*TRIGGER WARNING: this chapter contains mild content of sexual abuse. Please read with caution or skip select scenes entirely*

Sister? Melanie had a little sister?

I try to search her eyes but she's squeezed them shut, as if fighting off a memory. This is the first time I've ever heard of her having a sister. All I can do is stare disbelievingly as she continues.

"She was too young to remember Mom and Dad when they died in the crash. I mean she had some memories but they didn't last too long because she'd been what, probably five years old? I was eleven at the time and I'd somehow seen the worst parts of life before I even hit puberty. My world was ripped out from underneath my feet but I held it together for her. Rebecca. She was all I had left. We were both too scared and alone. I would have done anything to protect her and...I did."

A breath shudders out of her and she snatches her hand out of mine, crossing her arms and leaning back against the headboard. Her eyes are still closed but the tears are coming steadily. I can't shake the feeling that she's about to tell me something that will change everything.

"For the first few months after our parents died, we were sent to different group homes but no one wanted to keep us because we came in a pair. It was hard enough that I was a pre-teen but Becca...she was deaf. Meningitis when she was three. No one wanted us because we were too much to handle."

That explains the ASL. I release a heavy sigh as I try to imagine an eleven year old Melanie scrambling to keep her family together. At least I had Gramps when I lost my folks. I was in lucky in that regard. Who did Melanie and her sister have?

"Then we got lucky. Finally caught a break about five months later. Mom's sister got in contact after her and her husband were living abroad. They changed homes so many times no one could find them at first. All the addresses were mixed up but they were finally located and came to get Becca and I. We finally had family to live with. We moved in with Aunt Susan and Uncle Gary immediately. They were loaded. They had a really nice home and Becca and I got our own rooms and they even started learning ASL for her. It almost made losing our parents bearable. I felt like I could breathe again because Becca wasn't my sole responsibility anymore. I had help and I could be a kid again. Everything was pretty great for a while."

She pauses then, her breath catching as she places her shaking hand over her mouth, that same haunted look returning to her eyes. My heart drops to the floor because I just fucking know what she's going to say and I don't think I can hear it. A few moments pass before she gains the composure to speak, swallowing hard.

"One night..." A sob escapes her before she can finish her sentence and she ducks her head, inhaling and exhaling large breaths. I want to tell her to stop, tell her that she doesn't have to do this right now, but she holds a hand out like she knows what I'm about to say. She wipes at her eyes and sits up straight, putting her game face on. "One night while I was asleep, the door to my room opened. At first I thought it was Becca because she liked to sneak in to sleep next to me but it wasn't her. Uncle Gary...he sat next to my bed and petted my forehead and started telling me how much he loved me. Sweet Melanie. That's what he called me. He always did love my name. We'd been living with them for about a month so I didn't think anything of it. But then when he got into bed beside me and I asked him what he was doing, he said he was showing me how much he loved me. I knew it was wrong, I felt this awful feeling in my stomach, but I didn't stop him because I didn't quite understand at first. He took his time, putting his hand between my legs first and then inside my pajamas and I was frozen with fear. I wanted to stop him but I couldn't."

My stomach drops.

Fucking bottoms out and churns with the most intense nausea I'm surprised I don't throw up because Jesus Christ, I'm going to be fucking sick.

I look away before Melanie can see my face. I usually have an unshakable poker face but it's impossible to contain the horror I'm feeling. I want to believe this isn't happening, want to walk the fuck away, but this isn't what she needs right now. She's telling me the darkest parts of her life and she needs me to hold my shit together otherwise she'll regret saying a word. I don't want her to regret trusting me. I can lose sleep over this on my own time. Thankfully, she's looking out the window and not paying any attention to me. Her jaw sets and she looks more pissed than pained right now.

"Then he got his pants down and that's when I snapped out of it. Started to scream. He covered my mouth and told me if I said a word to anyone, he'd send Becca and I back to the group homes. He'd kick us out and then Becca wouldn't have a place to sleep or food to eat everyday or a decent school to go to. All his words, not mine. He knew how much I cared about Becca and that I'd do anything for her. She was my biggest weakness and he used her against me to get what he wanted. He played all his cards right."

My fingers curl into my sleep bottoms tightly. The sick fuck. To even think that he touched Melanie, my Melanie...if I ever see him, I'll kill him. Pound his face into the ground until he's six feet under. I only wish I'd been there to protect her then, to stop it from happening to her. She was a fucking kid. A child. An eleven year old child for fuck's sake. Who in their sick fucking mind would do something like that?

