No Strings Attached? // Roman Godfrey

Destiny.

There it was. Destiny's apartment.

The last time you had seen your older sister, was yesterday at the funeral. The two of you shared the same mother, but not the same father. Destiny had been around you for as long as you could remember, until she decided to move out and live on her own in Hemlock Grove.

She was only a couple of years older than you, and even though she wasn't fully your sister, you still saw her as one. She was the only one that understood what you were going through, because her dad has left the family when she was still little. And yours had recently left you when he found out your mom had died.

Destiny had arranged that you would live with her for as long as necessary. So here you were, the day after the funeral, standing across the street and looking at the apartment.

You took a deep breath, grabbed the two suitcases you were carrying with you, and crossed the street. The small, slightly hidden door was open and you entered the hallway. You knew which number she lived on, so you immediately walked towards the door and knocked on it.

"Eva, come in." Destiny smiled as soon as she opened the door. You followed her to the living room and saw someone sitting on the couch. You recognized him, because you had seen him at the funeral, but you had no idea who exactly he was.

"I'm gonna put my stuff in the bedroom." you said, eyeing the guy. He gave you a quick nod and you went off to the guest bedroom.

Destiny had put a lot of your stuff already in the room, like most of your clothes, your books and some of your crafting supplies. She'd even put your own pillow and blanket on the bed. You opened your suitcase and began putting the rest of your clothes in the wardrobe. You put your toiletries by the sink in your room and eventually pushed the empty suitcases under the bed.

There was a knock on the door and it slowly opened, Destiny's head peeking in. "Need any help?"

You shook your head. "No, I'm already done."

Destiny walked into your room and sat down next to you. You put your head on her shoulder as she put her arm around you.

"I haven't even cried." you stated. "I just can't, for some reason."

Destiny hugged you a little bit. "That's okay. Some people are like that. It'll probably come out some other time."

"Thank you." you mumbled. "For letting me stay here."

She pressed a kiss on your cheek. "No problem at all. You're my little sister, my everything."

She then let go of you and you managed to give her a smile. "Hey, who's the guy in the living room?"

She kind of jumped up from the bed and chuckled. "Why don't you go in and find out?"

"Alright, sure." you snorted. Destiny always wanted you to find out things on your own. Plus she liked it when people interacted with each other.

You followed her to the living room and sat down next to the guy. He run a hand through his dark brown hair and kept his blue eyes on you while flashing you a smile.

"So, who are you?" you asked, straight to the point.

He started to chuckle. "Destiny already warned me you wouldn't remember me. I'm Peter, your cousin."

You frowned. "Puppy Peter from aunt Lynda?"

Destiny laughed. "Hah! She remembers the nickname she gave you!"

Peter rolled his eyes. "Yeah, that one."

You wrapped your arms around him and hugged him. "I haven't seen you in years!"

He chuckled and hugged you back. "Yeah well, Lynda and I also live in Hemlock Grove since a year or so, and Destiny thought you'd like it if you already knew someone."

"So, are you still a puppy?" you smirked as you let go of him.

Peter gave you a gentle push. "Don't call it that!"

"Eva, I heard that he prefers the term sexy man-beast now." Destiny said, before walking off to the kitchen to get something to drink.

You raised an eyebrow to him. "Fuck off. I'll stay with puppy."

Peter messed your hair a little bit. "Sure, but only you can say that. Eerie Eva."

That was something you indeed stopped hearing when you weren't seeing Peter anymore. He used to call you that to get back at you for 'puppy Peter', and because you never really talked and just stared at people when you were little.

"Pfft, I'm not eerie anymore." you said, making a funny face at him. "But you're still a puppy!"

"Fine." Peter mumbled and he got up. "Anyways, I'm off. Lynda wants me home for dinner."

Destiny handed you a mug of tea and sipped from her own. "Yeah sure, tell her we said hi! And thanks for coming by."

"No problem D." Peter smirked, and he pointed his finger at you. "And I'll see you soon, I'll come pick you up for school in a few days."

---

It was early in the evening, and the house was filled with candles and incense. You immediately felt home in Destiny's place, and you snuggled up on the couch with a nice cup of tea.

"So, what's been happening in your life?" Destiny asked as she sat down next to you.

You were sipping your tea and looked at her from the corners of your eyes. "What do you mean?"

"Pfft, you know what I mean." she scoffed a little bit. "Your gifts. Have you done anything with them?"

Destiny had psychic gifts and on your tenth birthday, she had seen in your hands that you had some as well. If you made the effort to train them.

You shrugged. "A little bit. You know mom doesn't like that."

"That's because she's just jealous she never had any gifts." Destiny chuckled, and she blew a kiss up to the sky. "What have you done?"

You put down your mug and turned your body to Destiny, while grabbing a pillow. "Divination, mostly. Tarot, tasseomancy and bibliomancy."

Destiny's face brightened. "Good, good! How's that working out for you?"

You chuckled. "Well, my tarot deck is a sassy bitch, mom didn't let me rip the teabags so I wasn't able to practice that a lot and the local witchy woman almost attacked me when I told her that I don't like to use a holy book for my bibliomancy. So yeah, going really well."

Destiny started to laugh and soon you were laughing too. She then pulled you close against her and started sobbing a little bit. "I'm really glad you're here, Eva. Even though the reason is shit."

"Hey, I'm also glad I'm here." you tried to comfort her. "What happened has happened. And we can only make the best of it, the two of us."

She held onto you tighter. "And I'm so fucking glad Peter's there to watch you at school. I don't want anything to happen to you, you know that."

"I know." you mumbled. "Do I really have to go to school? I kinda don't want to."

Destiny let go of you, wiped away her tears and chuckled a little bit. "Yes you do! You'll make friends, I'm sure of that. Peter has a few good friends, and I'm sure they'll like you."

Well, we'll see that soon.