Chapter 1

I woke up with a start, breathing in gasps and my eyes wide with terror. My dream had seemed so real. I thought I was actually there, that it all happened. After a few minutes realization dawned on me and I realized I was back in my own room again, and I tried to steady my pounding heart and frantic breathing.

I pulled my knees up to my chest and sobbed quietly, making sure not to wake Charlie; then I'd really be dead. I thought back to all the horrors of my dream.

I appeared to be in a place of fog, for that was all I could see. I looked around me, but all I could see was the fog. I couldn't figure out where I was, all I could hear was my breathing and the pounding of my heart, and all I could see was the wet, dense fog in front of me. "Always look around you; take in your surroundings. Figure out where you are and get as much information as possible. Then you can make it through anything, and that way you'll always know what to do if you are in a bad situation. Just concentrate. " is what my mother always told me.

It had worked every time, since I had ended up needing to use it quite often.

"Just concentrate" kept repeating over and over in my head, and I looked around. Only fog. I looked up at the sky; it appeared to be cloudy, like a gray blanket was covering all the blue. I looked down at my feet and could see patched of grass and dirt, along with some twigs. Okay, dirt and twigs. That meant I must not be on a lawn or in a park, that meant I was probably in the woods somewhere. I cautiously took slow, steady steps foward, watching my feet and glancing around me for any change in the fog.

I smelled the air and could smell fresh grass, dirt, maple, and the smell of cleanliness that you get while in the woods. In spite of the circumstance I was in, I couldn't help but smile. It smelled amazing here.

The fog began to lighten, and the clearer it grew the more confident and quick my strides became. Soon all the fog was completely gone and I was walking at my overly fast pace, which was normal. I grew up learning that you either learned to walk fast, or you got left behind. I took in all my surroundings again. There was a deep, dense cover of clouds, so I guessed I was somewhere that it rained a lot.

I used everything around me to shorten the possibilities of where I was, narrowing it bit by bit. I was in what seemed to be the heart of the forest; trees of all kinds were everywhere and the forest floor was covered in fall leaves and dirt. There were quite a few hills all over the place and in the distance I could see a mountain range. This meant I was in one of about seven places. I knew right away I wasn't in Africa, or England. I knew I wasn't in Asia, the air here was too fresh and the temperature too perfect. I wasn't in Chile; there was too much grass here. And I knew for sure that I wasn't anywhere near the East coast; it was too warm and sunny there, here it was cloudy. I realized I was in the forest near my home of Forks, Washington.

Great, I thought sarcastically. I began walking towards the mountain range; I wasn't sure why. I just felt that's where I should be right now. As I neared the base of the mountain I heard a twig snap behind me and spun around, but nothing was there. I glanced around me and into the dense trees, but spotting nothing I began to again walk along. A minute or so later I heard the shuffling of a bush against a bush, and spun around again, but still saw nothing.

I was beginning to get anxious; was I going insane? I shook my head at my worry and began to, again, climb . Not two seconds later I distinctively heard something, like someone stepping on a pair of rocks, and I spun around much faster than before, just to catch a blur of something disappearing behind a close tree.

I was not completely freaked out, because I knew that someone or something was following me. I thought back to what my life is usually like, outside the world of dreams and mostly nightmares, about how much of a hell I'm living, and I smiled. After thinking things over I considered what could be following me. Probably and animal I concluded.

Still smiling, I sat down on the ground and waited. I didn't have to wait long because I could hear that whatever was behind the tree moving around a bit. Soon I began to see something coming out from behind the tree and I smiled. My smile froze in place and quickly dissipated into a look of pure horror at what I saw come out from behind the tree.

Charlie, my father began walking towards me, an evil grin on his face. Suddenly I was completely afraid, and I was trapped, I couldn't move. Like a deer in the headlights of a car, I didn't have a chance to move; I was transfixed. Charlie stopped about a foot in front of me and whispered in my ear, "I told you not to run Bella, now your going to get punished for it. "

He smiled that wicked smile and pulled out a long, sharp knife. My eyes widened even more in terror. My breathing hitched, and by now my heartbeat was out the roof. I closed my eyes; I didn't want to see him killing me. Suddenly, the dream ended.

