Author's Note *PLEASE READ*: This chapter includes sensitive details about my family. If you are a friend from school who knows me personally and knows my family, with the exception of Ayla Spencer and Jordan Perkins, please do not read this chapter. I don't want anything bad to happen regarding me or my family because of it. This chapter also includes very graphic depictions of violence and near-death experiences. It also briefly glazes over self-harm and is extremely sad and disheartening. If this is triggering to you or any way offends you, or if you are a friend that I know from school, do not read this chapter. I REPEAT: DO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER. Please and thank you.

All my love,

Em

"I'm breaking up with you."

Saying the words made me choke on my own tears. I wasn't ready to say it; I knew that now.

"No, you're not." Jenna gaped at me incredulously. "You're not!" "I am," I replied, with more distinction this time. "I'm sorry, but I am. It's over." "But you love me," Jenna said in a confused tone of voice, stepping closer. Instinctively, I took a step back.

"I do," I said, my voice cracking. "I love you more than anything in this world. But I'm still breaking up with you." "You're not breaking up with me!" Jenna practically screamed, and lunged forward. I backed up until I could go no further. She started to cry.

"How? Why? Why are you doing this to me? I've given you everything! Everything! I fucking love you, Emma! Why would you ever say that?" "You know why," I whispered. "I love you. But what you're doing, what you've done, this isn't love. I might love you, but I'm not stupid, bunny. I know you don't love me."

As soon as the last word was out of my mouth, Jenna had me pinned against the wall. She grabbed my face in her hands and shook me. "Don't you say that. Don't you ever tell me that I don't love you. I love you. I love you so much, it hurts. Do you hear me, Emma Kay?! I fucking love you!" 

"No," I said brokenly, tears streaming down my face. "I don't care. I'm still breaking up with you. I mean it, Jenna. We're done."

"No!" she screamed, and grabbed me by the shoulders. I flinched against her tight grip on my shoulder blade as she shook my body violently. "You can't! I won't let you!" Jenna threw me against the wall once more. I cried out in pain as my head hit the plaster. 

Jenna gathered me in her arms and held me. I fought against her, but she only held on tighter. "Let me go!" I screamed. She released me as if I had burned her, but grabbed my arm quickly and dragged me out of her camper, down her steps, and onto the campsite's front yard. 

"Stop!" I said. "My parents are sleeping in there! They'll hear you!" Jenna flicked her gaze from me to the early-morning sky, and then back to me. "I don't care." Her eyes darkened, and for a minute, I couldn't tell the pure blue from black. My heart pounded against my rib cage. Her eyes had never been that dark, for as long as I'd known her.

Before I had time to react, Jenna raised a hand and slapped me across the face. "I can't live without you," she sobbed, staring at my cheekbones, which had nasty bruises stretched across them due to the fact that I hadn't put on my makeup yet that morning.

"I can't live without you," Jenna repeated. "You can't make me try." I jerked my arm, trying to break free of the hold she had on my wrist, but she only gripped tighter. I could see finger-shaped bruises forming where she was clutching.

Suddenly, I became aware of everything. The bruises that lined my face. The hundreds of horizontal cuts that littered my thighs, the ones that Jenna hadn't forbade, but encouraged, that I put there, because it helped me deal with everything. The yellowed, fading marks on my ribs and hips. The bruises that dotted my arms from months of being handled much too roughly. The current state that my mind was in, where I thought that everything she said was entirely true. All of the times when she had called me a whore. The time when I broke, when I caught her in bed with another woman. And, lastly, all of the times when she held me gently against her chest and kissed my face, telling me how lucky she was to have me. 

The last of my weak resolve crumbled before my eyes and I began to sob violently. Jenna still held me at arm's length, not reacting to my state of distress. Her blatant ignorance to my pain only made me cry more. 

I'm alone.

No one notices.

No one cares.

I'm hurting, and she doesn't care.

I'm alone.

It's cold, it's dark, and I'm scared.

I'm trapped, and I'm all alone.

