Within

Chapter Eleven

According to Arthur, I had been missing for three days. Three whole days. I just kind of sat there when he told me that, unsure of what to do or how to react.

“Oh,” was all I said. I thought about my job and the fact that I had probably gotten fired while I wasn’t there--or replaced by some new girl.

Anyway, Arthur had given me this big lecture when we got home and after I had taken a shower. I wanted to ignore and disregard him, but I knew that he was right and what I had done was stupid.

I sighed deeply, looking at my cut up body in the mirror. I twisted and turned, looking at every nook and cranny that the glass had managed to slice into. I was going to be covered in scars for the rest of my life, I realized. Unless I found a way to make them disappear like the injury on my chin had. My hands found the largest scar, the one on my stomach, rubbing over the smooth surface.

“Okay,” I whispered to myself, pushing back my thick hair back behind my ears. They’d heal. Maybe fade. Some cuts, if small enough, just disappeared, right? That’s what was going to happen. I wasn’t going to be marred forever.

But what if I was? Would Arthur find that to be a turn-off? Would I be an embarrassment to him now? I bit down on my lip, hoping that there was some way to fix this. I had never been a vain person, but it didn’t mean that I wanted to walk around with cuts all over my body and having everyone look at me.

Before I went to sleep that night, I thought of Lindsay. So young and beautiful, now dead and lost forever. I wondered if she had tried to save any of the other girls. And what had happened to their bodies?

I wished that I had known about them, that way at least one person would know about it. Care about them.

That’s what I would’ve wanted if I was in their situation. To be forgotten was... painful, I guess. I’d wanted it to happen to me before, to vanish from people’s memories. But not anymore, I wanted someone to know that I had existed. It hurt to think about them, so I tried to turn off my brain and shield myself from the agony.

I fell asleep pretty quickly, and woke up within the same moment it felt like. Upon awakening, I immediately got dressed and headed down to Arthur’s apartment to see if he had learned anything about my healing capabilities. I was hoping that he had, but the chance that he hadn’t was definitely there.

I mean--I would’ve felt pretty offended if he hadn’t dedicated all of his time to trying to find and rescue me. I knew that he had a job and all, but I felt as if my life was more important than him keeping up the facade of being a human.

When I knocked on the door, I surprised that he didn’t answer immediately. Or, at all for that manner. I sat there for a couple of minutes, wondering what I was supposed to do now. Call him? I felt in my pockets for my phone, quickly dialing Arthur’s number and putting the phone to my ear indignantly.

He picked up on the third ring. “Hey,” he answered, sounding a little drowsy.

“Were you sleeping?”

“No.”

“Where are you?”

He paused for a second, probably wondering why I wanted to know. “The roof,” he finally told me.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll see you in a second. I have some questions.”

“Uh, okay.”

I hung up and made my way over to the stairwell (the elevator wouldn’t take us to the roof; we had to use the stairs) and nearly ran the entire way to the roof.

“Arthur,” I called out the second that my eyes landed on him. He was in the same spot that he had been when we had first met, doing the same thing, too.

He looked up from his phone and turned to me. “What’s up?” He took a drag from his cigarette and blew out smoke into the air.

“Why do you smoke?” I questioned. Even banshees couldn’t get addicted to a drug like nicotine.

“I don’t know.” Arthur shrugged. “I just do.” He stomped out the cigarette even though he clearly wasn’t done with it yet. “What did you want to ask me?” He switched off his phone, ready to answer what I was about to throw at him.

I wrung my hands and rocked back on my heels before coming over to stand by him and lean on the railing too. Our shoulders were touching so he moved away from me a little--maybe an inch or two. But it meant space between us. I ignored it and the sting that I felt. “Did you figure out why I healed?”

“No,” he said. “I’ve been looking... no luck. I might find something if I went to my other library, though.”

I blinked. I knew the question was off topic, but I inquired anyway, “You have another one?” The bookshelf that he had in his study was already jammed packed with books.

