Despite the lightness Annie's words had conjured, Mitchell still felt the weight of what had transpired between them the previous night, when George's light tapping on his door interrupted his thoughts.

"Hey mate, are you busy?" he asked, peeking his head into the room.

"What? No, of course not, you want to talk about something?" Mitchell replied, signalling for him to come into the room.

He noticed George's improved demeanour, which was a stark contrast to his recent mopping.

"Everything alright with Nina? You look content. Happy even."

"Yeah," George replied grinning. "I guess I am. We talked, and I think it's going to be okay."

The burden George had placed upon Nina had been heavy, and both he and Annie had worried for their friend. Of the three of them, George had always seemed the one with the better chance at being human.

"I'm glad, George," he said, tapping him on the back.

George looked around for a moment, and Mitchell couldn't stop the uneasiness at his friend's innocent scrutiny of his room.

"Where's Annie? I didn't see her coming in."

"Is she not in the kitchen?" Mitchell asked, feeling himself over gesturing and kicking himself internally for it.

George knitted his eyebrows and replied, "I don't think so, I didn't see her there. What were you doing anyway?"

"Ah, nothing really. Having a bit of a lie-in," Mitchell said, looking back at the bed in disarray.

George stared at the bed as Mitchell pulled his attention to it, and he seemed to look at it a bit longer than he should have.

His face then broke into a broad smile, and turning towards Mitchell again, he asked with a smirk, "Did you have somebody stay over?"

Mitchell opened his mouth, but his brain was having trouble catching up and finding the right answer, though Annie chose that moment to rent-a-ghost into the room.

"Were you looking for me, George?" she asked, ignoring Mitchell. "I heard you call my name."

"Ah! Annie. I was wondering where you were. Did Mitchell keep you up all night?" George asked, with a teasing smile on his lips.

Annie felt suddenly faint, and moving her head rapidly between her two friends, she started speaking at a faster rate than usual, "What? Why? What did you say, Mitchell?"

Mitchell raised his hands in the air and avoided both their eyes.

"Let's just back up," he said, trying to stop the misunderstanding before it caused everything to be up in the open before they had time to figure out precisely what had happened. "George, Annie doesn't sleep, remember?"

"It was a figure of speech!" George screeched.

He then turned to a nervous-looking Annie, and he said, "I'm sorry, Annie, I didn't mean it like that what I meant was that he probably bothered you all night with all that banging!"

"Mitchell!" She yelled, livid at what she thought George meant.

"George, what the hell are you talking about?" Mitchell asked, worried, and trying to avoid Annie's murdering eyes.

"Well, it is obvious that you had someone stay over. This room is a mess! Did you see the lady in question, Annie?" He asked, bending over attracted by something slightly hidden under the bed.

Annie figured out what George was thinking and sighed, relieved, looking at Mitchell, who was giving her a tiny complicit smile.

"No! It's not messy…er than usual. It's always like this. What makes you think I had someone over?" Mitchell asked, turning back to George.

"Well, it is not the normal Mitchell mess. It's more the 'I had a fabulous shag' sort of disarray, and there's, of course, this little number over here," he said, picking up a small piece of grey cotton.

"Somebody seems to have left her knickers behind. Unless there is some news, you've meant to tell us. I guess these pants could fit you."

It was now Mitchell's turn to be livid.

"No, I don't! Give me that!"

He ripped the offending garment from his hands and stuffed it in his pocket. Annie was looking away, trying to conceal her absolute panic.

"Oh, Mitchell! Such a gentleman! Somewhere down the street is a poor girl doing the walk of shame in last night's clothes and no knickers!" George said, barely containing his laughter.

"How can you say that to Annie!" Mitchell was visibly upset as he got closer to George.

"I beg your pardon?" Said his friend, confused as Annie yelled, horrified.

"Mitchell!

"I mean," the vampire stuttered as his hand was going through his hair, trying to backpedal. "I mean, Annie has to wear the same clothes all the time. Stop being insensitive!" He finally said, feigning indignity.

