Chapter 7:
Hey ya'll! Hope you guys enjoyed the last chapter! I'm going to keep updating this story every day/every other day so that you guys don't have to wait so long for chapter updates.
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I just want to die.
What's the point in living? I have no one. My whole life consists of hanging with my half-brother's older friends' and thinking about my past. All I seem to think about is my step-father. How he raped me; the things he did to me.
I actually considered suicide at one point of my life. When I was 10, my step-father started raping me. A thing such as that is not something a normal 10 year old experiences. The violence and drama got to a breaking point for me about 2 years later.
I turned to drugs. I became bulimic. I wouldn't eat. Couldn't sleep. I had nobody. All I had was bitter, cold, abuse.
The only thing stopping me from killing myself was my mom.
What would they think when they found me, drowned or hung? My mother would be devastated, and my step-father would eventually have killed her for sure. She was the thing keeping me alive. I did not want to hurt her; I wanted to stick by so that she would have someone to endure the abuse with.
But once again, I have to be the adult because she left me alone. She killed herself. She pitied herself and abandoned me. No matter what I do, nothing seems to be good enough to keep people I love alive. I must be quite an awful person if everyone around me dies. Why not just end it already?
The flashbacks are progressively getting worse; I don't think I can stop them any longer.
As Emily holds me in her arms, all these thoughts rush through my head. She strokes my hair and picks me up off of the tile floor. She holds my legs and supports my neck as she lays me on the couch. As soon as she lays me down, I slouch into the comforting arms of the couch. The maroon colored velvet rubs against my skin as I stare into space. If I close my eyes, I could have a panic attack, so I decide to keep them open.
I stare at the tan colored wall; just staring, not even blinking. My mind is blank. It's as if my emotions crawled out from under my skin when I was crying in Emily's arms.
Emily looks at me, but I pretend not to notice. We stare into space for a moment. She sits on the couch next to me.
"You know you're going to have to talk about these 'nightmares' sooner or later," Emily says.
No I won't. I can do whatever the hell I like. I look into her eyes, trying to give her the cold shoulder, but of course it doesn't work. Her compassion lights up the room like a light bulb; I can't ignore what's standing in front of me. Her eyes melt my soul like chocolate, and my eyes can't help but soften at the presence of her.
Emily notices my change in body language and decides to start asking me more questions. "How long have these nightmares been going on?"
"Too long," I mutter to myself, not realizing that she can hear me.
She senses my discomfort and changes the subject. "You know I didn't have the easiest childhood either…" I look up at her. "I moved around a lot when I was younger and never made many friends. I was vulnerable, stupid and young... My mom was never around, and she didn't know about half the things that happened during my childhood."
She clears her throat, and I realize she is going to share something really personal. "My father would blame my mother for not being at home; he hated her job. He was angry all of the time, and when he would get drunk, he would do some scary things." She clears her breath. Shakily, she continues on. "One time, my dad was really angry and drunk; he and my mom had just had a fight over the phone, and he turned to the bottle for comforting. After he had hung up the phone, I came out to ask him if I could go to dinner with one of my friends, Matthew. He called me selfish and said that no one would ever love me. And of course, he said I couldn't go to dinner with Matthew." I see the hurt in her eyes as she continues on.
"Soon he started asking me questions; why I was such a 'slut', why I was gothic, why I spent more time with my mom than him. He was always jealous, even though he didn't need to be. My mother loved him," she whispers. I give her a look of empathy, tears falling from my eyes.
"He started walking towards me with a kind of darkness in his eyes. He shoved me against the wall and slapped me, kicked me, and punched me."
"What he didn't know was that I was pregnant," she says.
I gasp.
"My boyfriend was abusive, and at the time, I was in love with him. There was no one else there for me, and I thought what he gave me was love; it was not," she says. "That night when my dad was beating me up, I had a miscarriage. There was blood everywhere. I was so scared," she squeaks. "Still am now. But that miscarriage scarred me for life. I was looking forward to having that baby. I was scared to death, but still happy, even though I was a little bit young to have a child. That night when my dad was hitting me, he almost killed me. I had to go to the emergency room."
She pauses, and a tear streams down her cheek. I give her a hug and lean on her shoulder.
"When I got there, I was in the hospital for a couple days. At the end of my visit, the doctors told me what prescriptions to take as well as that I could never…" she pauses.
"Never have children..." Her voice cracks. "No one knows, and every time I interact with kids and an agent comes up to me and says 'you'd make a great mom', it just hurts even more. Sometimes I just cry because I haven't always been the kick-ass SSA that I am now. No one knows who I really am. If there was one person in the world right now that needed me to tell them my struggles in order to know they're not alone; it would be you."
We look at each other. I suddenly become emotional and hide my head under the blanket that has been covering my now shivering feet. This is killing me. Her bringing this up makes it even worse. I can't hide this anymore. But it just hurts too much, hurts too much...
I want to open up to her, but I'm so scared. I don't want to re-live it. Not again.
"Honey, while I haven't been in your situation, I know what it feels like to feel pain and sorrow. You can talk to me," Emily says while tears are streaming down her face. She rubs my back, trying to give me some comfort.
