The Pain of Hiding

Summary: Darcy finds out about her parents' marriage troubles and what her sister has had to go through. TwoShot.

Darcy Edwards stared across the room, in disbelief at her sister's sobbing form. She didn't understand it. How could she not have known?

Darcy had come back from Kenya, eager to be reunited with her family. Everything had went well. They'd had a family dinner, the Edwards sister's had cried buckets of tears when they finally saw eachother again, Clare had introduced Darcy to her boyfriend, Eli and friend, Adam. The sisters had then went to the room that they used to share before she'd left and had laughed and talked for hours, before turning off the lights and trying to head off into dreamland. Around one in the morning, Darcy had been shocked to be awakened by the sound of something being shattered against a wall downstairs and then the loud voices of their parents yelling at eachother. The crude words that escaped from their mouths, the accusations, the insults-it wasn't what she'd been expecting. Her parents hadn't been like that when she'd left and none of the letters that Clare or their parents had sent had mentioned anything to make her suspect that her parents marriage was falling apart. She wonders how long her sister has had to deal with this. How long has she had to keep the secret that their perfect Christian parents weren't all that they said that they were? It made Darcy feel awful that she wasn't there to help her sister. Clare was too young to go through this alone.

She watches as Clare reaches for something on her nightstand and pick it up, clutching whatever it was close to her chest before putting on her head with clumsy hands. Clare's breath was ragged and the choked sound of sobs kept on escaping her lips.

Darcy knew that her sister thought that she was sleeping. She wouldn't be outwardly crying, otherwise. Clare had been like that ever since she was a little girl. Bottling up her own pain and helping others. Chewing on her lower lip, Darcy got out of her bed, walking slowly over to her sister's and sitting on the edge of it. A frown thinned her lips as she looked at her sister's shuddering form. Resting a soft, gentle hand on her sister's forearm, and squeezing gently to get her attention when she noticed the expensive looking earphones over her sister's ears.

Clare flinched slightly and then turned her head to look at Darcy, eyes red and swollen and her pale face streaked with tears. She quickly hoisted herself into a sitting position on the bed and took off the earphones. "Darcy!" She exclaimed in shock, swallowing hard. "How-how long have you been awake?" Her hands threaded nervously in the blanket that covered her and she looked away from her sister.

"Long enough." The older sister said simply, sighing and sliding a slender arm across her sister's shoulders comfortingly. "How long have they been fighting like this Clare? This obviously isn't the first time."

The other girl sighed sadly. "For a few months now. Pretty much since the beginning of the school year, maybe a little longer." She mumbled carefully into her sister's shoulder.

"And you never thought to tell me?" Darcy hissed incrediculously, looking down at her.

Clare laughed slightly. "You didn't need to know. You were busy helping kids in Africa. That seemed more important."

Darcy scoffed. "It is when you have to deal with it alone! Clare, I would've been here for you if I'd known."

Clare flushed and brushed a hand through her short curls shyly. "I haven't been handling it alone. Eli's been helping me. It's where the headphones came from."

Darcy was about to reply when more shouting travelled upstairs. The two sisters winced in unison at the sound.

"Well you still should've told me." The brunette said firmly as the house finally grew quiet.

Clare shook her head, blue eyes locking on the door. "Mom and dad told me not to. They said that there was no use to worry you." She pulled away from her sister and laid back down in her bed, not wanting to talk anymore about the situation.

Darcy didn't say anything. She knew that she needed to talk to her parents. Get it through to them that their fighting was hurting Clare. And she needed to thank Eli, for doing what he could to comfort her sister.

To be continued...

Next Part: Darcy confronts her parents and talks to Eli.