"I'd had three foster homes and I'd been in an orphanage for 9 years. By the age of 15, I knew nothing of the outside world other than I was somehow much different and obviously unwanted by it. I never saw a movie except for those the orphanage made in order to receive pity on us by adults who wanted to help, so they'd adopt us without asking if it was what we wanted. It's not a bad thing, I suppose... Too many people would have been hurt to hear, 'I wanna stay in this rat infested, decaying Hell hole. I don't want to go- you're ugly, and you smell, and you don't know me, and you'll just throw me away, anyhow.' Yet, we never would have said those things anyway, because our matron was always threatening us. She threatened, and we learned.

We learned to be polite and learned to hope, albeit we knew hoping only hurts more. So, we hoped they would like us and we hoped we liked them and we hoped our hopes weren't wasted as wishes were.

We never thought to wish, us orphans. Wishing was in fairytales and fairytales are stories filled with people who hoped- and their hopes weren't wasted. We weren't in a fairytale. I wasn't in a fairytale.

I never wished- not on a star, not for a coin to hear as it was pulled down into the darkness of a well, not for the wind to carry away to the heaven's that closed their ears and eyes and pity and loving, inviting, warming arms not meant for me or the others like me.

We weren't saying we were completely unhappy, and I didn't want pity- the others didn't either, I'm sure. The truth is, we didn't know how we felt- Love? Joy? Fear? Hate? Sadness? Happiness? We heard those are emotions...

I always felt a great weight pressing on my shoulders- slumping them, sloping them, shaping them- and a constant need for physical contact with something or someone.

Eri said it was guilt. Ayumi said it was self-pity. Yuka said it wasn't an emotion at all, just a tendency.

What's a tendency? Oh, a constant disposition to some action or state. Thank-

Thank what for dictionaries? God didn't exist anymore after what he had let happen to me and the others. Goodness wasn't tangible. The orphanage was a prison even if it had been what had supplied it- and why thank a prison that held you hostage? Plus, no dictionary can explain feelings.

Yet, 'tendency' just didn't fit with what I felt. I knew it was an emotion, but I also knew it wasn't guilt. It could have been self-pity, but that wasn't the full extent. It couldn't have been...

I gave up trying to understand it after the last foster home rejected me and sent me back to the orphanage. For the longest time, a feeling I called Confusion calmed me- no one ever told me why I kept being sent back. Perhaps it was my slumped shoulders. Yet, Confusion was cast aside very soon, yet it still stayed in the background, haunting as it hid in the deepest black of my core.

The last time I was sent back, something was bubbling inside of me. It felt like my own blood was set to boil and cook away my very being. I didn't know what it was- fear, anger, frustration, hatred? I knew it was one of those because I knew those were bad feelings that no one liked to have.

Just like no one liked to have me.

So, I welcomed the feeling and buried it inside to let it simmer and expand and fill me. When it told me to do something, I did it. When it told me to say something, I said it. When it told me to feel, think, like something, I felt, thought, and liked it.

I gave the feelings a house and, in return, I got a friend and a shield from all that was outside in the world that attempted to hurt me with words and looks of what I knew had to be disgust or pity.

One day, the matron told me to shut up because I was speaking out of turn during lunch.

My feelings told me to let them go so they could hurt her. I did it.

My feelings picked up the plate my food was on and threw it. Then my fork, next my knife.

I was sent to a psychologist and learned very quickly that she didn't care what was really going on. Her eyes always glazed over and a frown painted her face when I said the truth and what I thought I felt. When I told her a sugar coated version of my life, things got better- she believed everything more. She couldn't understand the full truth.

Soon, after I was transferred to a new person, I had fabricated a whole new life...

I had changed the story of my life to that of a better one, one with what I knew would have been a happier me. And I liked that me, not the me I was. My feelings I had housed, the anger or fear or hatred, they didn't like that I was liking something other than them- they didn't like that I didn't like me.

'Your blood will never change, just as your past,' it told me. Then said, 'cut yourself and see.'

I did it.

I saw it.

My blood.

A new feeling swept through me. It was the feeling of finally being able to release the anger and make it grow at the same time- give it room to breath and grow because it was being used, but no one cared enough to really give it adequate attention. They just threw me to another person because they didn't care, then those people threw me to another...

Over and over, I was thrown away.

Just like my daddy. Daddy never cared, they never cared, I never cared...

But...

That's just what I wanted to believe- that I never cared.

I kept cutting myself.

I saw it.

My blood.

It never changed.

I never changed.

And neither did the people around me.

A/N: First off, I'd like to thank Ama (Shades of Oblivion for the title and the boost of confidence he gave me. Thank you.

Secondly, I'd like to thank all of my reviewers for taking the time to put in a word or two about what they thought. All reviews your greatly appreciated. Thank you all.

Thirdly, I'd like to thank everyone for NOT yelling about adding another new fic with so many others on hold. Really, thank you.

Hm.... I think that's all the thanks I can afford to give out today!

Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Please review. Only two chapters left.