-1A/N: Okay, flashbacks finally here. Well, one of them. The whole next chapter will be a flashback too. Are you ready for it? I don't think you are. Haha. Jk. I highly recommend reading the lyrics written in this chapter. They do go with the story, and are truly beautiful.
Disclaimer- I don't own GG or This Time Imperfect by the great band AFI.
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It was three in the morning and everyone was sleeping. At least Cassie thought everyone was sleeping. There had been a noise that sounded like a window opening and someone slipping out of it. Cassie of all people should know what that sounded like.
But either way Cassie couldn't sleep. She never did. She was laying on the Gilmore's lumpy couch staring at the wall because she couldn't stare at the ceiling and she couldn't close her eyes. Every time she did, she saw everything. Everything that had happened, and she couldn't take it. But she still tried before forcing her eyes open and sitting up with her feet on the floor holding her head in her hands.
God, she was so tired. It had been so long since she had slept for more than 2 hours at a time. She was losing weight. Becoming dizzy at the slightest movement. Constantly nauseous. Always had a headache. It was torture.
She pulled her legs up to her chest on the couch and started rocking back and forth slowly, humming 'This Time Imperfect'. She didn't know why, but it always made her feel better and she was always singing it. After trying to sleep she felt dirty. She needed a shower. So as quietly as possible, she gathered some clothes, tip-toeing to the bathroom singing softly to herself.
I
cannot leave here, I cannot stay,
Forever haunted, more than
afraid,
Asphyxiate on words I would say,
I'm drawn to a
blackened sky as I turn blue,
There are no flowers, no not
this time,
There'll be no angels gracing the lines,
Just these
stark words, I find,
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd
share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this, hurts
me,
(I think I'm gonna crash)
I
cannot stay here, I cannot leave,
Just like all I loved, I'm
make-believe,
Imagined heart, I disappear,
Seems...no one will
appear here and make me real,
There are no flowers, no, not
this time,
There will be no angels gracing the lines,
Just
these stark words I find,
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd
share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this hurts
me,
I'd tell you how it haunts me,
I'd tell you how it
haunts me,
(cuts through my day, and sinks into my dreams)
I'd
tell you that it haunts me,
(cuts through my day, and sinks into
my dreams)
You don't care that it haunts me,
Oh!
There
are no flowers, no, not this time,
There will be no angels gracing
the lines,
Just these stark words I find,
I'd show a smile, but
I'm too weak,
I'd share with you could I only speak,
Just how
much this hurts me,
Just how much this hurts me,
Just how much
you...
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Rory walked onto the bridge and found exactly who she thought she would find.
Cassie had come back to the house a little teary-eyed and told Rory she was sorry. Rory didn't figure that after whatever had happened, he would remember the date they were supposed to have, so she just went to find him herself after everyone had gone to sleep.
"Hey." She greeted quietly as she settled down beside him.
"Hey." He sounded tense and that was when Rory noticed the smell of cigarette smoke, and how he was clenching his jaw.
"You okay?"
"Peachy." He replied sarcastically, putting out the cigarette he was smoking and picking up his nearly-empty pack sitting next to an already empty one on the bridge to get another.
"Jess-"
He cut her off. "You seen Cassie?" He pulled out a lighter and lit up another.
"Yeah. She came by with her face all blotchy. Did something happen?" Rory leaned forward slightly to get Jess' attention, but he just continued to stare blankly at the lake.
"We just did a little catching up." It was kind of the truth. They had caught up.
"Tell me what happened."
Jess finally looked at her, and a part of Rory was relieved, while the other part wished she wouldn't have seen the haunted look in his eyes. She'd never been able to see an emotion in his eyes before. It was almost scary.
