Chapter Eighteen – Just You
Julian's Pov

After my shower I wrapped a towel around my waist and cleared the mirror. She really was a strong girl. I could see the bruises forming all over my torso and arms and push away the memories of my father. I knew this wasn't the same thing.

I pulled on a long sleeve shirt and shorts so she wouldn't see it because I knew it would upset her. I didn't feel any of it so it's not like it really matters.

"Hey." She came in shyly and I gestured for her to come in and she shut the door

"How are you feeling?" I asked her and she shrugged slightly

"I don't know." She played with her hands as she looked down

"And that's okay." She shook her head "Talk to me." I wrapped my arms around her and looked down at her

"I'm not used to feeling like this. I wish I could just decide how I felt and go with it. I hate everyone one minute and want to cry the next. I can't stand you one minute and the next I just want to be with you. Lacey annoys me but I care about her but I don't know why because I don't even know her." she sighed in frustration

"It will get easier. I know you're mad and hate that people are just going with the flow of everything but that's just how it is here. Every single person has a connection to drugs in here. It can be personal like us or they lost someone to it, watched them go through it and some who helped other through it."

"Yeah, Lacey mentioned that. She told me to get to know people."

"You will when you're ready, it's only been two weeks, take your time." I told her and she wrapped her arms around me.

"I'll try." She promised

"You know you can always talk to me." I tilted her head up to look at me

"Yeah, well I've now opened up and poured part of my soul out to someone who is unbelievably closed off to Me." she stepped back and went to go look through the movies I had on my shelf. She was right there; I've been pushing her to open up when I haven't done the same thing for her.

"You're right and that isn't fair to you." she looked over her shoulder at me and continued looking until she pulled out a movie.

"My brother used to watch the fox and the hound with me almost every night until our parents needed to buy a new one. It was my favorite movie and I haven't been able to bring myself to watch it a single time since my brother left when we were fourteen." She said out of the blue and then handed me a movie.

"I can't watch that." I looked away, there was a reason it was in the back but I couldn't bring myself to throw it out.

"Barbie of Swan Lake, Never though that you would have this one." She said

"My dad should be in prison" I told her suddenly before I could chicken out and she looked at me

"Why?" she asked and I was nervous, no one outside my immediate family knew this, Kylie didn't even know the real story as to what was happening.

"I had a sister named Sara; she was six years older than me." I sat down on the bed, I wasn't very good at this whole thing but I was trying.

"What happened to her?" she asked me but I could see she could guess.

"She's dead."

"When did she die?" she sat down beside me

"When I was seventeen, she killed herself."

"So it's recent?" she asked and I nodded

"It's going to be nine years soon."

"Do you know why she did it?" she put her hand in mine

"Because of my father."

"Is he that bad?" she asked me and I nodded

"He's been beating us and my mother for as long as I can remember, but I never realized how much farther than then he went with Sara." My voice broke. I couldn't save her either, I should have been able to.

"He raped her." she said and I felt the tears as I nodded. She's broken down in front of me and maybe if she sees me do it she'll realize that it's okay. Maybe I just needed someone to talk to who would listen.

"Yes, I didn't know until after she died. She left me a letter telling me everything that I didn't get for a year; I found it when I looked through some of the old stuff left for me. I already hated him before and I hated him more after. I stayed school to be a doctor and medical school because that's what he would pay for and I wanted to be far away from him."

"You went to medical school?" she asked and I smiled at her tone.

"Yes, I got in a year early and was in my first year when I dropped out, it pissed my dad off. My older brother finished a couple years ago and is almost through his residency."

"Wow, I didn't know you were smart like that." She said and I looked over at her and cocked an eye brow and she blushed

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that, I just" and I laughed, I had tears in my eyes talking about this but she could still make me laugh

"I get it, it's okay." I kissed her hand and she bit her lip to keep herself from talking.

"I'm sorry." She said again and I nodded.

"My father pushed her to kill herself and didn't' even care about it when she was gone. I wouldn't have known what really happened. She told me about how he harassed her and bullied her and how the rape continued but she was too afraid to say anything."

"How could he do that with no one knowing?" she asked and I shrugged

"I don't know, but he pushed her so far he may as well have killed her himself. Dad used it as an excuse to bond with his boys, he said he didn't want to lose another child and that's when I decided I would go to medical school. I took some of Sara's things with me mostly stuff I gave her and that's when I found the letter."

"Maybe one day you'll tell me what was in it." she said and I nodded maybe.

"I remembered that day, I was young but I was starting my last year of college and in the next year I grew a new hate for my father and dropped out of medical school. I went to an audition to be an actor to piss my father off and it stuck." I said, that was how I got into it.

"Nice way to find your calling." She tried to lighten the mood.

"I found the thing I loved and got to make him angry at the same time, I got picked up and quickly rose to fame, but even that couldn't make me forget my childhood and my past. I had everything I wanted and I had never been so alone, so I started doing drugs to cope. At first they helped but then it got worse and I got harder to work with and now here I am."

"Sounds like a tough life." she told me and I nodded.

I was thinking about that letter right now, it changed my life and destroyed the way I looked at the world, Sara was my best friend and the person I trusted with everything, I guess that's why I never tried to get close to anyone else.

"I've had a hole in my heart for seven years and it never gets easier." I cried to her and this time she laid us down and put my head in her lap and let me get it out.

She ran her fingers through my hair and didn't ask me to tell her anymore.

On one level I felt embarrassed and ashamed of what I was doing, I should be strong for her and instead she was seeing the weak side of me I never wanted anyone to see, but if it would help her and get her to open up more to me than here we are.

I would work on it as long as she would.

But on the other side I felt happy and relieved that I could finally tell someone about what happened, if only partly. I don't know when I'll tell her the rest but for now this is more than enough. I liked that I had someone to help me when I struggled and be there for me when I cried. I wasn't as strong as I would like to be or how I portrayed myself.

Everyone was a little or a lot broken in here and I was no exception.

"Who knows about what he did?" she asked me and I shook my head

"My mom doesn't even know what he did to her, I don't think. She left me that letter to me."

"You haven't told anyone?" she asked and I looked up at her and she wiped the wetness from my face

"No, just you." I told her