Dreamer ~ A Daniel Seavey Fanfiction

Chapter 1

HARPER'S POV

This house smells like marijuana, the drinks are all drugged, and I'm ready to leave. I hate parties, and I hate my drug-and-alcohol-addicted parents for dragging me to them. It's not like I really have a choice though.

"Lighten up, Harper," my mom giggles now, high and drunk. Wonderful. "You sure you don't want the next hit?"

"I'm fine, Mom." Rolling my eyes, I reach for my water bottle. I want to go home and pretend like this doesn't happen every other day. Which it does.

"Listen to your mother, Moon," Tyler says, sliding his arm around my shoulders.

"Get off me, Ty," I say, pushing his arm off of my shoulders. "And I told you to stay away from me. It's never gonna happen."

"Whatever you say, baby." He winks and walks away, taking another hit of marijuana.

Ugh. I shudder and look at my phone. 3:36 AM.

"Are you guys ready to go now?" I ask my parents, yawning.

My dad snarls at me, slamming his beer on the table with his others. "We'll go when I say we're going. Besides, you can't leave anyway. We brought one car."

I meet his flashing eyes with my calm ones. "Watch me." And with that I turn and I'm out the door.

"Where you goin'?" Dad yells.

"I'll walk home!" I yell back. "I'm tired, and I have school tomorrow! You guys stay as long as you want and get high off your asses, but I prefer to actually have a future!"

"Little bitch," he mutters, and walks back into the house. "Thinks she runs the world or somethin'." He comes back out to yell at me again. "You just wait till I get home!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." I pull my jacket tighter around me and try not to let this bother me. This has happened a ton of times, and it's to the point where it doesn't even hurt anymore. The bruises they both give me are worth the hope of getting out of here some day, like Hailey and Dex did.

Hailey and Dexter are my twin siblings, and we're close as close can be. While my mom and dad were getting high and drunk, we stuck together, whether we were at the party with them or stayed home.

We grew up fast. We had to. Mom and Dad weren't taking care of us, so we learned how to take care if ourselves. On the outside, we looked like the perfect family.

But when we were home...forget it. Hailey, Dex and I were battered and bruised, and as soon as he was old enough to take Dad on, Dexter took beatings for both of us. He was hospitalized twice, and both times Dad blamed it on something else. The hospital never questioned it.

When Hailey and Dex got into UCLA, they jumped at the chance to go, leaving me at home for last two years of high school. They were leaving that fall for college, and I was a junior with senior-itis.

And then, the worst thing that could've happened to them happened.

The day before junior year started, my mom and dad told me that the twins had gotten into an accident with their car and a bus. They were taken to the hospital, but neither of them made it. They're gone.

I wasn't myself for weeks after that. I'd lost my two best friends, the only ones who could actually understand what it was like to live in this horror house.

Suddenly exhausted from thinking about the twins, I climb into bed. Whatever tomorrow brings can wait until tomorrow. Whatever Dad brings, that is.

If I've been through it once, I can go through it again.

~