The Blood Of One. The Sins Of Many.

Chapter One: Rock Bottom

Disclaimer: I am not Stephenie Meyer, it's unfortunate, but true. I don't own Twilight or any of its characters either... Though I would love to, I can't take credit for that genius. The plot is my own, but all references to Twilight, its characters and the lyrics used belong to their respective owners. Thank you for letting me play in the playground!

She paints her eyes as black as night now
Pulls those shades down tight
Yeah she gives a smile when the pain comes
The pain gonna make everything alright

She Talks To Angels by The Black Crowes

Laid on my back on the bed, I stared upright watching the ceiling fan spinning above me; its movement transfixed me. I was unable to tear my eyes away from it as it turned consistently. It maintained its speed and never changed, I wished my life were more like that, constant and steadfast.

The light of the morning was beginning to cast shadows across the room, it was only then that I realized I was sober. It brought me a rare moment of lucidity, and it wasn't something I'd wanted. I knew this state well. It was the moment that I asked how I'd got here, how my life had gone so wrong. It inevitably brought up the name that I never mentioned. Ever.

I wiped the sheen of sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand. If I hadn't been craving my next fix as it was, the hint of his name made that feeling explode into desire. I couldn't let myself remember, because the moment I opened up those floodgates, it would all come back. Every disaster, ever pain, all of it. I just wasn't strong enough to go through that. I didn't think I ever would be.

I rolled to my side and faced the guy I'd met last night, who was currently blocking the path to my next fix. He was still passed out, naked, and was snoring lightly under his breath. When I glanced at him, I realized exactly why I'd picked him. There was always something that resembled him. I don't think there was I guy I had been with that didn't have one feature that bore some similarity to the person I still couldn't forget. This guy had a mop of auburn hair.

That was another thing I couldn't deal with this morning. When I was high it was easier to look past that and believe it was about instant gratification.

"Hey, asshole. Party's over, get the fuck out."

"Shut the fuck up, bitch. I'm sleeping."

"Fuck you. Get out before I throw you out."

The guy groaned, his hand moving to scratch his balls as he stretched out on the bed like a lion. As his eyes flickered open he grinned at me and my mistake just became more obvious. How I'd even compared this guy to the real thing was ridiculous. Apparently, being high did nothing for my taste in men, but at least I got off.

"You want a goodbye fuck, beautiful?" I almost gagged at the thought.

"No. I just want you to fuck off."

He shrugged, obviously unaffected by my rejection as he crawled from the bed. After he was out of my way, I made my second mistake of the morning and crawled immediately to the nightstand where my lord and master, my mind eraser in a syringe was waiting for me.

"Oh, was I in the way?" The guy asked, shucking on his jeans and leaving them open. He stepped toward the nightstand faster than I could reach it and held up the little baggy with my dope in it.

"Give it back, motherfucker."

I could see him smirking at me as he swung the bag back and forth in front of me. He was teasing me and I knew it. I wasn't a hardcore user. I usually had two or three fixes a day to stop myself from building a tolerance, but my first morning hit was an important one.

"Please?" I forced out. Not an inkling of sincerity in my voice.

He made no move to do as I'd asked. He just stood there arrogantly with the same sardonic smile on his lips. It incensed me. I had tried to be polite and now he was just fucking with me because he could. I launched myself at him; my nails like claws raking down his face. He stumbled on his feet for a second before he was able to grab my hands and stop the attack.

I had to give him credit. He wasn't like the others and he didn't raise his hand to me even though there were red lines marring his cheeks. He simply shook me off as though I weighed nothing, and dumped me unceremoniously on my bed before storming to the bathroom.

"No!" I shouted, scrambling to follow him, but I was too late.

The toilet flushed and the smug look on the bastards face told me he wasn't fooling around. As I tried to pass him and do something infinitely more embarrassing, his arm circled my waist. He pulled me from the ground and into his chest, his lips close to my ear.

