A/N: First fanfic ever! I hope you guys enjoy it. But whether you do or you don’t, please read and review anyway. That’s the only way I can progress as a writer.

CHAPTER 1

Can you stop the fire? (Please… please…)
Can you stand to fight her? (Please… please…)
You can't stop the fire (Please… please…)
You won't say the words (Please… please…)
Please...

It was an atypical Friday afternoon in Gotham City, USA. The sky was of a golden orange hue and there was a bit of a chill to the autumn air. Minutes ago, the school bell over at Rockaway High School rang, signaling the end of the school day, and the hundreds of teens instructed here thundered out of the school in noisy cacophony, apparently raring to go and start the weekend.

Please, please forgive me
But I won't be home again
Maybe someday you'll look up
And barely conscious you'll say to no one
Isn't something missing?

That is for all except one student it seemed. Standing idly towards the top of the landing of the stairs that led to the school, was a timid young girl: Angela Roth. She looked to be no older than seventeen, and was fairly easy on the eyes, what with her long black hair pulled up into a messy ponytail, and icy blue eyes that seem to stare right through you. She also wore a striped bluish-green and white shirt under a khaki colored jacket along with a pair of faded denim jeans rolled up to the knee and a pair of white tennis shoes. Angela’s eyes nervously darted around the schoolyard as if in search of something or someone, and eventually after several minutes, she slowly made her way down the stairs and through the crowd of her ‘beloved peers’ …

You won't cry for my absence, I know
You forgot me long ago
Am I that unimportant?
Am I so insignificant?
Isn't something missing?
Isn't someone missing me?

Angela was never really popular in school. Actually, she wasn’t that popular at all, and many did all in their power to avoid her. Some had heard of the rumors that Angela was regularly beaten by her father (it was even speculated that this was also the reason why her mother had died so suddenly.) and therefore were afraid to befriend her for fear of their own personal safety. Others however were reluctant to befriend Angela simply because she was what they considered to be ‘weird’. Not surprisingly, as she walked by, no one did as much as bat a eyelash to acknowledge that she was even there…

Even though I'm the sacrifice
You won't try for me, not now
Though I die to know you love me
I'm all alone
Isn't someone missing me?

As she neared the bus stop, Angela spotted several of the preppy kids talking loudly and prattling on about their so-called lives. Not wanting to hear their mindless chatter (and not in such a great hurry to head home anyway), Angela opted to take the scenic route on foot over the twenty-minute bus ride. About an hour later, she arrived in front of a dingy and tiny two-story house whose front yard was littered with trash and other debris. ‘Home sweet home’, she thought to herself as she quietly opened the gate and crept up the stairs. Angela neared her apartment door and gingerly used her keys to unlock it.

Can you stop the fire? (Please… please…)
Can you stand to fight her? (Please… please…)
You can't stop the fire (Please… please…)
You won't say the words (Please… please…)
Please...

When she entered, the apartment was unusually still. There was no TV or radio blaring in the background and all of the lights were turned off. However, Angela didn’t need the lights to see how filthy the apartment was or to see where she was going. Concluding that either her father was not home or fast asleep (she earnestly prayed for the former), Angela swiftly but silently made her way up the stairs that led to the bedrooms in the dark, just in case he really was asleep.

Thirteen steps later, Angela was almost home free. As she neared the landing, her bedroom door was a mere seven footsteps away and once on the other side of that door, she would be safe. In all the years of the verbal and physical abuse, Angela’s father never once dared to harass her while she was in her bedroom. This was discovered the first few times she ran for sanctuary within those four walls, and found it odd when he would stop in the middle of his rampage right at the doorway. But now, she simply used it to her advantage. Her room, as it should, was her only safe haven from the world…

“Where have you been?”

Angela practically jumped 2 feet into the air and whirled around to find a burly man of six feet even leaning up against the doorway to the master bedroom. His normally gray eyes were bloodshot red and his face was scrunched up into a menacing scowl.

