A/N: Okay, here’s version 2

A/N: Okay, here’s version 2.0. I hope this is better. Tell me what you think of it. Is it better than the other one (if you even read that one…). What do you think of the character development, mechanics, vocab, realism…etc.

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Chapter 1

“This house is huge!” I exclaimed, grinning at Mother as we got out of our car. I stepped up closer to the house and stared at it. Mother had just gotten a divorce with Dad and taken nearly everything. The only thing he didn’t take was custody over me, and a few of Mother’s belongings. I’d even had to fork over my own personal savings because he’d taken so much of our money and since I was only seventeen, I had to comply.

But it was well worth it. The house was big, but the yard was bigger. We lived it a shady, quiet little neighborhood. Very green—there were lots of trees, well-kept grass, vast yards, and bushes. The house stood out in contrast to the bright green oak trees that towered over the left side of the house, pushing it to the right of the property. It was a white Victorian with a porch that wrapped around the entire house. The red-purple shutters and dark wood door seemed to be the only other color. But what had interested me the most was the garden in the backyard lined with a small white-picket fence.

“You’re daughter’s an easy girl to please,” I heard Collin comment to Mother. “Hey Catherine, come grab a box.” Collin had come help us unpack. Even though I knew he didn’t want to, he came because I’d asked.

“Mother, this place is way too big for the both of us.”

“Yeah, well,” she grunted, picking up a heavy box of books, which Collin dutifully took from her hands and placed on the ground next to him. “It’ll last us a long time.”

I sighed and glanced at the house again. “All we’re missing are the corsets, parasols, and maybe a small yappy dog,” I laughed. Mother laughed and carried a box labeled “kitchen” inside.

“What room are all of these going in?” Collin nudged the box of worn books with the toe of his tennis shoes.

“Mine. Top of the stairs, last door at the end of the hall,” I muttered, scanning the boxes in the bed of Collin’s truck for the box containing my clothes.

“I didn’t know you liked to read,” he mumbled.

I sighed. One would think that after three years of dating, he would remember things about me better. Instead of saying any of the nasty comments that pounded the inside of my head, I nodded, rolled my eyes and carried a random box toward the house.

The truth is that I may look like I have it all. I’m the cliché of the “perfect daughter.” I don’t drink and I don’t do drugs; I don’t even stay out past curfew. I have nice clothes and a good boyfriend. My grades are always excellent. I’m that quiet, timid brunette in the back of the class who strives for extra credit and blushes when she’s called on in class.

I may have it good, and maybe I’m just spoiled. No, never mind that. I am spoiled. I’m a spoiled little kid to even think that my life is so bad. Yeah, Dad walked out on Mother and me, but I still have a family. I have a new home, a loving boyfriend, and my health. But underneath all of that, I feel like I’m standing in the middle of a crowded room screaming, and not a single person is even turning to look.

Sometimes people say that they’re “on the outside looking in,” well I’m on the inside looking out. They may want what I have, but I never wanted it in the first place. I was forced to have it. I had to go to cotillion and parties with Mother and Dad when he hosted get-togethers with co-workers, I had violin lessons that I hated every minute of, and up until a few months ago, I’d had money.

Dad was a classic businessman. He owned his own jewelry business that was recently expanding. As it expanded, he started working a lot more and coming home a lot less. He would go on business trips that would last for a week or two at a time at least once a month. He missed my sixteenth birthday because he was on one of his longer trips that lasted three weeks.

Finally fed up with him, Mother told him that he needed to take a break to spend time with family, but he just got angry and declined. That was a year ago. I was stressing out because I was trying so hard to be the good child and not try to cause any more trouble for either of them, but nothing worked and eventually, Dad decided they had nothing in common anymore.

I placed another box in the kitchen down the narrow hallway towards the front door, wiping my hands on my jeans. The sky was a bright red and I glanced at my watch.

“How ‘bout I take you guys to dinner. I’m starving,” Collin said, bouncing down the stairs. No doubt, he was sifting through my things in my room. My things remained in boxes until I decided how I would organize things, or until Mother and I moved the furniture.

“Sure,” I smiled.

By the time we got back, I was ready to crash. And I did just that. Dinner with Collin was always emotionally draining. He and Mother always conversed about politics and government. You would think they were actually trying to bore me to tears.

Collin left soon after got back—his dad needed the truck back. He kissed me routinely on the cheek and left without another thought. Everything was routine with him; just another moment waving as it passed me with no promises of ever being remembered in the future.

I slept on the couch. It wasn’t the most uncomfortable thing in the world, but it definitely made me wish I had my own bed.

Whenever I was away from my own bed, I usually had nightmares. It was strange. I’d had problems with it since I was really little. Sleepovers were cut short a few times, and once I turned eight I quit going to over-night parties like that. Most of my more memorable embarrassing moments came from sleepovers where I’d have to call my parents at odd hours of the night to come get me because I was afraid. Most times I would go to sleep, wake up after a nightmare, wake everyone else up, and then go home because I couldn’t stay there. It made a few of my friends agitated.

But the dream I had sleeping on the couch wasn’t really a nightmare. I was running through some kind of forest, the wind catching my hair behind me. It was like a scene from a horror movie. As I ran, I’d throw scared glances over my shoulders, narrowly dodging trees.

And then I came to a house. It was no bigger than a barn or a shed, but it was a house nonetheless; dilapidated as it was. Boards were falling loose from the walls on the outside and it was painted a dark blue on the inside. There were two small rooms on the bottom floor of it, dust covering any flat surface and am old wooden chair in the far corner.

Walking up the stairs, my feet pounding the boards as I ran making them squeal in protest, there was a door that laid across the top of the stairs, a broken lock dangling from two rusty loops of metal. I ripped the lock off and flipped the large wooden board open in one quick motion. The top floor was not much cleaner, but it was brighter; there was a large window at the far end.

A long, pale shadow was cast across the dirty wooden floorboards; A man stood in front of the window, his hands in his pockets. He was the cause for the shadow, but he was strange. The light from the moon outside the house shone brightly like a spotlight through the window. Not only did it shine through the window, but the mans body seemed to be glowing; the moonlight passed through his body like a ghost.

He was transparent.

But, instead of being scared, I felt myself grinning, my stomach aflutter with excitement and thrill. The strange reaction seemed to push my legs up the last few steps and toward the strange person. As I got closer I realized that he was not quiet a man, but not a boy, either. He was around my own age; a man with boyish features. His dark black hair hung loosely in front of his eyes.

His eyes. I felt captivated. My mind scrambled faster than water whose container abruptly disappeared into thin air. His eyes were a bright, piercing shade of blue that held so much emotion. It was an amazing feeling—like you could say anything right then and feel so stupid, no matter what you said.

As I approached even closer, his hand extended toward me. Gingerly, my fingers slid into his and he pulled me closer to him, where I felt as if I had just stepped into a bullet-proof, air-tight suit of armor.

Nothing could harm me.

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Song I think of for this chapter: “Sanctuary” by Utada Hikaru
If you want, tell me what song you think of when you read this chapter :D