Better Than This - A Shatter Me Fanfiction

002

Tonight I'm deciding not to sleep. There's no point in trying to and not getting any. I'd rather be exhausted than see my dad kill my brother again.

It's a long story.

A long stupid story.

To make this quick. My dad was a big supporter of The Reestablishment but my brother was one of the many few who decided to actually go against them. I'm not sure what happened exactly because as soon as I found the memory in my dad's mind, I left it.

It was weird. I woke up one day and my brother, Elliot, just wasn't there. Not at breakfast arguing with me about what cereal is better or waking me up for school because my dad was sleeping through his hangover. And my mom was already out of the picture. Dead? On a bender? With another family? Who knows. I just know she wasn't there.

So I looked through my dad's memory. At the time I hadn't seen anything bad. So going through memories was kind of a pass time. And I know it's bad but 13-year-old me didn't think so.

After seeing the horrific memory, my mind shut down for a while.

For three years to be exact.

After 1097 days, I went through the motions. Wake up. Brush your teeth. Brush your hair. Get dressed. Eat breakfast. Go to school/ leave the house because there was no way I was staying in my house for longer than 30 minutes alone with my father. Et cetera.

The day I "woke up" was the same day I decided to stop going through the motions. The day I broke the cycle.

I left.

Ran away.

Then Castle found me. And my life went from bad to better.

I toss a ball up and catch it.

Toss.

Catch.

Toss.

Catch.

"Can you go to sleep, you're being so noisy?" Addie asks from the top bunk. Irritated.

"Sorry. Just can't sleep." I stand up from the bottom bunk and move into the darkness of the rest of the room. It's dark, but my eyes have adjusted so I can see fine in the room. I move carefully towards the wall farthest from the door.

I throw the ball toward the door.

Teleport.

Catch it.

I cry out at the pain in my palm.

The weak period.

I have ten seconds after I teleport where my skin gets very sensitive and weak. Almost anything nearly sharp can puncture my skin.

The ball, since it doesn't have any sharp edges, will
probably only leave a dark bruise.

Lucky?

"Fucking idiot," Addie grumbles, rolling over in her bed.

I wince as I close my hand around the soft ball.

"Yeah," I say back. "I'm going to roam the halls because I can."

I quickly grab a sweater and pull it over my tank top and slide on sneakers.

"You know that's against the rules."

"If anyone asks, I'm going to the twins to get my hand fixed." The twins are Sonya and Sara with their magical hands that can fix almost everything— medically speaking.

I leave before Addie can say anything back.

The only lights in the hallways are the emergency ones, so it's pretty dark. I toss the ball and catch it in my left hand— my not bruised hand.