"What makes you my conscience? Who did you say you were?"

"I live upstairs. I said my name's Elle."

"Yeah, I think I heard Mary mention you." Mea frowned. "You're the book lady."

"I use to be before I got fired. So what was that song you were singing?"

Mea's eyes clouded. "Song?"

"That love grows where my Rosemary goes song."

Dazed, Mea slowly lowered her eyes. She took a much longer sip on the mug and this time she didn't make a face. Elle wasn't even sure she tasted the bad coffee anymore. "I don't drink Vodka. That belongs to my-that belongs to Burly. I just get that way sometimes...in a trance." Mea told her. "I dream and I see him again and sometimes I don't want to wake up so I make myself stay there."

"Him? Meaning Mary's father?"

A tear dropped down Mea's cheek and she quickly wiped it away. "His name was Grant and I loved him very much. But just like all men do in my life, he left without even telling me goodbye. He used to sing me that song and he told me to always remember it so that's why I named her Rosemary."

Leaning forward Mea sat the mug down on the coffee table. "But sometimes looking at her is more than I can bear." Mea said. "She looks just like him, except for the hair. She has my blonde hair. Her eyes belong to her father. The first time that man looked at me with his blue eyes I knew I was in trouble. Grant gave me such hope for the future."

"You never tried to find him?"

Again Mea shook her head. "The last night we were together there was something bothering him but he wouldn't tell me. Every time I asked he would hold me tighter or kiss me again and that always shut me up. He would tell me that he just wanted to live in the moment while he could. He was such a mysterious man."

"Maybe he was married?"

"No," Mea slightly flushed, "I was his first, ever."

"How old was he?"

"Thirty-five. Look, I know what you're thinking but he wasn't living with his mother nor was he some deranged serial killer. Actually his family was very wealthy and I believe he was afraid to fall in love. You know...some women are all about money."

Mea sniffed and wiped her nose on the sleeve of her dingy robe. "I just wanted him. I should have known better. Nothing ever good happens to me. People ridiculed me, called me dreamy, crazy. They thought someone like him would never want someone like me. Guess they were right."

"What happened to Grant?" Elle asked, totally enraptured.

"I'm not sure really," Mea's voice cracked. "I worked for his family's company. Word got around that something happened. I asked a few questions and a week later I got fired. When I tried to find out what I did wrong, I was escorted from the building by someone I trusted. I was told to stay away. After that I just drifted away from life...and from everyone else."

Elle hung on Mea's every word afraid to look away or speak for fear she would stop talking. She had never known love nor had anyone loved her so much they would sing her a song. Mea told her how the two met and how Grant made her feel when he took her in his arms. He was strong, powerful and handsome, and Mea had never been wanted or loved that way by a man such as him. When Mea was with him, Grant made her forget about everything else, even her troubled past.

Grant made her feel that she was the only thing that mattered in his life. Pulling the cushion out from under her, Mea lied down on the couch and covered her eyes with her arm. Elle suddenly felt as though she was intruding but she wanted to hear more. She wanted to hear more about the mysterious Grant.

"Do you want me to make you more coffee?" she asked.

"I don't think so." Mea weakly smiled. "I think I just need to rest."

Elle didn't want to leave. She wanted to know that Cinderella stories actually did happen to ordinary girls, nobodies like her. She wanted to know that even damaged girls could be wanted. When a thought formed, Elle eagerly spoke. "Do you mind if Mary and I clean your kitchen then. I really don't have anything else to do. I can stay and maybe you might want to talk more after you've rested?"

Removing her arm from her face, Mea looked up at her. "You're so pretty Elle. Why do you look so sad?"

No one had ever told Elle that she was pretty before and meant it. Most of the time it was some boy that just wanted to spend a few worthless minutes with her, and then leave her behind like Mea said. But she had never given in until Julio, and then it was only because she had no one else that wanted her. "I guess because I've never known what you had even though it only lasted a little while."

