Disclaimer: I do not own Victorious. All rights and characters belong to Dan Schneider, who, obviously, I am not. However, I do own the rights to the poem from which this story sprang, so attempt to take it and I will hunt you down.

FYI: This chapter is set on Sunday night.

Scarlet Hopes and Paper Dreams

Life is a treasure trove, it seems,

Of scarlet hopes and paper dreams

Of multitudes, that time will tell,

Are whims within an empty shell

They're prisoners of their own free will

And never can break free until

They tear the shell down from the seams,

Put their life's edge against the night,

They'll free themselves and win the fight;

Their scarlet hopes stain paper dreams.

She cuts.

She cuts to forget the pain of her childhood, the countless hours spent crying in her bathroom; every day, silence greets her as she steps through the door of her house. Her parents don't want her, they never needed her. They hardly even acknowledge her existence. Her brother loves her, but he's usually off somewhere doing strange things or in jail when she gets home, so they don't get to see each other very often.

It's better for him that he's not home, really. Because their parents fight. All the time. And all she can do is hide in her bathroom, lock the door, and listen to the screaming and the crashing and the shouting. It never seems to end. Even when they stop fighting.

Even her friends make her cut sometimes. She'll start on one of her random stories, and they think she can't see them rolling their eyes and sighing at her "stupidity." Well, she can. She sees a lot more than anyone thinks. She knows how they consider her to be the school's resident "dizzy redhead" and a bipolar mess. And she's always painfully aware of just how annying she can be at times.

Treated as an accident, branded as a mistake, the only release she has is the feel of the knife against her skin. The sight of ruby tears emerging from her flesh, a wound that weeps with her, only it cries red tears….

But every time she cuts, she remembers.

She remembers why she dyed her hair red. To give her strength, strength to remember who she is on the inside: a bright, happy, beautiful girl. Cat Valentine.

The hair dye does also remind her of her favorite food, red velvet cupcakes, but she would never share the first reason for its color with anyone. It's just too personal. So she tells her friends that she makes her hair this way simply because of a dessert; it's easier that way.

And every time she cuts, she also remembers….

Robbie.

That gangly, awkward kid who always has his hand shoved up a puppet. The one who killed the Chancellor of Yerba's octopus and got them all thrown into Yerbanian prison. The one who looks so weird that he was placed on the girl's side of that prison (and she's glad he was). The one who wrote a song about broken glass for a four-year-old's birthday party and tried repeatedly to get his friends to sing it.

He eats mayonnaise to calm himslef down after a nightmare, and his locker is decorated with baby bottle nipples. He's skinny, nerdy, awkward, he can barely talk to a girl at all, and let's face it, he's just plain odd. Seriously. Who has such bad dreams that they have to take couple's counseling sessions with a puppet?

But she loves him. That's why she loves him. Underneath all of his quirkiness and shyness she sees the truly amazing guy he is. And really, his quirks are what make him so darn adorable.

She loves him.

Even though his puppet (who "doesn't like to be called a puppet") insults her often, she knows he'll outgrow Rex eventually.

She accepts every part of him, and loves him for who he is.

And when she thinks of him, she feels stronger.

As she's washing off the knife in the sink, Cat makes herself a promise.

She will tell Robbie Shapiro, the one true love of her life (however cheesy it may sound, that's how she thinks of him), that she cuts. And that she loves him.

She's made up her mind to tell him tomorrow.

As she gets under her covers and turns of the bedside light, Cat realizes something.

She's never been more excited for it to be Monday in the morning!

A/N Hm. My first story. I wrote this on a pad of sticky notes that I had in my purse while waiting for my mom to choose her new phone at the T-Mobile store (oh yeah, I don't own them either) a few days ago, and I've just now gotten to publish it. A warning:Though this is a multi-chaptered fic, the speed of my updates depends on whther or not I'm allowed to access the computer. So if I get in trouble with my parents, the computer is taken away for X amount of days. Also, I guess here is where I'm supposed to act like every other new author and beg you to only leave nice reviews. I'm not. However, if you're going to flame, PM me, please. All of this is original work, and I take my writing very seriously.

And oh yeah, I almost forgot! I'd like to get…. Maybe 8 reviews before I can update. Because if you're not interested, then what's the point of writing? So review if you think I should keep going!

Ridiculously long author's note ~ if you've even bothered to read this far down ~ END.

~IF7