Chapter 2: escape is chance
Poor girl.
I sit on my bed meeting the young girl's eyes. There's sadness there; pain that spans lifetime. Waves of gold fall down around her face creating a sence of saftey. Well tries to at least. For the girl safety will never be possible. She can feel her finger tips graze it but never can she fully grasp it. For now she would have to be satisfied with the illusion she lives in.
She stands up and begins to walk to me just as I get up and walk to her. She reaches out her hand to me; a tiny palm with delicate little finger shooting out from it. My hand goes up to meet hers but I can't; glass for ever divides us.
My phone rings and I give one last sympathetic look at my reflection before I leave to answer it.
I flip it open and instantly the chaotic noise of the dinner fills me ears. I hold the phone out at a distance. "Uh? Hello"
"Starla, Starla can you hear me?" It was Jules on the other line and her voice sound strained. Obviously Mindy told her about what happened with Owen last night. I mean they understood for the most part. Owen needed blood. As much as we tried to ignore that he had change there were somethings we could never forget. For the sake of my brother I agreed to feed him my blood and keep him strong.
Just because I hated them, we all hated them, I wasn't going to turn my back on my brother. That's something I could never do.
"Ya, what's up?"
"Hey are you heading over here yet?"
"Not yet, my shift doesn't start till almost six. I was gonna catch a quick bite to eat why?" I heard her stop breathing for a moment. "Jules what is it?" I suddenly had the feeling it wasn't about what Mindy saw.
"Starla you might want to hurry up. We have a problem."
I was out the door instantly. After a two minute car ride I pulled up to the parking lot to find police and a forensics team searching the premises. "Mindy, Jules whats going on?"
The wind whips at their hair making their bodies appear all the more ridged. Their faces looked grim as I stepped out of the car. Neither of them seam to be able to say it, so it's Dan who's forced to be the brave one "They found a body." I turned around to find him sitting down on the curb. The dinner was closed up for the day, I guess he knew he was needed.
"It's the man's. They found it in the back of the dinner." said Jules, finally thawing out. She came close to me draping her arms around me. My heart stopped for a moment as my brain tried desperately to reject the thought suddenly fluttering to the surface.
My eyes went wide, "Owen."
Dan stood up, "Did he come home last night Starla."
"I-I don't remember," I closed my eyes trying to picture last night, "I went to bed early after the..." I let my voice trail off but they knew what I would have said, "He said he'd take care of the body."
It was then that I noticed the red that rimmed Mindy's eyes. She had been crying. We all knew what they would do to my brother, a newly turned vampire, had been helping kill his own kind. Without another word I grabbed my keys and was screeching through the empty evening streets ignoring the frantic calls that trailed behind me.
~*~
"Owen!" the door slams open without resistence "Owen!" I call out again but it's only the lifeless echoes of my own voice that answer back. I run into the back room where he sleeps during the daylight hours. "Owen." my words seam to die in my mouth before I even have a chance to finish saying them. His bed is empty, his sheets in the same disoray they had been the night before.