“I’ve been alive for hundreds of years, I have a lot of books,” he defended himself. “Anyway, I don’t keep the important ones here. It’s too risky.”

Made sense, I guess. “Are you close to finding something?”

“I don’t know. Maybe, it’s hard to tell. There isn’t really anything definitive on banshees, or any of us, actually. The most accurate I have is what old researches did, and they had a limited subject pool.”

“Oh.” It wasn’t the answer that I wanted to hear. It would’ve been nice if he had at least something. “All right,” I said, grabbing the railings tightly and leaning back. “Hey, Arthur?”

“Hmm?” He lit another cigarette.

“Who’s the guy Lindsay--the demon was talking about?” I questioned innocently, running my hands through my hair and peeking up at him.

Arthur’s expression darkened, the cigarette almost falling out of his mouth. “No one that you need to concern yourself with.”

“I feel as if I should be concerned,” I countered, pushing my eyebrows together and scrunching my nose. “Seeing as I am involved in this, too.”

He shook his head, taking in a long drag and exhaling it, smoke billowing from his mouth.

“So, are you going to tell me?”

“No.”

“No?”

“No.”

I stared at him, mouth agape. “Are you serious right now?”

“Very serious, actually.”

“Give me one, one good reason why I don’t get to know.”

“No,” he said tersely.

“Why?” I started to raise my voice at him; I was frustrated and upset that he wouldn’t tell me.

Arthur gave me this line: “Because you don’t need to know.”

I gasped, genuinely gasped at that. “I can’t believe this!”

He shook his head in response (I think he even rolled his eyes), getting back on his phone and ignoring me.

How rude! I snorted and turned on my heels, storming away from him. Arthur had only been mean to me on two occasions. But this time, it was for no reason. Literally none.

I thought that we would go back to how we were before, like, before I had kissed him and ruined everything. Arthur had been nice to me at first, ever since he had rescued me, he had been his usual self. Then... then this! It wasn’t just the fact that he had been ruder than necessary, he also refused to tell me anything.

Like I didn’t deserve to know the truth.

I ground my teeth together as I stomped down the steps. Seriously, what was with him?

My feet carried me to my apartment, where I slammed the door loudly behind me.

Just unbelievable. His attitude was unbelievable.

I shook my head and walked over to the kitchen so that I could make myself some breakfast. It was simple, just the usual eggs, bacon, and frozen waffles. The entire time, I chewed hard enough to release my anger. Then I quickly polished off my milk and slammed the glass down hard on the faux-granite countertop.

What an ass.

I sat there for a while, lips pursed and gaze turned to the side. But what was I supposed to now? I should probably call into work, apologize... try to get my job back. But I also didn’t want to. The thought of being there felt so restricting now.

I pulled out my phone and put it down on the counter, staring at the black screen. Do I do it? I frowned. But they’d probably want an explanation, and I didn’t actually have one.

So... I just didn’t call them. Mr. Bradley was a smart guy, I was sure that he’d figure out that I wasn’t coming after I called off multiple days then didn’t show up for a three additional days.

I laid my head down on the cool surface, closing my eyes for only a minute.

When I woke up, there was a crick in my neck. And my back was hurting. “Ugh,” I groaned, wiping the little trail of saliva that had escaped from my mouth. I didn’t even remember falling asleep, or being tired, for that matter.

It just happened.

I yawned and stretched my body, bones popping satisfyingly. “Oh man,” I muttered, eyes noting the time displayed on the microwave. It was one PM, and I had fallen asleep around nine, going on ten AM.

My legs protested as I stood up, knees feeling a little weird from being bent. I padded over to the bathroom to pee. When I walked in though, the first thing I saw reflected in the mirror was Lindsay standing behind me. She smiled as our eyes met in the mirror, blood all over her face.

At first I didn’t think she was real, just a figment of my imagination. Then she breathed and I felt it tickle my neck. “Boo.”