"So I let him," She admits quietly. She's still facing the window but I can see the sheer agony on her face. The regret, the anguish, the anger. It's beyond me that this is something she's had to live with her whole life. How does she stand on her own two feet? "I let him finish what he started because I didn't want to ruin Becca's life. I knew I wouldn't be able to take care of her because I was a kid myself. In that moment, I had no choice. After that first time, it never stopped. He was smart about it too — never more than once every couple of weeks in case Aunt Susan wondered where he went off to in the middle of the night. I thought about telling her for the record but Uncle Gary handled all the finances. He paid for Becca and I so Aunt Susan wouldn't have been able to take care of us on her own. We would have been screwed either way. In the meantime, he kept screwing me whenever he could."

I flinch at her choice of words, of the image they put in to my mind. I don't even want to think about that for a fucking second. I drop my head between my knees and force myself to keep my mind blank before I get sick. I can't think of Melanie like that. I can't believe that something this fucking inhumane happened to her. It's not right. It's not fucking fair.

"It got worse when I went through puberty because my body started changing and he became even more attracted to me. I tried to rebel even more the older I got, tried to put up a fight. I brought home boyfriends and purposely got physical with them in front of him to piss him off. I tried dating big dudes, guys way older than me so they could scare Uncle Gary, brought them home and told him if he laid another hand on me he'd get his ass kicked. I tried everything I could think of because it was up to me. If I told anyone about the situation, CPS would have been contacted and Becca and I would have been separated. I was on my own and I did everything I could but he would just find new excuses to throw in my face to get me to stop."

"By the time I was in high school Becca was attending a special school of her own for deaf children and it cost a shit ton of money. He threatened to stop paying her fees and she would have been forced to go to public school which she hated. Kids picked on her and she always felt more at home, more happy, at her deaf school. I couldn't take that away from her and he knew it. He manipulated me every step of the way, always used my love for Becca against me every time I rebelled or put up a fight against him, and he somehow always took me down. I'd been roped in to his shit time and time again and before I knew it, it'd been going on for six years."

I stand up abruptly because I can't hear anymore. I'm physically sick, my stomach twisting with warning that I might throw up at any moment. This...this can't be right. Melanie? My badass, know-it-all, confident Melanie? And for six. Fucking. Years? Christ. I hold my stomach and clamp my mouth shut to ward off the bile rising my throat. This feels surreal, like I'm caught in the middle of a really bad fucking joke and I need it to be over. Need this entire night to be erased from my memory.

"I know it's a lot," She whispers. "Should I stop?"

Shit. What am I doing? I force myself to get my shit together and sit back down, levelling her with a serious expression to let her know she should keep going. She shouldn't be concerned about me, not when she's re-living this kind of horror. I gesture my hand for her to continue and she nods, looking down again.

"As time went on I kept telling myself to do it for Becca and that I would get us both out of there when I turned eighteen. We'd run away and I'd take care of her. She was supposed to be in my custody once I was legal anyways so I started saving up my own money to prepare for the day it would just be us. I got into art around that time and started making pieces to sell. I also started creating tattoo designs and selling them to studios. I worked part time as a waitress. I was trying to save as much money as I could. I told myself to just wait it out and suck it up because everything would fall into place. I'd even learned to just tune out when Uncle Gary came to my room so I stopped feeling anything once he got going. I was numb to it. I taught myself how to live with it, how to survive it. I was prepared to live like that for as long as I needed to."

"Just a few months before my eighteenth birthday, I remember waking up in the middle of the night because I heard crying. It was coming from Becca's room and somehow I just knew. I got there as fast as I could and when I busted the door open, I found Uncle Gary on top of her. Becca was only eleven, like me when it happened the first time. I didn't care anymore after that. He could have done whatever he wanted to me and I let him but Becca was off limits. I didn't care if I wasn't legal yet or that they could call the cops on us; I packed all our shit and threatened to ruin his life if he ever came near us again. Aunt Susan woke up during the commotion and I told her everything. She didn't believe me or maybe she didn't want to but I knew I couldn't count on her support and help. That was the final push I needed to get me and Becca out of there. We didn't have a place to go but anywhere was better than that shit hole. So we started living on the streets."

My eyes widen a fraction. She was living on the streets with her little sister? After all of that?

