Chapter Twenty-Four

Juan The Mexican Wine Master and Boggle

(Michelle)

"It might be a premonition, Chip - you never know."

I nestled back into the poofy armchair set in the corner of my living room, phone in one hand and mug of tea in the other. God, was there anything in the world like a faithful ol' dirty, smelly, cushy chair? Nope. My troubles simply melted away the second I parked my bum on the cushion. Although today, the troubles weren't vanishing as easily ... I heard Chip sigh loudly from the other end of the line and I knew at once the conversation wasn't exactly gonna be a happy one.

Chip and I had never spoken much, besides the odd couple of times we'd met at Paranormal State events. So I'm sure you all can imagine my shock when I answered the long distance call today (expecting telemarketers ... those devils), and heard Chip's Southern drawl on the other end.

He'd called for advice. Well. More like a second opinion. I knew for a fact how heavy this little 'gift' of ours could get sometimes - to have someone available for a second opinion or for some support or just to listen to you vent; it was wonderful. I didn't know Chip well, but I knew how highly Ryan and the rest of the gang spoke of him.

"I've never had a premonition before," Chip reasoned, more to himself then to me. "But last night, that was the second time in less then a month I've had the same dream."

"The exact same dream?" I asked.

"Yeah," Chip said, although he didn't sound convinced. "I mean, I assume so. I don't remember much of the details of the first one, but this second one, I remember it exactly."

"Well what do you remember? The exact sequence of events."

There was a deep sigh from his end, and I took a quick sip of the lemon tea from my mug.

"There's a boy. He looks familiar, super duper familiar. I know I've seen him before but I don't know who he is or where I know him from."

"What does he look like?"

"Handsome," Chip replied thoughtfully. "Can't have been older then ten. Olive skin, wavy dark brown hair. Beautiful little boy, phenomenally attractive."

"Does he say anything?" I asked.

"He keeps saying 'it's coming'," Chip said. "And 'tell her'. He never specifies who I'm supposed to tell, or what exactly is coming. But he repeats those two things over and over again. 'Tell her' and 'it's coming'."

"Is that the whole dream?" I asked, slightly puzzled.

"No," Chip said, but his voice was sudden chilled and fearful. "No ... he warns me, repeats those things over and over again, and then .. then, he just - he just falls to pieces."

"He cries?" I asked with a frown.

"No," Chip responded, and his voice sounded strangely haunted. "No, not at all. He swells up, expands. His skin goes all white and turns purple and blue. And then he just ... disintegrates."

"Disintegrates?"

"Yeah."

"Wha ... what?"

"It's like he's rotting at warp speed, right in front of me."

"Rotting?"

"His skin starts peeling away, and falling off and his hair falls out. He's stripped right down to the muscles and they fall apart and rot and all that's left is his bones and his eyes."

I felt sick to my stomach at the thought of it, but I made sure my voice was even and relatively calm.

"That's strange ... he disintegrates, or rots, but his eyes are still there?"

"Yes," Chip said, rather breathlessly. "His eyes. They're these bright green, like a harlequin color. Like two emeralds just staring out of these sockets."

We both fell into silence, my brain whirring and clicking and stomach heaving. When Chip called and initially told me he'd been having this strange, reoccurring dream, I thought it would've been, well ... at least a little normal. At least relatively common, explainable. But this? This was bizarre. Who dreams of rotting children? Who falls asleep and is overcome with the image of disintegrating flesh and black sockets deep set in skulls? Even for a psychic, this was rather odd.

"So," I said slowly, tapping a finger on the side of my mug. "Why do you think this is a premonition type thing?"

"I don't know if it is or not," he said defensively. "It's just ... everytime I have the dream, the little boy warns me. And each time, it's more and more frantic."

"That makes sense," I agreed. "Well ... how do you think you know this boy?"

"I don't," he said simply. "I know I don't know him. I've never met him before in my life. But I've .. I've seen him before. In a photograph, maybe? I don't know ... but I recognize him, certain facial features. He looks so familiar."

"The eyes," I said slowly. "Green, you said, weren't they?"

"Yes," Chip said. "Green as the grass. Bright as the Sun."

"Are they familiar?" I asked, trying to push him towards what may very well have been the answer he was looking for.

"Of course," Chip said, clearly puzzled. "He's completely familiar."

"But the eyes," I said, dragging him back, slightly frustrated. "The eyes. Harlequin green, eyes that sparkle like diamonds. Harlow's eyes are green, aren't they?"

There was dead silence on the other end of the line. I took my chance.

"You said Harlow had a brother, didn't you?" I pressed. "Alive, or - "

"He's still alive," Chip said, his voice barely a whisper. "I assume so, anyways ... but it couldn't have been .. no. No, her brother, Kingston - he's still alive. And I've seen him before, met him face to face. It wasn't him. Kingston's hair is black, his face is sharper, nose a little longer. And he's older then Harlow - by a couple of years, I'm sure of it."