"That's for my face, you junky whore." His tone was filled with malice and hatred, as he dropped me back to my feet making me stumble. I stopped before I fell to my knees, which even without the aid of this guy could have happened with my lack of balance.

"Fuck you. I can't believe you just fucking did that."

My hands were in my hair, already tugging as the trembles started like an echo inside of me. It wouldn't be long until I was a full on mess, and I knew it the mornings were always the worst. The sweating in this air-conditioned climate should have been a dead giveaway.

"Just get out."

"With fucking pleasure." He sneered, picking up the last of his things and storming out of my studio apartment. It was more a box with a bathroom than an apartment, but who needed semantics when a disaster had just occurred?

"Shit, shit, shit." I mumbled, pacing the floor while I shook out my hands to calm myself down. I had to find a dealer, I knew Tony wouldn't be awake until at least two, and it was... I looked at the clock... only eight in the morning.

If I didn't find something soon, the memories would start coming hard and fast with the withdrawals. There was already the image of my father in his uniform playing at the edges of my mind, and that was almost as bad as seeing him.

I picked up my cell phone and stared at the screen. I just needed a small fix that would carry me over until two, when I could meet up with Tony. Hardly anyone knew about my little problem, and I planned on keeping it that way, but there were a couple of people who partied with me, and they were my only other option.

As I scrolled through the contacts, I found a name that gave me hope. It was a girl I worked with, and I knew she was into the same shit I was, because she wasn't as eager as I was to hide the track marks as I was. I'd seen them by accident, but they were there.

I hit the send button and lifted the phone to my ear, almost gagging at the "I'm a Barbie girl" ringback tone. I may have needed her, but it didn't mean I liked having to depend on her.

"Whoever this is. It better be fucking good," she said down the receiver. I could hear the grogginess in her tone and almost face palmed myself for not realizing most of the world was asleep this time of the morning on a Saturday.

"Misty, it's Bella. Are you holding?" So much for not sounding desperate, Bella, I reprimanded myself.

"Are you fucking kidding me? You woke me up for this?"

"Some asshole just flushed my shit. You know I wouldn't call unless it was an emergency." I looked down at my shaking hand and balled it before pushing it into my stomach to stop it. I hated the side effects of this. I didn't have dexterity to begin with, but coming down from a high made all of that quadruple.

"Sucks to be you." She snickered down the line. "And to answer your question, no. I'm trying to stop."

"God dammit."

There was a weighted silence between us as we both contemplated what to do or even say next. Misty wasn't the kind of person I would usually have a friendship with outside of work, and we both knew it. Me calling to ask her if she could help me find a fix just seemed to leave an awkward air between us.

"Listen, my guy can help you out. Just tell him I sent you, you're gonna have to go in person because he doesn't deliver and he doesn't do business over the phone. He's a paranoid son of a bitch."

"That'll work." Sadly, I could hear my integrity flushing with my stash as I said it.

She gave me an address and I hung up and jumped in the shower. The memories were coming like small blackouts and it was beginning to become impossible not to follow this stumble down memory lane.

I leaned against the cool tile of the shower and rubbed my temples as the first time I'd seen him came to my mind. How innocent and naive I had been. I had just moved in with my dad because my mom was following Phil around in attempt to keep his career going. I was riding high on the fact that I had been gifted a truck, and even though the stares of everyone around me had been slowly pulling me under, the moment I saw him it all disappeared.

Of course he'd glowered at me as though I'd run over his puppy, and still had its blood on my hands. The way he'd upturned his nose at me had made me paranoid. I sniffed at my hair before hiding behind it, unsure of what the problem was. By the time the bell had rang; I was confused as hell and upset. That night, I convinced myself to confront him, but he wasn't at school the next day, or for the few after that.

He'd been more personal when he'd reappeared, and he'd looked different. Had I known what I knew now, I would have realized it was because he'd fed. He'd sated his thirst and was able to be around me. That right there should have been a huge hint.

