Left Behind (Completed) *editing*

Chapter One*

Note from Author:

This story is currently being edited. It is in serious need of editing since it was in entirety written from my iPhone and that darn autocorrect does some crazy things. The stars in the chapter title mark whether or not I've looked through it. I may leave little notes here and there to indicate where I left off - if it was mid-chapter. In the meanwhile, please excuse any errors you may find. Also - PLEASE feel free to point them out! I'm sure I will catch everything but any help/input is just so valuable to me. Otherwise, thank you for reading and please enjoy my work in progress. Feel free to comment - I love your support!

This is the beginning of how my life unraveled. This is my memoir of how I slipped away from the grasps of a mad man. This is the tale of how I fell out of love and met the boy who saved me. This is far from a fairytale. Life doesn't have perfect storybook endings.

It was a cool early spring day. I felt different. I couldn't put my finger on it and maybe it was my urge to escape the life I had but I couldn't help to daydream on my lonely walk to school about what could possibly change. I guess I had these thoughts everyday as I sunk into the world in my head where everything was perfect. My heart begun to race as I pictured my mom coming home - finally, to get me out of the hell that she left me behind in.

I grew up to be the spitting image of my mother. She was absolutely stunning. She was tall and strong but with perfect curves. She had long, beautiful red wavy hair and piercing big green eyes. I'm practically her clone. My mother walked out on us when I was 8 years old. Everything changed the day I woke up to find her gone. My brother, Liam, was still in high school at the time and was angry to say the least. We didn't have the same father and he never got along with my Dad. It was the beginning of the end of my former perfect life.

Liam later on told me he woke the night she left during an argument where they were fighting about her wanting to take me somewhere. Liam didn't know where but it left him bitter that she wanted me and not him. That was all I ever knew of her leaving - that she wanted me and I held onto hope that she would come back for me. My dad would never talk about what happened. He insisted everything would be just fine.

He lied. It wasn't. I think the last time everything was "just fine" was before she left. My dad sank into a deep depression. He was never a man of many words but afterwards, he rarely spoke. He drank most nights sitting out on the front porch. Sometimes he even passed out sitting there with a bottle of whiskey in his hand and when I woke him to go to bed, he sometimes called by my mother's name - Cecilia. After my mother's disappearance, I took care of him more than he took care of me.

This angered Liam even more as he assumed the role as a parent figure in my life instead of a brother. The situation between my Dad and Liam grew from bad to volatile. Liam became violent with my father and when he turned 18 my father made him leave. I rarely saw Liam in the two years that followed. He called me everyday when I got out of school to check on me. He promised he'd be by to visit every weekend but my Dad usually didn't permit it. They couldn't make it through a simple hello without it spiraling into a nasty argument.

I loved my father but the image of him I once had was quickly tainted. I guess you'd call him a functional alcoholic. He was drinking his life away but still managed to go to work everyday as well as pay the bills. While he didn't neglect his job, he did neglect me. I learned how to cook at the age of 10. If the house was dirty, I cleaned it or it would stay filthy. Aside from school, it was a lonely two years. I didn't think things could get any worse but they did.

I was 12 and had gone to my best friend's house to work on a project for school. My dad called me while I was there, maybe drunk by the slur of his voice. He asked what time I'd be home. I told him about 7. I remember him pausing and a sigh. All he said after that was "I love you, sweetheart. I will see you when I get home." Those were the last words he ever said to me. My biggest regret is not going home immediately that day. I sensed something was terribly wrong. The feeling was strong enough to go home a little earlier than I said I would.