Morning dawned bright and early, and I woke up to the smell of frying bacon. I stumbled to the bathroom down the hall, yawning, barely aware that I was scantily dressed in my extra-long t-shirt until I remembered. Shit, boys live here too. Luckily, nobody saw, and the bathroom was free. Somebody had already been in it this morning; the mirrors were still frosted with steam, and the big black and white room glistened with drops of water. It smelt, clean, though. And kind of fruity.
The fruity smell was shampoo, I found, as I lathered and rinsed my body under the warm water. When I wiped the mirror down and and stared at myself, I saw the patterns of bruises up and down both sides of my pale skin. I could have died. I had been so lucky.
I tossed the t-shirt back on, then dashed back to my room to dig out the panties I had recused yesterday from the washer. They were still damp, but I had to put them on anyway.
On impulse, I opened the closet, and found some old stuff pushed to the back, t-shirts, mostly, from bands I had never even heard of, a few I remembered as ancient. A couple of sweaters, too. I stripped off my bloodstained shirt and dragged on a faded black one, and, after thinking about it, left my shoes on the floor.
Downstairs, Eve and Justin were arguing in the kitchen about the right way to make scrambled eggs. Eve said they needed milk. Justin said the milk was for pussies. I padded silently past them, over to the refrigerator, and pulled out a carton of orange juice. I splashed some into a glass, then silently held up the carton for the other two. Eve took it and poured herself a glass then handed it to Justin.
"So" Justin asked. "Micheal didn't pitch you out"
"No" I replied before taking a sip of juice.
Justin nodded slowly. He was even taller and bigger than I remembered, and his skin was a tanned colour, he had clearly spent a lot of time in the sun. His hair had a bronze sheen to it too. Okay, he was fearfully hot. I wished I hadn't just thought that, but at least I hadn't said it out loud.
"Something you should know about Micheal" he said. "He doesn't like taking chances. I wasn't sure he'd let you stay. If he did, then he's got a good vibe off of you. Don't disrespect that because if you do, I won't be happy. Got it?" Justin almost threatened me.
Eve was silently watching, which I figured was a new experience for her, at least the not talking part.
"He's your friend, right?" I asked Justin.
"He saved my life" Justin said. "I'd die for him, but it'd be a pretty dumbass thing to do to thank him for it. So yeah. He's been my friend all my life, and he's more like a brother. So don't get him into trouble" he warned me.
"I won't" I said. "No milk in the eggs" I added.
"See?" Justin turned back to the counter and starting cracking eggs into a bowl. "Told ya"
"Traitor" Eve sighed, and poked at the frying bacon with a fork. "Fine. So how was Linda last night?" Eve asked Justin.
"Laura" Justin corrected rolling his eyes.
"Whatever. Not like I have to remember a name for more than one date, anyway" Eve argued.
"She bowled a one fifty" Justin said.
"God, you're such a disappointment, share already!" Eve whined.
Justin smiled tightly down at the eggs. "Hey, not in front of the kid, you got the note"
"Kid?" That hurt. I dropped plates onto the counter with a little too much force. "What note?" I asked.
Justin handed me over a folded piece of paper. It was short and sweet, and signed 'Micheal' and it told them I was underage, and that the two of them were meant to look out for me when I was in the house.
Cute. I didn't know whether to be pissed or flattered. On reflection I was pissed. "I'm not a kid!" I told Justin hotly. "I'm only like just under a year younger than Eve! Not even that!"
"And girls are much more mature" Eve nodded wisely. "So you're about ten years older than Justin, then"
"Seriously!" I insisted. "I'm not a kid!"
"Whatever you say, kid" Justin said blandly. "Cheer up, just means you don't have to put up with me telling you how much sex I didn't get"
"I'm telling Micheal" Eve warned.
"About how much sex I didn't get? Go ahead" Justin smirked at Eve.
"No bacon for you" Eve told him.
"Then no eggs for you. Either of you" Justin laughed.
