Chapter 1
Ellie Shepard was huddled in the corner of a dark room in a random hospital. She didn't know where she was, and she didn't care. She just had to get away from all the doctors asking questions and trying to contact her mother. She didn't want her mom to know where she was. She didn't want anyone to know where she was- she was upset and oddly embarrassed. She shouldn't be embarrassed; none of this was her fault. Still she felt so upset she couldn't even think of a word to describe it. Then she thought of it. She never really completely felt like she understood what her mother meant by "dark and twisty" until now.
As she sat soaking wet from the rain, with blood still dripping down her face from the cut above her eyebrow and glass in her hair, she thought back to how the night unfolded. How did she, Ellie, a 15 year-old sophomore with a seemingly boring life until now, end up hereā¦
Thinking back, this has been coming for a long time, since she was 7 and her mom brought home Paul, a well-established politician in Seattle. She never really liked Paul, but her mom never brought home guys, she never even dated guys, her job was her work and take care of her her kids. So when she brought home Paul, wise leader of the pack Zola, then 12, took her and 10 year old Bailey aside and told them to act like they liked Paul for their mom. Ellie always wanted her mom to be happy.
Before she knew it Paul had moved in. It was a happy time for a few months, until rebellious and rambunctious 7-year-old Ellie knocked over some valuable things in his office and accidentally colored on important campaign documents. He was outraged, and she had never been so scared in her life. He slapped her so hard. She still remembered the shocked look on his face when she just started at him defiantly and angry. She had a little mark that night, and when her mom was tucking her in that night and asked, she wanted to cry and tell her everything, but remembered what Zola said. "Mommy deserves to be happy. She makes everyone happy but she hasn't been happy since Daddy died." Ellie told her she hit head on a branch while playing in the tree house with Bailey earlier.
That was just the start of it. Ellie, never meaning to, was always getting into trouble, she was smarter than her own good and liked to cause mischief. Paul hated that. Over the next few months he grew closer with Zola and Bailey. Ellie watched as they began to think of him as their father. Ellie refused to think of him as dad. Her whole life Alex and the Chief and everyone else at the hospital told her stories of how awesome her dad was. Every time Paul hit her, she imagined a perfect world where her real dad was still alive and took her fishing and to play tennis and taught her to ride a bike. The longer it went on, the more she yearned for her dad, Derek. That's why for three years in a row she borrowed his ferryboat scrub cab and dressed as him for Halloween, which made her mom cry tears of joy.
It went on and on for years. Some days he would just spank her; on the worst days he hit her with rulers or something around his office. He said if he had it his way she wouldn't be in family and if she told her mom he would leave her and she would be so sad she would end up hating Ellie.
One night, a night she will never forget, Alex dropped her off after her tennis lessons and then headed back to the hospital. Paul had a big campaign coming to an end and was practicing his speech in the office nook. Ellie, having a lot of energy from sitting in school all day was running around the house pretending her tennis racket was a sword. Ellie accidentally bumped into his desk, knocking over his computer and breaking it. She had never seen him so mad. He grabbed her arm and twisted so hard, dragging her up the stairs; he locked them both in the bathroom and beat her with his belt, telling her she had to learn to behave. She felt like it went on for hours and to this day remembers lying in her bed after the ordeal and hearing her mom pull in with Zola and Bailey after picking them up from their music classes at school.
Her mom was concerned when she didn't want to come down for dinner and took her temperature. She lay in bed with her and began rubbing her back like she likes. Trying to hide it she pretended to sleep but couldn't help but wince when Meredith touched her back. Meredith Grey, loving mother with intuition, and excellent surgeon with medical training lifted up her shirt and found bruises and cuts all over her body.
"Oh my god, Ellie, what happened?!" Ellie began to cry, she was letting her mom down, she just wanted her mom to be happy. To this day she still feels like that. Like she is the cause of her mom's unhappiness. After hearing what happened, Meredith immediately ran down the stars and slapped Paul, telling him to get out of her house. She then called Alex. Alex rushed over. Ellie heard him slam the car door shut, leaving the car on, he ran inside "Where is he?" she had never seen him so angry. He saw the scared look on her face and examined her wounds, getting angry and angrier. He ran into the office and tackled Paul, beating him until Meredith pulled him off.. After the whole ordeal, Paul was charged with domestic violence and endangering the welfare of a child- his campaign officially ruined.
Fast-forward 8 years. Meredith had been on a few dates here and there, Zola moved out and was excelling as a junior in college while Bailey was a freshman. Ellie, a sophomore, loved her life. She spent a lot of time with her mom and went to the hospital after school like always. Today was no exception. She walked to the hospital to do homework in Chief Bailey's office before her tennis practice. Meredith got out of surgery in time for Ellie to say goodbye. It had stopped raining briefly so she decided she would walk to practice. As she was passing Joe's Bar, a familiar face walked up to her, clearly intoxicated. Paul. He was belligerent and grabbed her rambling angrily about how she ruined his life. She tried to fight her way out of his big arms as he threw her in the car but her tiny frame couldn't get away. He said he needed her to talk to the cops and his old campaign manager and fix everything she ruined.
He was flying, around turns, over curbs; they passed the outskirts of their neighborhood. Somehow he hadn't hit anything. They were over an hour away from the hospital and the bar, her school, her house, everything she knew and loved. He was speeding around turns and turns as it started pouring again. Her good sense told her to put on her seatbelt as he went faster and faster. Finally after her screaming he slowed a little, right before hydroplaning and skidding across the other lane into a pole.
She remembers her head bashing against the passenger window and then darkness. She woke up in an ambulance- the paramedic was assuring her that she would be ok and needed to stay awake. When they got to the hospital she was less foggy and doctors were trying to get answers: her name, her age, her mother and father's name, who she was with. When the friendly intern began stitching up her face but got paged to a bigger emergency, she didn't know what came over her- she just bolted. She sprinted through the unfamiliar hospital, slipping occasionally since her converse sneakers were soaking wet. She hated any hospital that wasn't her mother's. She made it to a quieter wing; some sort of extended nursing care and went into a dark room.
She began crying, the weight of everything that happened actually hitting her. Her head was pounding, her arm was throbbing and she was freezing. The thunderstorm outside only added to the way she felt- lonely, scared, hurt and depressed. She was definitely dark and twisty. As she sobbed uncontrollably, a barely audible voice in the dark room asked, "Are you ok?" in the most strained and weakest voice she'd ever heard.
