A/N: This is a gift-fic for Lamia of the Dark for placing 1st in my OTP Competition with The Nephilim. Since I've never written this pairing before, I decided to stay close to the atmosphere and setting of your story, including the darker themes. I hope you'll like it!

She didn't know why she kept coming back to him. Then again, she didn't know why she left every time either. Maybe it was the fact that he came too close. He saw all of her layers and knew how to read her like a book, even – or perhaps because of – never using many words.

She didn't know why she always sought out men who kicked her in further – but then again she knew she didn't deserve better. Some she picked because they supplied her needs – at first at least, but they became ever more demanding as she needed ever more, and if she didn't comply, they made sure that she remembered her place. Some she picked because they promised to be different – but they never were. And some… she didn't even know why she ended up with them. She knew it was her own fault. Every strike, every scar proved to her that she was what they told her she was: pathetic, an addict, a wallflower, a nobody. Ironically, it was Lily, freak-of-nature-Lily everybody always loved. She landed all the good guys, they were head-over-heels with her and on her wedding day she had looked so radiant that all Petunia had wanted to do was throw up. She was the normal one, the level-headed one, that ought to count for something, right? But as it turned out, normal wasn't what men went for. They only started noticing her when she did unnatural things. Men liked freaks, apparently. And before she knew it, she was in over her head. It started with pills that made Lily's stories seem like something toddlers made up, but she soon craved more. Starting was easy, but stopping was an entirely different thing altogether.

She didn't know why she allowed the boy who was the first one to tell her she, unlike her sister, was nothing special, to sneak his way into her bed every time. He was a freak, like Lily, and there were times – quite frequently actually - when she thought he only covered her in searing kisses to get closer to her sister. She dreaded the day – or night – where he would scream Lily's name, not hers, and with one simple word would shatter her beyond repair.

She didn't know why she didn't run from him permanently. It scared her that he could hold so much power over her, making her loose herself without her becoming dependant on yet another drug. Beatings and lacerations she could deal with: those were things she could – to a certain degree – understand, because they were part of a real world, but magic was a territory she could not and would not ever acquaintance herself with. The vials with potions he gave her to help her cope when she was not using – or so he said – probably prompted her to do his bidding - but then again, she remembered the sex too well for it to have been magic – or maybe that was just how magic worked.

She didn't know why she stopped using the very same things that made her forget that she was a nobody, that alleviated her suffering and elevated her to a somebody – if only for a short amount of time. Perhaps it had something to do with him not liking her taking it, but she told herself that that was not the case. She was just done being everyone's doormat and depending on them for her supplies. Being a doormat was bad enough as it was already.

She didn't know why she let him get into her head like he had. Maybe it was this damn freak-of-nature-thing again, maybe he was messing with her, unravelling her brain bit by bit until there was nothing left but some mushy goo. Maybe he was laughing at her expense with his friends, like all the others did. Deep down, she knew it wasn't true, but the truth scared her too much to let it in.

She didn't know why she stayed when he asked her to that first time – though it probably had to do with him asking her to, rather than commanding that she'd stay – but they'd grown into a pattern where they'd have sex, maybe twice, she stayed the night, they had breakfast and she left. She'd pick up her old life until things became too bad, and then she'd remember the man who never called her names – and the sex, she remembered that too when she was sobered up.

She didn't know why, when she became less reliant on drugs, she didn't stop seeing him. But as the days of agony became weeks of suffering and then months of coping, he was the one constant factor that prevented her from going entirely insane. They didn't talk, but her head was clearer when she was around him.

She didn't know why she mocked him that day, but the words were out of her mouth before she could think them through. Maybe it was because of how he had behaved that night, clinging on to her like she was his lifeline instead of the other way around. Or maybe she did it to test him. Would he raise his hand, like the others had done? She knew that if he did, she'd not be coming back to him. But he did nothing of the kind. In fact, she imagined she saw the tiniest hint of a smile on his face and decided to push her luck further. She told him she got a job, something she had meant to be her personal sanctuary. He was surprised, but didn't burn her cheeks nor made her head spin. She went as far as to mock him a second time, and this time, she did see a smile.

She didn't know why she'd been pushing him away all those years, leaving him whenever he peeled off too many of her layers. She didn't know why his magic scared her so much – he had never hurt her like others had. She didn't know why she allowed him to take care of her, but she had a blossoming feeling that maybe, just maybe, even someone as damaged at herself eventually got a shot at a normal life. She left his house that morning with a new energy in her step, cherishing the thought that she'd be back in the evening.