I frowned, but wasn't completely put out. "You're sure this Kingston is still alive?"

"I'm sure of it," he said, rather hesitantly. "Harlow would've told me ... "

"But the eyes, Chip, they - "

"They're the same color as Harlow's. But .. a lot of people have green eyes."

"That exact shade of green?"

He didn't speak, but neither did I - there were no words that could be found by either of us.

If Chip was having these dreams - or rather, these nightmares - over and over again of someone warning him about some impending doom, what did they mean? Who were they about? But most importantly, why did I feel like Harlow had something to do with them?

"Does Harlow only have the one brother?" I asked.

"Yes. One. Kingston, and I know he's still alive."

"You're sure it was only him?"

"Yes."

"He's the only brother?"

"Yes."

"Positive?"

Silence. Then ...

" ... Yes."

(Kimmy)

"You look exactly like her."

Harlow peered over from her perch on bed, and smiled grimly. "I don't really see it."

Clearly, she was lying.

The similarities were staggering. The skin was the same smooth copper, the nose long but rounded. The same round, perfectly symmetrical eyes. The long lashes, the flawlessly arched brows. The long hair, russet in color and set in loose waves over her shoulders. The strong jawline, the high cheekbones. And the eyes - when people said they'd never seen anyone like Harlow before, they were more often then not talking about her beauty. But the rest of the time, they meant those eyes. The brilliant green, the color of Spring leaves. The woman in the photo, her eyes were the exact shade of Harlow's.

Or rather, Harlow's were exactly the shade of her mother's.

I was cross legged on Lo's bedroom floor, looking through a small, dirty photo album I'd found on the bottom of one of Harlow's bookshelves. I'd stopped by her apartment about an hour ago, bearing gifts of candy and cake and so many jugs of iced tea it very well could've filled an entire lake. Her favorite things, y'know? I figured after the fist fight that had almost occurred at the game, the one thing she really needed - more then a friend or Valium or anything - was candy, sugar and tasty juice.

I'm fuckin' great, aren't I?

So after gorging out on our own body weight in food, we'd ended up in her room, seated in the bright sunlight shining through her windows. She was looking frantically for her exam revision folders from last year, and I was attempting to not puke out three liters worth of tea beverage. I'm so attractive, aren't I? As she continued leafing through her piles and piles of folders, I'd stumbled upon this old, nasty photo album tucked waaaaay in the back of her shelf. She'd allowed me to look through, although there was a slightly pained expression on her face as I flipped through each page, ogling over every yellowing photograph.

The second photo on the page, the one I was staring awestruck at now, was one of her mother, Nia Mercer. I'd never before seen a photo of her, and had only heard Harlow speak of her once before in the years I'd known her. But despite all the negative things I'd heard, from Sophie and even Lo herself, I couldn't help but stare at the photo in my hands.

It was shocking.

The only difference was the soul behind the eyes of both Harlow and Nia. When you looked at Harlow, there was peace. Calm. An overwhelming warmth that lit up her young and untroubled face. Looking at Nia's was like looking at an unpolished diamond. The cheeks were high, like Harlow's, but gaunt and chiseled out. The eyes were overbright and brilliant, but they were cold and emotionless. The smile fixed on her face was forced, unhappy. It was the only part about the woman that didn't resemble Harlow in the slightest - her mouth. The lips were thinner, lines etched on either side from years of frowning and disdain.

"Nuts," I mumbled, flipping to the next page.

And as if my mind hadn't already exploded, it was now fuckin' obliterated.

"Who is this?" I asked, turning the page to her.

She peered up from her mountain of papers, and grimaced slightly. "My Dad."

It was a male Harlow. Legit, if Harlow grew a penis and had a five o'clock shadow, this would be her.

The man was handsome - sickeningly so. A squared jaw, round eyes. High forehead and chestnut brown hair slicked back against his handsome head. The eyes were brown, unlike Harlow's, but there was light in his that had been so obviously missing from Nia's the page before. He looked happy. Calm. He looked as relaxed as Harlow did. And his mouth - lips full as pillows, teeth unnaturally even and white, bared in a perfect grin. Deep dimples set into his cheeks. If you covered the rest of his head and only looked at the mouth and dimples, you'd have sworn it was Harlow.

I flipped between the two photos, to Nia, then to her Dad. Nia, Dad. Nia. Dad. She was identical to both.

I felt a strange sadness fill my chest - I'd known Harlow for four years now, and in the sixty minutes I'd been at her apartment, I'd realized how little I really knew about her. I knew she grew up in Foster Care. I knew her only surviving family member was her older brother who lived in a mental institution in New Jersey. I knew her only sister died when Lo was six. I knew her mother spent the remainder of her life and the majority of Harlow's in jail. But beyond that? I knew nothing.

