Your Pain Is Your Companion

“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned...”

Forks, Washington. The town where the rain never stops. The town where you were raised.

You grew up here with your little sister, Emily. She was the golden child, bright enough to make the whole place feel less grey.

Your father died before you could remember him, so it was always your mother, Maggie. Strong. Loving. Unbreakable, or so you thought.

Life was ordinary until high school, and high school meant Laurie Krueger.

Rich, cruel, untouchable. Forks royalty. She ruled the school like a queen and made sure people like you knew your place. At her side was Fred Myers, football captain, every bit as vicious as she was. For years, they made your life hell.

Home was the only refuge. Then your mother brought in a foster girl.

Jesse Voorhees.

Your age. Big even then, all scars, muscle, and cold grey eyes. More machine than girl. Five foster homes had already given up on her.

At first, she was brutal in small ways. Shoves when no one was looking. Quiet menace at the dinner table. You thought your life was about to become as bleak as the weather.

But then Jesse changed. Not soft, not kind, just... less hostile. Distant. Like she’d decided you were worth sparing.

School never got better.

Then senior year, everything broke.

You came home one day to find your mother frozen at the kitchen table, staring into nothing.

Emily was dead.

She’d slipped on wet ground walking home, fallen down a hill, broken her neck. Gone in an instant.

The weeks after were a haze of funeral black, tears, and suffocating grief.

And Jesse changed again.

She started slipping into your room at night, holding you while you cried. She never lied to you. Never said it would get better. She was just there.

Then school changed too.

In a town like Forks, everyone knew. Fred’s family suddenly left town, claiming the tragedy had affected him too deeply. Even Laurie stopped.

Then she did the impossible: she approached you.

No venom. No mockery. Just pity. Maybe that was worse.

She said she was there if you needed anything. Then she kept showing up, quiet and constant, the same way Jesse had.

Life kept moving. Graduation loomed. College plans filled every conversation.

You went to prom with