Trigger warning: Verbal and Physical abuse and attempted murder.

***Faith POV***

Ow, my head. I cried so much yesterday I gave myself a headache. I slowly sit up. I look out the window. The sun is barely up. I was about to look at the clock to see what time it was when I hear the door open.

I look to see Alastor with a wet washcloth in his hand. He looks at me and seems a bit shock that I was awake. In an instant he was right next to me.

"How are you feeling dear?" He asks as he gently tilts my head up.

"I cried so much I gave myself a headache, so not good." I say honestly as he places the cool washcloth against my forehead.

The cold was a bit of a shock for like half a second, suddenly melt into relief. I didn't realize I was burning up. I sigh in relief after the washcloth was placed on my forehead.

"Not to worry dear. I can help with that." He says before removing the washcloth.

In it's place he put his hand on my forehead. Moments later the pounding headache eased up before the pain was completely gone. He removes his hand.

"Feel better darling?"

"Yea. I do. Thanks. Hey, wait a minute. If you could do that this entire time, why did you lick the cut on my cheek yesterday?" I ask very slightly annoyed.

"Because darling the cut on your cheek was small enough that using energy to heal you would have been a waste of energy. It was easier to use my saliva for that. Headaches need energy to be healed. Plus I was curious to see your reaction." He says with a small chuckle at that last part.

I didn't say anything. I wasn't sure what I wanted to say to that.

"I do want to apologize dear. I didn't mean to make you cry yesterday. The point that I was trying to make was that even if I am there, I don't want you to just throw yourself into dangerous situations like that." He says in a serious tone.

"I know I'm sorry for overreacting that way. I don't know what came over me." I say slightly embarrassed at my breakdown yesterday.

Thinking about it now, I probably broke down like that because I haven't had time to grieve over Anna. It still hasn't been that long since she died. Maybe the grief and sadness got the better of me for a while.

"Dear, you said yesterday you didn't want to lose anyone else. What did you mean by that?" He asks with slight curiosity in his voice.

"Oh. That. That's a long story. Are you sure you want to hear it?" I ask.

He takes a moment to think before nodding.

"Ok well, story time, I guess. Well to start I need to tell you a small bit about my birth mother and her image of her perfect life. Her idea of her perfect life was to be married to the man she loves and have two kids. One girl and one boy. Well, before I was born she so far had what she wanted. She was married to my dad and she had her girl, my sister Annaleese. But to her the day I was born I ruined everything."

"I mean I had no control over what happened, but she certainly treated me like I did. Not many people know this, but I actually had a twin brother when I was born. Unfortunately, he passed away not long after he was born. Or at least that's what my dad told me years ago. Apparently, the day we were born he died because his lung or heart were underdeveloped."

"She would blame me for that and neglect me when she could after about the age of 2. Then she had the idea to try and raise me as a boy when I turned 8. Around the age of 12 I told her I didn't want to act like a boy anymore. She didn't like that. But when I expressed to my father about being more feminine she took that as a personal insult."

"From that point she would only really say things when no one was around. I did try telling others about it, but she would deny it and turn on her charms to basically make me out to be a liar. Then around the age of 13 that's when her abuse went from verbal to physical."

"My birth mother wouldn't usually hit or do anything hard enough to leave marks. At least not where anyone would see. When she did though she usually had a story ready to tell to cover her tracks. Almost everyone saw me as a bad kid who was trying to get my mom in trouble. The only people I knew of that didn't see me as bad but didn't believe me either was dad and Annaleese. But this all changed one night when I turned 13......"

**Flash back**

***Faith POV (age 13)***

"Faith! Come here now!" I heard mom yell from the kitchen.

It was the middle of the night. What could she possibly want this late. Better go see what she wants before she wakes up Anna.

As I get out of bed and walk over to the door. Surprisingly Anna was still asleep.

I headed to the kitchen where I thought I heard Mom's voice coming from. Entering the kitchen I didn't see her.

"Mom?" I asked as I walked farther into the kitchen.

