Recently I have been reading fics with twisted Carlisles for some reason, but hands down, yours is the darkest I have read. Insane actually. Your story was very powerful, the emotions going through me were uncontrolled. I'm from India, till date some men think they're always right and have a way they wanna run their family. Women are uncredited things at home solely for the purpose of maintaining the house and bearing children. Might I add, arranged marriages are quite prevailing still. During the age of my grandparents, the bride and groom would see each other at the day of wedding. But then again, I'll have to blame our society and history for making such barriers which would take generations to break. 

I feel I'm ranting than reviewing. The chapter on Carlisle reminded me of Wuthering heights. Him being Heathcliff. Just a thought, and at that moment I felt a little sad for him. Even during the end. When he called Bella Renee. Apart from that, he was an asshole. Probably I needed some redeeming factor for Carlisle. 

Esme came out as a very strong character, I love how you wrote her. She not only supported herself, but Rosalie, Alice and Bella too. I can understand why Esme never left. I felt angry when Bella's therapist blamed her. If Carlisle had power to keel track of Renee and Bella, he could have brought her back as well. And she couldn't think of what Carlisle would take from her then. She always lived in the hope that her children would change someday. 

Lemme comment on the others too, though Carlisle and Esme stood out the most. Charlie had a rather active role in Bella's life, a lil too active I must add. James made me sick. Its true when they say, most of the time, the abusers are family members. Its sick to the core what they did, I'll never understand what Bella went through, but you wrote her well enough that I can feel some of her pain. More than one occasion, I cried. Edward was initially an assward, who later became confusedward, then just Edward. Take it however you want that. 

I liked that Jasper and Emmett took an active role in making Edward understand. Now that he had a girl worth fighting for. I just sang Mulans song in my head. I initially didn't believe that Rosalie could be subdued into anything and that Alice would sit in one place. Emmett and Jasper took good care of them and their love showed through throughout the story. 

I had to take a break and shake my body when I read that Demetri took Bella. I was so overwhelmed. I had to loosen myself before reading further. Thousands of thoughts were going through my head. This story brought out a lot of powerful reactions from me. I didn't skip through any scene, not because I'm a sadist or a creep, I wanted to take in the full effect of the story. I wouldn't have understood the characters if I had skipped the training scenes. 

I wrote so much, still I feel like writing more. That's my bad habit, if the story is complete, I can stop, I have to read it in one go and comment towards the end. 

All in all, I love your story, its one I don't think I'll ever forget. I was going through TWCSs top ten, and it deserves its spot there. It touched my soul, got me thinking about a lot of things. Apart from the violence, what people read in stories and think lightly of, some people live all that in real life. Hell include the violence. Who said violence can only be physical. 

Thank you for such a lovely story. 

Take care

Trilby.

The first half of the chapter was pretty personal to me. I'm Indian so I enjoyed the Indian dinner with Butter chicken and nice touch that they both wore sarees. I feel one takes their own culture for granted I guess. It's only when you go out and meet people you realise how others perceive cultures. I don't know if I'm making sense or not. One year my family and I were in Kansas; I was really young but  my mother tells me they would all share their recipes and it was always butter chicken that was in demand from my mom. And seriously a good buttery naan is our all time guilty pleasure. 

I even enjoyed the mango lassi part because seriously I didn't know it was such a big hype. We were traveling in Japan few months back and hosted a dinner at the Indian Restaurant and the locals went crazy over mango lassi. It's tasty no doubt. 

I'm really enjoying the story. Love the details. I can't believe it took my this long to come across such a treasure of your story. Enough said I'm gonna continue reading and looking forward to see how you make Edward squirm!!

I'm just reading the outtakes as they come on the list. I was very curious as to what Esme did with the ashes. Lovely to read how things go over a period of time and holidays are always a good time to think of happy memories. I loved your story behind the flamingos.

Take care,

Trilby.