"What was your Dad's name?" I asked.

She continued sorting out her essays and textbooks, but her eyes were oddly clouded.

"Keith Vincent," she said softly.

"You took his last name," I noted.

"When I turned 18," she replied. "My mother's name brought trouble with me wherever I went. I took my Dad's instead."

"Do you ever miss him?" I asked quietly.

She shook her head, continuing her mad sorting of papers. "Barely knew him. Died when I was three."

"I'm sorry," I said, and I truly was.

She shook her head again, humorless smile on her flawless face. "Don't be. He killed himself, left my siblings and I to be raised by that monster."

She motioned with her chin to the photo of Nia, and snorted in disgust. I turned the photograph of her mother over onto the floor, and flipped back to the picture of her Dad, Keith.

Killed himself? No, he couldn't have ... but I suppose it was hard to predict who fell victim to suicide, wasn't it? You just never knew. But looking at his face - that handsome, happy face. I found it impossible to believe. How can a man so beautiful, so happy, so full of life - just die? It was unbelievable. But I didn't want to question it anymore, I didn't want to put Harlow in a bad mood.

"Your Mom passed away too, didn't she?" I asked, looking cautiously up at Lo.

Harlow nodded, but I didn't sense that she felt uncomfortable. On the contrary, I felt like she wasn't even paying attention.

"When?" I asked.

"2002," she replied. "I was 18."

"Did you at least get to see her again?"

Harlow snorted, a look of disdain passing over her face. "See her? Why would I have wanted to. Hell would've frozen over before I ever went to visit her willingly."

Visit?

"She died in jail, didn't she?" I asked, as casually as I could.

"Something like that," Harlow replied, looking in frustration around at the stacks of books. "She died incarcerated, but not in jail - she died in a tiny little room, hooked up to an IV that was dripping poison into her bloodstream."

I'd never heard her talk so bluntly, but I barely took any notice. An IV that dripped poison into her bloodstream? That could only mean -

"She's on death row?" I asked, unable to mask the shock in my voice.

"Was," Harlow corrected. "As of March a little more then six years ago, she's been checked off that list. Where the Hell is that essay?"

She returned absent-mindedly to her mad sorting, but I was looking down at the photo album in my hands. Death row? Her mother, Harlow's - she'd been sentenced to death? For what? People who'd murdered multiple times hadn't even been sentenced to death. What had made her case different? That was something I wouldn't ask .. oh no, definitely not.

Taking one last glance at the rich and handsome face of Keith Vincent, I flipped to the next page, felt the breath once again catch in my throat - Jesus. Next time I came to Harlow's to look through her photo albums, I should probably bring a friggin' puffer or something. I think I'd simultaneously shit my pants eight times in three minutes.

The photograph on the page was of two young children. A girl, who looked about five, and a boy who looked four. Maybe three, it was hard to tell.

The boy was handsome, even at the tender age of three, or maybe four - he was one of the best looking males I'd ever laid eyes on. Olive skin, dark as cinnamon but smooth and even. Eyes set deep in his skull, but round and bright. A longer nose, distinguished and slightly aristocratic. Slightly waved chestnut brown hair, mussed and windswept in a startlingly perfect way. He was shoeless and in baggy beige cargo pants. The silky green shirt he wore were the exact shade of his eyes - yet again, the hauntingly familiar shade of Harlow's.

The girl was beautiful, one of the prettiest I'd ever seen. She looked like Harlow, but with deliberate mistakes. The eye color, the twinkling harlequin, that was the same. But the face was rounder, softer then Harlow's sharp jawline. The cheeks were still thin, slightly gaunt, but with the rosy glow only a child could have - they weren't chiseled and high, dangerously jagged. Her eyes were almond shaped, not big, round globes. The skin paler, the hair lighter. But it fell over her shoulders in loose rings just like Lo's. But everything else - identical to Harlow. They could've been twins.

The two of them stood next to one another, the girl with an arm around the boy. Neither were smiling - the boy in particular looked out to lunch - but you could tell just by the photograph that had they both been grinning, their smiles would've been identical to Lo's - and just as heartbreakingly beautiful. These must've been her siblings.

"They look like you," I said, holding up the album so she could see the photographs.

She glanced up, smiled slightly, but continued on rooting through her piles of paper. "I look like them would be more accurate. That's my older brother and sister."

"Kingston's the boy, right?" I clarified, looking at the beautiful young face.

Harlow nodded. "And the girl was my older sister, Brody."

"How old were they here? Four, five?"

Harlow peered up again, but she didn't smile this time. There was a faint line in her brow, and she looked thoughtfully at the photo.

