Life had felt like it had stopped for her. Ever since that night, that entire day even, she didn't really speak much. Sebastian wasn't much help about what had happened but every so often, it felt more like every few minutes to her, he would stop her and look into her eyes. When he left she felt this emptiness that she couldn't explain and she was like a ticking time bomb. Even Claude did the same, as if he noticed something too. But where was her demon? Not that she was complaining but it was odd for him to stop showing up every time the others did.

The girl sighed and softly stroked her cat's fur earning a soft meow from the feline companion. Smiling a little she kissed her head and laid back to go to sleep. A soft breeze brushed her cheeks and she looked up to find Ciel sitting on her bed, the back of his hand brushed against her cheek. She raised an eyebrow at the younger boy, surprised because he was there as well as showing some sort of gentleness to her. Moving over, she patted the bed beside her.

"You can sleep on the bed. Don't worry, the big bad lady isn't going to touch you," she said when she saw him about to object.

The boy sighed a bit and she slowly sat up, reaching over and unbuttoning his jacket then his shirt, leaving them hanging loose but closed. He looked surprised but was used to such treatment. However, he wasn't with her. Sebastian was right. She was acting rather odd, even for herself. After this she handed him a big t-shirt and some tie-string pants and turned away to let him hassle with it himself. Ciel figured it out easily, secretly wondering why things couldn't be this simple with clothing in his own time, before he laid beside the already dozing girl, the cat hissing and jumping down to hide under the nightstand. This was normal, but he found it odd at the same time.

"Payton," he said as his eyes stared at the box with moving pictures.

"hm," she grunted in response. She obviously wanted to go to sleep.

"…Why did you summon a demon?"

Her eyes shot open but she relaxed, realizing that of course Ciel would know about it. Turning over she faced him, and even in the light playing off her face he saw how exhausted she was.

"Why did you," she countered, though both parties knew full well she wasn't ignorant to this knowledge.

"I wanted to live and get revenge."

Hearing it for her own ears, she still chuckled, only thinking of Sasuke when she had brought it up.

"Well…I was young and stupid. I was dealing with things no human should mess with…he came out when I should have gotten a lost soul." She turned back onto her other side now, a soft sigh escaping. "I was too powerful for my own good."

When he was going to question it she waved her hand at him "Go to sleep your highness." Huffing he turned his back to her, closing his eyes as well.

.~.

"Pursey!"

She yelled for hours but to no avail. Tears streaked her face and she threw down the cup of food she had before sitting on the curb and bawling her eyes out. The night before her birthday and her cat has gone missing! Sebastian was jumping around the neighborhood shrouded in his element of darkness in search of the feline he had grown fond of. That and he needed to make sure her emotions stayed in check and this was sending her haywire. It was true that he had stopped Marciello but he hadn't been able to pull him back out. He grit his teeth slightly. Demons like that would wait dormant for situations like this. The thought in mind, he turned and ran back. While he adored cats, the girl's use wasn't gone yet.

Sliding to a stop he saw her push her friend away and ask to be alone. It was chilly out and she was sitting on the curb, face tear-streaked and in her normal pajamas of shorts and a tank top. He walked over and put his jacket around her before sitting down, grabbing her face again.

He was slapped in return, surprising him because he thought the girl was too far gone to even notice.

"Don't touch me," she yelled at him, all the hurt in her voice.

He dropped his hand slowly and resigned to let her behave this way for this once. Of course he understood this, but he knew there were other cats. The girl had been very attached to the animal, for reasons he could understand only by his own example. He watched her pull his jacket close, sobbing a bit more before Nathan pulled back into the driveway, having gone around the block as well. Soon Don did as well, both cat-less. Seeing this Payton stood and walked inside, closing the door to her room, a soft click of a lock heard loud and clear.

Nathan tried going in but she begged to be alone. They knew she didn't need to be but Sebastian saw how she would most likely always push away comfort in these times.

This happened close to midnight. Happy 19th Birthday, Payton.

.~.

In the morning, Nathan, Sarah, Sebastian, and Grell, who had arrived in the middle of the night, sat in the kitchen, eating a breakfast of pancakes Nathan had prepared for his girlfriend's birthday. The light was on in her room and she was moving around, showing that she was awake. Soon she exited walking through the kitchen to get to her mom's room to brush her teeth, seeing that she had left her toothbrush in there.

"Hey! Happy Birthd-" Nathan tried but was cut off immediately.