It had taken some time to get close to him, and I was ashamed to say that I had used my feminine wiles to get more information from my father's best friends son, Jacob. Putting the puzzle pieces together I discovered his secret, and it only seemed to bring us closer together.

I'd given all of my heart to him. He'd been everything to me. He had been my world. There wasn't a moment I wasn't thinking about him, or a way to be with him. He was my reason for breathing, my reason for living. The love I had for him was the type of love people wrote about.

When he touched me, my body came to life. My stomach never stopped flipping over my need for him. From the moment things between us became serious, he'd been so gentle and adoring. He had the ability to make me feel like the only woman in the world. I felt beautiful when I was with him. Though I never understood why he saw me that way.

I squeezed my eyes closed as I stood closer to the spray of water. That history was a double hit. It was two pains, and two names that assaulted me with bitter memories. It dragged me further under my own misery and self-loathing. Jacob. I hadn't thought of him for so long, but it was still just as hurtful as the first.

As I moved to pick up my shampoo I slid on the slick surface and hit the wall with my shoulder. The rush of my history smashed against my skull as I remembered the first time he and I had fully interacted. I would never forget the screaming of the tires as the mini van came toward me, and I sure as hell wouldn't forget the way he'd caught me and pulled me out of its path. He'd been so fast and so strong, impossibly so in fact. Whether or not I was aware of it, it would be the first time in a long string that he would save my life.

Once I'd confronted him about what he was, and, in time, figured it all out. I fell in love with him. We spent all of our time together, and when the nomads had come through, he'd fought to save my life once again.

It was the beginning of the end for the two of us, and it was the start of the downturn in my life.

At my eighteenth birthday party, my clumsiness had caused me to make a fatal mistake. A paper cut had caused Jasper to lose his tenuous hold on his nature. It had made him realize, just how fragile I was, and he'd decided I wasn't worth his time. The months following had been the worst in my life up to that point. I was sad to say that was no longer the case, but I couldn't think about that.

I couldn't think about any of it.

I shut off the water and stepped out of the shower, pulling a threadbare towel around my shaking body. The withdrawals were getting so much worse, I needed to get moving if I didn't want to be huddled in a ball somewhere between here and the dealers house.

As much as I hoped it would be the end of my rumination, I knew better. My lucid mind wouldn't let my waking nightmares go now, not as it was just getting warmed up.

My mind moved cruelly to Jacob. Once he'd been such a light in my life, but now he was just another source of pain. He'd helped me move past him, he'd been a sun in my dark world and pulled me above the surface before I drowned. It had taken me a while to trust him enough with my already shattered heart, but when I did, it had been beautiful. He and I had fit together, we had so much in common, but our differences also served to balance us out. I trusted him with my life, and my heart but my soul would always belong to someone else. He knew me well enough to understand that though.

It had worked well for a while. He and his friends were determined to rid me of the one piece of unfinished business he seemed to have forgotten about. Victoria had been one of the nomads that had come after me. He and his family had killed Victoria's mate and she hadn't forgotten it. She stalked me for years, and was always able to avoid Jacob and his friends.

When she disappeared for a while, I thought I could live a normal life. Jacob and I were getting closer, and once I finished college we'd planned on moving in together. That was until I came home for the summer during my sophomore year. Jacob was waiting for me on my dad's porch. I hadn't seen him in weeks because he'd been working and I was doing finals. I ran into his arms, but I knew something was different. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't show the excitement I was expressing at seeing him.

That's when he'd told me he'd imprinted. He'd been so apologetic; he'd fallen to his knees, his arms around my waist and his head against my stomach. He'd promised me it hadn't been intentional. He'd met her when she'd brought her car into the shop he worked at. He promised me he'd fought it, but it didn't matter. The fact was he wasn't mine, and no matter how many apologies he fed me, it wouldn't change anything. My heart was once again ripped into shreds; the fragments left behind by him were now in a thousand of their own from Jacob.