I cry even harder. My voice cracks. "…I c-c-aaan-tt."
"Yes you can, you're strong honey," she whispers.
"No, NO I can't," I cry. "I can't trust you. I can't… I can't trust anyone," my voice shrinks as I continue.
"Why Bells, why can't you trust me? I know your mother committed suicide, but that doesn't mean she didn't love you."
Finally, I've had enough of the lies. Enough of the silence. "Then why has EVERYONE left in my life? Why did my dad leave? Why did my mom leave? For god's sake, even my...step-father...left me. No one ever cares enough to stick around. I care about others, and in the end, I'm always the fall guy. I know it sounds whiney, but everyone has left me. I don't trust people because once I do, they betray my trust. Every. Single. Time." I look away to avoid eye contact with her.
"Honey, they loved you, I know they did. How could they not love someone like you?" She looks me up and down. "Your mom probably committed suicide because of her choices, she probably thought she had lost her battle, and that it was time to give up," Emily says calmly.
But I'm not calm. I'm hysterical.
"How could you even say that?" I screech. "Left me because she loved me? She left me because she was tired?" I look at Emily, animosity glaring through my eyes. "Do you know how LONG it's been since she said she loved me? Huh? 10 years. Yeah, that's a long time. She cared about her husband instead of her own daughter. She never cared about me, at least not more than him. She was completely in love with him; she would do ANYTHING FOR HIM. For me? NO. She left me alone, weak and vulnerable; she left me to be devoured by the wolves. Even if she didn't physically abandon me, she SURE AS HELL DID MENTALLY." I pause. "I'm going to the guest room," I hiss at her. I storm off.
(Emily POV)
I'm in shock.
I really have no idea who she is.
I just thought she was having a hard time dealing with her mother's death; this is so much more than that. She is grieving her mother, her father leaving her when she was younger, and grieving for herself. But underneath that anger and pain, there's something hidden; something that is causing her a great deal of stress. I decide to ask her about it and go into her room, but because my guest bedroom is usually empty, I don't bother to knock.
(Bella POV)
I decide to change into my pajamas. I'm too tired to argue with Emily about my mom; if she had grown up in my household, she sure as hell would know that no one in that household cared about me enough to care for me properly. Just as I'm pulling off my shirt, Emily barges in.
My back is to the door, and not realizing that my shirt is only about a third on, I yell at Emily. I don't mean to sound so harsh, but it comes out badly considering the mood I'm in.
"What the HELL," I scream. "Don't you knock? Jeeze."
But as I make eye contact with her, I automatically notice my mistake.
She sees it.
My eyes start to water and I pull my shirt over my body before attempting to run out the front door. This was the one thing I didn't want anyone to know about.
(Emily POV)
As I walk into my guest room, I forget to knock. Big Mistake.
As I open the door, Bella has her back turned to me, and she is in the process of pulling her shirt over her head. She turns around and looks at me, eyes like daggers.
"What the HELL, Emily," she yells. Just as she says that, I notice the untidy letters on her stomach. 'You wanted it, you little whore,' it says across half her stomach, in big, ugly letters. Oh my god, what the hell happened to her?
Apparently the shock is obvious on my face because she looks down to see her shirt is not covering her whole front. She realizes that I saw her scars. Her eyes well up with tears and pain. She tries to run past me out of the house.
(Bella POV)
Oh God.
Why did she have to find out about this; no one will ever want me now.
My feet gain a mind of their own and start running towards the front door.
All of the sudden, Emily slides in front of me. "Stop," she says sternly. I push past her. "I'm not a dog, you can't tell me to stay."
She steps in front of me. "I told your brother I would look after you tonight. It's also quite obvious that you've been through some hardships in the past few years."
"No I haven't!" I downright lie to her face, but she sees right through it.
"Please honey, let me help you. I promise I will be here for you every step of the way," she says. We walk over to the couch and sit down. "Remember what I told you, you're not alone. Let me help you." I look into her eyes and see a slight sadness as well as happiness.
I look at her. "It's too soon," I whisper.
Emily gives me a look of defeat. "Okay, Bella. Promise me one thing."
"Yeah?"
"Promise to tell me the truth…about everything. Whether you decide to get moral support is your choice, but I'll be here. I'll be thinking of you every step of the way. You can call me anytime or anywhere. You can talk to me whenever you're ready." She gives me a sad smile.
I wrap my arms around her small waist and give her a long hug. "Thank you... You don't know what that means to me." Tears fall slowly from my eyes, except this time they're happy. I'm crying happy tears because I once again have someone to trust.
Hey guys, sorry I haven't updated this since Tuesday. I was trying to figure out a good way to write this, so I've been editing/thinking/writing since yesterday. I hope you guys liked it; I tried to write this as realistically as possible. I didn't want Bella spilling all of her secrets so early in the story, so I'm going to try to drag it out. If you have any suggestions for the next chapter, PLEASE tell me, because I have no idea what it will be about. (Maybe I'll write about her starting school.) Reviews, follows, and favorites are EXTREMELY appreciated. (: