Authors Note: This is the first draft and is raw at the moment - when I have completed all Parts I will start the editing process. (All critiques welcome) 

The sky was dark and the Gregory house seemed like a distant far off place as Lavinia awoke from a scrambled dream that almost felt like memory. She was not the kind of person who remembered much of her dreams but as she returned from the world of the sleeping to the world of the awake all that was left of her dream was the sound of the sea crashing hard against a crumbling cliffs edge and a starry night sky.

Lavinia didn't like to be alone with the remainder of her dreams, they frightened her like her old life and new life could, for a few moments become one. So she shook Andy and Sam awake and waited for their bleary eyes to reach their focus, when their closed eyes became slits, and slits became whole eyes she sighed, she was no longer alone- alone on the cliffs edge with the sea crashing below.

She was safe, she was warm, was was almost home.

"Err, yeah?" Said Sam Irritated at being woken. He rolled over grumpily onto his back.

"I'll come back with you." Said Lavinia she said it out of fear more than anything, the dream had shaken her and in that moment, in that very specific moment, she didn't want to leave Andy and Sam.

"Seriously" cried Andy throwing herself into Lavinia's arms. All the blood rushed to Andy's head when she got up to fast.

"Just to look around I'll stay the weekend or something." Said Lavinia

Sam smiled, the smiled turned into a large yawn.

"This is all great and everything but I'm practically comatose so can we chit chat when the sun is in the sky and I've got breakfast in my belly." Said Sam

"Absolutely," Said Andy with a squeal hugging Lavinia good night while Sam rolled over and within seconds was back to sleep with his light snore.

For a moment, Lavinia smiled but then a feeling of dread washed over her body and she didn't even know why. A drawing hung above her bed that Sam had always made abundantly clear gave him the creeps. It was another memory but this was more than a memory, this sketch was of the perfect day in Lady Dolly's Maxby's life but, it was what came after this day that made the drawing so special.

 After this day everything changed for Dolly after this day nothing would ever be the same again and there would be no going back. Lavinia laid in the darkness and stared at the picture of Dolly who was lying back on a small wooden boat and being rowed across the water. Rowing her was the same faired haired man who appeared in so many of her pictures.

 Dolly's hand was touching the water and her eyes were closed, Lavinia tried to remember the heat on Dolly's skin and the water caressing her hand, she found the images coming to her easier than she would have liked. In the background of the picture were a few figures all talking and laughing. Lavinia's eyes homed in on one of the figures, the beautiful dark-haired girl with a cigarette in her hand, arms folded provocatively across her chest and, before Lavinia knew it a tear was falling down her cheek but she did not take her eyes off the woman, she did not take her eyes off Lady Percy.

Soon she was asleep again, the three of them like puppies squashed into Lavinia's bed. They had meant to go to their own rooms but as time passed they had just got too tired or too lazy to move. Then she started, or rather they started, the night terrors. They were such haunting cries and how she thrashed, as soon as they began both Sam and Andy rolled out of bed, there had been an incident when they were much younger when Sam had ended up with a black eye, he wasn't making that mistake again and Andy certainly wasn't willing to risk it.

 Andy knelt at the head of the bed and just stroked Lavinia's forehead trying not to let her piercing cries pierce her own heart. Slowly Lavinia began to open her eyes as the cries began to wane; she looked up to see her brother and sister staring down at her with fear in their eyes.

"I'm sorry," said Lavinia the blatant realisation of what had happened dawned upon when she saw Sam and Andy staring down at her with horror in their eyes.

"What were you...ya know, dreaming about." Said Sam with his hands in his pockets.

Andy didn't want to listen but she made herself, her muscles tight and unwavering.

"I fell, you should know by now I always fall." Said Lavinia closing her eyes.

Lavinia rolled over and Andy and Sam returned to their rooms, the reunion was over.

Reality had set it.

~

Lavinia woke early her bleary eyes and body couldn't tell her what time it was but she knew from the smell of the air and the sounds the world was making that the house would still be in darkness, she would be the first one to greet the day. Not wanting to be asked questions by Andy and Sam Lavinia grabbed the nearest item of clothing which happened to be a ripped pair of jeans and Sam's Chichester University hoody. 

She threw them onto her body without much thought to the outcome, quickly brushed her teeth and splashed her face, one swirl of mouthwash and she was creeping down the stairs attempting to not wake her inquisitive household. Having made it down stairs without disrupting the camp Lavinia spied a few stray grapes detached from the bunch pushed them into her mouth, threw Sam's grey hood over her blanket of red hair and shut the door quietly behind her.

 Sometimes the world felt so alien to Lavinia, all hoodies and denim and glimpses' of red tresses out the corner of her eyes. From the moment she opened her eyes this morning, or even closed them the night before she knew today would be a tough one she needed to talk to Charlie, she knew he would be awake he pretends to her he leaves his office but Lavinia knows, she can see it in his face, he doesn't sleep and he has the dark half-moons to prove it and that rum he keeps under his chair she thought.

 The man is a mess, not a mess like me she thought a mess that can be fixed. She continued to walk quickly to his office until she stood before it in its bleak depressing glory, Lavinia shuddered at the thought of him living inside, to messed up to go home, where ever that was. Stupid woman Lavinia thought of Alice what did you have to go and die for? But Lavinia knew better than to curse at the dead, she counted herself as one of them after all .

"I'm sorry," She said out loud and hung her hooded head low.

"I didn't mean it, I'm rotten, stupid rotten and broken, you shouldn't listen to what I say."

Lavinia didn't know who she was talking too but somewhere deep down it helped her to think that someone, whoever that maybe was listening even if no one was listening at all.

The posting schedule for The Girl That Fell Out of The Ocean is Wednesday and Sundays!