I was about to join in when the front doorbell rang, a lilting silvery sound. It wasn't a scary sound, but Eve and Justin froze and looked at each other, and that was scary, some how. Justin put his plate down on the granite counter top, licked the bacon grease from his fingers and said. "Get her out of sight"
Eve nodded. She dropped her own plate on the counter, grabbed my wrist, and hustled me into the pantry - a door half hidden in the shadow of the awkwardly placed fridge. It was big, dark, and dusty, shelves crowded with old cans of yams and asparagus and glass jars of ancient jellies. There was a light with a string pill above, but Eve didn't turn it on. She reached behind a row of murky- looking cans of fruit and hit some kind of switch. There was a grating rumble, then a click, and a part of the back wall swung open.
Eve pushed it back, reached in, and grabbed a flashlight that she handed to me. "Inside" Eve said. "I'm going to turn the light on out here, but try to keep the flashlight off if you hear voices. It could show through the cracks"
I nodded a little dazed, and crouched down to crawl through the small opening into a big empty room, stone floored, no windows. A few spiderwebs in the corners, and lots of dust, but otherwise it didn't look too bad.
Until Eve shut the door, and then the darkness slammed down, and I hastily flicked on the flashlight, moved to the nearest corner, and knelt down there, breathing fast and hard.
Just one minute ago, we had been laughing about bacon and eggs, and all of a sudden, what the hell had just happened? And why was there a secret compartment to this house? One with - as fast as I could tell - no other entrances or exits.
I heard distant voices, and hastily thumbed off the flashlight. That was bad. I had never really been afraid of the dark, but dark wasn't really dark most of the time.. there were stars, moonlight, distant streetlights.
This was pitch back, take no prisoners kind of dark, and she I had the ice cold thought that anything could be right next to me, reaching out for me, and I wouldn't see it coming.
I bit down hard on my lip, gripped the flashlight tightly, and slid down the wall until my searching hand found the rough wood of the door I had come in through. A little light was leaning in around it, barely a filmed but enough to ease my pounding chest.
Voices. Justin's and someone else's. A mans voice, deeper than Justin's. "standard inventory" they said.
"Sir there's nobody living here but what's on the roster. Just the three of us" Justin sounded subdued and respectful, which didn't seem like him. Not that I knew him that well, but he was kind of a smart ass.
"Which one are you?" The voice asked.
"Justin Bieber, sir" I heard Justin reply.
"Get your third in here" the voice said.
"Well, I would but- Micheal's not here. He's out until tonight. You want to check back then?" Justin stayed cool.
"Never mind" the man said. I strained my ears, hearing paper rustling. "You're Eve Rosser?"
"Yes, sir" Eve sounded respectful, but brisk.
"Moved out of your parents house - eight months ago?" He asked.
"Yes, sir" Eve replied.
"Employed?" He asked Eve another question.
"At the common grounds, you know the coffee-"
The man, whoever he was, interrupted her. "You. Bieber. Any employment?" He asked Justin.
"In between jobs sir, you know how it is" Justin still stayed calm.
"Keep looking. We don't like slackers in Morganville. Everyone contributes" the man said.
"Yes sir, I'll keep that in mind sir" I heard Justin's annoyed voice.
A brief pause. Maybe there had been a little bit more smart ass in Justin's response than there should have been. I deliberately slowed my breathing, trying to hear more.
"You left town for a couple of years, boy. What brings you back?"
"Homesick, sir. Missed my old friends" it was definitely back in his voice, and even I knew that was a bad thing.
I heard Eve clear her throat. "Sir? I'm sorry, but I've got work in half an hour"
More paper shuffling was heard. "One other thing. Here's a picture if a girl that disappeared from her dorm last night. You haven't seen her?"
They both chorused a 'No'.
He must not of believed them, because he didn't sound convinced. "What's in here?" He didn't wait to hear a response; he just opened the outer door of the pantry. I flinched and held my breath. "You always leave the light on?"
"I was getting some jam when you rang, sir. I forgot to turn it off" Eve said. She sounded nervous. "Sorry"
The light in the pantry went out, taking what little there was seeping through the door with it. I could barely control a gasp. Don't move, don't move Anastasia. I just knew whoever it was, was standing there in the dark looking and listening.
