I couldn't sleep. Nope, it just wasn't possible. Tonight just brought back too much memories. Memories that I wanted to forget. To burn down into ashes. Today was my Mom's tenth death anniversary. Except it isn't just a regular death aniversary where people die of old age, my Mom were murdered. It's the fact that my best friend's father murdered her that just makes it worse. I felt a tear slowly cascade down my cheek.

"Don't cry, idiot! You promised yourself you wouldn't cry - or remember!"I scolded myself while sobbing. But I couldn't help it. The memories just came flooding in, the tears came flooding in.

My memories went back to a month before my birthday...

"MOM! I DON'T WANNA GO TO DISNEYWORLD FOR MY BIRTHDAY! I'M GONNA TURN FIVE! FIVE YEAR-OLDS DON'T GO TO DISNEYWORLD - 3 YEAR-OLDS-DO!", I screamed when I figured out we were going to Florida for my birthday.

Any other kid would've killed to go to Disney World, but me - I wasn't any other kid. No, I wanted a regular birthday party like the big kids. I wanted to grow up so fast I wouldn't even remember my 'kid era' - as I called it then.

"Alright Max, we won't go. We'll celebrate it here like the big kids,"Mom said.

Then to the day of my party...

I looked around for Josie. I couldn't find her. So then I searched for my mom. I found her in her room looking very worried/sad/desperate.

"Where's Josie? You said she'd be here, Mom!", I asked. Everyone one was here - Sam, Dylan, Carly, Samantha, Alexis, Wesley, and the rest of the people from her kindergarten classroom. The only person missing was Josie - my best friend, sister, everything. "Where is she?"

"Max..."she whispered trailing off.

"WHAT MOM? WHERE IS JOSIE!", Max screamed.

Then she started crying. "Max, Josie...sh-sh-she h-has c-ca-can. She has cancer!" Mom burst out in tears, while pulling Max close to her.

Max stared up into her mom's face. She couldn't believe what she was hearing - she couldn't believe what she was seeing. Mom never cried, but today was different. Josie was like Mom's other daughter. I just stared. Then I ran out of the door.

A month later...

"How much more time does she have?" Mom asked Josie's dad Dave at the hospital.

"Another two weeks at the most," Dave replied, his face like stone.

"Only?" Max asked, her voice cracking.

And then the worst part, my other half dying, Josie dying, me breaking beyond repair...or so I thought...

I kneeled by Josie's hospital cot. She was already dead. It's said that when people die they look...peaceful. Not Josie. She looked as if she had died in pain. Her face was conterted in the strangest shape. She was so young...

I walked out of the room only to see Dave and Mom fighting.

"It's all your fault!" Dave yelled."If you had never-never-oh I don't know! But it's your fault anyhow!"

I cowered behind her mom's legs.

"Dave! You're scaring her! Stop this nonsense! It's none of our faults! CALM DOWN!" Mom scolded/yelled in her commanding voice.

"I'm going to get you! I WILL AVENGE MY DAUGHTER'S DEATH!"

He left us alone for so long, we had forgotten about Dave's words. But things came back, they always come back...

Mom and I were in the kitchen. I was sitting on the counter-top, and my mom was cooking dinner. We were just about to eat delicious linguine with clam sauce, when the doorbell rang.

"Who could be here at this hour?"Mom asked herself as she went to answer the door. It was Dave. "Have you calmed down yet, or are you still blaming us a year?" Mom asked in her 'don't-mess-with-me' voice.

"Yes, I have,"Dave said in a sneer voice as he stepped into the living room, locking the door behind him. Mom turned around to tell me to go upsairs. "But you know, I can't break the promise I made to myself for Josie." He pulled out a knife.

"MOM! BEHIND YOU!" I yelled. I was too late. My mom spun around, but the knife was already plunged deep in her back. She collapsed to the floor face down. Dave, who was laughing like a maniac, fled so he wouldn't get caught. I didn't call the police - I wouldn't have known what to say. So I rushed to my mom. She was still alive.

"Max...Max I love you. Don't ever forge-ge-t that. But I want. You to. Do something for me...sweetie. When you grow up...find her. Find...her."

This broke my even more than Josie's death. At I felt like every part of of me was broken into pieces. A terrible feeling for a child whose life has barely started...

Those words still haunt me. Find who? When? Where? She left me nothing to start with. Maybe there was something left back in our house, but I'll never figure out. A week after Mo - she died, I moved to my Aunt Leanne's house. After a week there, I got transferred to this orphanage. Since then every night of her death anniversary, I would lie down and mourn on my top bunk. Cry when I tell myself not to, remember when I know it will only cause me more sorrow. I never let anyone know though. For everyone outside, even my closest friends, I was Maximum Ride, the invincible, the brave, the most sarcastic person on earth.

Finally, sleep came to me and I blacked out.

First fanfic! PLEASE R&R!

(This is a rewrite of the first chapter)

~PLH2000