I stood in front of John, waiting for the impact. It was dawn now, and I assumed someone found us, my heart pounded against my chest like an animal in a cage.

They were not coming from the rigged staircase, so there must have been some other secret entrance nearby. I looked around the room, trying to figure out the source.

I heard one person speaking, and then another. Then, a panel in the wall across the way opened, it was a secret door.

"Who's there!?" I called, trying to be threatening.

I heard only footsteps. Looking, I saw a petite person step out of the darkness.

"Oh my- Amanda!" A strong relief washed over me. "I have never been so happy to see you!" it came out like a laugh.

"And..." I began, observing her. "I would hug you, but I don't know if you would appreciate it." I told her, folding my arms.

"Good call." She told me; she was dirty, bloody, and obviously exhausted. She approached John. I stepped back.

"The safe and Daniel are downstairs. I'm not strong enough to bring the safe up by myself."

"I'm sure Rivielle would be happy to help you." He looked at me, I nodded. "Did you administer to him the antidote?" He asked Amanda.

"Yes. He passed out after we escaped the bathroom. He's unconscious at the moment." She turned towards the entrance that she came through, gesturing for me to follow her.

"We have to hurry." She said.

-

"What did he do?" I asked, observing the pale looking teenager that was passed out on the floor. I thought he was familiar. But I could not understand why he would be a test subject, after all, he was just a kid. "He's...just a kid."

"He wasn't being tested." Amanda lifted him up. "This is his father's test. He's just a pawn in our game."

I understood then, and I picked his legs up carefully, noticing how much blood was on him. I got some of it on my palms, and I wiped it off on my jeans. Amanda frowned, telling me, "He killed Xavier."

My eyes widened. "Woah..."

"Good work Danny." I said dejectedly, as I held Daniel Matthew's legs up. Amanda held his arms as we brought him up the safe stairwell from the back entrance. We laid his inert body in front of John, and went back for the safe. Amanda and I heaved the safe onto the pulley that she made to bring it up easier.

"Are you sure we can do this?" I asked her.

"I've done my part. The worst has yet to come, and that's John's job."

I blinked. "What do you -ugh- mean?" I shoved the safe further up.

Amanda held the rope, and pulled, while I pushed from behind.

"Ask him yourself." She pulled the rope a few more inches, and then it was done.

We rolled the safe over to John. Amanda went back down to the van to get the oxygen tank for the kid. John and I were alone as I sat on the floor, Daniel between us.

"John...what is going to happen tonight?" I bit the nail on my index finger.

"Nothing so out of the ordinary. Wills will be tested, people brought to their breaking points." I could see him smiling from behind his oxygen mask. As he removed it, he became more serious in his tone. "Do not worry about me."

I stood up as I heard Amanda's return, "I'm always going to be worried about you. Even when I'm not allowed to show it, it's there." I couldn't help that. "You mean more to me, than myself." I told him, trying to make him believe me.

"I deeply care for you as well. I know that I can-" He took a breath from his mask. "-rely on you."

Before I could respond, I heard Amanda bringing a large oxygen tank up the stairs. I helped her set Daniel in the safe and place the mask over his face to help him breathe. He mumbled something groggily to me but I couldn't understand him. Amanda urged me to hurry and not to let him get a good look at my face, however disoriented he may be. She came over quickly with a syringe in her hand, injecting Daniel's arm with it.

"What is that for?" I asked.

"To make sure he stays unconscious until the game is over." She replied, fixing his legs into a better position.

I left it to Amanda to connect the safe to the timer. I sprinted over to the monitors, where the tape had ended. I covered the recording equipment and rewound the tape to the start, placing it on a timed play. Once someone entered the room, a sensor would go off and the video would begin to play. There was, once again, no sound so there was no chance of someone giving the actual time away, creating the illusion of a live feed.

When I returned, Amanda was locking the safe with Daniel inside. She looked up at me, and then at the clock on the wall. "We have to pick up a few things from the store." She told me.

Shaking my head, I pointed at her blood-stained clothes and arms. "You can't go like that. Just...stay here, and get cleaned up. I'll go." I insisted.

She appeared reluctant, but was forced to accept due to John's approval. "Amanda. Give her the list, the money and the keys to the van."

She hesitated, handing me fifty dollars and a piece of paper. Then she went to the table and handed me the keys that lay on it. "Make sure you get everything, and don't spend too much time there. We might need you." I was hurrying off before she finished her sentence.

