The Sound of Silence 2 // H.S.

29

Author's Note: Thank you for all of the birthday wishes! This isn't a very long chapter, but everyone was reeling over yesterday's cliffhanger. Here's a quick update, because I love ya! Now, grab some tissues...

"Guilty" - Marina and the Diamonds

Nikki's POV

I followed Lucy into the office upstairs making sure to keep the door cracked. I wasn't sure what to expect anymore. I thought I knew my mum, but I didn't. I thought I knew my sister but I didn't.

I'm forever guilty in their eyes. Whatever it is, however they feel, I'm the one in the wrong. I've been wired to feel this way and I don't deserve it.

"Say what you need to say, Lucy. Tell the truth and stop pretending to my loving, doting sister." I leaned against the desk with my arms crossed.

"I do love you, you're my sister. I was covered in your blood once. You would've died if I hadn't found you on your bathroom floor. I didn't want you to die before I could get my revenge." Lucy's body vibrated with a fury that she's kept hidden from me for far too long.

"Revenge? Oh, do go on." I try to keep a wall up to protect myself. I know this conversation is going to forever break me.

"I was the perfect child. Perfect grades. Perfect behavior. And you were this out of control freak who barely went to class, slutted it up for both boys and girls, got our brother killed—"

"Fuck you. You are a doctor in psychiatry and you just referred to your own sister as an 'out of control' freak because she grew up with bipolar disorder. You shouldn't even be licensed you heartless bitch!" I spat.

"But—"

"I'm not finished. I always came to you about boys and girls. Who I liked and who I kissed. You KNEW I wasn't a slut. Rumors started that I was and you went along with your friends thought. Meanwhile, my english professor raped me every other day. I wasn't safe at home or at school. My life was absolute hell." The past was too painful. I tried to ignore the sharp pain in my abdomen. I was feeling light headed and took deep breaths.

"You...you never told me you were being raped." Lucy stared down at the floor.

"Professor Murphy terrified me. I thought he would stop and he...well it doesn't matter anymore." I didn't want to tell her that he would keep going until I liked it and begged him for more. When I did that he would be nicer and would punish me less. I felt sick to my stomach just thinking about it.

The guilt, the guilt. the guilt.

"And you know I will always blame myself for Jack's death. I think about it everyday. Mum and dad made sure to keep beating the guilt into me. I don't know what you're trying to prove here. What are you trying to justify? What. Did. You. Do?"

The guilt. The guilt. The guilt.

Lucy looked up at me with tears in her eyes. I desperately tried to feel nothing. She thought she was perfection, but we were just broken kids in a broken home.

"I was jealous and bitter that you left and found freedom. I should've been happy, right? You got out and made something of yourself." She sighs and sits down in an armchair. "I met Jeffrey Azoff at a bar years ago. We dated for a bit. He promised me that you would get what you deserved for leaving me behind to live your perfect life. I didn't know the lengths he would go to—"

"YOU AND JEFF?!" I winced and held my stomach. "WHAT?!"

"YOU LEFT ME! Dad started beating me and nothing I did was good enough for mum anymore!" Lucy cried into her hand.