Jax.

Chapter 1

"Clara."
"Clara, Clara Elizabeth."

I jumped. Looking through the moonlight of my room, I saw my little sister, Emily, peering at me.

"What's wrong baby girl?"

Emily's tear streaked face could been seen even through the darkness. I sighed. The therapist had said the dreams would go away with time, had said that Emily would start going back to school, and had said that our minds would forget what our father did. The therapist had said a lot of things that had remained untrue.

"Come here baby."

Emily ran into my room and climbed into my queen sized bed. Her long dirty blonde hair was now oily due to the sweat she had on her forehead. As I held Emily in my arms I silently cursed my father. Benton Richard Jacobs Sr. had been an Army Ranger in his younger years. My father had seen things and had done things that diagnosed him with PTSD.

I was home babysitting Emily while my mother and two older brothers were grocery shopping. My father came stumbling in from his study drunk, having a flashback, with a gun in hand.

"You killed her!" I can still hear him screaming. "All you had to do was follow orders!"

Shooting me in the shoulder before turning the gun on himself.

Emily watching all of this.

The Jacobs' name was a name of honor in our town. My father's line before him were decorated War Veterans and my mother's line lawyers. You could say our family was held to a standard.

A standard that had been knocked off the tracks and my mother had been trying to find it's way back this last couple of months.

Holding Emily, I felt as if this was hopeless. School started tomorrow. My Senior year started tomorrow and all mother worried about was what I was going to wear and the excuse of my sling.

The Jacobs' name needed a rebound. My eldest brother, Easton, was planning to propose to his girlfriend, Katie, of five years. This was no doubt my mother's plan. She knew a big, frilly engagement party would make the town go wild. Along with her upper class friends.

I stared up at my dark ceiling. Tomorrow would be the first day of my Senior year. I had spent the whole summer hiding from everyone. Even my best friend, Lucy, would be barricaded from my life due to my overprotective brothers. My boyfriend, Ethan Curtis, was left with only voicemails of my absence.

My mother thought I had lost all the sense I had. She pushed me to all sorts of specialists. I had been diagnosed with Minor Depression with Anxiety. I had been put on 'crazy' pills I like to tell my family. If this was to be said out in the community, our already disgraced family would be packing for the hills.

I dozed off holding on to Emily. She was so young to have to go though this. She was just too young.

***
I looked into the mirror.

My golden hair was stick straight. I had put on the navy blue and white long sleeved shirt tucked into the snow white skater skirt my mother had picked out. My tan Tory Burch flats sparkled under my lights beneath my floor lengthen mirror. I had just put my pearls into my ears when I heard the soft steps of my mother walking through my door.

"Why don't we go without the sling today?" my mothers question sounded more like a statement.

The wound was healing leaving behind an ugly scar, no doubt why my mother put me into a long sleeved shirt, that and to cover up my more recent ones.

"I still can't use my left arm mom."

"I know sweetheart, but that will make big fuss. People will question if you are ready for school."