"No," she said. "Brody's eight, there. Which means Kingston would've been seven."

"Seven and eight?" I gasped, looking back down at the photograph.

Surely not, she had to have been mistaken. They were too tiny, much too small to be seven and eight, respectively. Seven year olds are taller, thicker. Eight year old girls are bigger, more rounded. These were just babies. They were thin and tiny and short ...

"They look tiny, though ... you're sure?"

Harlow nodded without looking back up. "We were poor growing up. Never had a lot of food. Undernourished, that's why they're so tiny. I was barely five feet tall until I was 18, then I just shot up."

I looked back down at the photos, ran a finger across the picture. It broke my heart to see them like that ... and Brody, she was eight. Hadn't she died soon after?

"She died when she was nine," Harlow said casually, as if she'd just read my mind.

"So young," I said softly. "How's Kingston?"

She shrugged. "He's alive. Taller then I am, now. Six foot one or something, he's a giant."

I laughed. "Seen him lately?"

"Last year," she replied, placing her hands in her lap - she seemed to have abandoned her search for the revision tables. "I try and make it out there once or twice a year, but New Jersey's a bit out of my way."

I nodded. "Understandable. Not exactly cheap to fly out there, either."

Harlow shook her head. "I try, though."

"Does he still look like you?" I asked, a million questions running through my head - I was having difficulty weeding out the appropriate ones.

She smiled slightly. "I don't know. I don't see it, but the nurses - he lives in a special mental institution - whenever I'm there they point it out."

I grinned. "You both look identical, and this picture was what ... twenty years ago?"

She nodded. "He's much paler now ... doesn't really get out in the sun very often. And his hair's a lot shorter, maybe a little darker then in that photo. And he's much thinner, we're about the same size, actually."

I tried to keep the shock off my face, but Harlow seemed to notice.

"It's alright," she assured me. "It's his medication. If it weren't for the doctor's and nurses, he'd never eat at all. The part of his brain that tells him when to eat, the Hypothalamus - doesn't really function properly. But they make sure he gets enough nutrients and vitamins and everything. He's always been stick thin."

"Oh, well that makes sense, I suppose. Are you going to visit him soon?"

She nodded, curling her legs up in front of her. "Couple of weeks, once exams are over, I think. I'm all he's really got left."

"It must be nice for him, when you go and visit."

She shrugged. "He doesn't remember me anymore."

I saw a wave of pain flash over her face, such a severe look of misery and guilt that the quick glance was enough to crush my heart into tiny little pieces. Kingston, the only family she had left in the world - and he couldn't even recognize her. When he looked into her eyes, didn't he see his own? Didn't he realize it was his sister? It must've been like looking in a mirror ... or had he deteriorated that much? I had two siblings. They both drove me nuts. But to imagine a day when I'd pass them on the street and not even recognize them - I'd rather be dead.

Harlow smiled, but there was still a dark cloud behind her pupils. "Nevermind it, though, Kimmy. I don't really like talking about him - it - er, them - very much."

I nodded. "I'm sorry to pry, Harley."

She shook her head. "You didn't, don't worry. It's always nice to vent sometimes, you know?"

I smiled. "You'll always have me to vent to, babe."

(Katrina)

"Where are you off to in such a rush?"

Ryan looked over at the three of us - myself, Sergey and Heather - and smiled rather guiltily, moving the wine bottle slyly to his other arm.

"Oh, I'm just going to hang out with Harlow," he said nonchalantly - I had to admit, he was getting better at this whole 'casual' thing.

"Oooh, what're you guys doooooin'?" Heather asked, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively. "Y'know, I mean besides downing an entire bottle of wine and getting tangled up on her couch."

He didn't even blush - Katrina equals majorly impressed.

"I'm not sure," he said with little concern, slipping his shoes on. "Maybe watch a movie, or something? Study? Play a boardgame?"

Heather rolled her eyes. "Because both of you would rather play Boggle then bang. Yeah, alright."

"They won't have sex, they'll just play Boggle," Sergey said with a grin. "Your Priest would be so proud, Ry."

"I'm a good little Catholic," Ryan agreed, stuffing his wallet into the back of his pants. "I'm out, don't wait up."

"You remember we have to catch a flight tomorrow at four," I reminded him.

"Four in the afternoon," Ryan said, with a nod. "Yes, Mom, I remember. That's like twenty two hours away, I'm good."

"Drive safe," Serge said.

"Buckle up," I agreed.

"Wrap up's, more like it," Heather said cheerfully.

"Shut up, Tad."

And with a snap, he was gone.

Serge leaned back against the couch, throwing his arms behind his head and propping his feet up on the coffee table. "You think he's getting any tonight?"

"I don't know, but I'm pretty sure that Boggle isn't on the itinerary for this evening," I said blandly.

