Chapter 1
I woke up with a start, clawing at the sheets, sweating buckets. My dream was horrible. There were no real images to hold onto, but the terror was so real that it made my heart pound just hinking about it. All I could remember was someone gripping my throat and squeezing as hard as they could.
I laid down back in my bed, roling onto my side to look out the window at the vast desert around me. The moon was huge, illuminating the night almost as well as the sun. I shut my eyes and tried to fall back asleep, but I couldn't fall back into the relm of my mind. I thought back to today and my huge slip up. I let Real Tragedy get killed. He died on my account and I had to live with that for the rest of my life. Poison was so close to kicking me out that it was scary. It was a complete accident. I tried to tell them. But they wouldn't listen. They never listened to me. I was just one out of the hundreds of other Killjoys out here fighting for what was good and right.
I heard a gentle rap on my door and Melodic Sorrows poked her head through the door. "You okay Rory?" I shook my head. "Everyone hates me now. I accidentally caused one of our own to die. How could I be okay?" My eyes started watering and I immidiatley wiped the tears away, trying to hide the fact that I'm crying. Sorrows walked over to me and sat down on the foot of my bed. "I know. I know." I shook my head and sat up so I could look her in the eye. "NO! YOU DON'T KNOW OKAY?! You have no idea what it feels like to be in my posistion!" She stood up, a dumbfounded look on her face. "Okay, calm down. I'm just trying to help." I nodded, starting to cry even harder. "I'm sorry! I"m just really on edge right now and I can't realy collect my thoughts very well." She nodded. "I understand. Do you want me to stay with you?" I shook my head. "I'll be fine. I think." She nodded again and gave me a small smile. She walked out of my room and as I watched her walk away, I run over the list of all the people I've driven away in my life. Most of my boyfriends, my own parents who I never met. Most of my foster paents, and just about everyone else. I was deemed a ward of the state a few weeks ago when I ran away from one of my foster homes. That last foster home was the final straw. I was only an object to the horrible people that lived there. They beat me pretty badly and rarely fed me, but the BLI social workers denied anything was happening, even though I was belted right in front of one of them. I found the Killjoys a few days after I ran away. The Killjoys took me in as one of their own, but I always felt like I was just there. I never really did anything. Until they thought I was ready today, and accidentally killed Real Tragedy. Before I even got to tell him how I felt. That was the worst part of it all: That I loved him more than anything in the world and now he's gone forever.
***
The next day, I walked downstairs and every eye was trained on me. Poison looked dissapointed. Then he said, "I've made up my mind. She's to get out of here by nightfall." This statement was met with a chorus of "YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" and multiple other screams and yells from the other Killjoys. Ghoul threw his chair out from under him in anger and stood up, yelling at Poison louder than I've ever heard someone yell before. "Come on, Poison! Cut her some slack, it wasn't her fault!" Poison shook his head. "Rory's too dangerous to stay with us. She'll have to survive on her own." I was so filled with rage that I couldn't think of anything better to do but punch Poison as hard as I possibly could in the eye, so hard in fact that he fell to the ground. Kobra came over and picked me up with ease, slinging me over his shoulder. I screamed as many swears as I could at Poison from Kobra's shoulder as I was carted upstairs. Kobra threw me on the ground without even thinking about it and walked away, not looking me in the eye. I threw open the door to my room and tossed myself onto my bed, gut wrenching sobs wracking my body. No one came to say their goodbyes... except for Sorrows. She came in as I was shoving everything I owned (which wasn't much anyways) into my bag. "I'm so sorry that had to happen. But, Poison's even more mad at you for punching him like that." I glared at her. "Did it hurt?" She shrugged. "He's already got a black eye starting, so I'd asume it hurt pretty bad." I scoffed a laugh. "Good." Sorrows raised her eyebrows at me. "Come on, Rory, you can't seriously be mad at him for making you leave. He's got every reason to be mad at you." I slung my backpack over my shoulder and stuck a leg out the window to jump out. "Well, I'm never coming back to this nightmare again. I guess this is goodbye, Melodic Sorrows." I jumped out and landed on the balls of my feet silently. I then took off running as fast as I could, never once looking back. They didn't want me. They didn't care about me. No one ever did. I should've known all along.
