Bright Lights, Broken Dreams

Prologue

4 years Ago:

Yelling and screaming filled the house her parents were at it again. A smack, a grunt broke up the monotony of the fight. Neither one cared where their daughter was as long as she did not inconvenience them in any way they pretty much ignored her. Thank god for that, they kept the fighting and hitting between themselves.

She had a part-time job to pay for her clothes for school so she did not look like a total schmuck She also spent a lot of time with her best friend, Anders. He lived three houses away and she knew that if she left her perch on the roof of the porch he would let her in. Finally the sounds and yells got to be too much and she left, there would be no let up in the fighting right now. There were times when it lasted all night long. She climbed down the drain pipe on the side of the porch and ran the down the street to Ander's house.

She threw pebbles at his window until his light came on and he opened the window. "They fighting again girl?"he asked.

"You know it."she said as she started to climb the lattice that seemed to be conveniently placed beneath his bedroom window. "It is a mega fight tonight." she said as she flopped onto his bed. They were both sixteen, practically grown up together. She had been the first person Anders had confided in when he realized that he was gay. Even though when he finally came out to his parents they were very supportive of him.

"You know you can stay here any time, mom and dad know how your home life is like." Hell their parents had been friends once until her parents had started to fight and they refused to take sides. They had only been six or seven when that had started.

She never understood why her parents didn't just get a divorce. "Thanks A, I jus..." The words died on her lips when the distinct popping sounds of gun fire  pierce the night. She put her hand over her mouth and stifled a scream.

Anders pulled her to him holding her close. It could have been anything he thought. While there was not love lost between him and her parents he didn't want them dead either. They found later that her father had shot her mother, she didn't make it. He tried to take his own life too only after not finding Freya at home, but it didn't happen. He was hauled off to the hospital ward of a jail.

Freya moved into Anders home and got by as much as she could. finished school and her and Anders were off at college now, he was the only part of her past that she wanted to remember everything else she buried so deep, never to surface again.