"No. Stop. There's nothing happy about today." The coldness made both her friends shrink and look at each other. Sebastian smirked slightly in amusement and Grell blinked a few times before doing the same.

She walked outside to go to her class and saw that her car had been painted up on the windows with Akatsuki clouds and red and white streamers. The back said the words "Akatsuki Member" and the front "birthday girl". All this was blind to her, even as Don asked to take a picture with her in it. She just got in the car, waited for him to finish the pictures on his phone and drove off. Maybe she was being too harsh, it wasn't their fault, but this cat was her baby. She was really the only being that brought her happiness.

Then again…she wasn't allowed to be happy, was she?

.~.

Payton drove up and parked the car, just wanting to go in and lay down. That is, until Nathan got into the car, the demon and shinigami getting in the back as well.

"Drive. Let's go to the mall," Nathan said, sounding adamant about it.

Payton leaned her head back and looked as if she was going to cry. "Please…I don't care what you have waiting for me in there, I just want to go lay down."

"Then let me drive," he offered.

"If I get out of this car, I'm going inside. If you try to stop me, I'll hurt you."

The girl wasn't stupid, that was for sure. Sebastian slowly leaned forward and turned the engine back on. "Drive."

She huffed and turned her music back on, blaring it as she peeled out off of the curb, sending most of them slamming against their seats. The girl wasn't happy and Nathan looked guilty. Sebastian wondered what it would take for her to get over the cat if she didn't turn up.

Pulling up into the mall parking lot she put it in park and Nathan started getting out. The brunette didn't budge at all. He slowly closed the door and looked at her with question. "Come on Payton. Let's go in and look around for a while." He didn't know how long the people at the house would need to set up and he didn't want her just sitting in the car.

"Nathan…I really don't want to go in. I look and feel like shit and I am exhausted to every part of my being," she responded softly as she closed her eyes. "Besides I already know what's waiting."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Nathan got a devious smile. Payton raised an eyebrow and turned to look at him. "You're not even being inconspicuous about it…"

He shrugged "I don't have anything to hide. They just didn't want you at the house and I don't think you needed to be there locked up in your room."

Sebastian and Grell glanced at each other. Both men were finally impressed with the silent boy as he had gotten her to lighten up a little and be herself as she tried to get him to admit to the surprise party waiting for her. They sat back and watched it before suddenly Grell grabbed Sebastian's arm and pulled him out of the car, making both teens blink in surprise. "I just remembered that I needed a new t-shirt!" It was a weak excuse but he was pulling the demon behind him before any of them could question it. As soon as they were away Sebastian snapped his arm away, giving Grell a demonic glared, Grell shivering in excitement when he saw it. But this wasn't their world to fight in and he didn't want to be on the bad side of the demon much longer. Of course they were natural enemies, and of course the last time they met, his subordinate had thrown the girl off a cliff, but he needed a good basis with him for when they were in the odd world.

"Did you get her anything," Grell questioned as they entered.

Sebastian raised an eyebrow. "We've been busy with the set up and I've been searching for her cat so no," he answered grudgingly to him, hating that he had to even talk to him in a civil manner. Maybe next time he should throw him off a cliff…

"Then let's shop until we both find something…and quick! Last time Nathan heard anything they were going to be about thirty minutes."

Despite everything, Sebastian knew the redhead was right. He wouldn't admit it out loud, nothing that would give that idiot a chance to feel smug, though. He turned and walked down to a store he had been taken to before with the girl. Grell did the same and in less than 20 minutes, no messing around here, they both had their gifts and pocketed them before walking back to the car, Grell holding a red dress shirt to cover for his alibi.

Payton started driving home when her phone went off. She unplugged it and put it to her ear, listening for a few minutes before he face lit up. "I'm on my way." She put the phone down and started speeding a bit down the road she was on. "They found Pursey!"

She pulled up to the house and shot out of the car, Leaving Nathan to get her purse and other things as she ran into the house. She surprised everyone that it took them a moment before one yelled "Surprise!" and the others followed.

Payton shot past them, as if none of them had been there and went into her mother's room dropping to her stomach and moving boxes aside. Low and behold, her cat's meow met her ears and she pulled her out gently, holding her close. She kissed the cat's head a few times, crying literal tears of joy. She brought the cat out and walked to her room to set her down, knowing her skittish friend would claw her to death over the people in there.