Before I realized what was happening, I felt bile rising at the back of my throat. I jerked in a different direction and threw up on the freshly-cut grass, gagging and choking on my own tears. When I finally acquired some control over myself, Jenna dragged me away again, off to the side, where the smell of vomit wasn't so ever-present.

"I'm going to change," she said, hoarsely. "I promise I am." "You've said that a million times," I said, tears still streaming down my face. "You've told me that you're getting better. That I just have to be patient and wait for you. Well, I tried that. I tried waiting, and it didn't work. I'm tired, Jenna-bunny. I don't want to wait anymore; I'm done."

"No!" Jenna screamed. It was so loud that I could hear the echo in the trees surrounding the lake. "You fucking bitch. You fucking whore!"

I flinched at her words, turning my face away from her cruel eyes that were boring holes into mine. "You fucking bitch," Jenna said, tears pouring down her face. "I trusted you! I trusted you and you betrayed me and I hate you! Do you hear me? I fucking hate you! I wish I never met you! I hate you, Emma Kay Fitzgerald!"

I began to cry again, as the words sank into my brain. Jenna wheeled, and hit me, faster than she ever had before. I felt my eye begin to swell. At that exact moment, a loud crash startled us both into turning around. What I saw relieved and scared me at the same time.

Standing in the doorway to my own camper, my father's large silhouette loomed against the bright, orange sun. I almost smiled, despite the circumstances. I'd done everything I could to keep my relationship's faults from my parents, but at the time, I was so desperate to get rid of the pain that I was feeling that I just couldn't be bothered to care.

I tried to yell for him, but for some reason my voice didn't want to work. Dad stepped out of the camper and walked down the steps. This angered Jenna, and she threw another punch to my ribs. I gasped, doubling over from the pain. I knew the instant that my father saw what was happening, because his eyes widened in utter shock.

I waited for him to come over and save me from her, but it never happened. I watched, as everything that I'd ever thought my father to be slowly slipped away. He stood where he was, and watched as Jenna continued to hit, kick, and shove me. More tears fell down my face as I realized that my dad wasn't going to make a move to stop me from being hurt.

For a second, we locked eyes. All I saw in his was a sort of TV-show indifference. Like he didn't even care that he was watching his only daughter slowly die at the hands of someone that she obviously loved too much to fight back to.

My father stood and watched for another minute or so, before walking back inside like nothing had ever happened. A sinking feeling of defeat began to take over my body.

Jenna was still screaming at me, and I still felt the pain of each of her punches. I looked up to meet her eyes just in time to see a galvanized water pipe coming towards my head.

The pain when it crashed against my skull was like nothing I had ever experienced before. My eyes spilled over with fresh tears, and my body became limp. I felt like I was floating on air. I had no control over my own limbs.

Just as soon as the numbing feeling from the blow with the pipe died down a little bit, I was greeted with another feeling: the horrible sensation of being choked.

I looked up and found that Jenna's hands were firmly wrapped around my neck. I brought my own hands to my neck then, desperately trying to pry her fingers off. 

"Jenna," I rasped. "Jenna!"

"I can't live without you," Jenna cried. "And I'm not going to try!"

She pressed harder and her grip became tighter. My vision became hazy and all I could see was Jenna's cruel, blue, ocean eyes staring into mine.

"You're going to kill me!" I managed to choke out, using what little strength and breath that I had left. Almost immediately, the pressure on my neck ceased. I felt her hands unwind themselves from around my neck, and I collapsed on the front lawn, gasping for air. 

"I'm so sorry," Jenna said, looking down at me coughing and struggling to bring air into my lungs. "Oh my god. Oh my god. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, Emmy. I wasn't going to. You have to believe me. I was not going to do it."

I looked up at her through my teary lashes.

I wish that was true.

"I'm so sorry," Jenna whispered. She walked over and laid beside me, stroking my hair. For once in my life, Jenna's touch felt cold on my body.

I can't do it.

I can't get away from her.

Not now.

Not ever.

I was trapped.