My Angel E.C.

Ch.8

I knocked on the door.
        "Just a minute!" Elizabeth called from the other side. I crossed my arms while I waited for someone else to open my door because she had locked it. It wasn't as if I couldn't just get in if I wanted to, but I didn't think breaking down a door was necessary.
        But really, I couldn't be annoyed. Elizabeth was right, the run and hunt had done me good to clear my head.
        She opened the door.
        "So, you weren't expecting company?" I teased.
        She tapped her chin in thought. "Hmm, no, I don't recall expecting any visitors." She grinned. "But since you're here, Darling, come in."
        "Nice of you to welcome me into my own apartment." I said as I stepped inside, but froze when I saw the place was perfectly spotless.
        "You might as well just call it a flat. You sound like such a tourist."
        But I ignored her comment as I inspected the apar- flat. Not a thing was out of place. All the furniture was as it was before I had destroyed it. Even the mattress, had been put back on the bed.
        "Is everything alright? Did I do something wrong?"
        "It's perfect. Everything is actually where it was before."
        She beamed at her accomplishment. I looked at her small frame, then at the righted refrigerator- it came with the flat- in the kitchen.
        "But how?" I asked.
        Elizabeth furrowed her eyebrows. "Well, geez, Edward, I can't exactly just straight out say it, and there are only so many hints I can drop before you figure it out."
        "Humor me with a couple more?"
        "Nope," she declared, popping the 'p'. "You're smart. Figure it out."
        I sighed and thought about everything she may have told me or that I observed about her.
        She has no heartbeat and has lived for almost as long as I have, yet she says she is not a vampire. She loved to read, and I've noticed a good portion of the books involve fantasy or the paranormal. She can restore a room that has undergone a full vampire-induced rampage in only a few hours without seeing what it had looked like before. She was dead.
        Not undead, dead.
        Everything made sense.
        "But that's impossible."
        "Took you long enough." She rolled her eyes.
        "You can't be serious."
        "What's wrong, Darling? I thought you believed in the paranormal."
        I scoffed. "But a ghost?"
        She rolled her eyes. "I prefer the term spirit."
        I looked at her for a moment before chuckling.
        "What do you find so funny?" she asked.
        "You. I don't believe it. Ghosts-" she shot me a glare, and I rolled my eyes "-fine, spirits don't exist."
        "What? And it's so much easier to believe that vampires are real? And let's not forget your zombie theory, Darling."
        She had a point.
        "But you could touch me. You don't pass through me and other objects."
        "Use your imagination, Edward. If you can see me, don't you think you'd be able to touch me? Humans, though, are different. They don't see me, they can't hear me, and they certainly can't come in contact with me." Her eyes flashed with a sudden sadness but quickly recovered.
        "Why is that?" I wondered.
        Elizabeth shrugged. "I suppose it's because you're closer to being dead than they are, but you're not as dead as I am, so you're somewhere in the middle. Kind of like a medium between the two worlds."
        "What about the myths? Transparency and levitation and things like that?"
        "Well, the invisibility explains why you never saw me leave the park, doesn't it? And why no one seemed to notice me? As for levitation? That's a myth. Walking through walls? Myth. I can teleport though."
        "Teleport?"
        "Yeah, you know, the movement from one place to another in no time at all."
        I rolled my eyes. "I know what it is."
        Elizabeth smirked. "Well, seeing as you don't believe me, I guess I'll have to show you."
        "Wha-"
        With absolutely no warning, she was gone.
        "Elizabeth?" I called out, spinning around and searching for her, to try to discover where she hid. She really was gone.
        A panic begin to bubble in my chest, and I was about to call out for her again when something- or should I say someone- landed on my back and a pair of legs wrapped around my torso.
        I immediately relaxed. "Please, don't do that again," I said, gripping her legs so she wouldn't fall.
        "I'm sorry, Darling. Did I scare you?"
        Yes, but not in the way you'd think.
        "No. Just surprised me is all."
        "So do you believe me?" she asked.
        "Yes, but only because there could be no other possibility. Is there?"
        "Nope."
        With Elizabeth still perched on my back, her head on my shoulder, she said, "I never asked. How did your hunt go?"
        "It was good."
        "Do you feel any better than before?"
        I immediately saddened, thinking, again, of why I had broken down in the first place. "Yes."
        I'd forgotten about her other abilities. "You're lying," she said sadly as she gave me a tight squeeze around the neck, which was more of a chokehold from her position, but it comforted me nonetheless.
        "Elizabeth?"
        "Yes," she replied. "How did you become a spirit?"
        "That's not a story I like to tell, Darling." She sighed, her cool breath hitting my neck. "Let's help you now, and we'll worry about my baggage later. Maybe, I'll tell you one day, but not today."
        I nodded. "You're so different from Bella."
        "Hm, the way you described her, she was an amazing, beautiful, intelligent young woman. Should I be offended?" She chuckled.
        "No, you're those things, too." I would've blushed at the statement, but I felt Elizabeth smile, so I continued. "I meant in looks and personality, you're completely different."
        "How so?"
        "Well, she had dark brown hair and brown eyes, while you have orange hair and grey eyes. You're taller than she was, too, by a couple of inches. You dress more fashionably than she would like. You'd get along with my sister Alice. She loved to try to get Bella to model her outfits. She'd hate it."
        I smiled at her laugh, but it faded as I continued to point out their differences, my heart strangely growing more heavy.
        "You're also more forward than Bella ever was, but also more reserved in a way." I noted. "Bella was so reserved in the way that she hated dresses and was embarrassed at public displays of affection. She was always so insecure, and needed my reassurance that I loved her which I'd be more than happy to provide. She acted so much older than she was. You, on the other hand, have no problem with giving someone you only just met a pet name and jumping on their back. You act like we're old friends, and behave like- well mostly like- a normal seventeen year old girl. You seem so confidant, but you're also guarded. I couldn't read her mind like I can't read yours, but I could always tell what she was thinking by either her emotions or the fact she would easily tell me her thoughts while you just are impossible to read. You're a mystery."
        Elizabeth was quiet, and I figured she was thinking. Finally, she said something. "We seem like total opposites."
        "You are," I whispered. The weight of my words seemed to finally come down on me. They were opposites, but that fact alone made me think of Bella even more, the fact that Bella was everything Elizabeth wasn't, and vice versa. I found myself wishing more than anything for Elizabeth to leave. Even she reminded me of Bella. I just couldn't escape her.
        Elizabeth must have sensed my discomfort and slid off of my back, walking around me to my front.
        "Edward? Hey, look at me." She grabbed my face because I was staring at the wall and brought it to face her. "You alright?"
        "Yeah, I'm fine. I'm sorry. I just- thank you for everything you've done. Listening to me, cleaning up my mess, but I just need some more time for myself. Can you leave me for a while?"
        "Edward, I don't think that's a good idea after you just-"
        "I need to be alone."
        She looked long and hard at me, her eyes holding my gaze, before giving me a short nod.
        "Okay."
        "Thank you. Really. For everything."
        "No problem. But I'll be back tomorrow. Remember, I know where you live," she warned me before giving me a wink.
        Then, like all those days before, in the blink of an eye, she was gone.
        I sighed, releasing the breath I hadn't even realized I'd been holding.