What was she doing? Why was she opening up like this? She couldn't explain it. Maybe she just needed to get it off her chest. For a long while, she didn't move. Finally, she turned to look at him when she spoke. Tears fell from her eyes, slowly trickling down her cheeks as she watched him. "The thing...I wish for..." She started. "...is that my parents were still alive." She explained. "They died...because of me. Because I....Because I couldn't help them." Her hands tightened around the steering wheel in a white knuckled grip as she closed her eyes against her tears. His hand was still on her forearm, and though she didn't realize it, Curt saw the memory as vividly as if it were his own.


[hider=The Memory]

[i]The three of them were shopping at a strip mall in the town she was going to college in. She had only been in college in the states for a semester, and they had come to visit with her over her summer break. She had gone out of the store first, and saw a stray going down an alley. Being the person she was with animals, she followed it, intending to get the dog to a shelter. But as she was getting close to the dog, someone came from behind her. He grabbed her, and she screamed. Everything seemed to happen in a blur to her in that memory. Her parents running around the corner, her dad punching the man, her mom running to shield her. The man stood up, then [b]POP. POP[/b]

The sound of gunfire echoed in the alley. She felt a splitting pain in her shoulder. She looked up to see blood coming from her mom's mouth. Her dad was already on the ground. She was covered in blood. The man ran from the scene as she screamed for help, but it was too late. He'd shot both her parents. Her mom had taken the brunt of the bullet, but Alyssa had been angled just right, and when the bullet exited her mom, it had gone into her shoulder. Both of her parents had died in that alley because of her.[/i][/hider]

The memory flash faded, and by the time it was done, Alyssa could do little more than cry into her hands as her body shook from the memory. The day everything in her life had changed. The day she'd caused her parents' murder.