"I'm sorry, Annie," George said to her.

"It's okay. Don't mention it," Annie said, relieved once more.

"I was just trying to make a joke. I don't know why you are both so gloomy today when I am ecstatic."

"I guess you had sex then," Mitchell intervened, shrugging. "You are only this giddy when you do."

"Yes, and it normally doesn't last long," Annie added with a nod.

"What? The giddiness or George?" Mitchell asked, entertained now that the tables were turned. "I guess that would be a question for Nina."

Annie couldn't stop herself from giggling.

"See! You are always teasing me about it, and when I do it to you, you act all offended! But now that you have turned it back at me, it's all shits and giggles!"

"It's all in good fun, mate!" Mitchell said, trying to sound serious, but failing miserably.

George stared at his friend for a while, and once Mitchell turned with hands in the air, he noticed something new.

"Wait! What's that on your back?"

"What do you mean?" Mitchell asked as he turned a little, trying to get a glance of his back in the mirror.

Annie felt her mortification rising again when fresh red marks were displayed on Mitchell's pasty skin. She couldn't do anything but look down to the floor, hoping George wouldn't catch on her embarrassment.

"You got yourself a feisty one!"

It was George's turn to tease.

Annie didn't miss the slight smug lopsided grin in Mitchell's face.

"What is it with you men and comparing notes of your sexual adventures?!" Annie yelled. "And it's not about you making the women happy, it's just who's better at it!"

"Oh, Annie," George exclaimed, scratching the back of his neck and grimacing. "I'm sorry. It was very insensitive of me to talk about my and Mitchell's sex like when you…"

"When I what?" Annie yelled, walking menacingly to George.

"When, it's been a while, right?" He asked with uncertainty.

"George!" both Mitchell and Annie yelled in unison.

"I'm sure you have your… needs. I don't know if ghosts get PMT, but lately, you make me think ghost ovulation is possible. That reminds me, Mitchell, can ghosts have sex?"

Mitchell doubled over in a nervous coughing fit.

Annie groaned loudly and said, "I really can't take this anymore. I'm not talking about my sex life in front of you!"

Both men stared at their friend speechless as she paced the room, her arms moving up and down, and ranted.

"Of all the people that could have rented this place! Why, oh, why couldn't I have gotten a fairy and a witch? It could have been corseted period dramas with Colin Firth 24/7! And I would never have to watch The Real Hustle!" she yelled as she stormed out of the bedroom.

"I'll be in the kitchen making tea and you can come when all the male stupidity wears off!" she ranted as she went down the stairs. "And I do not have PMT George, so don't even go there."

"Now you've done it," Mitchell said, putting on a shirt and leaving the room, making sure to pat George's back as he walked by.

"Though," he added, turning around right at the threshold. "Colin Firth in a corset. I'd watch it even if just for morbid curiosity."

Making tea was an art.

It was also something that Annie's hands knew out of pure muscle memory. Her Nan had taught her when she was seven, and Annie could still feel the papery texture of her hands around hers, helping her pour it from her family heirloom teapot. Her Nan had promised her to give the teapot to her as a wedding present.

She poured the first of the cups as she shook her head, there was no point letting her mind go to what-ifs. But still, that memory was better than thinking about what had happened in the last twelve hours.

As she was pouring the second mug, both boys entered the kitchen with equal sheepish stares.

"Here you go, George, Mitchell," she said as she handed them the tea.

Annie hadn't been able to look Mitchell in the eye as she handed him the tea, and because of it, she hadn't noticed that he had kept his eyes cast down as well, but both had felt something electric as their fingers touched.

"I'm sorry, Annie," George interrupted her thoughts. "Really, I'll just stop talking about sex altogether," George declared, as he sat down at the table.

Annie didn't say anything, but she hugged him from behind, wrapping her soft hands around his neck, which made George beam.

"How's Nina?" Annie replied as she pulled away and came to sit next to her friend.

