by Rue Volley
Sam sighed and placed her hands on her hips.
“She is the only human who lives with them, Josh… She is harmless,” she said
Josh looked at me and nodded.
I turned to step into a whole new… thingy. I never believed in palm readers and psychics, but now… well, anything is possible, right? I mean, I was immortal… so nothing should be a shock.
Truth was, secretly I always wanted to do it anyway. Sara and I spent a lot of time at the carnival during each summer leading up to my ummm… new thing I had going on… All of those visits excluded the supernatural, mainly because my Mom made me promise not to go to any. Now I knew why, but at the time I thought maybe she had one thing that she was conservative about… that being the spooky and unexplained. Now that I am on my own… well, kinda… I was so gonna have it done.
I pushed the slit open and peeked in at a room dimly lit with candles. Music was playing softly… I think old jazz. I stepped in and stood there looking at the room in full view. The bed was large and covered with Victorian-looking sheets… deep red and gold. A table sat in the middle, with tarot cards laying on it… some flipped and some in the deck. I looked over at the large chest, half-open with feather boas sticking out of it. A large dresser sat against the wall with multiple pictures on it. I stepped towards it and leaned in to look at the black and white photographs… smiling faces, different place than this… different time.
I thought I heard something, and I looked over to the corner and spotted an elaborate divider, with a corset strung over the top of it. Suddenly a hand popped up and grabbed it, pulling it over the side. I stood up straight and then called out.
“Hello?” I said in a gentle voice.
I heard rustling behind the divider and then a girl’s voice.
“Hello, Rue Volley,” she said.
I raised my eyebrows and waited.
I heard her laugh, and then she peeked out around the divider. I looked at her and crinkled my eyebrows at her. She was beyond cute… and young. She looked younger than me. Great. This is gonna be worthless. I guess that I was expecting…
“Someone older?” she said, as she stepped out.
I stood there confused for a moment… I mean, I was talking in my head right?
“Yes you were,” she added, as she walked out into the room and looked at me.
I stared at her corset and her skirt. She looked like an old vintage burlesque showgirl. So pretty.
“Thank you… I would consider the fact that you see me as pretty, a compliment coming from you,” she said.
“You can hear what I say in my head?” I asked her.
She nodded and looked at the two chairs at the table. I looked at them too.
I sat down, not thinking anything. I watched her walk up and pull the chair out. She flipped it, so the back faced me, and straddled it in her dress. I grinned, and she did too, as she picked up the tarot cards and started to shuffle them in her hand.
“You wonder why someone as young as me is doing this in a rogue camp,” she said.
I stared at her and then relaxed a little.
“Well, I’m sorry. I just expected some old woman with a crystal ball, I guess,” I said to her.
She smiled, as she peeked up at me.
“Well, I am old I guess… if you consider that this is my seventh life that I have lived.”
“Seventh?” I asked her.
She adjusted on the chair and looked into my eyes.
“Reincarnation,” she said.
I smiled a little and looked at her hands. They looked young.
“I’m seventeen. I look young, I know… but you can trust that I am old at heart,” she said.
“What is your...”
She cut me off. Of course she would. I bet that I could sit here and have a whole conversation with her and never open my mouth.
“Yes you could, and my name is Elizabeth… Elizabeth Crowley,” she said.
“Well, you already know my name,” I said to her.
She nodded and looked at my face.
“You have a lot of heaviness in your heart, Rue,” she said.
I leaned forward and placed my hands on the table.
“I just saw a ghost… two actually,” I said to her.
She grinned as she chewed her gum, which I wasn’t even aware of until now.
“I know… and I will not be popping my gum… since it annoys you,” she said.
I smiled and shook my head.
“Well, I don’t think that I will have a problem believing you,” I said.
She laughed and shuffled the deck of tarot cards in her hand. She held one hand above the other one and they fell, like she was pro at card tricks. I caught staring at it for a moment. She smiled, and I looked at her.
“What?” I asked her.
“You… so curious about everything, and yet so humble as to your own ability.”
I cleared my throat and leaned back in the chair.
“I don’t feel special right now,” I said.
She stood up and walked to the dresser, grabbing a picture from the top. She looked at it and then walked back over to me and sat down with the picture in her hand. She tilted her head and then sat the picture down on the table and I looked at it. It was her… younger, black and white. The picture so old it was faded. I leaned in and looked at her face… same one as now.
“This is me at eight. This picture was taken over a hundred years ago. This was my sixth life,” she said to me.
I stared at it and looked back at her. She had grabbed a small thin blade at some point; I had not noticed when. She stared at it and laid it on the table in between us.
“You remember this photo being taken?” I asked her.
She nodded and chewed on her gum.
“Yep… I remember everything… even when and how I died,” she said.
I took a breath and stared at the knife on the table.
“This was the knife that my psychotic boyfriend stabbed me with,” she said, as she stood up and walked to her chest along the wall.
“Omg,” I said.
She looked back at me, as she leaned down and opened the chest up.
