I've been working on this chapter for a while. It was becoming a mammoth of a chapter so I decided to break it into two. You'll notice it is shorter than my usual, but I just couldn't keep it as a whole. I expect to post the second part of this chapter soon.

Thank you for still having an interest in this story. I've loved all your comments and suggestions.

A.

Annie was no stranger to doors. In her non-life she had come to fear their sudden apparition and learned the hard way to turn them down and ignore them. But his door was there, not gleaming in soft blue light, but all wood and rusty hinges mocking her every time she walked by it, en route to knock softly in George's room to wake him up. She had almost mastered the art of rent-a-ghosting somewhere without looking back to see the door. But the mere existence of the entrance that once led to her happiness tugged painfully at her heart.

She never opened it nor she appeared inside anymore for she knew that on the other side rested the relic of a room that both George and Annie had silently decided to keep as a museum piece. Nothing was to be moved, nor seen, to remind them of what was missing. She had left things inside, a novel she had been enjoying oh so much, with the upper corner folded back, her favourite mug; her silly attempt at knitting one deformed dark grey fingerless glove.

Objects lost forever, like an old home abandoned in a hurry to escape a sudden invasion.

A cut limb that continued to hurt.

George and Annie had fled the doom without looking back, afraid that if they did they'd suffer the punishment of Lot's wife: to be petrified forever, unable to move forward.

She could picture the room in her mind's eye, his discarded shirt on the floor and the perfect crease of the sheet from the last time they had lain there together. She knew the window had remained open but she couldn't gather the courage to go inside to close it.

George had his own torments.

Mitchell was gone.

The line kept repeating in his head like a mantra. He had moved out weeks before, but it was until then that he truly felt him lost. That was the only explanation he could give himself to keep sane.

It had been a third of George's worst-case scenario happening, right after Nina getting hurt and in the same level as losing Annie to her door. But Annie wasn't sure what her worst fear was anymore. Something as inconsequential as her door appearing ceased to have the same meaning.

Annie had been avoiding him. At first he thought that he was imagining things, since she would still knock softly on his door to wake him and make him tea, but his friend had finally turned into a real ghost: one who would shift objects around him, make the old floor boards moan with her tired steps and appear just in glimpses in his peripheral vision. George would try to catch her, turn his head suddenly and walk softly like a thief, but she would stay afar, no matter how much he called her name.

At last George felt like the true lone wolf he was, howling the loss of his pack.

Annie knew she was avoiding him, and despite sensing that he blamed himself for her hurt, she couldn't face him. She could feel the deep shame mixing with her heartache.

There was a time she feared doors appearing out of the blue but now she knew better. That day in her room George had scooped her up from the floor and held her in his arms as tight as he possibly could. Once all the tears had been shared her mind wondered about the fierceness of George's silent pray, she could sense that he was afraid of her crossing over out of despair.

Mitchell was lost to them. She knew that now.

George opened the front door slowly hoping he'd get a glance of Annie, this time, maybe this time. Through the window to the kitchen he saw a faint movement in grey and his heart filled with hope. Slowly, like a wounded animal he moved, closer, pushing the door back slowly until it clicked in place. The movement in the kitchen stopped and he knew she'd flee again.

"Annie!" He called, "please don't go," he said running to the kitchen but she disappeared nonetheless. Something in her chest ached, as she appeared in the stairs landing, leaning on the wall and closing her eyes in pain.

George came out from the kitchen and stopped a few steps before the stairs.

"Annie, please, I won't come closer, but I need you to listen."

It took all of his strength to keep his voice steady, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry Annie," soon it was too much and all his poise was gone, "Oh Annie."

He was crying, Annie could feel it in his voice and his aura was reaching for her. Her own tears were falling now. She wanted to hold him, to cry together at last but something rooted her to the spot.

"I miss him too. I need him too. Oh Annie. I know it was my fault, I know. But I couldn't stand to see him hurting you, to see him like that. I don't regret it. But I can't take losing you as well. I'm sorry Annie, I'm just so sorry. Please, please forgive me."

