When Isabella entered her aunt and uncle's bedroom and her aunt shut the door immediately behind them, she knew something was up.

It didn't help that her uncle was perched at the edge of the bed either, looking oddly... hopeful. It was an expression she hadn't ever seen on his face in relation to her.

"Come here sweetheart, sit down," Gina guided Isabella towards the Queen-sized bed that was only draped with a folded tan sheet. "We wanted to talk to you about something."

"Is everything okay?" Isabella's brows knit together as she gingerly sat between the two.

"More than!" Gina reassured, and grabbed Isabella's hand in hers. Her aunt's eyes glistened a bit in the lamplight, as if she had been or was crying.

What is happening? Isabella thought to herself.

Tom cleared his throat. "It's been a tough eight months, to say the least."

"To say the least," Isabella replied, looking down at her lap.

She didn't feel the need to cry at the reminder of what had been of 1982 for her. She already got enough tears out in her shower, and was now completely emotionally exhausted.

Or so she thought.

"Which is why your uncle and I have been trying to think of ways to help you," Gina started again. "We're very worried that you seem to be going backwards. Staying the same is one thing, forwards is another. But backwards? Isabella, we're very worried."

Isabella clenched her free hand into a fist, and dug her thumbnail into the skin of her palm. It had served as an effective enough way for her to counteract the pain in her chest so it didn't ache asmuch.

"I'm trying," Isabella's lip quivered. "I'm sorry."

"You don't have to be sorry for anything," Gina put her arms around Isabella's slightly trembling shoulders. "We only want to help you. Can we ask you something?"

Isabella nodded.

"Do you think being here," Tom cleared his throat. "And not just here as in inside this house, but just this town generally, is making it harder for you to feel better?"

"I'm not sure. I don't know where else I could be that would change things," Isabella shrugged suspiciously.

"If we... had a plan for you, moving forward, would you trust us to go ahead with it?" Gina asked quietly.

"Like what?" The eleven-year-old asked quickly, the words coming out a million miles a second.

"Do you remember your mother's friend, Mary Austin? She was at the—"

"Yes," Isabella interrupted confusedly. "She's on the other side of the world. You've been talking?"

"A few times a week for the past month," Gina breathed.

Isabella detected... a sense of relief in her aunt's tone. As if Mary was some kind of savior.

"We think..." Tom paused for a moment. "We think that it might do you some good to spend time away from here."

Isabella completely froze. She felt like someone had sucker punched her in the throat, pulling all of the air from her lungs. Rain began to fall outside, pattering against the roof of the house. The sound of it pulled her back into reality.

"What your uncle is trying to say is that you can't heal in the environment that hurt you. Those were Mary's words, actually."

A rumble of thunder shook the house. There was no sign of blue sky that was there earlier when Isabella was making waves in the pool with her cousin, unaware of her aunt and uncle on the phone in the house as they made a decision that would ultimately change her life once again. Isabella knew then why Kate kept her outside the house with her for hours. The realization stung her momentarily.

"What does she know about what's good for me?" Isabella pushed Gina's hand off her knee. "She's seen me all but twice in my entire life, one being one of the worst days of my life. I could barely speak!"

"You know how much your mother adored Mary, sweetheart," Gina swallowed nervously. This was already going worse than she had expected, considering she hadn't gotten to the actual big news yet. "You know how close they were, even if you didn't talk to her often, your mother did."

Isabella's chest ached at the mentioning of her mother, and the memories that came flooding in with her aunt's words. Twice a month, her mother Ann would get on the phone with Mary the kitchen and they would catch up for hours, talking about their days in London where her mother stayed as she studied nursing abroad. It was Ann's precious alone time, and Isabella and Victoria respected it, staying out of the general area as their mother often laughed until she cried with a glass of white wine at her side.

As far as Isabella knew, Mary would cover the international bill that would come in every month. She'd seen the amount once on the table and gawked at it. That's when her father let her know that "the Brits" were always gracious enough to pay it.

"So, are you wanting me to talk to Mary on the phone or something?" Isabella turned to Gina. She didn't like how silent Tom had gotten, and it was clear he had news on the tip of his tongue that he wanted to blurt. Gina seemed more a bit more detached.

"No, not that," she shook her head.

"Ok good, because I really don't know her."

"Isabella," Tom cleared his throat again. Isabella didn't take her eyes off Gina. Her heartbeat began to thud harder, faster. "We've decided you're going to go spend some time with Mary."

"Mary's moving... here?" Isabella stiffened. Even at eleven, she was sharp enough to know that that wouldn't be the case. But at that moment it came naturally to her to assume the best, and not the worst.

Maybe if she speaks it into existence...

"No, Isabella," Tom replied flatly. "You're gonna go to London, where Mary lives. It'll be good for you to—"

"No way," Isabella freaked, eyes blurring with tears. "No, no. You can't do that to me. You can't!"

"Sweetheart, I promise we would never do anything to put you in harm's way, or anything to purposefully hurt you," Gina pleaded. "Something has to change, and we aren't helping you here. Mary is a lovely woman and she has a lot of time and energy on her hands, she couldn't be more ready to welcome you with open arms and give you what you need."

"Please don't, I'll do anything!" Isabella then grabbed her aunt's hands in hers in a desperate motion. "Please don't get rid of me, I know I'm awful but I'll be better, I will!"

"Isabella please trust us. It won't be forever, only until you feel more yourself," Gina begged. "Just think, you'll get to live in a great big house in London with a big back yard and there are lots of cats—"

"I don't even like cats!" Isabella began to bawl, and ran out of the room.

In that moment, to her aunt and uncle, she had not seemed more like a child than right now.

As Isabella shoved her face into her pillows and sobbed, she couldn't help but feel more unwanted than ever before. She knew she'd been a burden to this household for almost a year, but never once thought they'd get rid of her.

Gina and Tom gave Isabella about ten minutes of alone time, before entering her bedroom to speak with her again. After two knocks, they were in.

"Please go away, you don't want me anyway!" Isabella cried, belly down on the mattress and not lifting her face from her tear and snot-streaked pillow.

"We never said we didn't want you, sweetheart, please."

"You might as well have, sending me across the globe to live with a stranger!"

"We're the adults here, and you're just a kid. You need to trust us."

"You won't give me a second chance?"

"This is not about second chances," Gina swept a hand through her hair. Neither she nor Tom had sat on the bed. They both stood apprehensively at the foot of the mattress. "This is about you truly getting better."

"And not the kind of better where you pretend like you are, the kind where you really, truly heal. We haven't been able to help you."

Because you haven't tried hard enough, Isabella's own voice screamed in her head. She so desperately wanted to say it, but held her tongue. She was too afraid to say anything against them. She would hold onto the tiniest hope she could convince them to not make her go, and would until she was on a plane.

"When are you making me leave?" Came out instead.

Tom sighed at her word choice. "Two weeks."

"Oh my God," Isabella began to weep again, hands on her face.

Gina was tight lipped, and seemed on the verge of tears herself. Tom kept talking, but softened a bit.

"This isn't forever, remember that. Just... trust us. And if anything happens where you need us to interfere, you call us immediately. I'm only saying that because, as a father, I have to. I don't anticipate you getting into any trouble. They're good people."

As a father, Isabella thought. But not my father...

There was no arguing after that. Isabella had no fight left in her that evening. She could only hope that in the two weeks they had before she was off, they would suddenly realize what they were actually doing, apologize to her for even considering it, and call the whole thing off.

If only.