"You think they ever talk about Harlow being a medium?" Heather said thoughtfully.

"How did we go from them banging and-slash-or playing Boggle to them chattin' about Harlow's ability?" Sergey asked, puzzled.

"You don't hang out with Heather enough," I sighed. "This always happens. Why would they talk about that, Tad?"

"Oh I don't know," she said with a shrug. "Wouldn't you want to talk about it?"

"If I were Harlow? No."

"No, if you were Ryan."

"If I was Ryan and I was drinking wine with someone who looked like Harlow, I don't think I would be able to give even the slightest fuck about what childhood terrors led her to see ghosts," Serge said.

Fair point.

"I'd wanna know," Heather sighed. "I keep wanting to ask her about it, but I never know if it's appropriate or not .. "

"You're worried about something being appropriate?" I gasped, and Serge slapped a hand over his mouth.

Tad rolled her eyes and curled into a little ball on the cushy gray armchair set in Ryan and Sergey's living room. She looked thoughtfully out the window into the darkening sky, an uncharacteristic look of puzzlement on her normally cheerful face.

"I just wonder, you know?" she said. "Like, has she had it her whole life? Can she remember a time when she didn't? Will she be psychic forever?"

I frowned. "Heather, I don't think you can lose a psychic ability."

Tad nodded. "Yeah you can - Chip said so."

"When did Chip say that?" Serge asked.

"Couple of weeks ago. You weren't there," she said. "We were talking about Harlow, and I asked the exact same question - do you think she'll be psychic forever? And Chip said - and I quote - 'I don't know, Heather. I wouldn't be surprised either way.'"

Now this was news to me.

"What did he mean?" I asked, resting my chin in my palm.

Heather shrugged. "He wouldn't really elaborate. All he said was that it wasn't uncommon for people to 'lose'psychic or mediumship abilities. In fact, young children who report having a sixth sense often grow out of it before adulthood. In children, a supposed 'medium ability' is ninety percent more common or prevalent in children with particularly turbulent childhoods."

Serge and I stared blankly at Tad - his mouth was slightly agape, and I was pretty sure mine was too.

"Heather," Sergey said slowly. "How ... how can you remember something like that, but nine times out of ten you can't remember if a potato is a vegetable or a fruit."

"It's a protein, duh," she said, rolling her eyes. "Hey, what's the difference between Boggle and Scrabble?"

Serge looked at me. "We're back to boardgames? What?"

I shrugged, relaxed back into the sofa in exhaustion.

"Like I said - you don't hang out with her nearly enough."

(Ryan)

"You're quite the wine connoisseur, Ryan."

Harlow grinned at me from over the kitchen counter, and I smiled back. She'd just uncorked the wine bottle I'd brought and was pouring it carefully into two tall glasses. I couldn't keep the grin off my face - she looked, as always, like perfection.

"I can't lie, I usually just show up at the liquor mart and make them choose something for me," I admitted. "If I was left alone to choose wine, I undoubtedly would pick the most disgusting one."

She grinned, handing me my glass over the countertop. "There's no such thing as disgusting wine."

"Oh I beg to differ."

She laughed, took a little sip from her chute. "My mom was an alcoholic, I grew up with the knowledge that there's no such thing as 'bad' alcohol."

I smiled, but didn't laugh - I guess laughing at my girlfriend's alcoholic mother wasn't the best thing for our relationship, was it? Regardless of whether or not she started it.

"Lucky, your Liquor mart friends chose a pretty good one," she said with a smile. "This one's lovely."

I took a sip, and had to agree. I'd - or rather, Juan the Mexican Wine Master - had picked another homerun. Perrrrrrrfection.

"Is wine your drink of choice?" I asked.

She shook her head, flicking a few pieces of hair off her face. "Champagne, actually. I'm not especially fond of the taste of alcohol, but champagne is fun and bubbly and wine is fruity enough to mask the taste."

I nodded. "Fair enough. I've always been a fan of whiskey, actually."

She scrunched her nose, in potentially the most adorable way I'd ever seen, and shook her head. "I can't stand whiskey."

"Ahh, it's not that bad," I laughed. "Strong, but it's got that nice musky aftertaste."

She smiled, looking cheerfully down at her glass. "My Dad used to drink whiskey ... Bagpiper's. It smells more like rum, but it's considered a Whiskey. Whenever I smell it, it brings back memories."

My heart warmed a little, and I was pretty sure it wasn't from the wine - so little had I ever seen Harlow smile when she recounted a memory from her childhood. But the thought of her Dad - the memory of him smelling like the rum-tinged whiskey - brought a smile to her face. And to mine, too.

"You remember your Dad very well?" I asked.

She grinned, taking a seat on the barstool beside her - I slid onto the one to my right, so we sat face to face across the marble counter.