Mea quickly sat up. She kept her head down but Elle could tell that she was crying. "I think I'll take a shower," she announced. "When I'm not drunk that's when I go into those trances. I don't know how to function when I'm not drunk. I don't want to drink, not really. It's just the pain is too much. I don't want to live without him and so far I haven't found a reason to."

"Mea, you do have Mary to live for."

As Mea stood, Elle could see the woman's thinness underneath the robe. "I know and I also know it's time I let him go. You would think that after ten years I would accept the fact that he's not coming back."

Elle was just finishing up the last dish when Mary finally emerged from her cubbyhole of a bedroom. She had gone in there to change but for whatever reason had decided to stay there awhile. Elle sat the last omelet down in front of her knowing the second Mary shoved the food away that something was wrong. She had assumed her disappearing act was to get out of doing her share of the housework but now Elle wasn't so sure.

"Are you mad at me Mary?"

Mary shook her head. "No, I heard what she said about not being able to look at me."

Thinking back Elle replayed the conversation with Mea in her mind and realizing what the little girl must have overheard, pulled the chair around so that she was sitting next to her. "Mary your mother loves you. It's just you look like your dad and sometimes it's hard for her."

"She doesn't show it," Mary said stabbing a fork into the center of the omelet. "I heard what she said and it makes me wonder if she doesn't love him more than me."

"I think that's wrong for you to say that. Every woman longs to have a man in her life that means as much to them as your dad did to your mom. What happened hurt her deeply, but now she's just got to find a reason to move on. It's not in the booze or her boyfriends. Her biggest reason to go on is here with you and I think she knows that." Elle playfully poked at Mary's nose. "You sure do smell better Miss Rosemary."

Mary pinched one blue eye closed. "Better than before?"

"Oh, most definitely," she said.

Out of the corner of her eye, Elle noticed Mea standing in the doorway and quickly stood. She had dressed in jeans that were far too baggy and a tee-shirt that had seen better days but at least she was out of the dingy robe.

"I'm sorry. I hope I wasn't being too presumptuous," Elle apologized. She removed the apron she had found in the closet and tossed it over the table in front of Mary. Behind her the dishes were drying on a towel and Mea was noticing everything that she had done.

"You don't have to run off," Mea told her as she crossed to the sink. She stopped before a cabinet and started turning the dials on an under-the-counter radio. "You're an easy person to talk to Elle."

"No one's ever really told me that before." Elle moved over to where she stood.

"You are and that's why the children must like you. You just speak your mind and see behind a person's faults."

"I guess it's because I have enough of my own."

"You said you got fired?" Mea selected a soft melody on the radio and started putting the dishes away. Elle nodded an answer, picked up a towel and started to dry. "What happened?" Mea asked, curiously. "I think Mary tried to tell me but I can't remember."

"The guy said he knew daddy," Mary blurted, "and he tried to take me to him but Elle stopped him."

Cringing Elle sat the mug down on the counter that she was in the process of drying, since Mea's wide eyes were staring directly at her, and she had stopped putting things away. She had washed her hair but instead of putting the soppy wet strands up in a towel, her hair hung down upon her shoulders, and there was two inches of her natural darker roots showing in contrast to her white bleach job.

"I don't know anything about that," Elle explained. "Some guy just tried to take her from the library and I stopped him."

"Do you know what he looked like?" Mea asked. A new intensity formed in Mea's eyes and Elle had a horrible feeling that it wouldn't take long for that passion to form into obsession. She looked back at Mary and the little girl possibly wasn't sharing in her mother's same enthusiasm, but there was definitely something warring in her expression, Elle couldn't quite place. Her mannerism told her that she had been waiting, almost testing her mother and her reaction. "You must have some kind of description. Elle please,'" Mea pushed.

"He was wearing a leather jacket with a bird on the front. He had dark blonde hair, and he looked like an actor I saw in an old vampire movie once," Elle reluctantly said. The look on Mea's face grew distant and Elle instantly regretted telling her. "Do you know him?"

