A/N: When I originally set out to write this story, I didn't plan for it to be this way. A change in the relationship the story was modeled on caused the change in the story. The names have been changed and looks have been modified for privacy's sake.

Danica Romont checked her email. Still nothing. It had been three days since she had heard from Gabriel Cherst, her newest friend and, she admitted, secret crush. She had admitted this crush to her mother, who had met Gabriel a week ago last Sunday when Danica had invited him to church. Danica's mother had told her that from the way Gabriel acted with Danica, that the feeling was mutual.

Danica sighed and idlely twisted a lock of her shoulder length red hair around one finger. That didn't explain the sudden disappearance or lack of communication. Last Sunday Gabriel had said he'd come with Danica to church again, but he'd never showed up. Later on that same day, Danica had spotted him walking around town. She went up to him and asked what had happened. He told her he'd overslept because of having a hard time getting to sleep the night before. They parted ways with Danica promising to send him an email.

Before she could calm down enough so that she wouldn't sound like she was scolding, however, Gabriel had emailed her. In the email, he explained more fully about what had happened. She wrote back and explained how things had felt on her side. He wrote back, apologized, and said it would never happen again. Danica believed him.

The next day, Danica got an interview for a job she'd wanted scheduled for the next day. She wrote to Gabriel and told him the great news. He congratulated her and everything seemed all right between them. He called her "star" in his emails which was his own personal nickname for her because of her name meaning "morning star." Her nickname for him was "angel" because of the angel Gabriel.

The day after the interview, Danica and Gabriel had told each other that they would be going to a meeting of a club they were both members of. Danica arrived early, as always. She waited...and waited...and waited for him to come. Finally, with about half an hour left of the meeting, Danica realized that Gabriel wasn't going to come. She knew he could be late to things sometimes, but it was never that late. So much for it not happening again, she thought as she left that night.

She immediately went home and checked email to see if Gabriel had written to her with an explanation. There was nothing there. The next morning she checked. Again, nothing, so she sent an email telling Gabriel she had missed seeing him at the meeting.

All that day, she kept hoping for an email from Gabriel, but there was nothing.

The next morning, Danica had the awful feeling that Gabriel was trying to tell her that he didn't want to talk to her any more. So she sent him one last email in which she told him that if that was what he was trying to do with his sudden silence, that she would rather have him tell her than have her have to guess like this.

Again, all she got was a deafening silence.

All that afternoon, Danica kept remembering things that her mother had told her over the past few days, which triggered memories of her own father.

"He's pulling away from you, Danica," her mother said. "I don't think it would be a good idea to get into a relationship with him. While if you were in a relationship it would be harder for him to pull away this completely, he could still pull away. Your father was an expert at it."

Danica remembered exactly what that was like...

"Well, if she doesn't want me, I'll just go do more work on the computer..." Danica's father said after a four year old Danica had told him she wanted her mother to read to her, not her father.

"I don't!" Danica exclaimed, green eyes flashing. She didn't know it at the time, but this was the start of the strained relationship that would continue on for many years...

Danica didn't want to possibly get into a relationship with a man who was like her father. She and her mother had suffered enough with her father himself.

In fact, the more she thought about it, Danica realized that Gabriel and her father were a lot more alike than she cared to admit.

They were both computer people, and both preferred hardware over software, though they both knew some software programming languages. They both also acted as the repair person for the computers of their families.

Gabriel, like her father, had been allowed to just do whatever he felt like doing growing up. He'd never said so, but Danica suspected that this was the case because of how Gabriel acted sometimes. He would make excuses for his behavior, which was something Danica had never been allowed to do, and it indicated that his family had let him do that growing up. Because of this, Danica suspected that his parents had been pretty lax with him. Of course, she had no proof of this, and Gabriel would probably just deny it anyway.

Danica sighed. What had gone wrong with their relationship? It had started out so well. They had originally gotten in touch through a local dating web site and had emailed back and forth for a while. They had first met face to face at a meeting of the club that they were now both members of. She remembered that night so well. It was April first...

Danica was participating in an icebreaking activity, since she wasn't the only one joining the club that night. Gabriel, who had told her he would be there, hadn't shown up. Danica had mostly forgotten about him and was engrossed in the activity.

Just then, a new guy came in. His hair was black, straight, and slightly mussed. The founder of the club stood up and held out her hand. "Hi," she said. "I'm Robin."

"I'm Gabriel," he said, shaking hands. His voice was deep.

Danica bounced out of her chair with a smile. "Gabriel!" she exclaimed. She held out her hand. "I'm Danica."

"Nice to meet you, Danica," Gabriel said, smiling back and shaking her hand. Danica smiled and sat back down, patting the empty chair next to her. He slid into it. She looked at him and noticed that his eyes were a beautiful dark brown. One eye went off in its own direction, but she didn't care about that.

At one point they were broken up into pairs to talk to people they didn't know. During the activity, Danica glanced over at Gabriel a couple of times and caught him looking at her.

After the activity was over, they watched a movie. The founder of the club had been sitting next to Danica for the activity and Gabriel was across the room in a place that would be hard to see the movie in. Gabriel stood up. "Robin," he said, "Would you mind moving? It would be easier for me to see the movie from where you're sitting than from where I'm sitting."

"Oh, sure," Robin said, and moved.

Gabriel made his way over and settled into the chair next to Danica. She was suddenly tempted to lean over and whisper to him, "And it had nothing to do with the fact that you'd be sitting next to me, right?" but she didn't.

After the meeting was over, Danica had arranged for a friend of hers named Vicki to give her a ride home. As Vicki left, Danica kept glancing over her shoulder, hoping to see Gabriel come out of the room so the three of them could walk together, but it didn't happen.

Again, she wondered why it had gone so wrong. What had happened? Why the sudden silence?

Her mother had once told her that she'd had friends who would back away and then come back and act as if nothing was wrong. Danica knew that she wouldn't be able to stand that. Nor could she stand to constantly worry over Gabriel, and she certainly didn't want to be chasing after him all the time.

Over these past few days, she had slowly felt her crush fade. Now she felt like she could be happy just being friends with Gabriel. Or maybe more like friendly acquaintances. It hurt now, of course. She had hoped for more from him. She had hoped that they would end up together, maybe even married someday. But she knew now that she had to let those dreams die.

It was better this way.