The shakes in me began to work into tremors. My whole body moved with them making my teeth chatter together. It was no longer just the need for drugs that plagued me. It was the memories barraging me too. I pulled on my shoes and grabbed my bag for work. Heading down to my car I threw it into the trunk before climbing in behind the wheel.

Ten minutes and this would all be pushed to the back of my mind once again. It was the only thing stopping me from curling into a ball and letting fate take its course. As long as I had my fix, I wouldn't be plagued like this. Maybe it was avoidance. Maybe not dealing with all of this and escaping it was the one thing making it so hard to be sober, but I wasn't strong enough. I never really had been. That was my problem.

As bad as having my love thrown to the wayside, it hadn't been the thing to completely break me. Losing love twice, I think I could have handled that, but it was the repercussions of those relationships that had been the straw that had broken the proverbial camel's back.

I had refused to talk to Jacob after he'd imprinted. I knew it was unfair of me to do that to him, but I couldn't stand seeing him and knowing I couldn't have him. I threw myself into school, and avoided going home for holidays. I felt terrible punishing my dad for the betrayal of Jacob and him, but avoiding being close to them seemed to work.

When he finally convinced me to come home during spring break of my junior year, I grudgingly packed my things and drove home to visit with him. It had been great to catch up with him, but after a side visit that had almost crippled me, I'd run into Jacob. The need to flee was almost overwhelming. When it came to fight or flight, flight had always been my instinct.

Jacob wouldn't let me walk away from him though. He forced me to listen to his lies, before commenting on how much weight I'd lost and how pale I'd become. When my silence finally became too much for him to take, he drove me home to dads house.

No! I couldn't think about that. That was too hard, that was too much. I tried to turn on the radio in my car and drain out the images smashing against my skull, and it was futile to try and ignore it. Even staring at the red light in front of me didn't take my focus from the memory of what came next.

Jacob and I had been in the car. I hadn't said a word since he'd cornered me and I hadn't been about to break that vow of silence. When I'd opened the door and climbed out, he'd pulled me back in by the back of my coat, my head smashed against the middle console painfully. I cried out in fury, but the shouts died in my throat as the front door to my home was pulled open, revealing Victoria.

The happenings after that have always been fuzzy, but I knew I screamed a lot, and I will never forget the satisfied smirk on Victoria's lips as I charged at her. Jacob managed to get to her first, but I was too invested in getting to my father and practically ran through the middle of the fight to get to him.

There was no saving him. I'd known it the moment I stepped in the house and saw the blood covering the walls and every surface of the house. I'd found dad lying in a pool of his own blood, not breathing at all as his blank eyes stared into nothingness. There was no spark behind those eyes, and there hadn't been for a while.

The days following his death were a blur. I don't remember anything other than Jacob telling me she'd got away yet again. The only other vacant memory was me accusing him of not trying because he didn't love me anymore, and the look of utter destruction on his features following it.

My next memory was of waking up in a strange bed, in a strange house. As I'd opened my eyes, I saw my mother sitting in the chair next to the bed looking disturbed as she slept. With Victoria still on the loose, I wouldn't risk her too, so I raided her purse while she slept and left without a word. I hadn't spoken to her since. I hadn't spoken to anyone since then. I legally changed my name to Isabella Masen, as ashamed as I am to admit it. I moved as far as I could possibly get from anyone I knew.

I reinvented myself, but the memories just kept coming. I was living in a motel when I met Luke. I'd been working three different jobs as a waitress to make ends meet. We got close and started something that resembled a relationship, I ended up moving in with him and picking up his bad habits. That's where I discovered I could force myself to forget, and I did. As often as I could. He was the one that found me the job I was working at now and I'd been there since. It had lasted exponentially longer than my relationship with Luke.

