11:00 P.M.

Duncan was sleeping beside her. Courtney slowly and gingerly moved out of the bed, careful not to wake him up. She had been planning her escape for a week now. She would drive all the way from her and Duncan's home in Vancouver to her Aunt's house in California. There, she could figure out her life and move forward from there. She could close this chapter of her life once and for all.

Duncan was an alcoholic. Nobody knew about Duncan except for her Aunt Linda who had been there for her all of her life. Her parents had died in a car accident when she was about 3 years old and her aunt took care of her. Her friends didn't know, her co-workers didn't know. When he got drunk, he got furious. He would throw things around and even hit her if there was something that upset him. She had been dealing with this for two years now. At the end of last year, she'd found out she was pregnant. He had hit her 5 or six times during her pregnancy but he never hit the baby. She had Emily in September and now it was two months after the delivery. Two months too long. She tried to keep Emily out of the house as much as she could by taking her to day-care from 8:00 A.M. to 9 P.M. every day since 9:00 is when Duncan usually fell asleep.

She hadn't suspected he was an alcoholic when she first met him at that diner two years ago… he seemed sweet but with a mysterious side. They dated for about 7 months and got married. The biggest mistake of her life. Why did she rush into marriage? She should've known he was only manipulating her so she would marry him and deal with his shit all the time. He hid who he was and then reveled his shitty self to her when they tied the knot.

Her Aunt had warned her.

"There's something about him that's not good," Linda had said. "Don't marry him, Courtney. He's not genuine at all. I can tell."

"Oh Auntie," Courtney had said. "You're just being overprotective, that's all."

But Courtney was wrong.

Courtney had put her suitcase in the trunk of her car yesterday. She grabbed Emily's book bag full of clothes and wore it on her shoulders. Emily was sleeping quietly in the room right next to theirs. Courtney gingerly walked out of their room and into the next. She carefully placed Emily into the car seat and carried it out the door. She walked quietly down the stairs. She opened the door very slowly and walked out into her car. It was pouring so she walked quickly and stretched the car-seat cover of Emily's face.

Courtney put Emily in the backseat quickly. She hadn't realized how messy her car was. She never really had time to clean it. There were some of Emily's toys littered everywhere in the car along with lots of coke-cans and coffee cans lying on the floorboard. Courtney gets into the front seat, starts her car, and drives off.

She calls her aunt at a red light.

"Hey, it's me," Courtney says.

"Have you left?" Her aunt asked.

"Yes," Courtney sighs. "I'm on the road now and my battery is almost dead."

"Oh thank God," Her aunt says and breathes a breath of relief. "I'll let you go now. Call me soon."

And with that she hung up.

Hopefully the storm wouldn't wake Emily up, because if it did Emily would probably start wailing.

3:00 AM

It had been about 4 hours since Courtney started driving and she was already tired. She needed somewhere to stay for the night. Even if it was a cheap hotel with only a single bed and cable T.V. It would suffice. She'd head back on the road anyway. Courtney took the next exit to a Motel Six. She parked her car, took Emily out, and walked inside.

Courtney faked a smile. "How much is it for one night?"

The manager smiled back. "It's 40.39."

She didn't have any cash on her and she wasn't sure how much money she had on her credit card. But she had no other way to pay. She handed him her credit card.

"Alright ma'am," The manager said, taking her card out of the machine. "Here's your room key."

Thank God it worked.

Courtney thanked him and walked to her room.

The room had a single bed and a TV. She wasn't sure if motels carried cribs so she had purchased the ""Leachco Roam 'N Holiday - 4-in-1 Travel Bed" from Babies R Us. She unfolded it and placed Emily in it.

Courtney sighed and plopped on the bed. Emily would start asking about Duncan when she would start to talk. What would she tell her? Would she lie to her daughter? Would it break her poor, innocent heart? Or she could wait until she was old enough to know the truth. But it would still hurt. It would hurt even more because Courtney would've kept the truth from her for so long. And maybe then she could find someone who could love her and treat her right.

Courtney thought back to the last year. It had been rough with Duncan. She was the one making the money because all Duncan would do was sit at home and drink all day. She'd rush home from work just to make sure everything inside the house was perfect and to make dinner. But of course, it was never enough for him. His dinner was never good enough and the house was never clean enough. She couldn't win. He was never happy.

"Why is my dinner cold?" Smack. "What kind of crap are you making the dinner with?" Another smack.

"The house is dirty, Court." Slap.

But now Emily was here and Courtney wouldn't let anything happen to her. Because if she was hit… it'd hurt her more than all the times Duncan had hit her.

8:00 A.M.

Courtney woke up to Emily's crying. She picked her up and rocked her back and forth. She placed her back in the Travel Bed and retrieved her bottle from the fridge. She warmed it up in the microwave and fed it to her.

In the next hour, she got her and Emily ready for the day.

9:30 A.M.

She was on the road again and it was still pouring outside but it was beginning to clear up. The trucks around her were splashing water into her windshield, as if they were taunting her with misfortune.

It's a new day and there's a second chance for Courtney and Emily. The painful memories of before are just memories and they're over.

Her floor was still littered with baby toys and empty cans.

But if there was one good thing that came out of her suffering, it was Emily.

A/N: Requested by I'll Cover Angel and Collins. I didn't use lyrics because of those Critics United people. Hope you liked it :)