"I did the best I could. Down the line I stole a car for us to live in so that we would be somewhat safe. I tried attending high school regularly and made sure Becca went to all her classes but it became impossible. I couldn't finish my senior year and Becca's fees weren't being paid so we both had to leave school. I picked up more shifts and kept making art, never leaving Becca out of my sight. I knew my best wasn't enough, though. She was losing weight and getting sick and she was terrified of the world. A deaf kid living on the streets isn't exactly an idea situation. It made me regret leaving that place because at least we'd had a roof over our heads and food on our table and Becca was getting an education. I thought about going back and I almost did, thought about making Becca sleep in bed with me so I could keep her safe if we had no choice but to live with that asshole. But I never got the chance."

Then her face comforts into grief and I just know I'm about to learn why she's speaking of her sister in the past tense. She's unable to speak right away, reaching for her glass of water but stopping short when she realizes it's empty. I stand up to go get her some more but she shakes her head, motioning for me to sit down. She looks like her teeth are being pulled out against her own will but it also seems like she's trying to prove to herself that she can do this. I place a tentative hand on her knee and she smiles faintly, her hand latching on to mine.

"For my birthday, Becca wanted to get me new art supplies so she tried to rob a store. I admit I'd stolen a few times before, things like clothes and food and tampons, but I didn't think she picked up on it. Anyways, I was working a shift and she was in her usual booth but managed to slip away because it was rush hour. I...I didn't even notice. I was still in the middle of work when I got the call and it felt like a bad dream. A terrible, horrible, bad fucking dream. I got to the hospital as fast as I could but by then she was gone. Apparent the alarm went off and the store clerks were chasing her. She panicked and she was in such a hurry to escape, she didn't see the car turning the corner while she ran across the street. It honked but of course she couldn't hear so...she got hit. Her injuries were too extensive so she died within ten minutes. That was the day I lost everything."

Jesus Christ.

Even if I could speak right now, I don't think I would have the words. All I can do is stare at Melanie who seems like a completely different person and wonder how the hell she's here in front of me right now. Her past...it sounds nothing like the life she's made for herself now. How does one go from that to this? How does one continue to live after going through all of that?

She must see the questions in my eyes because she shrugs. "I've had a shit life, big guy. After losing Becca I gave up on myself. I thought a lot about killing myself. They were dark days and I was at my absolute worst. I honestly didn't think I was going to live any longer."

And I don't think anyone can blame her for thinking that way. But what saved her? Melanie watches as I sign the words how and move on. I hate that I can't speak right now, not even by choice. I want to say something but my voice is doing that thing where it burns in warning when I try to talk. It's just not happening right now.

"I guess you could say life owed me a few," She chuckles humourlessly, swiping away the tears on her cheek. "Aunt Susan and Uncle Gary were Becca's emergency contact so they showed up to the hospital the day she died. I lost it on them. Took them into a room and told them it was their fault, that I had to fend for Becca and I alone and that she was gone because of them. I threatened to tell the police everything because there was an ongoing investigation. I'd never seen Uncle Gary look so afraid before. When Aunt Susan saw the look on his face that's when she realized I was telling the truth about everything. She was disgusted and horrified and Uncle Gary was at the verge of losing everything. He was desperate so he wrote me a fat cheque because he didn't want to go jail. He was a dumbass. The justice system wouldn't have been on my side anyways. The rape accusations would have been just that — accusations. I had no proof and my only witness, the only person who knew what was happening to me, was dead. But if there's anything I learned from him it was how to play my cards right. That day I did. I also made him pay for Becca's funeral and her burial. Only then did I walk away without looking back and started over. I had no choice but to keep going. There was nothing left for me in the past."

I run a hand through my hair, trying to process everything. So many things click into place. Her knowledge of ASL. Not wanting to stay in another man's home. Locking the door at night. The way she reacted when that guy grabbed her ass. How much she hates her name. Sweet Melanie. Fuck me. I...I always suspected bits and pieces of her past but this? My mind can't even fathom that this is how bad things were for her. It's no wonder she's so untrusting of the world, always pushing others away. She lost everyone. Everything. How do you come back from that? How did she?

"That cheque kept me going for a while," For once since she started talking, she doesn't look anguished or destroyed. There's determination on her face and I'm floored by her strength. I don't know how many people could have gone through what she did and completely turned their life around. "I finished high school and college using the money. I even tried to get into law because I wanted a steady job once I was almost out of Uncle Gary's money but my passion was art. Tattooing. After everything I'd been through I figured I owed it to myself to do something I love. To put myself first for once. It was a risky move and to this day I'm struggling financially but I don't give a fuck. It makes me happy and that's something you can't buy with any amount of money. I never thought I would be happy again but...I am. I'm okay. Some days are hard but for the most part, I got through everything."