"The description fits one of my old boyfriends. I always thought he looked like Kieffer Sutherland. Actually, I was dating him when I met Grant. He hung out with some Harley riders in a group called the Blackbirds."

"Well he followed me home afterwards and he let me know he wasn't too thrilled about my interference."

"He followed you home." Mea frowned looking at Mary. "So that means he might know where I live?"

"I'm sorry Mea," Elle apologized as Mea headed for the kitchen door. "I thought I was doing something right."

Mea stopped and turned around. "I'm sorry Elle, you did the right thing but my reasons to move on without Grant just got a little more complicated."

Chapter Fourteen.

Something Broken Elle pulled off the plastic gloves and tossed them in the trashcan next to the backdoor. She rested her arms on the windowsill and stood watching the sun, big, round and orange as it lowered behind the abandoned building down the alley. Inside she wondered how something could be so glorious that it could bring beauty to a structure left neglected and uncared for a decade ago.

"I really appreciate you doing this," Mea said, from her seat at the kitchen table.

"You have to keep the dye on for twenty minutes and then wash it out," Elle told her. She went into the living room where Mary was watching a cartoon and collapsed on the couch. Had Mea not waken her out of her depressed slumber, Elle would have remained in bed. "What is that you're watching?" she asked Mary.

All morning Mea had been trying to talk to her but Elle wasn't in a talkative mood. Elle didn't see the point in talking. Her situation was hopeless. Nothing would ever change, at least not for her.

"Its *American anime' but it's not as good as the books you read."

"The characters don't even look real," Elle grunted. "Hatori's look real at least."

Mea sat on the other end of the couch. Elle was glad she was keeping her distance. The chemical smell of the hair dye was starting to play havoc with her stomach.

"Mary, would you mind going to your room a moment?" Mea's tone drew Elle out of the funk she was in. Elle waited for Mary to obey before she turned her eyes on Mea, but she spoke first. "Elle you've been moping around for days. You need to tell-"

"I'm pregnant," Elle cut her off. She had meant to take Mea by surprise but she responded with a solemn nod. Elle on the other hand started crying. "Mea what am I going to do?"

A sad expression crossed Mea's face. "Elle, you've got to get away from him before he hurts or kills you both. That's what you're going to do."

"You make it sound so easy. I would have been gone a long time ago if I had some place to go. I have no money, no family. Even then, Julio may claim that he doesn't want me but he always manages to find me. Believe me those fights you've overheard are nothing in comparison to what he puts me through afterwards when I try to leave. There is no place or no one that could protect me from him."

"Elle don't give up on me."

Elle turned her head away and started watching the cartoon again. "You better check the clock. I think it's been twenty minutes."

Once Mea left to wash the dye from her hair, Elle hurried out the door. She didn't want to talk to her anymore. Mea was convinced that Grant was still alive, thanks to an ex-boyfriend gang member in a leather jacket trying to take her kid, and she was off living in her own fantasy world.

Finding Grant however and living happily ever after was an illusion, a dream. Things like that didn't happen to women like them. Things like that didn't happen in real life. Real life was shacking up with a man you didn't love just to have the security of a roof over your head.

Elle shut the door behind her and quickly flipped on the lights. Julio wasn't sitting on the couch but only after she thoroughly inspected every last closet, and space big enough for him to hide, did she relax. Julio had been doing that a lot lately, hiding in places she wouldn't think to look and spying on her.

Going to the bathroom, Elle took out a tube of ointment from the medicine cabinet and applied some to the teeth marks on her neck. She really hated Julio and the last thing she wanted was to have his child. She wanted a distraction, something to help pass time and take her mind off her problems, but there wasn't anything.

She couldn't read since Julio had stood over her until every last page of Hatori's book had burned in the big roaster his mother had given them for Christmas. She didn't want to watch television because when she was reminded just how fictional happy endings really were, she became even more depressed. With nothing better to do, Elle climbed out onto the fire escape and sat down.

