Hey! Rose here!
Faith is on holiday on France which leave me to post this for her.... thanks Faith.
its also her birthday today so y'know Happy Bday Faith...
this is the prequel to her other fanfic 'Maximum Ride: Angel's Experiment' which you should read.

If you dont, to summarise, this is the story of Kim, Fang's Mum.

Because of You

PART 1 Evangeline

I'm so tired of being here,

suppressed by all my childish fears
And if you have to leave,

I wish that you would just leave
' Cos your presence still lingers here

it won't leave me alone

These wounds won't seem to heal,

this pain is just too real,
There's just too much that time cannot erase

When you cried,

I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream,

I'd fight away all of your fears
I held your hand through all of these years
But you still have

all of me

You used to captivate me by your resonating light
Now, I'm bound by the life you left behind
Your face, it haunts my once pleasant dreams
Your voice, it chased away all the sanity in me

These wounds won't seem to heal,

this pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase

When you cried,

I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream,

I'd fight away all of your fears
I held your hand through all of these years
But you still have

all of me

I've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone
But though you're still with me,

I've been alone all along

When you cried,

I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream,

I'd fight away all of your fears
I held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me

I lie on the floor and look at the air above me, look at the swirling dust particles, the vast nothingness. It scares me, how big it is, stretching as far as I can see, through the ceiling and up, going on and on. I try to move my legs, my arms, anything, but I'm stuck in the heavy nothingness. I'll stay here forever, in the nothingness, unable to move. I can hear the bubbling voices downstairs, so close, so reachable, but so far away, so lost. Footsteps echo along the hallway, coming to a stop inches from my knotted hair, my face. A face looms over me, and I peer up at it, trying to see through the thick, smoky air. At the face I am never ever going to let help me up off the floor and out of the nothingness.

So I rewind, go back, look at what my life was one week ago, and I can pinpoint the exact day when it all went wrong and I ended up passed out on the floor of someone I didn't even know.

I'm sitting at the old oak table, trying not to rub my arm along it too hard and get a splinter, it's so roughly cut. I'm making the most of the little time I have to myself, to eat before everyone else appears and shatters my little world of silence. I scrape away at my oatmeal as I read the newspaper: none of the war or murder stories, just the book reviews or those kooky little stories about four-foot-long rabbits and stuff.

I'm halfway through the rabbit story (called Phoebe, aged six years) when Victoria appears. She stomps down the stairs, her thick dark hair falling in her face with each step she takes, making each step heavy, before throwing herself down in the seat opposite mine, making it creak and groan. I frown at her. I mean, she's never been renowned for her silence, but she could be a little quieter. She catches my look and scowls at me, scrunching up her pretty little face. "Glad to see you're in a good mood, as usual." She snarls at me and I sigh. The thing is, I had been before she appeared with all her noise and spiteful thoughts, cluttering up my peace. She pours herself some oatmeal, then begins shovelling it in her mouth at a speed that would have been quite alarming for anyone else. I let her carry on like this for a while, then clear my throat. "Umm...i can't walk home from school today. I have to visit the library." She frowns, then looks at me beseechingly, Phase One of the famous Victoria method. "But Kiiiiiim," she whines at me, "That means I'll have to go to Harvey's, and you know I hate Harvey…" She presses her eyebrows together in the middle, showing me her heartbroken face. I shake my head.

"No."

"But…!"

"But what?"

"But that's not fair!!!"

"No."

She glares at me for a moment, then opens her mouth and shrieks.

"You are so mean to me!!! I hate you!!! Selfish, greedy, self-obsessed pig!!! I wish you were never born!! Stupid, fat loser!!! I hate you!!! You ruin everything!!!"

And with that she stomps back up the stairs, where I hear her collide with Mom, closely followed by more shrieking.

"I hate sixth grade!!! I hate school!!! I hate you!!! I hate Kim!!!"