And then, finally, I heard him say, "you ring the station if you see that girl. She's got herself in some trouble. We're supposed to help her get straightened out"
"Yes, sir" Eve said, and the pantry door shut. The conversation moved away, because softer and softer until it faded into nothing.
I switched on the flashlight, covered it with my hand, and punted it at the corner, only a little light escaped, just enough to convince me an evil zombie wasn't sneaking up on me in the dark. And then I waited. It seemed like a long time before there were two sharp raps on the door, and it swung open in a blaze of electric light. Eve's stark white make up and black eyeliner looked even scarier than before.
"It's okay" she said, and helped me out of the hidden room. "He's gone"
"Oh, the hell its okay" Justin said behind her. He had his arms folded across his chest, and rocked back and forth frowning. "Those assholes have her picture. They're looking for her. What did you do, Anastasia? Knife the mayor or something?"
"No!" I blurted. "I don't know why- maybe it's that they're just worried because I didn't show up last night?"
"Worried?" Justin laughed bitterly. "Yeah that's it. They're worried about you. Right. I'm going to have to talk this over with Micheal. If they're going to turn the town upside down looking for you, either you're too hot to stay in Morganville, or we need to get you under some kind of protection, fast"
"But- maybe the police-" I tried to speak.
"That was the police," Eve said. "Told you. They run the town. These guys work for the vamps - they're not vamps themselves, but they're scary enough without fangs. Look, can you call your parents? Get them to pull you out of school and take you home?"
Sure. That would be the easiest thing in the world, only it would mean failure, and they'd never believe a word of this stuff, ever, and if I tried to explain it, I would end up drugged and in therapy for the rest of my life. And any chance of making it to Yale would be blown. I supposed it was dumb to be thinking of it that way, but this was real to me.
"But I haven't done anything!" I said, looking from Justin to Eve. "How can they be after me if I didn't do anything?"
"Life ain't fair" Justin said, with all the certainty of two more years experience of it. "You must of pissed off the wrong people, is all I know. What's the girls name? The one that knocked you around?"
"Monica" I told them. And they both stared at me as if I had grown two heads.
"Oh crap" Eve said, horrified. "Monica Morrell?"
Justin's face went blank, completely blank, except for his eyes, and there was something pretty scary going on behind them.
"Monica" he repeated. "How come nobody told me?"
Eve was watching him, biting her lip. "Sorry, Justin. We would have - I swear, I thought she left town. Went off to college somewhere else"
Justin shook it off, whatever it was, and shrugged, trying to look like he didn't care. It was obvious to me that he did though.
"She probably couldn't stand not being queen bee, and had to come begging back to daddy to buy her some grades" Justin muttered.
"Justin-" Eve looked at him.
"I'm fine. Don't worry about me" he said.
"She probably doesn't even remember you," Eve blurted, and then looked as if she wished she hadn't said it. "I- that's not what I meant. I'm sorry"
He laughed, and it sounded wrong and a little bit shaky. There was a short, odd silence, and then Eve changed the subject by resolutely picking up her plate of cooling bacon and eggs. And then she went still and round eyed.
"Oh shit" she said, and then covered her mouth.
"What?" I asked.
She pointed at the plates on the counter. Justin's, hers and mine. Three plates. He knew something was up. We told him Micheal wasn't around. No wonder he kept poking.
Justin said nothing, but I could see he was- if possible - even more upset. He didn't show it much, but he picked up his plate and walked away, out into the living room, then up the steps two at a time. His upstairs door slammed.
"So...Justin and Monica?" I guessed.
Eve kept staring at the doorway. "Not like you're thinking" she said. "He wouldn't touch that skank in a million years. But they were in high school together, and Justin - got on her bad side. Just like you did"
My appetite for breakfast was suddenly gone. "What happened?" I asked.
"He stood up to her, and his house burnt. He nearly died" she said. "His- his sister wasn't so lucky. Micheal got him out of town, off in his own, before he did something crazy. He's been gone a couple of years, just came back before I moved in here" Eve forced a bright smile. "Let's eat, I'm starving"
We sat out in the living room, chatting about nothing, not talking about the thing that was most important: what to do. Because I sensed, neither of us had a clue.