-

I bolted outside, it was very early and most stores werent open yet. I was unlocking the van's door when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I spun with a gasp, dropping the keys, only to see Mark bending to pick them up.

"You scared me." I told him, a hand over my beating heart.

"I'm sorry." He told me.

"No, I'm okay, just don't do that please, I'm jumpy enough as it is-"

"No." He interjected, "I'm sorry...about Addison."

I looked down, staring at my shoes, "Don't be. I wasn't being good to you, I know now...I mean I don't think she was anybody's fault."

"You lost your good friend last night, and for that I'm sorry. You of all people...I didn't want it to happen."

I nodded solemnly, almost forgetting the task at hand.

"Will you come with me? I have to pick up some things for John."

He accepted, and I hopped into the driver's seat much to his resentment. "Please don't double park. You don't know what I had to go through to get my car back."

I grinned, feeling guilty, but amused. "I won't."

-

Inside the pharmacy, I looked at the list for the first time. Which was mostly vitamins, nutritional energy bars and drinks, and fruit. Everything was so specific, I didn't know where to go first. I stared around blankly for a second.

"Here, give me the list, I know what to get." Mark told me. He had obviously done the shopping before. Before Amanda and myself were ever even thought of. I watched Mark lead me down aisle six and wondered what he did to get involved with John. Well, judging from the limited time we had, I decided I would store the question away, and ask him later.

"Here," He handed me the basket with all the items on the list. "You should pay for these." He smirked.

"Just you wait, I'm going to get good at this stuff." He followed me to the register.

The woman at the register looked way too much like my mother, but younger.

She smiled at me, and I froze up, almost forgetting to hand her the items. Mark noticed I think, but he didn't say a word.

-

I was driving faster on the way back, my nerves on edge.

Mark was looking at me, I wondered if I was being so obvious.

"I said I was sorry." He told me.

"I know that, Mark."

"You just look a little, unsatisfied. I can't say anything more than I already have." His tone was calm.

"I'm not mad at you...I can trust you, right Mark?" I look at him, but only for a moment, because I have to keep my eyes on the road. It was still very early, and there were few cars out. Still, I took no chances.

He was taken aback, "Of course. You know that."

"I've just been thinking about this, and I can't keep it in any longer. I need to tell somebody."

"Tell me." He said.

I pulled over to the side of the road, knowing that once I start talking, I won't be able to stop.

I put the van in park, staring directly ahead of me, recalling one of my earliest memories. One of the many that shaped me into a person who John saw fit to be tested. I went back in time, my memory showing me everything down to the smallest detail. It's funny how sometimes you can't remember the simplest things, like where you left your house keys, or what you ate for lunch yesterday. But the moments that make you or break you, will forever haunt you.

I exhaled deeply before I began, "I just want to be able to hold onto something, somebody who I know won't go away. Or look at me like I'm some mistake. When I was a kid, my dad wasn't there...and my mom, she acted like I was some piece of him that wasn't as good..." I began telling him something I had never told anyone, and would never tell again until now.

-

I stand in front of the closet door where my mother keeps everything my father left behind. I have never been inside and yet I am sure that whatever is inside is something I want to see. My mother is asleep on the couch, the remote control dangling from her limp hand and it is falling over the side of the couch. She sleeps wildly, sometimes thrashing about the bed like a madwoman during a dream. I know this, as I am still young enough to sleep beside her in her bed; as well as the fact that we live in a one bedroom apartment in the city. We have struggled all my life, however short it's been so far. She looks afraid most of the time, and I want to show her I am brave. I often act boyish and present her with dead snakes, worms and beetles that I find in the park. I assume this will make her know that I'm not afraid of anything. Then maybe she wont be anymore.

She is the most beautiful woman I have ever known. I watch her comb her wavy hair in the mirror. Her eyes are pretty, I can tell, but it's hard for most people who look at her to notice. They only see the bags underneath her eyes as she can't sleep at night. I lie awake, holding my old bear tightly, listening to her crying quietly. She tries very hard, even at my age, I am aware. I watch her mend my overalls, and run my baths. I help her make spaghetti and smile at her when she can't smile at me. She loves me, but she doesn't like me. She says I "look too much like my father." and I wonder if I can take a picture of myself and make a MISSING flier, so I can find him. I don't know who he is but I want him. I want him to hug me and kiss my momma, I want him to look at me and tell me how much we are alike. I want to feel like he is mine, and I am his.

