Everything you want is on the other side of fear.

Text to: Mommy                                                                                                                                                                       I am already in bed, see you later.

Read: 8.20 P.M.

Text from: Mommy                                                                                                                                                                 Don't wait up.

THERE IS A MAN IN MY HOUSE. I can't see his face, it has been covered in a black balaclava, but I know that it's a man. The way he stands, his broad shoulders, he has betrayed himself. That carpet used to be white you know? Now it has been soaked in red, it looks liked dirty, matter hair, it smells like death. On the carpet is a woman, she has brown to red hair that is covering her entire face, I know that there are blue eyes underneath, her throat has been slit. I can see the blood, still pulsing out of my mother's long dead body.

Next to her is a man, his hair has been graying for a while now but I didn't dare tell him that. He had an important meeting today, something about the development of new apartments, so he's wearing one of his best suits. There are stab wounds in his belly, his dress shirt has ridden up slightly, his eyes are open but his chest is no longer rising.

I didn't try to run, or scream. I don't remember doing anything. I had already accepted that this would be the end of me. I accepted it when I heard noise downstairs and I came to investigate, clad only in a silk kimono.

The man grabs my shoulders, his gloved hands are touching my bare skin, he looks like he is smiling. He kisses me on the forehead, his lips are chapped and he presses down way too hard, pushing my had backwards. As if he doesn't want to let go, not yet.

There is a knife pressing against my throat then, cutting through the thin skin. It feels like a papercut times 1000, slowly gliding over my arteries. I feel the blood pouring out, it's a lot of blood and I collapse. I fall onto the soft, slowly going cold bodies of my parents.

I wake up, covered in blood. My own, my parents', a full body mask of blood. I don't understand how I survived, with the amount of blood I am looking at, covering the carpet and the wooden floor.

The man must have left, so I press one of my hands down against my slit open neck, trying to keep pressure on it to stop the bleeding.

I crawl towards the cabinet with the home phone standing on it and manage to slap it off, it falls onto the hard wood floor. When I dial the number I first discover I can't speak, I try so desperately but only disgusting gurgles of blood seem to come out of my mouth.

The operator on the other side talks but I can't answer, so I hope that she understands. That I'm dying, slowly but surely.

White, white, white. White walls and white sheets and everything else is white and sterile. There are machines beeping, tubes are invading my nose and throat, feeding me and allowing me to breath.

I look around the room and it's when I feel it. Not for the first time, it's a familiar feeling but it hurts more each and every time. The intense fear of it all. What if he comes back? What is he has been waiting outside this room and smothers me with a pillow, without even trying.

I pull the tubes out, it makes me gag and I throw up inside my mouth, spitting it out besides the bed. The needles get ripped out too, they leave behind giant blue and red bruises.

I try to get up but I can't, my legs are still so weak and I fall down, slipping on vomit and fear.

So I scream, and I scream louder than I ever have before. I can feel the stitches on my throat ripping out one by one, and nothing matters anymore.

PROMINENT FAMILY, PARENTS KILLED.

New York City- Last night around 8 p.m. Gloria Arends and husband Patrick Arends were declared dead on the scene of a horrific crime that has shocked this city.

Their daughter has been transferred to hospital and remains in critical condition.

"Would you mind stating your full name and age for the record?"

"My name is Paloma Cecilia Arends, I am seventeen years old."

"And your attorney please."

"Annelies White."

"What are you here for Paloma?"

"You think I killed my parents."

"Did you?"

"No"

PALOMA ARENDS FOUND NOT GUILTY

New York City- The trial that had a grip on this country has finally ended. Paloma Cecilia Arends, now seventeen years old, has been found not guilty by jury in the double murder of her parents.

This was decided based on a severe lack of evidence.

Paloma's attorney requests privacy in these turbulent times, so Paloma can finally mourn her parents.

I gasp. Everything hurts. There are needles in my arms and I can already see those ugly bruises start to form on the tender insides my elbows.

I remember, I remember Caroline's face, how there were grey veins bulging underneath her eyes.

I remember how she bit me, how her teeth tore through my skin like a knife through butter. The machines around me start beeping faster with every memory that returns to me, as I start hyperventilating, as panics seeps into every cell of my body.

I look up and I see Damon's brother, I think his name was Stefan, did he tell me that last night? Did we meet before?

I cry out and I can feel my face contorting into fear, "What is happening to me?"

Stefan looks into my eyes and I can swear I feel him in my brain.

"You fell last night and landed on a piece of glass, Caroline, Elena and I brought you to the E.R."

I won't let it happen this time, I am done with being lied to.

"But that isn't what happened."

"Excuse me?"

"Caroline attacked me, I didn't fall, why are you lying to me?" Stefan takes my face in his hands firmly, his forehead is wrinkled, he repeats himself.

"You fell last night and landed on a piece of glass, Caroline, Elena and I brought you to the E.R."

"I don't understand, why are you changing my memories? How? I can feel you rooting in my brain."

Stefan repeats himself, he keeps sticking to this lie and I don't have the energy to fight it. I am too vulnerable.

"I fell last night, I landed on a piece of glass, you Elena and Caroline brought me to the E.R."

Stefan looks at the ginger girl, he remembers dancing with her like it was yesterday, all her freckles are still in the exact same place.

"That's right Lola, now get some sleep."

"I just don't understand, the vampire blood didn't completely heal her and she could resist my compulsion," Stefan is pacing through the halls of the boarding house, Damon is sat on the couch drinking a glass of Bourbon.

"I mean let's just ignore the fact that she looks exactly like Lorelei and her name is Lola, why don't you brother." Stefan stops pacing and pulls one of his diaries from some shelves.

"Look, Lorelei died. I wrote it down, we went to her funeral." Damon takes the diary when Elena walks into the house.

"I remember, but she was shot through the head Stefan. This girl isn't Lorelei, not the same one anyway." Stefan sighs, Elena takes his hand.

"What's going on?" She asks. "We are trying to figure out who your friend's little niece is."

"Lola?" Elena responds, the two brothers look at her and nod.

"Lola is just Lola, she went through a lot last year, but she is still just Lola."

"What happened last year? Why did she decide to come here?" Stefan asks.

"Her parents were brutally killed, her throat was slit but she managed to survive. She is still the main suspect in her parents' case." Damon takes a big gulp of the burning liquid.

"Well, if we find the real culprit I bet we'll figure out who she is." He puts down his glass harshly and slips into a leather jacket.

"Toodeloo my lovers, I am gonna do some investigating." He turns back.

"And brother? You have a grave to dig up."