"More then I think I should," she said thoughtfully. "He died when I was three - hung himself, actually. I don't know why, or ... or what led to it, really. But I remember it was in our old house in Maine. In the basement, from the rafters. I don't have a lot of memories about him, I don't remember ever seeing him with my Mom or any of my other siblings. Which makes sense, I suppose, since I was his only biological child. But I remember his smell."

She smiled, caressing her glass in her small hands. "Like I said, whiskey. Bagpipers. But it was always musky, like cigar smoke. He didn't smoke cigarettes but he always smoked cigars. I remember I'd wake up late at night and look outside, and he'd be sitting on this rickety old porch swing, smoking a cigar. Sometimes I'd sneak out and sit next to him. He always smelt like rich whiskey and smoke - he liked to drink, was always at the bars. And he'd tell me stories all the time."

She curled a leg beneath her, taking another sip from her glass. "Those were the happiest moments I can remember. Just being alone with my Dad, sitting outside under the stars. Sometimes he'd walk me back into the house, tuck me in. Usually he'd just tell me it was time for bed and send me off."

"Didn't he live with you?" I asked curiously.

She shook her head. "Maybe when I was a baby, but he and my Mum had split up by the time I was a year old. She stayed in Maine a long time though, that's where my Dad lived. I think for a while there .. I think she tried to get her life together. It never happened, but I'm glad for her attempt at it. It just meant I got to be with my Dad for a little longer."

I found it strange, although I would never tell her, that she had so many memories of her Dad, but none that had anything to do with her Mum or siblings. If her Dad was such a nice guy, if he cared so much about her, why didn't he take her out of the home? Take her with him? I tried to push the troubling thoughts from my mind.

"There aren't any pictures of him around," I casually noted, looking around the kitchen. "Don't you have any?"

"Only two," she said simply. "One of him when he was young, it's in a family photo album in my bedroom. And there's one of him and I, when I was just a couple of months old. It's tucked away somewhere."

"You said he used to tell you stories."

She nodded. "Every time I went and sat with him on the swing."

"What stories did he tell you?" I asked.

She smiled, folding her hands on top of one another. "Almost always the same one. It was about a princess, a beautiful little princess who lived in a castle on top of a hill. The princess was very sad and very lonely, all the time. She just wanted friends, and to be able to leave the castle and play in the sunshine and pick flowers. But the owner of the castle was very mean and very evil, and never let the little princess go out and play. So to keep herself busy, she'd make friends with the butterflies that would fly past her window. She'd tell them her secrets and care for them, give them little bowls of sugar water so they could drink and be happy. And then one night, all of her butterfly friends came to her window at once and told her they wanted to take her to their kingdom, where she could play all day and have all the friends and flowers and happiness she could ever want. So she grabbed on to their little legs and they carried her away from the evil castle and to their butterfly kingdom, where she lived forever and ever."

She laughed. "He always told it better. But that was the jyst of it, as far as I can remember."

I smiled. "Were you the beautiful little princess?"

She shrugged her small shoulders, smiling slightly in her deep thought. "I suppose so. But I never had butterfly friends that came and carried me away."

"Your Dad sounded like a nice guy," I said softly.

She sighed, but the cheerful light that had brightened those brilliant eyes had faded. "I suppose."

She had the far-away look in those pupils again, the one I'd only seen a couple of times since I'd met her. Usually, it was just a flicker of doubt, of cloudiness. But the flicker had turned into a permanent fixture in those globes of green - she looked troubled, unfocused. Her eyes were glued on a spot in the living room.

I glanced over to where she was looking, but saw nothing. "Lo? Are you alright?"

She jumped a little at the sound of her voice, nodded, and threw back a gulp of wine. "Sorry, zoned out."

I frowned a little, rested my hands on the counter. "You see something?"

She blinked. "See something?"

I nodded. "Whenever you've done a walk-through or notice a spirit or something, you get this look on your face. Like you're here, physically, but your mind is a million miles away."

She smiled slightly, casting those bright eyes down at her lap. "I didn't know I did that ... "

"It's cute," I assured her. "Really. It's just ... I don't know. I thought maybe you saw something."

She looked at me curiously, a rather puzzled expression now splashed across her face. Her eyes flickered to a point behind my head, then back to my face. She looked slightly uneasy, a little worried. She looked like she was trying to communicate non-verbally with someone standing directly behind me - it gave me goosebumps.

"The thing is," she said slowly, eyes still oddly fixed to a point behind me. "Well .. there's a spirit that lives in my apartment. Ever since I moved in, she's just ... been here, always."

I feigned nonchalance. "Oh yeah? That's pretty cool ... you talk to her?"

Harlow nodded. "Often."

"What's her name?" I asked.

