Tapestry of Scars

Anger Management

A/N: Caution: this chapter is a rollercoaster of feels. Sensitive material alert.

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Chapter 10:

Anger Management

Alison felt a mixture of guilt and relief after she admitted the truth to Emily. The last thing she wanted to do was pile her trauma on top of Emily's, but at the same time she knew they could never truly move forward if Emily didn't know the full story.

She thought that maybe Emily would open up more about her past, but Emily was still a steel trap. She was soft with Alison, but she kept her at a distance. Alison knew the basics. She knew that Emily had watched her father die and that things had been really rough on her after her mother remarried. But she didn't elaborate.

Emily still disappeared sometimes without telling Alison where she was going. But that was only because the things she was doing behind her back were dangerous.

Caleb had gotten her a list of phone numbers that had called the public access phone. Every day for two weeks she set up shop near the phone. She watched the traffic to and from the library during different times of the day. She used the internet to start tracking down some of the phone numbers on her list.

Her morning routine was always the same:

Get up. Take her meds. Leave Ali a sweet note. Exercise if she felt like it. And then it was off to find out whether or not the bastard was still anywhere near town.

Her latest conquest was someone who lived around the block from the library. She had taken a bus to a crossroads and had stopped long enough for coffee to keep her awake.

She had slept like shit the past several nights, which her doctor told her was a side effect of her poor health. Her liver wasn't completely failing, but it was deteriorating.

She'd felt pretty decent when she got up that morning. She'd gotten up early to take a jog around the block with Lupo.

After she'd fed him she'd left a note for Alison to let her know that she was going out for a little while so she wouldn't worry when she woke up.

Lupo had looked at her with his big sad eyes when she walked by his leash and left without him. She'd seen him staring out the window. It had made her feel bad. But she didn't want to put him at risk.

The morning had been going fairly smooth. No one had really paid any attention to the fact that she was hanging out and watching the phone usage, listening in the hopes that someone would say something that would get her the information she needed.

She saw one person calling for a ride, two drug deals, and a homeless man trying to bumble his way through a phone interview for a job.

She packed it in after a while and went to find a place to stake out the nearby house. She watched the house all day, waiting for some kind of activity.

She couldn't help but laugh about Hollywood's depiction of stake outs. Nine times out of ten they were boring as hell. Sitting, staring, waiting for something to happen, needing to pee, but having nowhere to go.

At the very least, she had a sketchpad and could occupy her time while drawing portraits of Alison. She liked drawing the blonde. It soothed her.

At 3:30 a car pulled into the driveway. Emily watched carefully. An over-tired looking woman climbed out of the front seat wearing clothes that were at least two sizes too small for her. A lanky looking teen climbed out of the passenger's side. He had earbuds in his ears and was looking at the world with indifference. The woman leaned into the back seat and emerged a few seconds later with a toddler on her hip.