So I stand in front of the closet door. I reach for the knob and it is cool under my small hand. I wonder if I should just forget about it and get a bowl of cereal before catching a Sesame Street marathon on the small tv that my mother isn't watching. I grow up to hate television because I don't want to become my mother, who can spend a day emotionally ignoring me until she falls asleep in the middle of 'All My Children'. She watches soaps to make her real life dissapear.

The door is still there and it is yelling at me, it tells me how badly I want to see inside.

'Just a little peek' I vow to myself.

I begin to turn the knob slowly and as quietly as I can, looking back every couple seconds to see if my mother has stirred from the sound. I am afraid of what she will do if she catches me. I know she would hate me if I let on that I was curious about the man who didn't care about either of us. The door opens a little, I try to make no sound. I poke my head inside. I see a suitcase, a cardboard box and an old, unloaded, shotgun. I stare at these things for a long while. I am a small girl staring at things that mean nothing and everything to me. They belonged to the man who is one half of me, and now they belong to no one. They are worthless, hidden away in a closet like a dirty secret. I wonder if my mother will do this to everything that once belonged to him, and I am afraid that someone will find me among the worthless items someday. A symbol of the man who caused her the most pain she had ever felt.

I am a child, and I will grow up into both of my parents. One side of me, is diligent and mindful, maternal as can be. I am sad in this aspect because I feel that the love I can give will never pay off for me. Scared of the future and wounded by the past. My other side is insecure and full of remorse. I hate anything that reminds me of my wrongs, and yet I love them. I can be irresponsible because I fear rubbing off on the thing I must care for. I feel shame when I am bad, but there is a sick pleasure that comes from it because I know that nobody will care enough to reprimand me.

I want to touch the items inside the closet. I want to identify with these things because we are the same. We are all things which once held value for the same person, and then we were forgotten, abandoned under the same roof. I have no friends because they all have fathers. They tell me that I am a bastard and they give me strange looks when my mother drops me off at school with a cigarette in her hand. 'Theres nothing wrong with her' I tell them, but they don't believe me. I dont even believe myself.

I creep inside the closet, hands outstretched towards the cardboard box. I am very close and I feel excited. Suddenly, I feel a tight grip on my arms. She is pulling me out, and she's upset. She yells, but I can't hear her. All I hear is the voice in my head that tells me I'm crazy. Then, she slaps me across the face for the first time in my life and I am too stunned to feel the sting of her hand. Now I hear every word she says, and it scars me forever. "Dont you ever go inside that closet, do you hear me?!" She shakes me hard because I'm not responding to her the way she wants. I am a robot. "I said, 'Do you hear me?' You little bitch!"

"She dragged me into the room, and she beat me for ten minutes..." I breathed slowly as I told him, trying to keep from crying. "She had never done that before. I didn't know what to do, so I just laid on the bed and let her hit me! I didn't move and I didn't cry, I know it's so weird now that I think of it..." My voice fell to a whisper as I confessed, "But do you know something, Mark? In a sick way...I wanted her to beat me. I wanted her to take everything my father did to her out on me, so that maybe..." My voice broke, "Maybe, she could beat me to make herself happy again. Because I wanted her to be happy more than myself. I thought, 'do whatever you have to do momma, just be okay! Just dont hate me!'" I was crying long before I finished my sentence. I was bawling hysterically over the steering wheel, he reached over, trying to hold me, but I fought him off.

"It's okay!" He told me, trying to make me open my eyes and look at him. "It's okay, I'm here. I'm here, you're safe. you're safe." He tried to get a grip onto my arms and shoulders, but I was holding him back from me.

"You're safe, Ellie, you're safe. Trust me, nothing can hurt you. I have you."

He must have said it one hundred times before I was finally convinced, and let him take me into his arms.

"Say something to me." I pleaded with him. "Make me forget." Hot tears spilled down my face.

He rocked me in his arms, easing me into comfort. "I love you." He didn't mumble, or stumble over his words.

I froze for the slightest moment. He felt that and held me closer, I let him. I liked his body heat, I liked his touch. He felt like home.

The kind I never knew.

"Say you promise." I managed to gasp through my tears. I was holding him back, for dear life.

"I promise I love you. I promise I will never make you cry, lay a hand on you, or abandon you." He kissed my forehead, but I was dissatisfied.

Holding him to me, I captured his lips with the greatest ease, breaking us apart only to speak, "I love you back."

-