I got this chill up my spine, but before I could react to it I felt something hit my upper back, hard. I was hard enough that I not only fell forward and land on my knees, but I forgot to breathe for a second. When I did breathe again it hurt.

"Aw. Did that hurt Faith? Good, it should. It's nothing less than what you deserve. After all you ruined everything." Mom starts on her usual rant about me ruining her life.

Something seems off this time. Then I smelled it. Alcohol. Was she drunk? Before I could think or react to the realization Mom grabs me by the hair and pulls hard on it. Pain shoots through my head.

"You are nothing. Nothing but a parasite. One bent on destroying this family. You took my son from me. I wish it was you who died. I wish your brother was the one who lived. You won't be plaguing this family any longer. Tonight, I am putting an end to that." She says before smashing the glass bottle in her hand.

She then pushes me forward until I am on the ground. She sits on my lower back so I can't move. Then I feel her lift the back of my shirt up and before I can question what she is doing I feel the pain of the sharp edge of the glass bottle slice my skin.

I couldn't help but let out a cry of pain. She then hit me hard on the back of my head with her fist.

"Shut up. This is what you deserve." She says as she continues to cut into my back.

A gasp cut through the air like a hot knife through butter. It could only be Anna. She is the only other one in the house.

"MOM. What are doing?!? Stop!" Anna shouts as she tries to get Mom off of me.

Mom gets off and punches Anna hard enough to knock her into the wall disorienting her enough so Anna can't stop her. Mom grabs my hair again and pulls me up enough to where she can press the glass shard she used on my middle back to my neck.

"Any last words parasite?" She asks hate and venom clearly in her voice.

"Mom. Don't. Please don't do this." Anna says less disoriented, but still on the ground.

Just when I thought it was over the door to the kitchen opened. Dad was in the doorway. Shock painted his face before melting into anger. He walks right up to Mom.

"Stop! What the fuck do you think you are doing!?!?" He shouts at her before pulling her off me.

She dropped the glass shard and tries to act like she wasn't trying to murder me. Dad was having none of it. When she slips up and calls me a parasite the look on his face said it all. He was done with her. He asks Anna if she is alright. She says she is as she stands. Dad picks me up and has takes me and Anna out to his car. He has Anna call the police on Mom while he takes us mainly me to the hospital.

Anna was fine. I would be in pain for a while. Luckily thought she didn't cut deep enough for me to bleed out, but it was deep enough to scar. Anna and Dad apologized a lot for weeks for all the times they didn't believe me about Mom unstable behavior. I had already forgiven them though.

**Flashback end**

After I had finish my story about the time my birth mother tried to kill me I looked at him to see his face and from the look on his face I kind of wished I didn't. He was looking very angry.

"Dear, where is this woman now?" He asks with his voice slightly distorted.

Light radio static in the air caused the hairs on my arm to stand. It kind of seemed like he was trying to contain his anger. I'm not worried or scared cause I know this anger isn't directed toward me. He no doubt wanted to torment and torture my childhood abuser. Unfortunately for him his about 8 years too late for that.

"Well, right now, she's dead." I said and so soon as I said that the intense anger in the room died down to mild annoyance.

"What?" He asked still clearly annoyed.

"Yea. You are about 8 years too late for whatever you had planned to say or do to her."

"How?" I asked now clearly annoyed he didn't to do whatever he was planning.

You know I don't think I wanna know what he was planning. It's probably best I not know.

"That is another long story that I will tell if you want to hear it."

"Do tell dear." He says less annoyed and more interested in another part of my story.

"Well to continue were I left off at after my birth mother tried to kill me Dad moved us out of that house. He also pressed charges on her for trying to murder me. She was charged with attempted murder and child abuse. She tried pin some of the blame on Dad, but it didn't work. The jury found her guilty and she was sentenced to 12 years in prison."

"After she was convicted, Dad's divorce from her was easier. Not long after the divorce Dad moved us mainly me and him to Idaho. Anna didn't move with us because she was in collage at the time so she stayed down here. A year later my dad married a really nice woman named Leneta. At first when I met her I wasn't sure what to think of her."