Fuck yeah, she did. If I thought she was incredible before it's nothing compared to what I think of her now. I was wrong to think of her as anything but confident and brazen and kick-ass. She's all of those things and more despite what's happened to her and I've never met anyone like her before. She fucking amazes me.

I cup her face before I can stop myself but I'm glad I did because she smiles a genuine and small smile. She leans into my touch and I watch her intensely, wondering why she crossed paths with someone like me. There's so many things I want to tell her, want to apologize to her for. I shouldn't have made her stay the night with me and then asked her to move in. I shouldn't have insisted on calling her Melanie. I should've taken her ASL lessons more seriously because it means something to her. What could she possibly want to do with a guy like me?

"Whatever's going through your big head, stop it." She laughs softly. "I'm fine, okay? I'm a big girl and I know what I'm doing. You know how I know that? Because I took a leap of faith by telling you my past, all the ugly and horrible things, and I feel pretty fucking great. The best I've felt in a while."

She sits up on her knees and I watch her curiously as she throws one leg over my side to straddle me, her hands on my shoulders and her face level with mine. I have no idea what she's doing but I can't move, afraid to do the wrong thing.

"See that? I don't want you to look at me differently. Don't think of me as this fragile and damaged girl because I'm not. I can still kick your ass if you so much as look at me the wrong way. I can take care of myself. So stop second guessing the way you touch me, or if you should touch me, because I'm fine. I've always been honest with you, right? Don't let this change anything between us."

Shit. She really can read me like an open book. I nod and let my hands grip her hips like I wanted to before I hesitated. She's right — I shouldn't let her past change the way I see her. I wouldn't want her doing that to me. When I tell her about myself, and I'm thinking that's going to be real fucking soon, I don't want anything to change with us either.

"Big guy?" She asks quietly. I meet her eyes and for once, the stark shade of blue is open and vulnerable. She's never looked at me with her walls down like that before. I couldn't look away if I tried. "Don't ever call me Lenny. You helped me become Melanie again and that's all I want to be to you. Okay?"

That's the one that does it. Because I know what she means by that, the underlying message of her words. She's giving me her trust. She's giving me all of her, just like I asked her to.

"One more thing," She whispers, not quite meeting my eyes. "I'm proud of myself for telling you everything but it brought up a lot of unwanted memories and feelings and shit so...I mean....would it be cool if you spent the night here? Maybe not in the same bed because I don't think I'm ready for that but...could you just be here with me? You can totally say no. It was just a thought."

She's already starting to climb off of me but I stop her by tightening my hold on her hips. Her eyes meet mine, a flash of surprise passing through them when I nod. I want her to feel safe around me, to be able to trust me like this. I want her to count on me so I can show her she's not as alone as she feels. The smile she gives me is nothing short of grateful.

Without a word we start to get settled. She gets off of me and back under her covers while I grab an extra blanket from the closet and lay it out on the floor beside her bed. I lie down, staring up at the ceiling and unable to stop thinking about everything she told me. Unable to stop wondering what the fuck comes next for us. This was huge, especially because it came from Melanie. I can't help but feel that I owe her even though I know that's not why she confided in me but fuck, I want her to know me. I want her to know me the way I know her. I don't want any more secrets between us. Fuck that shit. She means way too much to me.

My thoughts are cut short when Melanie's arm dangles off the side of the bed, her fingers stretching and wiggling. It takes me a moment to realize she's reaching for me and I suppress a smile as I clasp her hand, intertwining our fingers. She squeezes back.

"Night, big guy." She murmurs.

I bring her hand to my mouth and place a soft kiss on the centre of it in return. I think I hear her laugh under her breath, I can't be sure, but I smile anyways because it's the best fucking sound. As much as I enjoy the silence, I think I'd trade it for Melanie Parks' laugh in a fucking heartbeat.

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A/N

Another update! As it's my birthday today this is my present to you all!

But also bear in mind the next update won't come until April 3rd. The explanation is on my message board.

Anyways, tears, tears, so many tears. Shit, I need a breather after this chapter. I always knew Melanie would be my toughest and challenging character because of the story I had set out for her. Thoughts about her past? How much of it did you guess and how much did you not see coming?

This was a major breakthrough both for my characters and my story. Things are really going to start picking up now and I am so excited. These two give me fucking butterflies!

Please VOTE, comment and share if you liked this chapter!

Happy Reading :)