Authors note: Okay, so I'm updating more than I thought I would before I'm gone for a week. This chapter is soooo much longer than usual!! Thanks so much to all my reviewers; it's all appreciated so much. You will be happy to know that I'm still very far off the end of this, but I can't decide whether to have a happy or sad ending, and if to do another sequel or not. Any opinions?

Chapter 14 – Unconscious Memories

In his unconscious mind, that's when Reno remembered things he would have given the world to forget. He had caused so much trouble when he was younger; he knew he shouldn't have done it…

But sometimes, you just have to forget your knowledge of right and wrong, and just go with the flow. He remembered looking up to that woman; her red eyes smiling back down on him. How wrong he had been.

"Reno! Don't go again…your sister's worried about you…and so am I." He should have listened to his mother. When he went to Vanessa that day, it was the second from last time that he did. He stepped inside the small abandoned building Vanessa had arranged for them to meet in, Vanessa turned around, her red eyes meeting his green ones. They were, for some reason filled with disappointment.

"You're late."

"I know, I had trouble at home…"

"Your mother, she doesn't want you to return does she?

"No…"
"And I know, Reno. You're not so sure anymore either."

Reno looked at her, trying to hide the fact that she was right. He shook his head.

"No. I will keep coming."

"Only because you have to. I can see you're struggling more than ever." Reno looked at her. "With money." She added seeing his confusion.

"How?"

"You've lost weight…again. If you're not careful, you'll end up starving. What use will you be to me then?"

Reno looked at her. She was speaking in harsher tones than what she usually did to him, and her eyes were filled with some sort of hatred.

"Well, we just don't have that much money that's all. None of us can afford to eat properly."

"Ah, but your sister, and your parents for that matter; they aren't half-starved like you, are they?"

"They're more important than me. Rihanna deserves better…"

"Deserves better? Well, you're not as selfish as I thought you were. But, what makes you think she deserves better? Are they better than you?"

The taller woman was closing in on him, the look of hatred still in her eyes. She smirked at him.

"Because they weren't stupid enough to get involved with…you!" Reno shouted and turned to run. This mother was right, this had to stop. Before he could move however, Vanessa had caught hold of his scrawny wrist and pulled him back towards her.

"Let me go!" Reno screamed, pulling away.

"I could snap you like a twig, Reno. Be careful in the decisions that you make."

She tightened her grip on Reno's wrist, making his eyes water in pain. Just when he thought she was going to snap it, she let go and pushed Reno forwards, making him fall to his knees. He got up, wiping the tears from his eyes, clutching his wrist. It was bruised already, probably broken.

"You need to prioritise. What's more important; your life, or their lives. Then we'll see how selfish you really are."

Reno turned and ran, ignoring the pain in his wrist, and now in his knees where he had fallen. He ran until he got back to his house, but stopped outside the door. He had been crying, and his mother would ask him until she got it out of him. He peered into the window, making sure no one had seen him and walked off towards the city centre. Living in the Sector 7 slums, it wasn't much of a city centre, but he would blend in a little better with all those people about. A 14 year old boy wondering around alone wasn't unusual to anyone who lived here. Just as he turned the corner into one of the more crowded streets, he heard a voice behind him.

"Reno?" He turned to see Rihanna behind him.

"Oh, shit. Rihanna, why are you here?" Reno asked her desperately.

"I saw you come home, and then you left again. Why?" The sad look in her green eyes was almost too much for Reno to take.

"It's nothing…"

"What happened to your hand?" she asked him. Reno looked at it to see that it had turned almost black and he was unable to move it.

"Slipped over." Reno said the first thing that came to his head.

"It's broken. Why didn't you go in and tell mom. You need someone to have a look at that."

"I don't want to worry her. She has enough to think about."

"But that's not gonna go unnoticed is it? C'mon, let's go to the hospital now."

Reno was too exhausted to argue, and he realised she was right. The nearest hospital, however, was not a pleasant one. Not because it was run-down, being in the slums, in fact, it was quite the opposite. That was the problem; street rats like them. People would look down their noses at them, and whoever dealt with Reno's wrist would probably cause more pain than necessary.

"Look, I know you're not gonna let me leave it, but lets go in and out as quickly as we can, okay?"

"Right."

They stepped inside the hospital. They really contrasted to their completely white surroundings with their red hair and dirty black clothes. As soon as they walked in, people began to frown at them. Reno gritted his teeth as they stepped towards the reception desk.

"Can someone look at my brothers wrist please?" Rihanna said confidently to the woman on the desk. She looked at them.

"What happened?" she said, quite rudely. Reno didn't say anything because he felt he wasn't able to without shouting some very rude words at this woman. Rihanna, however, replied with the same bright voice she always had.

"Oh, just an accident. He fell."

"Right…" the woman's voice was voice was positively dripping with sarcasm. The whole waiting room had gone silent. Rihanna ignored it and waited patiently for the woman to answer her.

"You're lucky." She said, "There's no one in A and E. That way." She pointed to the small corridor behind them.

"Thank you." Rihanna said politely. The sibling headed down the corridor and knocked on the door that said A and E. The man that opened the door looked down at Reno and frowned.

"How many times have I seen you here this year?" he said nastily. He opened his door so the two of them could go through.

"Sit." Reno sat on the chair he was pointing to. "What happened this time?"

He took hold of Reno's wrist roughly. He hissed in pain.

"Fell over…"

"Of course." He obviously didn't believe him, but he didn't care enough to find out the real reason.

"It's not broken. Just sprained." He said. His grip on it was uncomfortably tight.

"Are you sure? Shouldn't you X-ray it?" Rihanna interrupted.

"Look, kid, I'm the doctor." He snapped. Then he turned to Reno. "Just go easy on it. You're fine."

Reno pulled his wrist out of his grasp and left the room. He knew it was pointless coming here in the first place, all that trouble for nothing. He heard Rihanna's footsteps running up behind him.

"Reno? I'm sorry." She said when she caught up. "I didn't…"

"Yeah, well, it's too late now. People like us just aren't welcome anywhere. The world just wants to kill us off…and sometimes I can't help but think that they're right."

"What? You can't mean that!"

"Just look at us, Rihanna. We have no place here."

"But Reno…we are here. Nobody can change that."

"I'm sorry…" Reno said sadly. He picked up his pace and ran away from Rihanna leaving her staring after him.
"But, Reno, you're all I have left…"