A/N: Hey, guys! I decided to add a second part to this story that involves Nina at Anubis House dealing with her past. Enjoy!

Nina's POV

Everything good in my life...it always goes away. The year I spent solving the mystery with Fabian and the rest of Sibuna was the best of my life. For once, I wasn't constantly preoccupied by thoughts of my awful elementary and middle school years. There wasn't one instance where I even thought about self harm or starvation.

Everything changed the next year. Joy returned, a new boy joined, and Fabian didn't seem to like me as much. Or at all. Two weeks after we broke up, I found myself pushing my food around on its plate; thoughts of the ever-so-tempting razor blade that was sitting in the bathroom wouldn't stop haunting me.

Jerome's continuous comments about my and Fabian's break-up were the last thing I needed at that point. I suppose you could call them the straw that broke the camel's back. Either way, as soon as he finally shut up about us, I abandoned my dinner and the rest of the house.

I found myself in my and Amber's room, tears staining my diary as I tried to convince myself that writing would make me feel better. I had never really gone into detail about my past in the diary for fear of someone else reading it, but maybe it was time to come to terms with my life. Maybe that was the only way to stop myself from this state of mind I was spiraling into. And so I began putting pen to paper, forcing myself to write down the most gruesome details of my life...

I was always the one left out. My mom had me when she was sixteen years old. She was a single mom until she married my stepfather. I was only two years old. I have no memories of what life was like before him, but I think it was better. My earliest memories are very faint, of gran telling me to tell her everything that happened to me. And I wish she had stayed. To this day, I still don't understand why she abandoned me the way she did; why she held her distance. Everything started when I was so young. I never had a good reputation. I was the only girl wearing make-up in the second grade. I wore the make-up because my stepdad would physically abuse me. And my mom joined in the party as soon as she realized that her make-up was mysteriously disappearing.

I didn't have any friends between preschool and seventh grade. When my stepdad killed May, I was shunned by the rest of my classmates. Most of them followed me through grade school. I think my appearance was intimidating, too. The sheer amount of make-up I wore was enough to push people away. My skin was pale and my clothing was ripped and worn out, most of it dyed black. Every time I did something that angered my parents, I would get a beating. To hide the abuse, I would do more things that angered them. The cycle went on for years. I was always too afraid to tell someone, especially when things got worse.

The worst thing that happened to me was puberty. I started developing into a young woman at the age of ten. To my stepdad, I was just another person to abuse. The only time I remember my mother being remotely nice to me was after she discovered that my stepdad had been abusing me, too. It was while I was hospitalized and she was on trial. The moment she got word of my diagnoses, she demanded to see me. Though she didn't have custody over me at that point, my gran gave her another chance. There wasn't a single word exchanged in the few minutes she was with me. She just held me in her arms and cried. Later, gran told me that my stepdad had been abusing my mom, too.

The worst it ever got was in sixth grade. I had been starving myself for months. I refused to eat for weeks at a time. One night, my stepdad came into my room, as he did most of the time. Most of the time, he stopped at forcing me to pleasure him orally. Because I was so thin, my breasts were very small at that time. At the lowest weight I ever hit, I was wearing bras that claimed to increase your cup size by two and I was still made fun of by my classmates. My stepdad became furious at my lack of breasts and made me perform oral sex on him multiple times. And then...he raped me. Hard. The next day, I fell asleep in class and had nightmares about it. I had to lie again and say that everything was all right.

Then my gran found me and I was hospitalized because I passed out. I hadn't eaten in weeks at that point. Recovery was so hard. I had never known was normal was like. It took me three years to get to a point where I was acceptable to be released from inpatient treatment. The next year, I started at Creepy Towers, as everyone calls it. And now...Fabian broke up with me, and I've lost my best friend to her attempts to try to get me and Fabian back together. I feel lost and abandoned...and writing everything down didn't help me at all.

That was it...as I closed my journal, I wiped the tears from my eyes and refused to let any more fall. It was just too much for me to handle. Shakily, I walked to the bathroom and grabbed my razor from its holder. When I returned to my bedroom, my hands were trembling so much that I almost accidentally dropped the razor.

Rolling up my sleeve, I pulled the head off the razor and rolled up the sleeve of my sweater, exposing the pale skin of my inner forearm, where the faded scars from my childhood still remained. I chose a spot that wasn't already scarred, which was hard to do, and swiped the razor sideways across it a few times. It wasn't the most efficient method of self-injury, but it was all I could handle at that point.

Tears began falling again as I dropped the razor blade. I buried my head in my hands and stayed there.

"Hey, Nin-what's wrong?" came a voice from the doorway. I immediately straightened up to see Fabian crossing the room, rushing to my side.

"Oh, it's...it's nothing. Just..." I couldn't finish my lie without breaking into a fresh round of sobs.

"Nina, I know something's wrong. Is it my fault?" I saw his eye catch the razor blade by my feet. "Nina...no. You...you didn't."

Sniffing, I turned my arm outwards towards him. The blood was now running down my arm and staining the sleeve of my sweater bright red.

I could tell that he was too shocked to speak for a few minutes. His arm reached around me and held me comfortingly. Finally, he said, "Do...do you want to tell me anything?"

Initially, I shook my head. As I thought more, though, my therapists had said to find someone who would listen and always be there for you, and tell them about everything. "Actually...yes. It's a long story..." My breathing became unsteady again; I had managed to stop myself from sobbing in the few minutes of silence, but it was all starting to come back. "I...my parents aren't actually dead." I saw Fabian open his mouth to speak, but I cut him off. "Please, let me tell the whole story. Everything will make sense. My gran...she's only forty nine. When she visited us a few days ago, she put up an act so that people wouldn't get suspicious. I was born when my mom was sixteen. She broke up with my real father before I was even born. When I was two, she married someone. He...he ruined my life." And so I went into the full details of everything that had happened to be because of my stepfather. When I finished, Fabian and I just sat in silence for a few minutes. My arm had stopped bleeding, but my sleeve was stained scarlet.

Finally, he found words. "Why...why didn't you tell anyone this before?"

"I don't know. I didn't want to worry you, I guess..."

Fabian wrapped his other arm around my front and pulled my legs over his. I was practically sitting on his lap, something I never thought he would let me do. His thumbs wiped my tears away and he cupped my cheek with his right hand. "Nina...thank you for telling me everything. I just wish you had told me before. I really care about you, and I would be devastated to lose you. Nina, I...I love you."

His words shook me a little bit. I hadn't expected that from him. "You...love me?" He nodded. For the first time since he had broken up with me, I truly smiled. "I...I think I love you, too."

Our lips met for a few tantalizing seconds before Fabian pulled away. He helped me stand up. "How about we go get your arm cleaned up, and eat some dinner?"

I nodded. "Thank you...so much. Please don't leave me again."

"I won't. Promise." His hand slipped into mine and our fingers intertwined; for the first time that term, I felt as though I had found my place.