A Hundred Lifetimes

Eight

Mary was right. He was dramatic, but it was I that fell for his sad puppy expression. I was left with a sense of guilt, having had been rude to the man who had just saved me; given, of course, that he also tried to take a bite once when he was out of his mind, and I wouldn’t be fearing for my life if it weren’t for the man he had angered. Still, Dorian obviously wanted none of this happen. It was I, anyway, who was wearing the face of his beloved Clara and agreed to go to this damn Murder Mansion twice out of curiosity. Really, if there was anything to blame, it was whatever granted me this shapeshifting ability.

As I slumped back into bed, there was a knock on the door and Clarissa walked in. “Good evening, miss. Master Dorian informed me you were awake,” she said, walking towards the bed with a tray of food and drinks. “How are you feeling?”

“Never been better,” I said sarcastically which, again, I immediately regretted. Boy, was I on a roll! I sat up and looked at her apologetically. “Sorry, Clarissa, I didn’t mean to, I um—my head hurts and my entire body feels weak, is all.”

“You’d feel better with some food in you,” she said, placing the tray on the bed. “You’ve been asleep since last night. It’s been around 23 hours now.”

“23 hours?” I asked, my eyes wide. She nodded.

“You’ve been through an ordeal, miss. Your body needs to catch up, so please help yourself.” She offered me the spoon, which I took and thanked her for. As soon as food touched my mouth, I realized that I was very, very hungry, and proceeded to eat a spoonful after another.

Clarissa moved to fix the room while I busied myself with the food. After a while of working in silence, she spoke up. “I’ve been told that you will be staying with us for the foreseeable future,” she said, glancing at me.

I nodded.

“That’s for the best of your safety, then,” Clarissa softly smiled, but I could feel her hesitation.

“What is it?” I asked.

“It’s just that,” she paused, thinking what to say, “it must be quite hard on him to see your face looking so—”

“Like Clara?” I supplied, and she nodded. “I only heard that she was his… lover, but he also mentioned that he blames himself for her death. Did he,” I couldn’t continue.

Clarissa dropped the throw pillows she was holding and walked towards me, shaking her head. “Dear heavens, of course not,” she said. I made room for her to sit beside me on the bed. “I have only heard the stories,” she admitted, “but miss Clara died in a fire, and Master Dorian witnessed it. No one really knows what exactly happened, but the fire seemed to be an accident. He claims that he was partly to blame, but the stories passed down to me say that miss Clara went into the burning house on her own volition, before it collapsed. Why she did so, I do not know, and he very rarely mentions her name.”

Clarissa placed a gentle hand above mine. “Master Dorian has a kind soul, miss,” she assured, “I have been here almost all my life. Even when I started here younger than how he looks now, he has always been respectful and kind. That was why I chose to stay, and why my granddaughter chose to stay. He is family to us, and he has been like a father, a brother, and now a son to me. I can only hope that you see the goodness in him in your stay here in the mansion.”

She tapped my hand once and stood up. “I’ll leave you to rest. Please ring the bell if you need anything else tonight. Mary will give you a tour around the mansion tomorrow,” she said, before collecting the tray on my lap.

“Thank you, Clarissa.”

She only smiled then closed the door on her way out.

That night, I had a dream—possibly the most vivid one I’ve had in years. There was an old woman who smiled at me so sweetly. In the dream, I knew who she was: a grandmother. She called me her light, her bright and shining star, and handed me something. When I looked down on my hands, they were that of a child’s. Was I dreaming of Clara’s childhood? I wondered. But just when I was about to open my hand to look at the gift I received, I woke up to the sound of knocking.

It didn’t stop until I sat up and said, “Come in!” and Mary entered. “Good morning, sunshine,” she said with a cheerful smile as she parted the drapes, basically blinding my eyes as the morning sun poured directly into the room.

“Wash up, let’s have breakfast, then I’ll give you a tour,” she said. “And hurry because I have a date in the afternoon.”

“The sun, Mary,” I complained, shielding my eyes.

Mary chuckled and adjusted it just enough so the bed wouldn’t be directly hit by sunlight. “What are you, a vampire?” she asked.

I looked at her dryly, but she only smiled and said, “Too soon?”

A vampire. I still couldn’t believe it. “What time is it?” I groggily asked as I stood up.

“7 in the morning. Hurry up so we can change the dressing of your wound,” she said, taking a seat on the edge of the bed and pulling out her phone.

“Are you not going to—” I motioned towards the door.

She glanced up at me and shook her head. “I was told to keep an eye on you. Bathroom's over there, your stuff are already in the closet.”

My things! My heart pounded as I remembered that Mary had her hands on them. Did she go through my box? I wondered. I frantically opened the closet and found my clothes neatly folded and hung. The box, I saw, was still safely locked and placed in a corner. I breathed a sigh of relief.

“I wanted to open it, but Mr. D told me not to,” Mary admitted, peeking at what I was holding. “Hurry up,” she reminded. I proceeded to gather some clothes, and took a bath. When I emerged from the bathroom, Mary was still where I left her—typing away on her phone.

