Misprinted Lies (Alice in Chains/Bruno Mars)

First Time

Once again we were in Vegas for New Years. I was doing another show. My fans were so excited about it because I hadn't done many shows that year. It was a lot better this time. Neither of us ended up angry, crying, or beat up after the ball drop.

Lily started yawning after we danced for a long time. I smiled and pulled her in close to my body. She rested her arms around my neck and rested her head on my chest.

"One more song and we'll go back to our room."

"Aww," I heard from a distance. "Look at the lovebirds."

It was Phil.

"You guys are so cute. Brandon's taking a picture of all of us in our suite in a couple minutes."

We all took a picture. Everyone else left and I threw my phone over to Brandon to take a picture of just the two of us. I grabbed Lily by the waist, wrapping both arms around her. Brandon showed it to us.

"Aww," Lily said. "I love it!"

"Take one more," I said.

"Why?" she asked. "It's perfect."

"Just one more."

Brandon took my phone back and was about to take another. I grabbed her by the waist again.

"1...2..." Brandon said.

Right before 3, I quickly kissed her cheek which made it her squeal. Brandon gave me my phone back.

"Aww," I said. "This one is perfect too. I'm postin' both of these on Instagram. You okay with that?"

I nodded. I posted them right then and there with the caption... I already found the happy to my New Year.

Later that night, we were still awake, despite being so tired earlier. 

"Sh..." I whispered into her ear, kissing her neck and moving my hands up and down her body.

She pushed me off her. "I can't...I can't do this, Bruno...I'm...sorry...I'm so sorry..." She looked so hurt. I had no idea what I did; I thought it was going great.

"Sweetheart, what's wrong?"

She grabbed her robe off the floor and put it on. I put on my boxers again, following her into the bathroom. Lily got to just before the tub and then turned toward me.

"Please tell me what's wrong," I begged, kissing the tears off her face.

"I can't."

I moved her hair out of her eyes. "You can tell me anything, Lily. Anything. If I did something wrong I'm really sorry."

"It's not...not...you didn't do anything wrong," she said, rolling her eyes and head to the side.

I had to force our eyes to meet she was so upset. When I gently grabbed her arm, she pulled away quite a bit.

"Lily...it's...you did nothing wrong either." 

"Then why...why...then why," her voice cracked, "...why did...she...

Once I helped and walked her over to the bed and sat down next to her, she told me everything. She describe every detail of the same horror show that I thought TV shows made up just to scare people. She'd told me some stories, and they took her plenty of time even to get comfortable with telling me. What I learned this night was of the horrifying sexual abuse, the five rounds of reconstructive surgery, and how often she still had to see Courtney, even after what had happened. No wonder why she had so much anxiety.

"Why did she..." she cried again, still stuttering, "Why did she hurt me then...if I didn't do anything wrong?"

"I don't know if anyone knows why someone would do things like that...to their own daughter...but what I do know is that it's not your fault," I said, slowing opening her robe, revealing scars that suddenly made sense. "If you told me about this...I would have stopped smoking cigarettes...at least in front of you...I mean...come on Lil...was I giving you anxiety attacks all this time?"