Disclaimer: If I could own any character, I think I would own Alice or Leah. Unfortunately, I cannot own either.

Chapter Ten

Talks

Anna's P.O.V.

I stayed the night with the Cullens, I was going to sleep on the couch in their living room. The entire night I was terrified that I would have the nightmare again. They asked me if I wanted any food, I had said yes so they brought me spaghetti. I ate quite a lot, but I noticed that they didn't eat anything.

I was about to go to sleep when one of them came downstairs. I shivered, how could people be so silent? I looked up to see the short one staring at me. She looked at me nervously then sat down in the chair next to the couch. I stared at her, why would she be up? She looked scared, like she had seen something that didn't exist.

"Alice, are you alright?" I asked her hesitantly, had I caused this?

She looked at me, "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to, but where did you get your scar?" I knew she had seen it, but why did it hurt to know that she had? Alice read my face, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked."

"It's okay," I told her. "I might as well tell someone." I sighed, if I told the story the memory would come back. I braced myself into the couch, I couldn't let her see my emotions. I just couldn't, my emotions were mine and mine alone.

Alice's P.O.V.

She paused as if deciding where to begin, then she shifted her weight in the couch making herself seem buried inside it. I noticed that she had positioned herself so that I couldn't see her face. "Are you going to tell anyone?" She asked, leaning forward to look at me. I shook my head. Edward would know as soon as she thought about it. If it was important then he could tell them.

She took a deep breathe and began. "My father was an alcoholic, when he was upset he would drink. When I was to young to do anything about it he started to beat my mother. She wasn't a fighter, she never even stepped on spiders, she couldn't hit him back. Every day I would wake up to see a new bruise on her face."

"She was beautiful once, before she let him slowly start to kill her inside, but she slowly faded away. It was killing me inside too. I had to do something about it, but whenever I fought him he would hit me. I never expected that, it had been the first time he hit me. I showed up at school the next day covered in bruises. Everyone wanted to know what they were from, but I never told them."

"A few years went by, he stopped differentiating between my mother and me. He beat us both. Some days it would be worse than others. Once he punched me so hard I couldn't see out of my left eye for a week. The teachers at school figured it out, even if the students didn't. They called me in to the office to talk to me about it. I almost told them, I thought that if I told them the problems would go away."

She stopped like she was ashamed of something. I saw that her eyes were glistening with long held back tears, waiting to be shed. She took in a long shaking breathe. "But he was still my father. I can't couldn't betray my family, not even to save myself, not even for my own mother." Her voice shook with pain, she blamed herself for her mother's death. "I wouldn't betray my father for my mother, even when it would save us both."

"I started wearing makeup to school. At first the teachers could see through it, but then I got better. Eventually no one, not even my mother, could tell I was covered in bruises. I couldn't hide the way my face would swell, especially my eyes. So I would protect my face. Even when he hurt me I protected him."

"I was terrified of him the entire time. I was withering away, like my mother. I met a friend, she helped me realize that because he was my father wasn't a reason to protect him. He didn't deserve my protection. I wasn't bond to him anymore. I was me, not his daughter, me. I was going to tell."

"That day, while they thought I was still at school, I found him about to kill her. I got between them. My father was drunk, he picked up his beer bottle and threw it at me." Her voice started to get thick. "I ducked out of the way and pushed my mother out the door, she ran across the street but collapsed in the neighbor's yard."

Anna stopped, she wiped her eyes with the back of her hands. "I couldn't get out of the house before he grabbed the back of my shirt and pulled me back in." Her heartbeat sped up, as if she was still struggling to escape the man whom she had called father even if he was far undeserving of the term. "I-I struggled but he locked me into a room with no way out, I tried to run anyway. He stabbed the bottle into my back, then I fell forward and he twisted the bottle further in. He told me if I ever told he would kill her. She was my mother, I couldn't figure out a way out." She turned her head into the couch and sat there for a long time.

"I wasn't strong enough to do what I needed to protect her." she said, crying openly now. "I wasn't good enough to be worth fighting for. And now she's gone."

Shit, I didn't know her mother was dead. I shouldn't have asked. She was in agony, I had made her be in agony. "Are you okay?" I asked hesitantly, I didn't want to hurt her any more.

She stared at me. "Honestly, no, I'm not okay." she paused, then continued. "And there's not a damn thing you or I can do about it."

Anna's P.O.V.

I turned my back to Alice and settled down in the couch. I closed my eyes and went still, the nightmare would definitely come now. Alice stood up, always feather light, and touched my shoulder. "I'm sorry." I looked up again and she was gone. I buried my face into the pillow and sobbed. Couldn't I do anything right? She had come to me to help me, but I had pushed her away.

Why had I even told her? It had absolutely nothing to do with her. If anyone I needed to tell Embry. He deserved to know the entire truth. He should be with someone whole, someone who could play games and wear bikinis and be a teenager, so that they could grow up together. So that they could be normal together, not someone trying to put together a shattered soul.

He couldn't be with me, no matter how much it hurt I had to let him go. It hurt so much. A week was all it took for me to fall for him. I had fallen hard, and a thousand feet below I couldn't see if he would catch me or if I would drown in the icy pain. I had to stop myself from falling any deeper from trying to drag him with me.

What if he didn't even like me? Was it all just out of pity? I was certainly pitiful, but he wouldn't do that, he would at least tell me straight, wouldn't he? I shook my head, I would tell him either way, I would rather get hurt than hurt him.

Sleeping slowly pulled me under its claws. I drifted away into meaningless jumbles. Then the nightmare began, trembling, even in my sleep I tried to wake up, but here my dreams, he had control.