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THERE WAS SOMETHING COMFORTING in the silence that was her room. Although there was noise outside due to the cars driving the street, her room was a place where she could get away from everything. The room was her safe haven, where no one could get to her, never again.
The walls were a pastel yellow, a color called Daisy Petal, which always made her smile. Her uncle had painted them this color less than a year ago, and said that her old room used to be the same color, not that she remembered. He had hung photographs from his home in San Francisco on her walls, showing pictures of what her life had been like before.
Her favorite of them had to be the picture of her family from when she was an infant. There was a pretty blonde woman standing beside a tall man with kind eyes. In the arms of the adults were two children, a little boy who couldn't be more than eight years old, and a little girl who looked to be about three. The family appeared to be perfect. All of them were alive and happy.
Oh, how that had changed.
One could say that she was the last one alive from that photo, but she knew that she was no longer that girl. She hadn't been that girl for a long time, but she was slowly healing.
She would spend hours in the basement of her home, working out to keep her mind off of everything that happened to her. It was something they taught her to do years before, and here she was using their method to forget what they did to her.
The sun had barely been up for an hour by the time Olivia left her bed. She wasn't a morning person, not in the slightest, but sleeping meant nightmares and Olivia didn't need any more.
With a speed she didn't normally use, Olivia got herself ready for the day. She pulled on a pair of light wash jeans and a blue crew neck with her school's logo along with a pair of black converse.
Once she was certain she looked decent —including her hair, which she had tied into a high ponytail— she made her way downstairs to where her uncle was sitting at the kitchen counter with two bowls of cereal.
"Hey kid," he greeted, a small smile on his face. "Sleep well?"
Olivia shrugged her shoulders, unsure of how to answer her uncle's question. Sure she didn't have any nightmares, but she rarely ever slept for more than six consecutive hours.
He poured her a bowl of cereal, pushing it closer to her before pouring her a cup of coffee. A small smile tugged at her lips as he slid the mug of black coffee toward her. It was the best way to get Olivia to open up in the mornings, and it also made her smile just a bit more.
Joshua Bowman tried his best with his niece, he really did. He hadn't ever planned on being a parent, but when the accident happened, he took up the role as best he could. His sister had been his rock, and all of a sudden, she was gone, as was his nephew.