But over the months I got to know her, and she regularly treated me more like a daughter than my birth mother did. She had managed to get me and Dad love her. In different ways of course. When Anna first met her I could tell she felt like how I did. She kind of kept her distance for a while. Which is understandable. She loved our birth mother and she was betrayed by the mother she loved. Our birth mother never hit Anna until the night she tried to kill me, so in a way she was still hurting.

Anna eventually came to liking Leneta though. I don't think she ever liked her as much as I did, but that's ok. I didn't expect her to. Not long after she and Dad got married she legally adopted me and I was proud that day to call her Mama. Around 15 we moved back to Louisiana."

"Around the time I turned 17 she went missing for a couple days. After those couple days they found her. She was dead. The truly sad part was Mama was pregnant so the person who killed her also killed my unborn brother or sister. That's not the worst thing that would happen though....."

**Flash Back**

***Faith's POV (Age 17)***

I had just come home from spending time with a friend. It was a better day than most lately. I walk up the stairs to the house. I let out a sigh as I open the door wondering how Dad is doing today.

"Dad! I'm home!" I say as I walk in.

After the door shuts I get that feeling. The feeling in my gut that something is very wrong . I look around and didn't see anything out of the ordinary.

"Well. Well. Well, look who we have here. The parasite that ruined my life." A voice I hadn't heard in years said behind me.

Before I could turn around something hard hits me in the back of the head. I become very disoriented. One thing I can say for sure was that she walking around me in a circular motion.

"What are you doing here? I thought you were in prison." I say trying not to show how nervous I was.

"Oh. That. Well, those fools let me out for good behavior. I swear I must be a better actress then I give myself credit for." She says smiling evilly.

"Where's Dad? What did you do to him?" I ask while trying to get my bearings and think of a way out of here.

"He's alive for now. But if I were you, I would worry more about myself than your dad. Cause I am going to do what I should have done years ago."

I manage to dodge her as she tries to stab me. She ends up stabbing the floor. I try to get up and run for the door, but apparently, she quicker than I thought. Because just as I am about to reach the door, she grabs me by my hair and throws me to the ground.

Before I can do anything, she kicks me. The kick managed to hit my ribs and hear something break. Intense pain fills my side and it's hard to breathe. I think she broke a rib. In that moment she tries to pull out the knife.

She gives it a few hard pulls before it comes out of the floor. She then gets on her knees beside me holding the knife high in the air above me.

"Shame your dad can't save you this time." She says smiling.

She tries to bring the knife down on me, but I move out of the way. The knife is once again stuck to the floor. She notices and goes to grab me, but I give her a kick to the chest. As luck would have it she manages to fall back and hit her head off the corner of the nearby table.

I back up against the wall as she lays there. Unmoving and bleeding. The adrenaline from what happened got me to stand up and run to a neighbor's house. They called the police and not long after I passed out from the pain.

When I wake up, I am in a hospital with Anna by my side. I asked her what happened cause my memory is a bit fuzzy. Our birth mother came to our house to find me and when she couldn't she killed Dad. Then she tried to kill me and when I fought back, she hit her head off the kitchen table. She had hit the corner in just the right spot to kill her instantly. They had also found out by looking through our birth mom's apartment that she killed Leneta. Now here I am battered, bruised, and broken.

**flash back end**

"So, she died when she was trying to kill me."

"Well dear, she is lucky to have died that way. Death by me would have been much slower and painful." He says with a small evil smile on his face.

"You she did do some pretty bad stuff when she was alive. So, I have no doubts she went to hell. Maybe you'll run into her one day. That is if you haven't already." I say to him kind of hoping he loses that evil smile.

"Well now aren't you a sweet talker. Making such sweet promises." He said with a softer smile.

I turn to look at the clock and it says it's 9 am. Time for dinner. Then bed.

"Well, I think that's enough story time. I am going to go downstairs and get something to eat. Wanna join me?" I ask as I stand up.

"Sure darling."