"It's not my story to tell." He repeated the statement he made to Cassie slowly, then looked back to the lake, taking a drag. "But Cassie wants it to be told." Rory waited patiently for Jess to start. "Cassie and I dated. For a long time. You want to know who the only other girl I called my girlfriend was? It was Cassie. I was left with a woman to baby-sit me that lived in her building. We were friends forever and really were dating forever. She was my first girlfriend, my first kiss, my first sexual experience, my first lo…" Jess sighed. "everything." Rory had heard the beginning to the word love, though. "When we were fifteen, she was raped." Rory gasped. She really hadn't been expecting that. "By her step-father. She had always hated him, and he did that to her."
Cassie was walking out into her room only dressed in a towel with her hair soaking wet. She had just come out of the shower, and was going to get ready for her date with Jess while her mom took a shower and got ready for her night out with George. Hitler as Cassie always called him, because she swore that's who he looked like. If only he shaved his mustache like his, they'd be twins.
The water for her mother's shower was already going when Cassie walked into her room humming to herself, excited to see Jess. She bent over to pick up a shirt my the floor, then stood up and looked over to her bed and screamed. Laying there watching baseball on her T.V. was none other than George.
"What the fuck are you doing in my room? Get out!" Cassie really did hate him. She was spooked at finding him in her room. There were other televisions in the apartment.
"Just thought I'd watch some baseball." He shrugged like it was no big deal.
"Well go watch some baseball in the living room. This is my room, and you have no right to be in it."
"Where are you going tonight?" He completely ignored Cassie and acted like this was completely normal. It wasn't.
"The moon." Cassie dead-panned, trying to get him out of her room.
"With that boyfriend of yours?"
"Dude, get the fuck out of my room!" In a second he was up and slamming Cassie onto the bed, her towel falling off slightly, making her nervous.
"You really shouldn't speak to me like that." He growled, and although Cassie really was scared out of her mind and visibly shaking, she was still tough and a smart-mouth.
"Why? You're not my father, and you're never going to be. Now let me go!" The next thing she knew, her towel was ripped open and he was unzipping his pants. "What are you doing?! Get off me!" She shrieked, panicking, trying but failing to push him off her. He did work out at the gym everyday.
He covered her mouth with one hand, and held her arms with the other. Cassie tried to kick him, but he was laying on top of her with her legs pinned. She felt like she was going to vomit. She really felt like she was going to vomit when he thrust, ripping through all of her tightened muscles. She screamed into his hand and tears prickled behind her eyes. She could feel the warm thick liquid dripping down her skin, and it burned. Everything burned. She couldn't see. She tried to scream, but every time she made a sound, even if it was a cry or whimper of pain, it only seemed to spur him on harder.
She couldn't stand it. She just looked up to the ceiling trying to think of anything else but what was happening.
A few more gruff grunts and he was at the edge, spilling inside of her and then Cassie really did puke. Into his hand, and he let her mouth go in disgust, but everything hurt too bad for her to make a noise. She just kept throwing the contents of her stomach onto the sheets next to her as she rolled onto her side, and he wiped the blood that had gotten on him onto the towel that was already soaked with it.
He left the room while her mother was still showering, looking put together again and not at all like he had just raped his fifteen year old step-daughter.
Cassie barely heard some voices and something that sounded like George telling her mother that Cassie had already left and hurrying her mother out the door.
That's how Jess found her. He came to pick her up and on his fourth time knocking, no one answered the door. Having had to break into her house before, Jess did it again calling out Cassie's name as he looked through the apartment. He saw her door only open a crack. She never left her door open. Ever. He cautiously pushed it open and looked inside, everything inside him breaking at what he saw.
A shaking, naked Cassie in the fetal position with dried tears and hair on her face. A bloody towel under her, and vomit on and next to her completely blank face.
"Cassie." He tried softly. God it smelled terrible in there. Old blood and vomit were not good smells. "Cassie." He touched her shoulder, and she didn't even flinch, much less look in his direction.
She wasn't there anymore.
Jess left the room, and came back about a minute later. He slowly put his right arm under Cassie's back and his left behind her knees, picking her up from the bed with a little trouble, but then carrying her to the bathroom just fine. Just as gently as he picked her up, he set her down in the warm bath water. He ran his hand over her head soothingly a few times before unbuttoning his shirt, slipping it down his arms, taking off his undershirt and slowly starting to clean her off.