I use the noise to slip out to the door so I can grab my bag and leave before anybody can stop me.

I walk along the street, scuffing the sidewalk with my toe. Or the toe of my boot with the sidewalk, whatever. I walk into school, which is pretty deserted at this time, and collapse at my desk in the homeroom.

I don't have to wait long. Soon enough, Sugar's bushy black head of curls pokes itself through the doorframe, and she scuttles in so she can launch herself at me.

"Kiiiiimmmiiee!!!! How was your weekend?? How come you didn't call me???"

That's the thing with Sugar. Sure, she's my childhood friend and she tells me everything and understands what's happened even when nobody's told her anything, but she's clingy. Like, overly. Like, I don't need my mom to look after me cos I've got Sugar. Which can be good…or bad. But she can always be relied upon to appear in our homeroom right after me, no matter how early it is. I smile and shrug and answer her questions as I watch the students milling around below me, checking who's here and who's not. The door flaps open again and Leah appears. Despite walking to school with Sugar, she always manages to make some sort of detour around campus. But she's nice and was once my best friend, which I guess counts for something other than how my life has changed since I was thirteen and actually cared.

It's already break by the time I find Evangeline. She wasn't in Math, presumably because she couldn't get out of bed in time, but I wasn't particularly bothered by it. She always comes in the end. She knows I'll kill her if she doesn't. But anyway, there she is, and just seeing her makes me feel alive, or at least gives me enough energy to bounce along over to her and hug her too hard, making her cough and choke. Because Evangeline is overly emotional, generally grumpy and really quite strange. She's my best friend in the whole entire history of the world. But don't tell Sugar I said that. As far as she is concerned, we are best friends, I am going to be a vet and when we are both twenty one we're going to share an apartment in New York, painted lilac, our joint favourite colour. Just like it always has been since third grade. Just like she wants it to stay.

The day drags on as normal: I try to spend as much time as possible with Evangeline, Sugar tries to stop me. I find Alexa, therefore completing my list of People I Like, and manage to hold on to her for a few second before she rushes off to redo her eyeliner. I daydream my way through History, splot my way through art and just about sleep through double biology.

It drags and drags until suddenly it's all over and I'm free to run down the stairs and out before anyone else has a chance, getting me home in record speed.

Mom's there, in the kitchen, and she spots me before I can hide.

"Hey, Kim!"

Note the bright, cheery tone not quite covering the fact that she has no idea what the hell she is doing with that packet of noodles.

"Hey, Mom."

"How was your day??"

"Meh. Okay, I guess. We had a substitute for Math."

"Oh. Okay. Where's Victoria?"

"Walking by herself. Well, with Harvey. I need to go to the library."

"Bye, then."

And there you have it, out daily rigmarole. I wish.

"Um, Kim? Wait a second."

"Yeah…?"

"I was talking to Evangeline's mom today."

Oh, jeezum.

"Yes?"

"We were talking about you two."

Obviously. It's all they ever do talk about.

"And?"

"We were thinking…you're both fifteen now…and we thought it might be a good time for you to start going out. You know, to parties and things."

"Going out??? Parties???"

"Well that's what everyone else does, right?"

"Yes. They do. And they drink and smoke and vomit and take drugs and lose their virginity and end up curled up in a ball on the stairs, passed out."

"Well, you don't know that."

"Yes, I do. I have to hear them talk about it every Monday morning, don't I?"

"I, We just think that maybe it would be good for you to do that, have fun."

"Have fun. Sure."

"Oh, Kimberly."

"Kim."

"Kim, then. Please? Just one? If you don't like it you'll never have to go again."

"Ever?"

"Ever."

"If I so much as vomit, fall down stairs, trip up?"

"I will never say a word about it again."

"Fine then. But I'll hate it."

"Yay! You can take Victoria too."

Oh, joy.


My first chapter of Kim. Yay!!

Please R&R (nicely, please)

Faith xxxxx