“Yea… omg, it sucked. Dying is a weird experience.”
I looked at her and touched the knife with my fingers. I felt a slight vibration on it and let my heart relax. Why I felt so nervous going in there, I didn’t know.
“Did it hurt… I mean the dying part?” I asked her.
She stopped and pulled out a black box from the chest and looked at me.
She walked back over to me and sat the box down on the table.
“The stabbing hurt… all six times. The dying was more life falling into a beautiful sleep,” she said.
I took a breath and watched her take a seat across from me.
“So… you died the same every time,” I said in a low voice.
She leaned forward and opened the black box up. She pulled out black candles… three of them and crystals, in all sizes and colors.
“Every time… it’s a boy with a knife. So, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised… but it still sucks.”
“That does suck,” I said.
She stopped fussing with the contents of the box and grinned at me.
“You came about a ghost,” she said.
I nodded and looked back at the slit in her tent. I turned to her and bit my lip.
“I saw Johnathan… and then Sara, my friend. She was hurt,” I said to her.
She pulled out a box of wooden matches and started to light her candles one by one. She pulled a mirror from the box and placed it in the middle of the table and then placed the candles around it… one at three sides, leaving the open side towards me. I watched her and waited. She closed her eyes and took a breath and then let it out. Her breath came out in white, and I watched it. It was quite a warm night so I don’t know why her breath would be cold enough to come out like that. She opened one eye and looked at me.
“Do you constan
tly talk in your head?” she asked me.
I grinned and shrugged my shoulders to her.
“Sorry,” I said.
She placed her hands over two of the candles, and I could smell the flesh on her palms start to burn. I wanted to jump up and stop her, but once again she looked at me and shook her head. I leaned back, and she pulled her hands up and held them out in front of her, her palms facing me. I
Chapter 4
The Animal You Are
Johnathan woke up on a soft bed. He rolled over and sat up quickly, as he took a breath. He touched his side and then looked around at the room. It was an old room, full of vintage dolls… looking creepy on a bookcase. He looked at the bed comforter and it was pink and yellow… obviously a girl’s room. He looked over and a large window, floor to ceiling, had light peeking through it. He pushed himself up and placed his feet on the floor. It was ice cold, and he raised them both quickly as it burnt his skin. He hissed and then breathed out, as he watched his breath turn white.
“What the hell?” he muttered, as he rose up and crossed his arms on his chest and rubbed his arms.
He walked to the window and looked out; he watched the trees sway in the wind and snowfall slowly.
“Okay… it’s winter… now where the hell am I?” he asked out loud.
He turned when he heard a voice and looked towards the doorway.
A girl stood there, with a tray in her hand. She stepped in and grinned at him.
“I have hot soup for you, Johnathan,” she said, as she sat it down on the table beside the bed.
Johnathan looked at it and at her.
“It’s you,” he said.
Elizabeth smiled and nodded to him.
“You weren’t hard to find really,” she said, as she stood there and smiled at him.
Johnathan rubbed his arms and stared at her.
“You took me to, Rue,” he said.
She nodded to him and walked to the bed. She popped up on the side of it and let her feet dangle off the side of it.
“That I did,” She said.
Johnathan tilted his head at her and looked at the soup steaming from the bowl.
Elizabeth looked at it too.
“Eat,” she said to him.
Johnathan laughed.
“I can’t believe I am hungry… I am dead right...? Dead people don’t get hungry.”
Elizabeth smiled at him and leaned back on the bed. She grabbed a pillow and hugged it to her.
“Well… we are kind of dead, not all the way dead,” she said.
Johnathan shook his head at her.
“There is dead and not dead… no in between,” he said.
Elizabeth leaned up and smiled at him.
“Not for those of us that should not yet be deceased,” she said to him.
Johnathan laughed and looked out the window.
“I don’t know why I would be shocked, but I guess that I am. Listen… I remember seeing Rue, but I don’t remember what I said,” he said to her.
Lizzy popped up and stood on the bed. She started to jump up and down. Johnathan watched her as he raised his eyebrows.
“You said hello,” she said as she smiled.
“And?” Johnathan said, as he stepped up to the soup on the tray.
“You will get to say hello again,” Lizzy said.
Johnathan picked up the spoon and scooped some soup up in it. He placed it in his mouth, and it tasted warm but flavorless. He swallowed and looked at her as he let the spoon drop in the bowl.
“It tastes like air,” he said, as he rubbed his mouth.
Lizzy stopped jumping and looked at him.
“That is because you need to drink blood,” she said.
Johnathan looked at her and shook his head.
“No… no I don’t.”
Lizzy jumped down, like a pro, from the bed and landed right in front of him.
“Yes… you do,” she said, as she nodded.
Johnathan looked at her and held up his hand to her.
“I am not a blood drinker… never was,” he said.
Lizzy laughed and walked to the door.
She turned back to him, holding onto the frame, and leaned her head back.
