Chapter 1

Good At Pretending

She would never admit it, but she missed Alabama.

However little time she spent there, it would always be ingrained in her memories. To the open grass field behind her house, plentiful sunshine, and the countless stars that littered the sky during the night, it never failed to make her smile softly and release a little bit of serotonin to help her get through the day.

The city was the exact opposite.

With the tall concrete buildings, the smog filling the air, and the starless sky during the night, she struggled to be content with what she had, even though she could buy virtually anything. Her father, Atticus Marcos Finch, was a highly respected lawyer and often traveled around the country for work, having law firms spaced all around the nation.

Her mother, Alexandra Hope Finch, was an ex-marine, and was often gone, and she was often told she was doing everything in her power to make sure that America was safe. She learned from a very young age that that was a lie, given she always went to someone else's house, taking care of this woman's child, shielding her from her parents' fights before her mother would leave to go meet her drug dealer, leaving the father's heart broken in her wake. And while Alex cared for another like they were her own, her flesh and blood daughter sat home alone, wondering what she could do to earn her mother's approval.

It was an endless cycle, constantly repeating itself until it didn't.

That was five years ago.

If it weren't for the pictures, she would never have known what they looked like. As they were often gone on business, she only got to see them three weeks out of the year and only on the three main holidays: Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter.

Her father's hair was black and cut into a professional, business-like fashion. His face was like a stone mask, never changing and never breaking, always remaining the same, even as the years went by; always void of emotion. His green eyes always held a dark look, making him far more intimidating than he already was. The very thought of him made her shudder.

Her mother's hair was a very bright blonde, and it was often cut into a pixie cut. While a scowl usually marred her features, there was always a smile that rarely graced her features, usually when her daughter managed to get hurt, her bright gray eyes alight with twisted mirth as she watched her child's face contorted with pain.

As terrible as it was, her mother was the one she was closer to.

Soft piano music drifted through her ears, the gentle sound keeping her anchored to reality. Her eyes were closed, but she didn't need them to know what piano keys she needed to hit. Years and years of practice and muscle memory allowed her fingers to naturally glide over the keys hitting each of them with practiced ease. Her left hand played the harmony, her right playing the melody, and both of them came together to make a beautiful song.

"Continuer," her instructor said and she resisted the urge to frown. Her instructor, or more like her criticizer, was a woman in her late sixties, her gray hair silver at the roots and her face was tight and wrinkly. Her french accent was sharp and prominent when she spoke.

Blood pooled in her mouth as she bit her tongue, resisting the urge to snap back at her, but the moment of distraction was all that was needed for her to make a mistake. She winced at the sound, the chord, the incorrect chord, disrupted the smooth sound of the music, pulling her out of her moment of peace.

Her instructor, Madame Anastasia, stilled.

"Wait-"

The metal ruler met her hands with a loud crack, immediately breaking the skin and blood began oozing down the side of her hand. She bit her tongue again to hold in her cry of pain. The ruler came down again and again, leaving bloody marks in its wake. The ruler came down one final time, striking her across her left cheek with such fury she fell out of her chair, crying out as she used her hands to catch her fall.

The ruler opened an old scar on her face, one she was used to covering with makeup. The force of the strike broke open the healed skin, leaving another bleeding cut in its wake. Blood dripped down her face gently, like water dripping down someone's face during a shower. She pressed her lips firmly together in a vain attempt to hold in her cries and Madame Anastasia stood over her with a disgusted frown.

"Déshonorante," she snarled, "Ton père ne me paie pas pour que tu fasses des erreurs ! Aucun de mes étudiants ne sera considéré comme un tel échec!"

"Madame," she began, "S'il vous plaît-"

Madame Anastasia's heeled shoe met her ribs, causing a pain so sharp that it left her winded. She could already feel the bruises forming, knowing that when she would check them, they would be an awful mixture of green and violet. The few tears she had left slipped down her cheeks and she pointlessly ducked her head to try and hide them.

But Madame Anastasia's already saw.

With the strength no sixty year old woman should have, she grabbed her student by the collar of her dress shirt, partly lifting her off the ground. Her old blue eyes were alight with fury and it took everything in her to keep from spitting in the old woman's face.

"Jamais," she snarled, "Jamais. Pleurez ici encore. Si vous le faites, la punition que vous recevrez sera pire que tout ce que vous pouvez imaginer. Comprendre?"

"O-oui madame."

The slap smeared the blood across her cheek, "Pas de bégaiement!"

"Oui Madame."

Her instructor's unsatisfied gaze pierced her soul before she finally released her, letting her body fall to the carpeted floor with a gentle thump. Her eyes briefly closed as she forced her tears back, but the opened once again was something heavy landed next to her head. It was a first aid kit.