I pulled up to the curb outside of the address Misty had given me and rested my head on the steering wheel as I sucked in breaths. I had to get it together before I went inside. If this guy was paranoid my withdrawals wouldn't make him comfortable.

The memories were still circling in my head, but knowing my respite was a mere walk away seemed to give me the fight to shove them a little further back. If I stayed clean they would become an endless circle, and that would only affect my work. I just needed a hit and I would be straight. I could chill out in my car for a couple of hours before I had to start my shift. Get past that first burst and I would be set for at least six hours after that.

I climbed out and drew in a breath from the desert heat. It was hot and dry, and didn't exactly make me feel better, but it straightened out my head. I walked to the door as steadily as I could, counting each step to keep my mind from restarting my life history. By the time I was knocking at the door, I was almost bouncing on the balls of my feet in anticipation.

"Who are you?" A voice asked, startling me. I'd been so focused on not focusing I hadn't heard the door opening.

"I'm Bella. Misty sent me."

The guy gave me a once over and licked his lips. I could see exactly how she got her shit from him, but if he thought I was going to whore myself out to score a hit he was mistaken. I had money. In fact, I had hard, cold cash. If he didn't want that kind of transaction, then I wasn't sure what I would do. My craving was already telling me not to be so hasty.

"Lift up your shirt."

I did as he asked. He was checking me for wires. I'd been through the drill a thousand times and it didn't make me feel as uneasy as it once had. It was all part of the life I'd built for myself.

"You a cop?"

"Do I look like a cop?"

"Do you want my help?"

"No. I'm not, nor have I ever been a cop." Just a cop's daughter, I thought painfully.

"Fine. Here's how it works. You come in; you take a hit so I know you ain't five-oh. Then you can pay for what you want and leave."

"Perfect."

He opened the door a little further as I stepped in eagerly under his arm. The house was dark, and musty and the smell of chemicals was overwhelming. I wasn't exactly well versed in anything other than my own poison, but it was obvious they were cooking meth. It made me all the more eager to get the hell out of there.

"Here," he said, handing me a small tray with my drug of choice set out on it.

I took it from him fervently, my hands shaking a little as I dropped to my knees and set it on the table. I put everything together easily like I had a thousand times before, and pulled out one of my own empty syringes.

"You care if I use one of my own?"

"Prefer if you did."

I nodded and got to work, sticking the tip in a cotton ball before pulling up the plunger slowly. Dropping the rest of the crap, I held the needle upright and made sure there were no air bubbles before pulling off my shoe and situating my foot where he could see it. I knew he was looking up my skirt but I ignored the fact. I was concentrating on the needle in front of me.

I leaned forward and placed it between my toes, I winced as I always did at the needle sinking into my skin. It was like a small bite of pain that held the promise of freedom. One step left and I would be in oblivion.

As my father's face came to my minds eye, I threw caution to the wind and depressed the plunger. With one sigh of ecstasy, I let the needle drop to the floor as warmth rushed through my veins and everything fell away.

Authors Note: I realize this covers some of what you already know, but I wanted to show how Bella's thoughts worked when she wasn't filled with her chemical memory eraser. This first chapter is rough and choppy, and it was intended that way to show how erratic Bella's thoughts are when she doesn't have what she needs.

I realize that this chapter could turn some of you off, and have you walking away before its started, and believe me, I understand. It's not going to get easier for a long while. Bella is broken almost beyond repair. She doesn't want to feel and she doesn't want to live. Things will be explained a little more as time passes I promise :)

As with Rekindled Ashes, I have a playlist for this on Spotify... If you have it come check it out ;-)

Thank you for reading. I hope to see you again next week!

As always... to Hev99 and Sabi'sSookie... Thank you for always being, for reading this stuff when its discombobulated and utter crap, and sticking with me until it resembles something a little better. Thank you for your love and friendship, and for your faith in me! LOVE YOU!

MWAH!