"Brilliant. I think we're good. Really good as a matter of fact."

"I got the idea from all the giddiness," Annie said with a wide honest smile.

"How about you? How was the fair? I know you were planning to go and do your usual people-watching. You had it marked on the calendar and everything."

"Ah, it was," Annie replied, while she fidgeted with the objects on the table, trying to will herself to act natural, "okay."

"Really? That's it? Okay? You normally have so much more to say about it. You have all those observations about how people looked and what they were eating."

"They looked fine," she replied with a shrug. "Happy… Alive, I guess." Mitchell coughed up his tea nervously at the word. George looked back, suspiciously.

"I mean, they were all fantastic," Annie added with her silly smile, the one she put on when she tried to lie unsuccessfully.

"Oh, no, Annie!" George complained, shaking his head.

"What?!"

"If you are giving me that smile, it means that you have some sort of Annie shenanigans going on, and we'll be up to our eyeballs with you trying to play matchmaker with the neighbours or with a litter of stray cats for a week."

"First of all, George," Annie replied, crossing her arms over her chest, "My father's name is Frank Sawyer, not George Sands. And second, nothing is going on. No brilliant ideas, no projects, no nothing! Last night was just boring. People-watching was boring! Only that and nothing else."

"Okay, once more. I'm sorry."

Annie felt a tug at her heart for the way George looked, sincerely concerned about making her feel bad. Yes, watching people live their lives around her bothered her.

Worse.

It hurt deeply, but right then, she was not dealing with that particular heartache. She was doing her best to keep those thoughts at bay, wondering what happened between her and Mitchell. She did her best shoving it all in the room at the back of her mind, where everything that haunted her went. She just pushed this new thing there, and she slammed the door hard, but sitting in the kitchen of their little pink house, she could feel the shaking of that door, and she could almost see it in the corner of her eye, threatening to open wide and let everything spill out over their kitchen table.

She felt terrible at taking it out on George to distract herself, and to avoid their unsuspecting friend from finding out.

"Well, that's good," she finally said, dropping the issue when she noticed something sticking out of Mitchell's pocket and looked back at him horrified. He caught her stare and her not so subtle indication at it, while George was telling them something trivial.

"Are you even listening?" George asked, annoyed at his friends.

"What? Yeah of course… Lovely weather," Mitchell said.

"What? I wasn't saying anything about the weather."

George stood up, offended, and he turned around and opened the fridge to get milk for his tea. Mitchell took the opportunity to fumble with the pants and pass it to Annie who promptly stuffed it in her sleeve.

George groaned and slammed the fridge door as he said, "We're out of milk again! Couldn't anybody else bother to do the shop once in a while?"

"Well, I'm dead," Annie deadpanned.

"I guess that is the last bit of giddy George," Mitchell joked, infuriating the man even more.

"Whatever! I'm going to have a shower," George said as he went upstairs, leaving Annie and Mitchell in awkward silence.

After hearing the upstairs bathroom door slam and the water running, Michell finally came to sit at the table, in the place George had vacated. He sipped his tea slowly and in between sips, he noticed Annie, playing with a loose thread of her grey cardigan. A sudden thought entered his mind, and he wondered about the loose thread. If Annie's clothes were the echo of who she thought herself to be while she was alive, or at least her last conscious memory of her identity, why was there a loose thread?

She kept fidgeting with it, pulling at it, and making it unravel. Mitchell wondered if it would all disintegrate if she continued drawing it out, and at the moment he wanted to set his hand on hers and make her relax, but he stopped himself and instead he made a tight fist.

It was then that he cleared his throat and attempted a conversation.

"Annie, I'm really sorry. I shouldn't have..." he started to say.

"What? Spare the life of our neighbours?" Annie interrupted him, raising an eyebrow and finally turning towards him.

"No! Of course, I'm glad they are all alive!"

"Good. Then there's nothing to worry about. No one got hurt."

"No one?" he asked in a transparent code.