Payton's attitude turned around and she enjoyed the rest of her party. But…later that night she runs out of her room and past everyone. Sebastian blinked a few times as he had been in her room, unknowingly to everyone else of course. He walked over to the wall between her room and her moms to listen.

"Mom, Pursey has a wound on her leg and it looks bad," He heard her say and immediately turned to look at the animal. It meowed at him as he bent down and sure enough there was an open wound on the feline's right leg. He tenderly lifted the leg up, earning a scratch from the animal that he ignored. He saw a growth and wasn't quite sure what it meant. He stood hearing Payton come back in and push him aside to hold her cat, once again in tears. He bent down and pulled both cat and human into a tight hold, Payton blinking at the out of character act. Was this what her world did to them? Would she end up doing the same when in theirs?

He softly whispered in her ear, "You need to calm your emotions, Payton. I couldn't take him out of you as I would have liked to. I couldn't without either killing you or making you go through the worst pain of your life times ten. He's still in you and he will act on these emotions to trick you into a deal…you're not alone, little human. Share this grief with someone besides yourself."

He felt her turn and cry into him, gripping his shirt tightly. He sighed softly. He hadn't meant him but he dealt with it all the same. What was it that made her trust him enough to do this sort of thing with him but wouldn't even let Nathan, her own boyfriend, hold her after their wreck? He needed to establish that he was still a demon and that he was only stuck here by chance. For now, though, he couldn't do that, for he too was worried for the cat with sweet eyes and soft fur.

She heard someone coming and turned as if she had been petting at the cat the whole time. He went and sat on the desk chair as if he had been sitting there the whole time. Her mom entered the room, looking disheveled but worried as well. It was decided and they took the cat to the emergency vet.

Her cat had cancer.

Happy 19th Birthday Payton.

.~.

She stared at her computer screen at the emptiness from the people she thought she could count on as friends. She was hurting and needed comfort so why were they saying that she was only attention seeking? Wasn't that the point? When one is hurt, isn't it natural to seek comfort from people they call friends?

Tears filled her eyes. Her world felt like it was crashing and she couldn't breathe. Standing she made her way over to the match box not to light the candle…but to light her skin. She hissed in pain but took it, she deserved it anyways. She looked over at her healing cat, but could see the tumor growing back fast. This cat was the only person that needed her, really. She was as good as dead though and Payton didn't want to be around for that. She didn't want to be around for any of this bull crap her friends were putting her through.

Slowly she gripped the pocket knife out of the drawer she kept it in. Would this really be it? Slowly she typed the words 'Good bye…for good' on the screen and posted it. She sat back and laid on her side staring at the open knife in front of her. Soon her computer was set off with notifications. She didn't look at them, nothing would change her mind. She brought it closer and closer to her until she felt it prick her skin.

A gloved hand covered hers and took the knife forcefully from her. She looked up into the glaring eyes of the demon butler in front of her but her brown eyes were wet and shiny from tears that hadn't stopped flowing. He knelt down beside the bed and grabbed her face.

"See what you're making her do and feel? Get out of her. Now," he ordered, gripping the girl's face tightly. A dark chuckle filled his head and her eyes widened as she heard it as well. He…really was inside of her! Sebastian turned and shut the noisy laptop before he locked the door. He walked over to her and pinned her to the bed.

"I'm sorry but I need to get him out of you," he said as she tried to fight with no avail. He didn't care too much about hurting her, but killing her was another thing. They needed her here. It wasn't as if he couldn't figure things out, but having a place to stay and hide out was a bonus.

"No stop." She begged thrashing under him, her wrist hurting with each movement. He noted the burn marks on her skin before growling softly, forcing her to still. "y-you can't do it here…someone will hear me scream!"

He had thought of this…would it be worth people breaking the door down just to see her unconscious or screaming as he had her pinned to the bed? With this in mind he sat up still straddling her so she couldn't move away. "The moment you're in my world…or the moment we are alone away from everyone…I will get him out of you by force."

She whimpered as she saw his hand come towards her again but only felt the caress of her cheek. "Until then…fight it with all you can. I may not always be just in time," he spoke with practiced gentleness. Humans usually went insane after dealing with demons, that's why they always tried to work fast to complete the bargain so the purity of the contract and soul would stay there for the meal. He needed to keep her calm and watch her more closely, knowing if the girl went through with it, she would do it right. He would have to be uncharacteristically kind and gentle with her until she put her mind together. This would slowly get at him forever, but she couldn't kill herself. She just couldn't.