After he was done, he wrapped her in a big clean towel and sat her on his lap, rocking her slowly back and forth as he called out softly. "Cassie… Cassie." Her eyes didn't move and her face stayed blank. If it weren't for her chest rising and falling, he would've thought she was dead. "Baby, look at me. I know you don't want to, but you have to come back." There was a slight twitch in her face like she was trying to move it. "That's it. Come back to me. I've got you. You're okay." He softly coaxed.
Finally, her wide eyes shot to Jess' and he fought not to cringe at all of the pain he saw in them. Instead he took her in his arms further and kissed the top of her head humming whatever song popped into his head. The first song that came to him was "This Time Imperfect" by AFI. Cassie was really rubbing off on him.
Immediately after he started humming the song, Cassie relaxed in his arms and her breathing evened.
As much as he wanted to kill the son of a bitch, he knew that Cassie needed him right now and she came before anything or one else. Every part of him ached in pain watching the girl he loved like that. And while he was cleaning up her room, he heard her small raspy voice behind him. "Please don't say anything." She pleaded. "Promise me." He could do nothing but nod.
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A/N: Hope you like it. Please review.
Contygoldbarg- Thank you very much. I'm glad you think so.
Charlilee- Thanks
Hollowgirl22- Thanks. Well here is the main part of what happened.
Just A Girl- Cat is shorter, but might be hard to remember. My brain is full. Hahaha. I have to go back a chapter even now when I don't read that many fan fictions. I used to get confused even when I did that. I had to stop. Haha. Glad you liked the chapter. What'd you think of this one? Thanks for the review as always.
Spazz- Glad you're actually reviewing. Hopefully for this chapter you'll have more to say than update soon, so you'll review again. Milo should know that I own him. He doesn't mind. He's just cool like that.
XoBlair- How about that name? I should be able to remember that. If not, I will go back to Xo. Glad you're cool about me shortening it. The thought of Jess with someone else usually makes me cringe too, but for a few select stories I'm okay with it. I'm glad that even though you don't like those, that you still read them both. Bringing new characters can always complicate things. It's not supposed to in my story, but other people use it to that effect.
Dragon Dreamer3- Well I do write for the fun of it. I pretty much have this story written, and I don't always wait until I get a certain number of reviews. I didn't for the first chapter, and I still update quickly. As long as I don't torture everyone, which I don't think I could do because I love posting and getting lovely reviews from people. And the second authors note was just giving people a heads up so they don't feel the need to point it out. I know you're not flaming, and I just thought I'd explain to you why I work the way I do. I'm not mad at all, so don't take it wrong.
Exitlight- Thanks. Do you like where this is going?
Aiden-Tonic- My chapters are magic! They get rid of headaches! I should use it for myself some time as a medicine. Though my headaches don't go away nearly as easily. With my luck it would just get worse. Sorry if you couldn't sleep, but now maybe you can? Or maybe not if you're too excited about the next chapter. I'll try to get it out fairly quickly, but I'm still editing. Thanks for the reviews. I love them.
19merz86- Thanks so much! Haha, I'm only a quick updater for this story because I pretty much had it completely written before I even started posting. For my other stories, I'm really terrible at updating. Hence why I waited until it was written to start posting. Glad you like it. Appreciate the review, and hope you continue to do so.
PGGF- Thank you! I like Cassie, too. She's not here to mess anything up. Now you know a little about their backgrounds. What do you think?
Lavieboheme13ak- You're one of the only people that have asked specifically what happened in the past. Haha, now you know a little. What do you think?
Liasoneternal89- Well now you know. Were you right? What was your idea that was lined up? I'm curious.
Allycat1186- I'm glad you like that Rory and Cassie get along. I thought it'd be a nice change from all the stories where a girl comes to take Jess back. Thanks for the review.
The Warner Sister Dot- Sorry, but this chapter wasn't any happier. Probably even sadder. But was it still good?