"Nettoyez-vous." She said simply, like the whole exchange didn't happen, "Sois hors de ma vue dans vingt minutes."

The click-clack of her heels faded as she walked out of the room, but she could still feel the vibrations they sent through the floor. She laid there for a moment, forcing herself to take deep breaths as she staved off a panic attack. Pain flared through her hands as she clenched them and it took everything in her to keep from crying again.

Her ribs ached as she sat up, but their pain was minimal compared to the pain in her hands. She could only thank her lucky stars that the blood didn't stain the cuffs of her white shirt. It would have been a pain in the ass to get out. The first aid laid open beside her, revealing antiseptic wipes, butterfly bandages, and a roll of gauze. As far as she was concerned, it was like a holy grail.

She moved with practiced ease, gently wiping the blood away from the cut on her face and placing the butterfly bandages over the cut on her cheek. Her ribs were fine, they would only need to be iced for a few days until the bruises healed.

Her hands were another problem.

She winced every time she ran an antiseptic wipe over the cut, cleaning away the crimson and leaving her damaged hands in its place. She had five cuts on each hand, all which were still bleeding, the blood being too stubborn to clot. The skin around the cuts were a lighter shade of red, stained by the blood that had coated it a few minutes before.

Wrapping gauze around it was a painful process, leaving her wincing and resisting the urge to cry every few seconds. Blood immediately soaked through the first layer of gauze, only seeped through a little bit of the second layer, and the third layer stayed as white as fresh snow. Once she taped down the gauze on her second hand, she couldn't stop the quiet, gentle sigh of relief slipped past her lips.

The relief was short, because once she remembered the old cunt's threat, her heart immediately jumped into her throat. She shifted her panicked gaze to the clock and barely calmed when she saw eighteen minutes had passed. She quickly and quietly placed the first aid kit back in the piano bench, wincing as she closed the seat and nearly threw herself at the door dashing down the halls as quickly as she dared.

Madame Anastasia was waiting by the door when she got there, tapping her index finger against her arm as she waited. "Il reste vingt secondes," she stated and the injured girl had to with hold a flinch, "Vous vous relâchez, Mademoiselle Mayella."

The girl-Mayella-bowed her head at Madame Anastasia's tone, "Je suis désolé, Madame Anastasia."

The older woman stared at the girl before she reached over and opened the door, "Je vous verrai la semaine prochaine, Mlle Finch. Cela donnera à vos mains suffisamment de temps pour guérir. Je m'attends toujours à ce que vous répétiez la cinquième symphonie de Beethoven. Ne me déçois pas."

"Oui Madame."

"Va."

She dashed out the door as quickly as she could without being reprimanded and she sighed with relief once she heard the doors close behind her. The sounds of the city quickly crowded her senses, nearly making her wince as the suddenness of it. The sun was dipping behind the buildings, nearly covering the entire street in shadows. Very few pedestrians littered the sidewalk, nearly all of them walking as quickly as they could to get in doors. Everyone knew to get inside once the sun went down.

She swallowed nervously, wishing desperately that she had a weapon or pepper spray at the very least. But she couldn't. It was unlady like for a woman to handle a weapon, that was for men.

Or, at least, that's what her parents said.

Her gaze shifted from side to side constantly, paranoia leaving her on high alert. She could almost feel someone's gaze on the back of her neck, causing anxiety to pool in her stomach. Her outfit made it worse, her white, flowy dress shirt was okay enough, but her light blue shirt stopped a little way past her knee, nearly making her squirm in her skin.

She wasn't an idiot, she knew that her outfit only drew more attention to her, how some men would not hesitate on cat calling her, on whistling in her direction in an attempt to somehow get in her pants. Normally, she knew she could defend herself, but with her injured hands, her outfit, and her flats that were impossible to run in, she knew that if she was cornered, she was more or less screwed.

A sharp whistle pulled her out of her thoughts and dread pooled in her stomach.

"Hey there, baby girl," a man called out, and even from there, she could smell the liquor from his breath. "You look a little lost, why don't I help you out?"

Her gaze shifted around the street once more, only to find that no one else was there. She was all alone.

Shit.

There was laughter behind her and she could hear his friends egging him one. "Hey, c'mon now," he cooed, "You can't just leave a guy hangin'."

"Leave me alone," she said simply, subconsciously picking up her pace.

"Hey," he said and suddenly, she was pressed against a wall and her wrists were pinned above her head. The man's gray eyes were clouded with a drunken rage, "I gave you a compliment, you can't just walk away like that."