It was all too much. Annie felt guilty for making him blame himself.

"It's not your fault. I'm sorry George." She said loud enough for him to hear and rent-a-ghosted out before he could find her.

Soon she was in the only place she knew no one expected her to be: sitting on her grave.

Nina found her boyfriend in his kitchen rearranging the cupboards.

"Aren't you going to get into trouble with Annie for doing that?" She asked trying to be funny.

She had sensed George's despair but hadn't had success finding the cause. Something had shifted in the pink house and George had tried to keep her away. That day she had had enough of his evasiveness and had finally come on her own accord to figure it out.

George had turned slowly and she saw traces of tears in his face. She ran to him and held him in her arms.

He felt himself crumble. He was done being strong.

"I don't think she cares Nina, not anymore," he said crying silently on her shoulder.

"What happened? Tell me what happened." She commanded pulling herself from him just enough so they could see each other eye to eye.

George looked at her sadly and then looked around the kitchen. He left his fingers linger in one of her mugs.

"Was she ever real Nina? Have I imagined her all this time? Maybe it's only been me making all that tea. Maybe I'm mental. That's it, isn't it? Mitchell was only my junkie housemate and Annie my imaginary friend."

"George. Where's Annie?" Nina asked feeling the dread rise in her throat.

"Who knows?" He asked cynically "she's a ghost."

"George. Has… Annie… crossed over?"

"No! I mean. She's just been avoiding me. And it's my fault. By how could I let him? He was hurting her. He was out of his mind drunk. He wasn't himself, I know he's not your favourite person, but the real him would have never done that to Annie. God! I love him like a brother, but I just couldn't stand it. I just saw red. I could have killed him right then Nina. I hit him and I kicked him out. And Annie… Oh Annie… She was so small, crying on the floor. I held her for hours, until dawn. I must have fallen asleep. And she hasn't let me see her since."

"What did Mitchell do George? What did he do to Annie?"

He shook his head. "It's not my secret to tell Nina. I can't. I'm sorry."

It had taken her a good part of the night. Holding him tight against her own body until he had fallen asleep. Nina could only pick up the shattered pieces of what once was a family, a home. He hadn't told her what had happened but she had been able to grasp that Mitchell had come back and he had hurt Annie, and that George had kicked him out. In the last weeks she had sensed George's sadness at Mitchell moving out but it was now something bigger. George was mourning Annie as well.

Something was sitting wrong inside Nina. That nasty voice in her head was at it again. A voice forged out of old lovers and her mother. She had vowed that she wouldn't let the voice touch her but in the middle of the night, alone in that haunted house the voice hissed at her. It reminded her of times in the past when she had mindlessly wished that George could be only hers. She hadn't caused whatever had happened, but her stomach burned with guilt.

She pulled herself from her lover's embrace and put on his dressing gown in the dark. She went down the stairs to the kitchen to get a glass of water. She didn't bother to turn on the lights, her wolf sight was keen.

She walked out of the kitchen and despite the dark she could see the silhouette sitting on the sofa.

"Annie," she softly called.

The figure didn't move, and for a second she wondered if it was an optical illusion created by shadows, until she lowered her head a little. Nina got closer and she could tell Annie had been sitting holding her bended legs in front of her. Now her face was tight against her thighs and only her curls were visible.

"Annie, please don't go."

"He told you." She affirmed without the hint of a question.

"No. He was coming undone this evening Annie. He said he was sorry, that it hurt him too, but that he couldn't take him hurting you. He didn't explain, but he was hurting so badly. He thinks that you are mad at him, that you blame him for something and that is why you're avoiding him."

Nina could hear Annie sob.

"No, no, no. It's not his fault. I'm not angry with him. I just can't look him in the eye."

"What happened Annie? How did he hurt you?" Nina was ambivalent. She wanted to know what had happened, and yet at the same time her defence mechanism was yelling at her not to know.

"He's lost to us. I don't think he's ever coming back. The real him."

"He's killing again." She said.

"I don't know. I guess. He's drinking blood. He's not Mitchell anymore. Not the man I love."