“I’m just getting home from school,” stuttered Angela, cautiously backing away and towards her bedroom door. From where she was standing, she could smell the alcohol on his person, and in his present state, he was more irrational and dangerous than usual.

“Why did it take you so long to get here then?” slurred Mr. Roth. He attempted to rise from the door way, but then staggered back from lack of balance.

“I missed the bus,” fibbed Angela, eyes still locked with his and blindly reaching for the bedroom door.

Please, please forgive me
But I won't be home again
I know what you do to yourself
I breathe deep and cry out
Isn't something missing?
Isn't someone missing me?

“Liar!” Mr. Roth bellowed, and for a drunken man of a husky 280 pounds, surprisingly bounded from the doorway and towards her. Angela hurriedly reached for the doorknob and slid into her bedroom. She twirled around and with her body weight shoved the door closed. However, Mr. Roth was already by the door at this time, and at only a scant 100 pounds, Angela was thrown back by the force of the older man crashing into the door. Angela tried to kick the door close, but instead her father reached out and grabbed her by the leg, dragging her out into the hallway. Angela wiggled free and frantically crawled back into the room, screaming bloody murder and with tears streaming down her face. When she neared the foot of her bed, Mr. Roth was right behind her, and with a swift blow, Angela found herself crashing head on into the wooden frame. As she laid there on the floor with this juggernaut looming over her, Angela winced, knowing all too well of the onslaught soon to follow …

Even though I'm the sacrifice
You won't try for me, not now
Though I die to know you love me
I'm all alone
Isn't someone missing me?

Hours passed and Angela finally came to. She was quite surprised that she did really, for it seemed that the violence intensified each and every time she was beaten. The stinging cuts on her head, lip and arms and the soreness that engulfed her petite body were proof of it. But the thing that bothered Angela the most was the fact that her father no longer viewed her room as a sort of neutral zone. What was she to do now? Social services seemed to constantly turn a deaf ear on the whole matter. No one in school cared about her. She had no older siblings to run to, no aunts or uncles, and her paternal grandparents were in bad standing with her father, so she couldn’t rely on them to save her. And her maternal grandparents died several years back from a heart attack and terminal illness.

And if I bleed, I'll bleed
Knowing you don't care
And if I sleep just to dream of you
I'll wake without you there
Isn't something missing?
Isn't something...

Frustrated and exhausted, Angela reached out with her left arm (since she was lying on her right hand side) and feebly waved it until it finally pushed the bedroom door closed. It was then when she noticed the enormous bruise on her left hand and moaned in displeasure. She then forced herself off the floor and locked the door. Slowly making her way to her dresser, Angela opened the topmost drawer and took out the usual: rubbing alcohol, bandages, cotton balls and gauze, and set to mending her wounds.

When she was all cleaned up, she stared into her reflection in the vanity mirror and frowned in disgust. There was once upon a time when others would say that she greatly favored her late mother. Both of them had the same blue eyes and the same sweet face. And in a way, they still looked like one another, only now, they both had inherited black and blue eyes and nicks and cuts to decorate their bodies. And unless something was done, Angela would also share the same fate as her mother: beaten and strangled to death by a man who claimed to love her for better or for worse.

Even though I'm the sacrifice
you won't try for me not now
Though I died to know you love me
I'm all alone
Isn't something missing?
Isn't someone missing me?

When this crossed her mind, something inside of Angela clicked. The soft-spoken wallflower had witnessed and endured quite a lot in her life, but the one thing that she would absolutely not permit to happen was the loss of her life and possibly even her innocence, especially to that monster of a man who dared to call himself a father, and she was sure that she was not going to wait around to found out. It was now official. With no place to call home, hardly any money to her name and no moral support from family and friends, Angela Roth vowed on that night to find a place to which she truly belonged, someplace far away from this home sweet home…

Can you stop the fire? (Please… please…)
Can you stand to fight her? (Please… please…)
You can't stop the fire (Please… please…)
You won't say the words (Please… please…)
Please...