I screamed loudly, dropping my phone and falling to the floor. I whipped around, but Lindsay wasn’t there anymore.

I clutched my heart that was now beating rapidly. “Jesus Christ,” I swore. I was probably hallucinating since I was still tired. I wiped my eyes and pushed myself off of the ground, stumbling over to the toilet and sitting down.

My eyes threatened to close as I washed my hands, my head nodding up and down. I didn’t know why I was fatigued currently, it didn’t make any sense to me.

Blood started to drip from my nose, the crimson bright against the pallor of my skin. It was a gusher. I groaned in annoyance, finding it to be more of an inconvenience than anything else. I tilted my head up, pinching my nose shut with my thumb and forefinger.

When I was younger, maybe fifth or sixth grade, I got nosebleeds pretty frequently. It had happened so often that the other kids started calling me the Gusher because the bleeds were never slight.

I had been holding my nose for maybe a minute when I heard a knock at the door. The chance of it being anyone other than Arthur were slim to none, so I groaned and made my way to the front while still trying to combat the nosebleed.

“What?” I demanded as I opened the door, not in the mood to deal with Arthur. I was still mad about our argument from a few hours ago.

Arthur was holding a book in his hand, but upon seeing me, he almost dropped me. “What’s going on?”

“It’s called a nosebleed,” I answered smartly. “Ever seen one?”

His mouth twitched. “I have, actually. But why?”

“Do I look like I know?” I rolled my eyes. “ Anyway, what do you want?”

“You’re holding it wrong. You’re supposed to lean forward, not back.”

I did as he said in the most dramatic way possible. “Gonna answer my question now?”

“I wanted to show you something,” he explained, pulling out the book. “I think I might be onto something about why you healed so quickly.”

I stared at him for a few seconds before stepping aside and allowing him inside. “What is it?”

Arthur walked over to the couch and sat down. “Take care of that first and I’ll tell you.”

My eyes narrowed into slits. Did he think I was just holding my nose for shits and giggles? “I’m working on it.” I came over to him, slowly sitting down. “It’ll be gone in a few minutes. Tell me now.”

He sighed and put the book down on the table, flipping it open to a page he had marked. “It’s a mixture of lore and actual fact,” he stated. “It talks about an unnamed species, so similar to banshees that the difference was negligible. It’d be more accurate to say they’re like wolves and dogs. Still canine... but not.”

“Okay.” I mean, it was cool and all, but I just wanted straight answers right now. “What is it that sets them apart?”

“I don’t know.”

“What?”

“It doesn’t say. Just mentions that they’re different.”

I exhaled, wanting to shake my head but I was still trying to stop the nosebleed. “All right. Do you think you’ll be able to find more on the topic?”

“Maybe,” he said with a shrug. “It’s hard with these sorts of things. Like I said, there’s not a lot of info on the subjects and it’s hard to discern which has some validity to it and which ones are complete and utter bogus.”

I took in a deep breath through my mouth. “Okay. Could you get me a napkin?”

“Yeah,” he answered, quickly jumping up from the couch and going to the kitchen to get some for me. “Are you sure that you’re okay? There’s a lot of blood.”

My eyes met with his, my heart unwillingly skipping a beat at the everlasting intensity in his steely blue gaze. “Thanks,” I muttered, accepting the napkin and putting it to my nose.

Arthur nodded his head and picked up his book. “Well, that’s all I had to tell you.” He moved towards the door. “Bye, I hope your nose stops bleeding soon.”

Then he was gone without another word.

I just sat there, head tilted up and nose pinched. I thought about what Arthur had said to me, about the possibility that I was entirely different species altogether.

I couldn’t say that I really felt anything about it. It didn’t change much. I was still close enough to a banshee to be a menace. The most I gained from this was having regenerative powers that I didn’t even understand.

So it wasn’t all that great. It was like having a car and not knowing how to drive it--useless.