Dammit! " Shilo exclaimed, pulling her hand back from the skillet. She cursed herself for being so absent minded and gripping the handle too high up. She held her breath and raised her eyes, listening for any sounds from upstairs. Nothing. Shilo exhaled, relieved that she hadn't woken her father from the first truly deep sleep he had had in so long. She stuck her burnt finger into her mouth, an impeccably childish response, and grappled in the cabinet for a band-aid. She wrapped it around the blister already forming there and turned her attention to the mangled mess in the skillet. It was french toast..was being the operative word. Now it didn't even resemble bread, just a brownish glob darkening by the minute. Making a mental note to teach herself how to cook, Shilo slid the toast onto a plate and dumped it onto the table, sliding into a chair herself. Ignoring the taste of burnt plastic, she devoured the toast, desperate to eat anything. So preoccupied had she been with playing the nurse to her now invalid father Shilo hadn't had a moment to sit down in the last three days, let alone fix herself food.
It had been two weeks since that dreadful night, Shilo had been at her fathers' side ever since. She had fed him, cleaned his wounds and calmed him when he awoke; his skin on fire from dangerously high fevers, delusional and calling fro Marni. The last three days had been exceptionally trying, Nathan had grown so tormented by invisible monsters that the stitches in his leg had torn. Shilo had already depleted the stores of prescription Zydrate in her father's lab...and last night had been so desperate; her father weeping like a child from the pain, his skin red and inflamed...Shilo's will gave out and she reached for the only thing she had left, three vials of illegal Zydrate, Graverobber's idea of a consolation prize. Within minutes Nathan's fever was breaking, his breathing growing deep and even, giving into sleep. Unable to ignore the hunger pains rumbling in her stomach any longer, Shilo crept downstairs. The french toast hadn't been some form of Epicurean choice, it had been the only choice, only bread, two eggs and half a jug of almost soured milk were left in the refrigerator.
A sharp prick of pain brought her back to the present and Shilo realized she'd been holding her injured fingers to tightly iin the other hand. The room began to swim before her eyes, and unable to resist any longer, Shilo lowered her head into the cradle she had made with her arms on the table and let her mind wander and her eyes close. Enjoying the silence....
"Wow, Kid. What did you do in here, cook a cat?"
Shilo whipped her head up, fell backwards out of the chair, and found herself staring in a familiar ghostly white face.