Woot woot, an update and it's been LESS than a week. I think I'm going to shoot for a chapter a week. hopfully on Sundays. I have decided to dub them "Shaken Sundays" Anyway, here we go. pllllleeeeaaassseee comment and tell me what you like, what you dislike, that this is the worst story you have ever read.

I promise it's about to pick up from here. Her powers are starting to make themselves known and as soon as she figures them out so will you! It's about to go down yalllll.

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Benjamin knocks on my door and I yell for him to come in. After I took a shower and got dressed in a pale green sun dress letting my hair air dry, I decided to make him those cookies. I just set them on the counter when he walks in. He sniffs like a dog and grins. "Cookies?" I nod and he rushes to grab one. "Yummmmmm" I laugh and go to grab my phone out of my room.

"I'm ready when you are. All of those are yours." He looks down at the 3 plates, his mouth full.

"All of them?! Awesome." His words are muffled. He grabs one to take with us and smiles.

As we get into his truck he grins at me. "You ready for this?" I hope the look I'm giving him is a hopeful look, nodding. I could only imagine what he's got in store for me. As he drives, I take a few minutes to look at his profile. His nose is straight, almost perfect, but goes just to the right like he might have broken it at some point in his life and his jaw is strong and scruffy with hair he hasn't shaved in a few days. He turns and smirks at me. "Enjoying the view are we?" my eyes widen before I bust out laughing.

"Oh yes Benji. I am." His smirk forms into a face splitting smile his dimples coming out.

"Well Hallie, I know I'm pretty, but we are almost there." He nods to the front of the truck, as we turn down an old dirt road. The trees are thick and after about a mile they open up to a beautiful lake.

"Oh wow." I breathe out, it's completely breath taking. "This is amazing." He grins and puts the truck into park and jumps out grabbing a few things out of the back.

"This way my lady." He puts his arm out for me to walk ahead of him to a small pier. He lays down a blanket and a couple bags before dropping down to sit. He pats the seat next to him. "I brought some snacks and water. I thought we could have a little picnic." I smile and sit next to him my legs out in front of me and lean back on my hands letting the sun warm me.

"This is a place I come when I need to be alone and think, or just want to get away from everything. I thought you might need that today." The look on his face is one of pity and anger. I could tell he was thinking about last night and I place my hand on his, opening my eyes to look at him.

"Ben, thank you, and thank you for last night, I needed someone and you don't even really know me." he squeezes my hand then grabs two water bottles for us, handing me one.

"Well, why don't we fix that then?" He starts, sitting up and turning towards me. "Well my father, Antonio, was born in Italy and came here to Texas for his father when he was 20, he ran into my mother in Dallas by accident and decided to move here to be with her, he always said it was love at first sight." His eyes light up at that. "She was actually from right outside Tyler and when they got married they moved up to Dallas, where my sister and I were born. We lived there until about 3 years ago when my grandma got sick so we moved down here to be closer to her. My mom always did love the fact that it wasn't as busy here as it was up there." I smiled at him before he looked off at the water. "My favorite color is green, I love all Italian food, obviously, my dad's mom is the best cook in the world, I love action movies, or anything with Johnny Depp." He laughs a little embarrassed. "What about you?"

"Well," I sigh, I figure I'll start with the easy stuff first. "my favorite color is also green, I love Italian, but Mongolian is my favorite, I love action movies, and chick flicks and Johnny Depp is the best." I stop looking away from him for a moment.

"Have you always lived here?" he prompts when I haven't said anything for a while.

I nod. "Yes, my parents both lived here and had my sister and I, we grew up here and I went to college in town as well." I get up and walk to the end of the pier letting my feet touch the water. "My sister was my best friend Ben, we did everything together. It's been a really hard two years." He walks over and sits beside me.

"Have you ever been in a car wreck? It's like the world slows down. I remember every detail. We had gone to a party, since she was going to be joining in college that fall, and I wanted to make sure she didn't do anything to stupid. I didn't touch any alcohol, I wouldn't dare drive drunk, and never with my baby sister in the car. We were singing along to the radio, the road was empty; it was just after 1am. We turned a curve in the road and straightened out and all the sudden a car came out of nowhere. I swear it was like it popped out of thin air, it wasn't there and the next minute we were crashing into it. We spun around the road and hit the guard rail part of the end going over the edge, and I blacked out. When I came to my sister was not in the car with me and there was no other car to be seen. The paramedics had to sedate me because I would 't stop yelling for Emma." I take a deep breath and Ben rubs my shoulder.

" They searched for Emma for weeks before they said she must have been ejected into the river. They couldn't find a body, still haven't. They told us because the river goes so far we might never get a body out, and after a few months they gave up all togeter. We had the funeral with an empty casket. My parents wouldn't even look at me, let alone talk. After the funeral I moved out and haven't seen them again until my graduation, which was part of why I didn't want to go out that night. My mom barely said two words to me. They hate me, it was my fault I didn't see the car in time to stop or move out of the way." I drop my head down into my hands as I feel tears on my cheeks. I hadn't talked about it since the police questioned me. It hurt too much.

He wrapped his arm around my back pulling me into him. "Hallie, you have to know it wasn't your fault, it was that man's fault." The sobs shake my body. And he places a kiss into my hair. "Please listen to me. It wasn't your fault. And I'm sure your parents don't hate you. They lost two children that night and they don't know how to handle themselves. But I don't think that anyone could hate you Hal." I nod slowly and put my hands down and look up at him.

"I just wished it would have been me instead. I miss her every day Ben, every single day."

We don't say much else the rest of the day; we eat a little and watch the clouds. This is what I needed and I might have needed to get the story out as well. Though talking about it made me continue to think about it for the rest of the day. Like a disaster you can't look away from, my mind wouldn't let me look away from the scene in my head.

Once the sun sinks down over the tops of the trees we get up and clean up our mess. Driving back we are both quiet as he hums along to the radio. When we get to the apartment building he stops the truck and looks over at me.

"Thanks for coming with me today." He rubs my hand and I feel something pull inside me. I push it down, I won't be going down that road, and he's too great of a friend to even think about being anything more, plus I heard him tell him mom he wasn't going to date me.

"Thanks for taking me Benji." I grin and he narrows his eyes before smiling at me.

"You know, it's kind of ok when you call me that." I throw my head back and laugh as we get to our floor. He hugs me tightly and pats my head before walking off to his door. "Thanks for the cookies too. I'll need more by tomorrow." He says over his shoulder before waving and stepping inside.

I go into my apartment and slide down the wall sighing. I already miss his company. And then my thoughts drift back to last night and my hands start to shake. I hadn't really thought about it all day but I knew I needed to. He hurt me, but I had got him off of me. I wasn't the victim. I wouldn't be the victim. I clinched my fists looking around the room. I was angry, really angry. I can't believe that he had tried to hurt me, tried to make me do things I did not want to do with him. I shook my head and stood up. Pacing around my apartment, they need to punch something was strong. I clinched my fists even tighter and it felt like my whole body was shaking radiating out from my hands. I hit the wall beside my bedroom door and cracks went out away from where my hand was. My anger faded out as I gapped at the mark. How had I done that? I wasn't very strong. Walking into my room I fell on my bed. My life seemed to be one long line of questions I couldn't answer.

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It's a little short but I thought I needed to stop here or this chapter would end up being like 20 pages long.

Again, thank you for reading.

xoxo,

Lacey