“Yeah. It’s nice to watch something that I don’t have a hand in. For the hour and a half I watch a movie I feel normal,” I answered her truthfully.
“I don’t see how this makes you feel normal. I mean, watching this should make you feel empowered.” She looked at me and smiled slowly.
“How is this going to make me feel empowered?” I laughed, pulling my knees closer to my body.
“Because we are meant to stop things like this from happening. Look here; this demon seems to think that he can inhabit anyone’s body that he wants. It’s our job to stop that. You’ve seen the possessed first hand. They are quite frightening.” She looked back at the TV.
“I guess you could say that. Never thought of it that way.” More truth.
“You know, back when I was alive things were a bit different.” She spoke as if she was still floating in Purgatory. I supposed it was going to take some getting used to, being back in a living body. “I never saw anyone die. Not until that night John killed me.”
“I’ve meant to ask you a question about that,” I said, losing interest in the movie.
“Anything.” She turned to face me.
“Mara said you knew what he was. Yet you still loved him?”
I saw her eyes cloud up. “John was very dear to me. When I met him all I saw was the good in him. That boy would give the shirt off his back to a homeless man if it meant giving him just an ounce of comfort. He was giving, kind and honest. I should have known when he went away; he would come back changed. I held onto hope though. I hoped that he wouldn’t find the darkness that was in him.” Her smile faded, and she looked lost for a moment.
“He hurt you, and yet you still came for him when he meant to do me in,” I said softly.
“I will always love him. Even the eighteen years I spent in Purgatory wasn’t enough to make me stop. You still love your Wesley even after he betrayed you,” she reminded me. It was a valid point. I did still love my blue-eyed boy.
“You may be right. What happened that day? I only saw some of it.” I hoped that I wasn’t crossing an imaginary line.
“I met him at a restaurant, where we had dinner. There were four of us: John, his friend Ryan, Ryan’s girlfriend, and me. John lost his cool in the parking lot outside the restaurant. I had received a phone call while we were at dinner and I was concerned it was the girl I had seen in the drawings. He hit me. You saw all of that. The whole thing went so fast that before I knew it, I was scared and crouched in his closet. My last moments were the worst moments of my life. When he had taken the last bit of innocence from me, all I willed for was death. Nobody was there to save me. I didn’t have any amazing friends as you do.” She ran her fingers through her blonde hair.
“You don’t remember much then, do you?” I asked as she looked toward her feet.
“No, just the fragments that I have in my sleep now and then.” She looked tired suddenly at the thought of sleep.
“You know, anytime you need me I’m just one door down,” I reassured her.
“Thank you, Dawn.” She reached out to grasp my hand. “You know the same goes for you.”
“What’s going on in here?”
I heard Adam’s voice from behind the couch. We both looked up to see him staring back at us.
“Nothing. Just watching a movie,” I said, hitting play on the remote.
Our brief moment of getting to know each other was over.
“Ah, yes,” said Adam, glancing at the TV, “an oldie but a goodie.”
Krista let out a snort, and Adam frowned.
“Let’s not forget I’m thirty-six years old, trapped in an eighteen-year-old body,” Krista said, laughing.
“You know, for an old lady you’re pretty hot.” Adam winked at her and Krista roared with laughter once more.
I looked at Adam and frowned. I had never heard him hit on anyone, and here he was flirting with Krista. It was odd how it made me feel funny, not quite how it was with Helen, but still there under the skin.
“Adam, you’re a charmer,” Krista told him. “Your girlfriend must be so happy to have you,” she teased.
I liked how she reminded him of Nadine. The last few days I’d developed the feeling that he had forgotten all about her.
“Yeah, she’s pretty lucky.” He winked again and jumped over the back of the couch, taking a seat between the two of us. “Of course, right now I think I’m pretty lucky. I have an awesome best friend, and I have you, beautiful.”
“Oh, please.” I poked him with my big toe.
*****
Mom sent Adam back to Midvale with his father a few days later. The reapers promised to keep them safe, and that put my mother at ease. Adam would be returning after school ended, with his father to continue training. Mom thought it was best that way. It was already raising eyebrows that both Adam and I were missing. It was starting to get around that we had run off to elope. Teenagers and their rumors, right?
I continued doing my schoolwork from the manor, sending in everything electronically. The teachers were pretty gracious about it, and my mother made regular phone calls so they couldn’t complain that they were being left in the dark on anything. My “grandfather” was slowly dying, but because he had nobody to care for him, we had to stay with him. I couldn’t believe that this was working. My mother called them every day to give them a heads-up on the situation and check on my grades. Surprisingly, I was doing better with my studies by not being in the classroom. Apparently, I had been more distracted by the pastel-clad children of
