tone too. Something Tara couldn't identify.

"She doesn't dance anymore either." Abigail piped in when there was looming silence to Tara. Time to let everything soak in. She called it. But it seemed her dark haired friend didn't want to wait for the storm to come on its own.

"Are you sure?" Came Christian's voice. Tara heard a sigh, but the brunette couldn't decide who it was.

"No. We're not. All we know for sure is that Tara said she doesn't dance like she used to. She said she doesn't have time with her busy schedule nowadays." Grace explained in a harsh voice. By the sound of it, Tara could've almost sworn she was glaring at Abigail.

"But Tara not dancing? I didn't think that was possible. She was our dreamer. The one who dreams of flying." Christian sighed.

"Like I said, Tara just said she didn't dance as much anymore." The blonde said again. Her voice was no longer harsh, but soft and maybe a little sad. There was a silence and Tara took this as her cue and walked into the kitchen. All eyes turned to look at her.

Tara didn't spare them a glance as she made her way to the fridge and opened it-looking for the items she would need to make Cam's hangover cure. She didn't look at them when she placed the items on the counter top. She didn't even look at them when she began to prepare the cure. Her voice was quiet when she spoke.

"Ben's right. I'm not the same Tara you remember. I haven't been that Tara for quite a while… The girl who dreamt about flying, she didn't make it past second year. She crashed and burned one too many times." She paused to crack a few eggs into a bowl. But her eyes never left the eggs sitting in the bowl to meet the gazes she could feel piercing her head.

"To be honest, I don't dance as much as I use to anymore, because it hurts too much to remember what I lost the night I fell." She continued on as she looked for a spoon to mix the ingredients up. After pouring the contents into four glasses she finally looked up at her friends. But she wished she hadn't as she felt suffocated by the looks on their faces. The brunette sucked in a breath.

"I'm sorry…" She finally said feeling tears sting her eyes. "I'm sorry I'm not the Tara you all want-the Tara that I was. She had to grow up sooner or later. I'm the Tara that's in her place now."

She looked at the girls and gestured to the glasses that sat on the counter, "If you drink this, it should take away the hangovers I'm sure you all have…"

"Excuse me…" She muttered, before rushing out of the kitchen and to her bedroom down the hall.

Meanwhile in the kitchen, everyone stared wide eyed at each other.

"What just happened?" Abigail wondered aloud looking from Kat to Ollie and everyone in between, "And why do I suddenly feel so bad?"

"Because Tara overheard us talking and we made her cry." Kat spoke in a strained voice.

"So, who's going to go talk to her?" Wes asked. Immediately all eyes turned to Christian.

"Why me?" Christian asked, once he saw everyone was looking at him.

"Because she listened to you before. You were always the one that got through to her when no one else could. Maybe she'll listen to again." Kat explained, "Please Chris?"

Christian sighed as he shook his head, then he walked down the hall towards Tara's room and knocked on the door.

"Tara?"

"Please, go away Christian." The response, none the less teary, came from behind the door. It was like a light switch went flipped. Christian couldn't tell where it had come from, but he spoke to the door, using a very gentle voice that he only used for the brunette and a nickname she hadn't heard and he hadn't spoken in years.

"Training Bra, I just want to talk."

There was no response for a moment then the door, and then the knob turned. The invitation was clear, what was also clear is that he still had as much pull on her as she did on him. He shut the door behind him; it went with a definite click.

Tara was standing by the window, looking out at the view.

"You know I almost forgot what a sight this country was." Tara's voice was soft. Christian heaved a sigh. Starting this conversation would not be easy.

"Are you okay?" He asked her. But she didn't answer him, instead she changed the subject.

"I'm sorry how I left you that night. I know how it must have made you feel. But I knew that if I woke you to tell you goodbye in person, you would've tried to stop me and I would've stayed. Only because you asked me to."

"I still don't get why you left in the first place." Christian said quietly as he sat on the bed, "You said last night that you left because you were holding all of us back and you didn't want to. What did you mean by that?"

Because if she wanted to talk about this, then fine. They were going to talk about this. Tara finally turned to face him and he finally got a good look at her. Oh sure, he had saw her like everyone else did yesterday. But at the time his mind was too busy picking out what was different. Now he could see what was the same.

"You're not going to like my answer." Like how she still bit her lip when she was nervous.

"Oh, I don't think I will either. But I still want to know." He told her as he leaned back on his hands and stared up at her.

She sat down beside him and folded her hands in her lap. That was something else that was the same. Her hands. They were still so delicate and small.

"You know how you have a voice in your head and it's your conscience?" She asked and it was such a very Tara thing to say that it shocked him, because up until this point, she hadn't seemed very much like the person he knew from before.

Wondering where she was going with this, he nodded his head.

"The summer after Sammy…" Her voice chocked, before she swallowed. "I started hear this quiet voice. I know it wasn't him, but it sounded like it was Sammy. He told me, I would be this glue that held everyone together. Like he was."

She turned to look at him with a humorless grimace for a smile, "And well, we all saw how that turned out. But they were quiet. I could handle them."

Her gaze moved to the carpeted floor and Christian could saw from looking sideways at her look, that she was somewhere far away. "Then I broke my back and you guys, stepped in and you all were great. But that's when the voices got loud and screaming at me. They sounded like you guys. They talked about how I was making everyone carry my weight. It got to the point where I wanted to rip my hair out. So I left in hope that they would stop."

"Why didn't you talk to us about this? Any of it?" Christian asked quietly.

"I didn't want to sound like a crazy person." The brunette shrugged, "Hearing voices in my head? Come on,"

"You wouldn't've sounded like a crazy person. To this day, I still hear my mom's voice in my head and sometimes, I even hear you to." He told her, then they were incased in silence.

"Can I ask you another question?" Christian broke the silence with his question. Tara nodded as she played with her fingers.

"Why didn't you come to your father's funeral?" The brunette looked up, her eyes wide.

"You know that he's dead? Because it seems like no one else does. Kat suggested a day time to Victoria to see my parents. " She told him.

"I've been meaning to tell them, but it's crazy since then and I didn't know how to tell them." Christian tried to explain, knowing that wasn't a great reason. But it was all he had, luckily for him, Tara got it.

"I couldn't tell Kat either. I didn't know how too." She told him with a sad smile and he returned it.

"You still didn't answer my question. Why didn't you come to his funeral? Because I know you. No matter who you are now, you wouldn't just miss saying goodbye to your dad." His words had tears surfacing to her eyes.

"I didn't want to. One of the hands called me when he had the heart attack. I was ready to drop everything and come back home. To help my mom with the farm and everything. But then my mom called me and told me what happened. I explained to her that I coming home for good. To help her with everything. But she…she told me not to. She said she didn't need my pity and that if I stepped foot on the farm, she would have me arrested. Then she told me to basically have a nice life and hung up." Tara turned to look at Christian. Tears had begun to run down her face.

"So the answer to your question as to why I didn't attend my father's funeral was because my mother basically disowned me and told me I wasn't allowed to."

"Tara I'm…" Christian started, but the brunette shook her head, cutting off whatever he was going to say next.

"You don't need to say sorry Christian. I've made my piece with it long ago." The brunette shook her head, her darker hair swishing back and forth. She tried for a smile, "Thanks for coming in here and talking to me, but I'd really like to be left alone now."

The ex-skater now teacher, stood up and headed toward the door. But when his hand touched the handle, he turned around and his brown eyes found hers.

"One last question," Suddenly Christian felt as if he were in first year again. Only this time, he was the one asking the question.

"What?"

"Why'd you open the door for me?" His answer was a soft smile and, "Probably for the same reason you called me Training Bra."