My new room, I found out, was on the second floor of the left wing and easy to find. We went down to the dining room, which was on the right wing, and when I hesitated to go in—because Dorian had told me not to avoid said wing—Mary only waved a hand and said, “You’re allowed in the kitchen and dining area, don’t worry. Just, maybe, keep away from the other rooms around here.”

Once Clarissa joined us, we began to eat breakfast that she had prepared. I didn’t bother to ask if Dorian would join us—he was, after all, not human. I figured that his diet didn’t consist of bacon, eggs, and pancakes.

“So, Shay, what’s your story?” Mary suddenly asked as we ate, earning her a stern look from Clarissa.

“It’s fine, I don’t mind,” I said. “I, um, I studied medicine, but I never took the boards.” That was only half a lie. I did, at some point in my life, do those things. Roughly five decades ago.

“Why not?” she pressed on.

“I wanted to travel and see the world.” And I did.

“How about your parents?”

“They—they died when I was young.” I wasn’t even sure if I had parents in the first place.

“How did you pay for school, then?”

Clarissa decided to interject then. “That’s enough, Mary. The last thing Miss Shay needs is to be questioned during a meal.” That effectively shut Mary up, but not without her rolling her eyes. Once we had finished, Clarissa began clearing the table and Mary excused herself to go to the washroom.

“Please, let me do it,” I insisted.

“It’s alright, miss, you’re a guest in the—”

“Please, it’s the least I can do. You already cook and Mary drives or something. It would make me feel better if I could contribute, even with just this,” I pleaded. Clarissa must’ve found my pitiful look effective, because she reluctantly said, “Alright, but only on breakfasts.”

I smiled and nodded.

“There’s a dishwasher in the kitchen,” she let me know. “Oh, and please be careful with the plates. Master Dorian can control his urges, but it would be hard on him if he gets a whiff of human blood.”

I nodded and gave her a reassuring smile. “Got it.”

“Then if you have no more questions, I’ll be bringing Master Dorian's breakfast,” she said, giving me one last look before heading towards the kitchen.

“Wait a second,” I said, “he eats breakfast? Like human food?”

Clarissa looked at me curiously. “Why, of course, but he still needs a dose of the occasional blood, as not to be consumed by the thirst. He usually eats breakfast with… ah, I must get going,” she said, then excused herself and left.

“Oh,” I muttered, thinking he must not have come down since he knew I would be here. Even more guilt-ridden, I placed the plates on the tray and brought them to the kitchen. I was in the middle of loading them into the dishwasher when the door suddenly opened. I turned to look and saw Dorian standing under the doorway, surprised to see me there. He was wearing a blue hoodie, looking like he’d just come from a run.

“Oh,” he said, “sorry,” then immediately took a step back and closed the door. I sighed.

That sort of dance went on for an entire week. Once, I was exploring the house in the afternoon, and found him replacing the flowers in the vases. When he saw me, he only said, “Ah, sorry,” awkwardly before walking away, even leaving a few flowers on the floor in a hurry. One morning, I was going into the kitchen to get some water, and Dorian happened to walk in, holding two grocery bags. He left the room without putting the bags down. Another was when I was checking out the garden, and I caught a glimpse of him approaching and literally turning around when he saw me. He never joined us for meals, and Mary accidentally let it slip that she missed his cooking.

Suffice it to say, he was doing a great job avoiding me on purpose. I wouldn’t blame him, really, since I did seem (and was) pretty scared of him; but give me a break, wasn’t that the normal reaction when you learn that someone is a blood-sucking, inhumanly strong immortal?

The aloof Dorian, however, wasn’t my main concern that week; for ever since I started living in the mansion, I kept having dreams that felt like memories every night. They were quite unlike the memories I’ve seen from other people’s lives, though, because they felt very real—like I was experiencing them during my sleep.

There was one dream where a mother was teaching me how to sew, one was when I was running in the fields, and another with the same grandmother showing me a book about crystals and rituals. They were weird, really, and I could only assume they were Clara’s. On the 7th night of my stay, however, I had the most unusual dream.

I was sitting in front of a small, wooden dining table, waiting for someone. I looked around the room, feeling a bit impatient and uncomfortable. There was something I had to do, and yet this meeting was delaying me from doing it. Finally, I heard someone say, “I’m sorry, have you been waiting long? It took a while to boil water.”

A woman. Her voice was extremely familiar. In the dream, I knew who she was—that she was the person I was waiting for. And the house were I was sitting in was hers.

“It’s alright,” I politely said, even though I didn’t hear my voice. It had been like that in all of my dreams; I knew the exact words I was saying, but I couldn’t hear it.

“I hope I’m not keeping you from something important,” she said, and I saw her place a cup of tea in front of me. My eyes locked in on the ring on her finger.

“You aren’t,” I assured her, even though that was a lie.

She sat on the chair across mine. “Good,” she said, and I looked up to see Clara Stonewall smiling at me.

I woke up.