I considered what could have happened in my dream after that and shuddered, willing it to leave my memory. I heard some of the floor boards creak outside my door and knew Charlie was awake. Crap, I was so dead. Suddenly my door was thrown open, and Charlie walked in, that same grin on his face as the one from my dreams.

I could have sworn he had gone to bed, oh well. I guess it was beating time; I thought I had wiggled out of it tonight. I guess not. I just sat there on my bed, my arms wrapped around my legs and my head on my knees, watching him. I closed my eyes and waited for him to come and punch me or something, though I didn't want to see him do it. I didn't want to see his laughing face and watch his fists come at me.

My wish was not granted; at the first kick in the gut, my eyes flew open and I couldn't keep them shut; I was too busy crying and trying to find something, anything, to use as an escape.

Charlie kept kicking me and I could literally feel my ribs breaking, but that wasn't uncommon. I could see all the bruises on my stomach through my white spaghetti strap tank top, and that meant it was bad, really bad. Charlie suddenly stepped on my leg, and I screamed in agony; I think he just broke it. Suddenly, he picked me up by my hair and punched me straight in the face. I continued to cry silent tears, I didn't blubber or whine or sob, I just cried silently and screamed when it hurt too much, like when he snapped my leg.

The torture went on with Charlie continually beating up my legs, arms, my back, everything. Then I felt the strangest feeling, the most unusual sensation. I felt kind of dizzy and peaceful for a moment, then the pain sank in, and my eyes flew to my stomach. Charlie had stabbed me. Blood was running in huge bunches down my stomach and legs. I didn't scream though, I just stared at it until Charlie put his hand on the knife and moved it an inch.

That inch was all it took, and I screamed and fell to the floor. Charlie bent down next to me and pulled the knife back out and just stared at it for a moment, watching my blood ooze off the end.

He pulled me back up and grabbed my bruised left arm. He took the knife and started at my wrist, cutting a slice in my arm all the way to my elbow. He did that eight more times on that arm and then did the same to my other arm. Every time he made a cut I screamed, and in response he would dig the knife further into my arm. It hurt so much. After each of my arms had nine fresh cuts on them, Charlie lowered the knife and threw me back onto the floor, so I was laying on my broken ribs and stabbed stomach. I continued to cry silently, trying not to make a sound.

Suddenly, I felt Charlie's hands on my back, rolling up my tank top so my back was exposed. He unsnapped my bra so my back was completely bare and unprotected. A moment later I could feel the cold silver blade's tip resting on my back, just below my neck. He started to make a huge, trailing cut down my back, first veering downward slowly and towards the right side of my back until it reached the edge, and then started turning it the other direction, so the cut on my back went in a curve from my right side to my left and then further down. Charlie made the cut end at the small indent in my back near the bottom of it, around my hips.

He removed the knife and that was the last I felt of it for the rest of the night, though a few more kicks were thrown in before Charlie sauntered out. I waited on the floor for a few minutes, listening to the sound of Charlie getting ready for bed.

When I began to hear his steady snores, I lifted myself carefully off the floor. Steadying myself, I walked as quietly as I could into my closet where I had hidden my medical kit that I had to restock every week. I sprayed my arms and back where I had been cut with the anti-bacterial spray stuff, it stung, but I didn't care. It was nothing compared to the rest of my pain. After I had sprayed it I wrapped my arms in a gauze roll and pulled out my larger gauze roll and wrapped it around my torso and stomach, so the scar on my back and the hole in my stomach could heal a little.

The hole in my stomach wasn't bad; it wasn't like he had thrust the knife into it. He had only made a slight hole, one that would easily heal in a few weeks if I kept that part of me protected.

After that I checked my leg; I was lucky. He hadn't broken my leg, he had popped it a little and had bruised it up pretty bad, but it wasn't broken or strained. I could walk on it just fine. I sighed in relief and carefully put away the kit and made my way to bed, being wary of my bruised and/or broken ribs. I soon fell into a dreamless sleep; the first in a few weeks.