Sorry about the delay in updating I have been on holiday and nowhere near a computer.
This chapter is written from Joy's perspective.
Disclaimer: Don't own Booth, Brennan, Angela, Hodgins or the others from the show. Joy and her family are mine though.
Thank you to everyone who has reviewed and pointed out errors, hopefully there will be less of them this time.
Seven years. That is a long time to keep a secret like mine. And it's all over now. Just like that it's over. It doesn't feel real yet, it won't until the cops find me and tell me that they found her and that she really is dead.
There is movement in my room now, one maybe two people. The window slides open then is released to slam shut. The sound is audible even from here-across the street and one house over from Mom's-and it sent an icy ripple through my mind as it touched memories, that I didn't want awakened. Especially now, sitting on the Rout's fence watching them wheel Mom's body out to the waiting van. Fighting the suffocating rush of emotions, twisting the purse strings around my finger to give my mind something, anything else to concentrate on, I don't notice the woman come down the front steps, moving towards me. Then she calls my name.
"Joy."
And suddenly I am eight years old, standing at the top of the stairs looking down at my mother's lifeless body. Hearing my name yelled but in anger now, not curiosity. Running away from her.
No, I can't. I can't run, not this time, not today. A hand lifts, reaching out to me from across the road, not hers but his-the suit that went in with her. None of this really registers, like hitting a glass pane-I can see the facts but I'm not recognising it. She calls my name again and the dam breaks. The emotions are there not just the images. Fear, anger and the urge to run hit me and I am fighting a losing battle. Fight or flight reaction that what it's called. Today, like every other day, flight beats fight and I hit the pavement running.
Down the alley, across the road and around the corner, then I am in the park. My haven. The one place I can pretend none of this ever happened. But not today, I can hear voices behind me, calling my name. Their problem is I know this park better than the people who designed it.
The playground is packed as I make my way through it, wading through games of tag and ducking under monkey bars that used to seem so much higher. Down past the bike rack and along the path. Onto the sidewalk again, turn left, cross the road and then I can see Dad's house. The empty black roaring in my ears starts as I hit the front door. I barely make it into my room before the blackness crashes over me.