“Well, you better change your attitude… otherwise I will not be able to get us topside,” she said to him.
“What the hell is ‘topside’?” Johnathan said, as she disappeared from sight.
Johnathan ran to the doorway and looked down the long hallway. One end, ended at a window and the other lead to a turn. He scratched his head and stepped out of the room. He started to walk down the hallway in the only direction he could go. He stopped at the corner and took a breath before he stepped around it. He decided that it was an all or nothing situation and stepped around it expecting something crazy… but no. It was just a short hallway, leading to a staircase.
He walked to the staircase and looked down the steps. He lifted his foot and waited to feel shaking, or see flashes of light… but nothing. He smiled and stepped onto the first step and then walked down the stairs that dropped him off in a large entryway. He looked around and called out Elizabeth’s name, getting no response.
“Awesome… another crazy girl… just perfect,” he said to himself.
“I am not crazy; I am just living challenged,” Lizzy said from right behind him.
Johnathan jumped and grabbed his chest, as his heartbeat hit a galloping speed.
“Holy crap… don’t do that,” he said…half-winded.
Lizzy laughed and took his hand. Johnathan looked down at their hands intertwined, as it felt ice cold to him, just like the floor had in the bedroom.
“You are freezing cold,” he said to her.
Lizzy laughed and pulled him forward with her, as she walked backward.
“Of course I am cold… I am dead, just like you are,” she said.
They stepped out into a large living room, and Johnathan looked around the room at the large white statues and the oversized Victorian furniture.
“Where are we?” he asked her.
“You mean literally...? Or just this house?” she asked him.
“Both, I guess,” Johnathan said, as Lizzy let his hand go and ran over to the large rocking horse near the large window.
She jumped on it and started to rock back and forth.
“Well… here is my house,” she said.
Johnathan walked towards her, as she rocked on the horse like a child.
“And the literal version?”
Lizzy stopped and looked at him.
“In between,” she said.
Johnathan scratched his head and looked around the room.
“Oh, that clears everything up,” he said.
She smiled at him and tilted her head.
Johnathan looked at her and grinned.
“Are you a protector too?” he asked her.
Lizzy smiled and nodded.
“Well, technically I am human… but I was bitten before I died… so here I am,” she said, as she popped off the horse and looked him up and down.
“You really are quite tall,” she said to him.
Johnathan stared at her small frame.
“Maybe you are short,” he added.
She shook her head and walked to the window that had a bench in front of it attached to the wall. She sat down and curled up against it and stared out into the yard. Johnathan followed her over and sat down, glancing outside.
“I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings… I am just sarcastic by nature.”
Lizzy looked at him with a soft look on her face. Johnathan noticed her pale skin and blonde hair. She looked so young and yet not, all at the same time. She had huge blue eyes and lips that looked pouty… pink in color. Lizzy blushed a little and looked back out the window. Johnathan cleared his throat.
“So… how long have you been here?” he asked her.
Lizzy grinned and rested her chin on her hand and watched the snow fall slowly outside.
&nbs
p; “Time is an illusion,” she said.
Johnathan looked out at the snow and took a breath.
“Time matters,” he said softly.
Lizzy looked at him, as he stared out the window.
“You love her very much,” Lizzy said.
Johnathan looked at her and half laughed nervously, as he shook his head at her.
“You are talking about Rue… Well yea, I love her… not in that way though.”
“Mmm,” Lizzy said, as she looked back out the window.
“I love someone too,” she said.
Johnathan glanced at her from the side.
“Who?” he asked he her.
“Oh, you probably don’t know him,” she said. “He is the reason that I am still here. I have been with him twice… hopefully I will be with him again.”
Johnathan leaned back and looked at her, as she stared off into the snow covered yard outside.
“I know a lot of people,” he said.
“Jonah,” she said.
Johnathan stood up and looked at her.
“Top hat… carnival… cannibal Jonah?” he asked her.
“Oh, you do know him...? Well, yes. I love him a lot,” she said.
“Huh,” Johnathan said.
Lizzy looked at him and stood up in front of him.
“I will be with him again… and together we can make that happen,” she said.
Johnathan crinkled his eyebrows at her and looked out the window.
“What is the plan then?” he asked her.
Lizzy clapped her hands together, like an excited child, and ran into the adjoining room. Johnathan ran behind her not knowing what she was doing. He stopped when he saw Lizzy leaning over something. Johnathan stepped up behind her and stopped… leaning in when he saw a boy… tied up on the floor. Lizzy touched the boy’s face and stood up and looked at Johnathan. She grinned and held her hands out in front of her.
“Okay… eat him,” she said to Johnathan.
Johnathan stepped back and looked at the boy, as the boy on the floor shook his head and made noises behind the tape on his mouth. Lizzy stood there and placed her hands on her hips. Johnathan looked at her and did the ‘why’ with his hands towards the boy.
Lizzy looked at the boy and back to Johnathan.
“He is for you, Johnathan… You have to feed to make it possible to leave,” she said.