"Chick," Lo responded.

"Chick?"

"Mmhmm."

"That's her real name?"

Harlow bit her bottom lip, and shrugged. "I .. I don't actually know. I just call her Chick."

"So you're ... communicating with her right now?" I asked, slightly anxiously.

Harlow smiled, although it was a grim one. "Not really. She just left the room, she's quite angry with me."

"Why?"

"I told you about her. She doesn't really ... well she's not the biggest fan of people like you."

"People like me?"

"Paranormal investigators."

"Ahh, I see."

A silence fell upon the two of us. I was looking at Harlow, slightly distressed but more intrigued then anything. She was gazing over her shoulder out into her living room, brow furrowed slightly, mouth downturned. There were a million questions running through my mind, I had a thousand things I wanted to ask. But I didn't know if it was appropriate or not ... regardless of if they were dead or alive, I didn't want anyone close to Harlow to dislike me.

"She's been acting very strange lately," Harlow said softly, resting her chin in her palm. "More so then usual."

"What's she been doing?" I asked.

"Avoiding me, mostly," Lo said with a sigh. "She won't come anywhere near me. Keeps saying she's feeling this dark presence around me."

I felt my heart skip a beat, and tried to force my face into polite disinterest. "Dark presence?"

Harlow shrugged. "I don't know. She said she keeps sensing that something bad is going to happen to me or something."

She looked over at me, and her face whitened slightly - probably because I looked shit-in-my-pants terrified.

"Are you alright?" she asked, eyes round with worry.

I nodded, trying to contort my face back into some semblance of passivity. "Fine, sorry .. something bad is going to happen?"

Harlow closed her eyes, shaking her head slightly. "No no, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you - it's nothing, really. I think she's just a bit depressed, to be honest, maybe her own feeling of darkness is transferring over to me or something."

She lay a hand over my own and gave it a light squeeze. "I'm sorry, nothing bad is going to happen. Trust me."

I didn't know what to say - did I tell her? About the dreams I'd had, the dreams Chip had had? The warnings from this disintegrating, rotting children? The kids who kept showing up in our dreams, all beautiful, all dead, all falling to pieces? All with the same eyes as her? Or did I pretend like I didn't know anything, pretend like I was just surprised, that's all.

Against my better judgment - I chose to tell her.

"Harlow," I said, whispering although it was only the two of us - as far as I knew, anyways. "Chip ... I was talking to him the other day. You know he had a weird dream?"

"Oh," she said blankly, clearing trying to make sense of my random blurb. "I .. that sucks, I hope he's alright?"

"Sorry, I should be more specific. He .. he had a dream about a boy, and the boy kept telling him to warn her, it's coming, over and over again."

Harlow frowned. "That's .. strange, yes."

"You don't think it has something to do with you, and the ghos - er, Chick, do you?"

Harlow bit back a smile, shaking her head. "How could Chip's dream possibly have anything to do with me?"

"The boy in the dream looked like you," I explained. "Well, besides the fact that he's a boy, you know. But he had the same color eyes as you."

She smiled this time, looking completely unworried. "Ryan, a lot of people have green eyes. It's the most uncommon color, I know, but there are hundreds of millions of people who - "

"Not just green, Lo," I interrupted apologetically. "Your exact shade of green. People have green eyes, tons do. But not like yours. Yours are ... one of a kind. There's no shade, no tone, no color - nothing - that can be used to describe it. And Chip said the boy had the exact shade as yours."

Still looking nonplussed, Harlow took a sip from her glass and folded her hands on top of one another. "Ryan, the subconscious is a very strange thing. Dreams - they don't only mean one thing, there's a million meanings all rolled into one. They're strange, and impossible to decipher. I did a course on - "

"I had a dream, too, Harlow," I blurted out. "Not the exact same one, but ... there were the green eyes, the same warning."

She stopped talking, but no longer looked completely calm. I took my chance.

"Don't you think it's strange?" I asked her, scooting closer to the counter. "The girl in your apartment senses something bad is going to happen to you - Chip and I both have similar dreams about kids with green eyes telling us to warn you about something, they - "

"They told you specifically to warn me? They legitimately said Harlow?" she asked curiously.

"Well, no, but - "

"How do you know they were about me, then?" she asked, and there was a slight trace of exhaustion in her patient voice.

"I just .. I don't - we just know, Harlow," I sighed. "And what are the odds? All within a month, these dreams and the girl's premonition and - "

"It's not a premonition," she said simply. "It's a feeling. Not intuition, not a prophecy - just a feeling she has. And frankly, she's been dead for more then 30 years, I don't know how in tune with the real world she really is. And these dreams - these two dreams - they're not necessarily about me. Just because these kids have the same color eyes as I do, that doesn't mean it's about me. It's a familiar color, if I was even slightly in your thoughts before you went to sleep, your brain could weave a certain detail about my appearance into the dream. It happened to be the color of my eyes - it could have been the color of my hair, the sound of my voice, the sofa from my living room."

