"Care to demonstrate your skills for me?"
Elizabeth had the feeling that her aim wasn't going to be good as it usually was, on account of the fact that she could barely walk in a straight line at the moment.
But that wasn't going to stop her from trying anyway.
She had been throwing for a few years at this point. She started doing it after breaking that mirror. Even though it was still sorta dangerous, it didn't make it incredibly painful for her to move her fingers for weeks.
It was also nice to have confirmation that she wasn't a complete failure at everything. She was actually decent at it.
She awkwardly took the knife from the girl, popping the blade out as she looked around.
There wasn't anybody nearby, aside from a few other people putting up flyers and a guy that was cleaning off a storefront window.
"Wh-what do y-y-you want me to hit?"
The girl pointed to a graffitied wooden bench on the opposite end of the street."You see the wolf head on the middle of that bench? See if you can hit that."
"O-okay." Elizabeth tried to gage the weight of the blade in her hand, taking a step back.
She stared into the blue eyes of the wolf head that somebody had spray-painted onto the bench, raising the blade up.
She double-checked that no cars or people were approaching.
And then she threw.
There were rather sharp pains throughout her entire arm and her side, but she just ignored them.
The knife spun through the air before striking the space between the wolf's eyes, quivering slightly.
She missed.
She had been trying to aim for the nose.
Not that the girl knew, since she had asked her to just hit the head.
Still, Elizabeth was slightly disappointed with herself.
"Would you look at that? Right between the eyes!" The girl clapped. "I think Mister Afton's gonna like you."
She walked over the bench, tugging her knife out before shouting, "Yenn!"
A guy with salt and pepper hair and a thick handlebar mustache walked over, a short stack of flyers in one hand.
"Yes?"
"D'you know where Mister Afton went after he handed us these flyers, mumbling to himself about how there weren't enough up?"
"I think he went back to where we set up to wallow in his sadness," Yenn said. "Why?"
"I think we've already got ourselves a new knife thrower." The girl grinned lopsidedly.
Yenn's eyes briefly swept over Elizabeth.
"Well, that's good because quite frankly, I'm not prepared to listen to him complain about how we just lost ours for the next four months."
"Yeah, me neither. C'mon, uh..." the girl gestured for the younger girl to follow her and trailed off, clearly waiting for her to fill in the blank and say what her name was.
"El-elizabeth."
"Elizabeth," she repeated. "I'm Jesse. No 'i'. And I'm gonna introduce you to the ringmaster. Follow me."
Elizabeth did just that, hoping that the ringmaster would hire her and that she'd be able to leave her hometown behind.
She hoped that if she did, things would finally get better for her...
"Jesse?"
"Dude, I'm not interested in taking your survey!"
That was definitely Jesse's voice.
Elizabeth spun around, finally spotting her friend.
She breathed a sigh of relief.
"It'll only take a few minutes, sir."
Jesse was in the middle of arguing with some short guy that she recognized as a store owner.
"No. For the last time, no."
"Wh-what is happening...?"
She seemed to have felt her gaze because she gave Elizabeth an exasperated look. "Just make the call, Liz. The phone is only a couple of feet away. I'll be over in a second."
Hesitantly, Elizabeth closed the five-foot gap between her and the phone. She shoved a couple of coins into the coin slot, picked up the receiver, and... for no particular reason, stared up at the building that was in mid-construction, sort of zoning out...
After a moment, she was pulled back by the sound of the dial tone.
"You call her already?"
She jumped slightly, turning her head to look at Jesse, and then back at the phone, which was still in her hand.
"No, I've only b-been standing here for a f-few seconds."
Jesse gave her a funny look. "Liz, I was definitely gone for longer than just a few seconds."
"Oh..." the redhead blinked, "I think I forgot to t-take my meds this m-morning."
She dialed Charlie's number, which she had memorized during the train ride.
It didn't take very long for the brunette to pick up.
"Hello?"
"Charlie? It's El-elizabeth."
"Oh, good! Okay, so, I went back and looked through more of my files, taking into account the new information you gave me. Unfortunately, my suspicions were correct. Now, do you remember earlier when I said that I didn't want you to freak out?"
"Uh... y-yeah?"
"Well, I still don't want you to freak out. So, try your best not to do that, okay?"
"Okay..."
"It's not your fault. It really isn't. Keep that in mind."
"O-okay..."
"This is a very unusual case. I've never seen anything like it before. This demon has been -,"
Elizabeth had been incredibly anxious to hear what Charlie had to say for days, but that didn't stop her from getting completely distracted by something that was happening nearby.
A small crowd of people had gathered, looking up at something.
Something that was dripping.
"Elizabeth? Are you still listening to me? This is kinda super important. Elizabeth?"
The words weren't registering anymore.
Not even a little bit.
She had looked up.