"Hello Miss Rosemary," Elle said without turning. She had heard the little girl coming up the ladder rungs and even though she didn't want company, she knew she was about to get some.

"Mom left and told me to stay in the house. She said she had some things to do and was going to look for a job. I kind of got the impression that she would be gone a few days."

"Are you worried about that?" Elle asked.

"I've been alone most of my life whether she's home or not." Mary sat down next to her and Elle turned sideways so that she could see the little girl's face. "I know," Mary sighed, "I talk older than any ten-year-old you know."

"I guess that's a good thing because that means you're smart and that means a lot, these days."

"You're smart Elle."

"If I were smart I wouldn't be here now- meaning in this mixed up mess of a life."

"Had you been given the chance Elle, what would you have done with your life?"

"I read about the adventures Pain goes through in the Tale of The Two Brothers and sometimes I think I might want to have such adventures. I think about traveling and seeing things that I've never seen before like the ocean and the Smoky Mountains."

Elle moaned wistfully. "I think it would be nice to have friends and a family like the one Pain has. I think of big houses with families gathering on the holidays, where everyone is laughing and having fun. Truthfully, I've never thought about me, what I would like to be personally. I don't see myself as a doctor or flight attendant or anything like that. Those things aren't important to me."

"Well I want to know my dad," Mary said. "I don't believe he's still alive like my mom does, but it would be nice to know things about him other than his name and the fact he used to sing her some silly song. But," Mary hesitated, "I think the best thing...the most important thing to me...ever, would be to tell someone my secret. I want to tell them what I am." Mary's eyes, wide and beseeching, rose slowly up to Elle's.

"Okay," Elle shivered. "You're really creping me out."

Mary nodded. "Yes, but that's probably about to get worse. I'm like one of the shifters in your book Elle. I can change into an animal. That's why I started following you to work so I could hear more of your stories."

"I think I'm going to go inside now Mary." Elle rose to her feet. "When you're out of this weird mood you're in, we'll talk more."

"It's ok Elle," Mary said with her eyes still on her. "I didn't expect you to believe me. I was just hoping you would."

There was nothing in the fridge to eat and Mary was hungry. She hadn't eaten anything of nutritional value for two days. There were no more Moon pies and the handful of Cheerio's wasn't enough to control her hunger. She closed the fridge and went to the cabinet. She'd done this several times in the last couple of hours.

This trip didn't reveal anything new either. She hadn't expected it too. There was nothing there but flour, sugar and a few broken stale taco shells. She couldn't recall them ever having tacos. Mary couldn't eat them. It was hard telling how long they'd been there.

Taking the Cheerio box from the shelf, Mary poured the last of it into her hand. She slowly chewed as she watched a roach crawl across a greasy stove burner. Inwardly, she hoped there weren't any hiding in the cereal box. She moved again to the fridge hoping mysteriously that something had appeared since the last time she checked. Her mother had told her not to leave the apartment or Mary would have gone begging again.

People were starting to talk about the dirty little girl that knocked on doors asking for food, and mom was starting to get worried that social services would show up soon. It wouldn't be the first time that they did on the account of Mary's wandering.

Finding it hopeless, Mary slammed the fridge door shut and returned to her room. Sitting down on the bed she picked up the book that Elle gave her. She opened it to the first page and started reading, but the words didn't make sense. Setting it aside, Mary felt like crying. She hated her life and she had so hoped that Elle would believe her.

A loud noise startled Mary and quickly she bolted upright. Mom still wasn't home. Many times in the last couple days she had been tempted to ask Elle to come downstairs and keep her company, but Elle had not only been avoiding her, her boyfriend had been spending a lot more time at home. Just when Mary thought that it might be her mom returning she realized that the voices she heard belonged to two men. As something loud crashed to the floor, Mary instinctively hid under the bed.

"Make it look like a robbery and I'll see if the kid is in her room."