"I'm alright," she said with a smile, making light of it. "Not a vampire and, wait, I am dead, but the good news is you didn't do it."

She had even placed two fingers on her neck in an exaggerated gesture of looking for a non-existent pulse.

"But I did do something, didn't I?" Mitchell asked, getting closer to her and holding at the sleeve of her grey cardigan.

"We did something, Mitchell. Please don't start with the vampire guilt. I'm not in the mood," she said as she stood up to place the mugs in the sink.

"Annie, this is serious," she heard him say from the place where he was sitting.

"It is. You needed something last night that I was happy to give. I was there to help you, and it was good to be able to save someone for once. It's nice to feel useful and," she explained as she continued washing the mugs, but then she took a moment, and continued, "needed."

"Annie," Mitchell spoke then, and Annie heard him pushing his chair back and standing up before he spoke right behind her. "You cannot define yourself by what you do for others. I don't want to do that to you."

There was a twinge of fear in his voice now.

"It was a conscious decision, Mitchell," she said, turning around and leaning against the sink. "End of discussion."

"Fine," Mitchell said in defeat, letting his hands fall to his sides.

Annie didn't know what prompted her to speak then, but she said, "and it was good."

Mitchell's eyes shot up to look at her, and one of the corners of his mouth started curling ever so slightly.

"Was it?"

"No!" Annie yelled.

"No?" He asked, a little hurt.

"I mean, yes it was bloody good, but that is not what I meant!"

Annie huffed, taking the bright marigold gloves from her hands and setting them next to the sink. Mitchell looked at her, pursing her lips as she was finding her words, and he made a mental effort to remain silent and let her say what she wanted.

"I meant that it was good to feel more in charge of myself, of my body," she said finally, with her hands moving in the air. "I was always so passive about everything in my life that I never really lived. I never even had a one-night stand. I was so bloody naive!"

"That is not necessarily a bad thing," He said, brushing her hair behind her ear.

"And besides, it is good to know that the last person I've slept with is not a murderer," she said without thinking, but suddenly the implication became clear to her, and she turned to Mitchell with a horrified expression.

He looked pained, knowing her statement wasn't right, and he abruptly let go of her hair.

"I mean, my murderer," she said, placing her hand on his arm trying to reassure him.

"Good save," Mitchell said with a sad smile.

Annie lowered herself until she was sitting against the kitchen cupboards, and Mitchell came to sit right next to her. They stayed like that for a few minutes, neither of them speaking, but being painfully aware of the places where their shoulders touched.

"I don't think of you in that way," she finally said, trying to make him feel better.

"But that is what I am."

"That is what you were," she countered. "And thanks to me, that is still in your past."

"Yes, and I will be forever grateful for it. I really am," Mitchell spoke, turning his face towards her and leaning in a bit.

Feeling Mitchell so close that his breath caressed her cheek was so overwhelming that Annie had to lighten the mood.

"On the other hand," she said, "I'm the slag without pants."

That made him laugh.

"You, Annie Sawyer," he said, taking her hand in his, "are no slag. And I should know. Those are not the pants of a slag."

"They're not?" she asked playfully.

"No, those are very nice. Very you by the way," Mitchell said, pointing at her sleeve where the dark grey knickers were peeking out. They were cotton and simple. Boy-short cut with two pink lace vertical lines that ended in two tiny bows.

"Very me?" she asked with suspicion. "Because they're grey?"

"No! Because they are simple and comfortable, and feminine," he said, and then he looked down to her hand in his, "and sexy without trying too hard."

Annie felt the ghost feeling of her heart rushing in the middle of her chest at his words.

"Well, at least I don't have to live for eternity in the thong I was killed for," she said with a smile.

"No. These are much better," Mitchell added, kissing her forehead and standing up to leave her with her all-so-confusing thoughts, sitting on the floor of their kitchen.

Annie thought, maybe for the first time, that it was a good thing she didn't sleep at night while the boys did because she anticipated she'd have plenty of things to ponder upon.