"But it was all those things. Except for the couch. These kids looked like you, just with deliberate mistakes."

"But they weren't me," she said, and I heard for the first time in all the weeks I'd known Harlow, a slight trace of annoyance in her honey smooth voice. "They weren't. They didn't say my name. They didn't specify I was the one who had to be warned. It was just a dream."

She seemed to notice the slight bite in her voice, and her face fell into an apologetic grimace. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to snap. I'm just ... don't worry about me, alright?"

She grasped my hand in both her tiny ones, lay it against her warm cheek. "You have enough on your plate. And frankly, I've never felt this good in my life. I feel great, academically I've never done better. The volleyball team's doing amazing. Everything in life is falling into place."

I nodded, and although my stomach was still in uncomfortable knots, the feeling of her cheek against the back of my hand sent a rush of blood through my entire body. It hazed my brain, blurred my vision, made my knees weak.

"You're right," I managed to mumble. "You're right."

"And I have you," she said simply, but her voice as sweet as sugar. "Life truly, truly - has never been better then it is now."

My legs were turning to completely jelly - ohgodohgodohgod.

"Speaking of," I managed to stutter out. "We've never officially decided on dating."

She grinned, a very wry and very cheeky one. "You're right, aren't you?"

"It happens sometimes."

She laughed. "Well ... are we?"

"Lemme make this official," I said, clearing my throat and grasping her hands in my own. "Harlow - you wanna go out with me?"

She grinned, pulled me close to her over the counter, and rested her lips against my own. I felt her eyelashes flutter against my skin, felt her warm, fruity breath rush past my cheeks.

"I'd love to," she whispered.

I'm not entirely sure how it happened, but less then ten seconds later, she was up against the wall of her kitchen, hands moving hungrily up and down my chest as she nibbled ferociously on my lip. I wasn't exactly innocent either - one hand tangled in her hair, the other grabbing helplessly at that perfect bum.

She giggled, let a hand drop down to the waistband of my jeans. I thought it was accidental at first - but then I felt a tug, a soft yank and realized with pure jubilation her fingers were creeping slowly, with expertise, into my pants.

"Naughty," I managed to breathe, feeling completely drunk off the smell of her skin.

"Just you wait," she whispered in my ear.

Oh God, I was totally getting laid tonight.

I swear, I only came to play Boggle.

(Unknown)

"Warn her, please please tell her!"

I was confused - where the fuck was I?

It looked like a large field, but it was all in muted tones - blacks and greys, seaweedy green. It was foggy, misty - the trees had no leaves, the grass was dead. It was cold ... very very cold. I looked at my hands - they were as pale as the sky, as withered as the branches dropping from the hollowed oaks.

I looked up, into the eyes of that little girl. Beautiful ... mahogany hair, pale skin, lips as white as snow but eyes as large and round and bright as the sun - not yellow, though. Green. A brilliant and dazzlingly glimmer of color in this plain, barren, colorless world surrounding me.

I reached out a hand, motioned for the girl to come close.

"Who?" I asked, and although my hands had withered to nothing, my voice was strong, still relatively calm considering the panic creeping through my chest. "Warn who?"

"Harlow," she whispered - gagged, was more like it.

It was as if the name was like tiny razor blades, digging and demolishing her throat as it crept up and out of her mouth. She grabbed her throat with a hand, such a tiny dainty little one I couldn't keep my eyes off it.

"Harlow?" I repeated. "Warn Harlow?"

"Harlow," she choked, her voice rasped and chillingly ragged. "Warn Harlow - it's coming, it's coming!"

She gagged, spluttered - great pools of scarlet red began to bubble at the corners of her mouth - I couldn't move, couldn't do anything. I stared in horror - the bubbles leaked down the sides of her mouth, dribbled down her front.

I felt a horrified scream escape from my throat - a well of blood, so brilliantly red it was nearly blinding , cascaded from her mouth, like a waterfall of gore. It soaked the monotone dirt beneath her feet, bled color into the lifeless blades of grass beneath her. And then, perhaps even worse then the claret river erupting from her mouth, there was a ripping sound. Not like a piece of paper being torn into two. It was the sound of skin, being ripped from the bone. A smooth, gut-wrenching tear.

The girls face, from the center of her forehead to the very back of her skull split into two. Surely she had to have died - but her eyes were still alive, transfixed in horror at the puddle of blood below her. It was as if she hadn't noticed the flesh of her scalp begin to peel, curl like rotting orange skins left in the sun.

I was horrified - I felt like I had to vomit, but I couldn't. I felt like I should cry, but no tears would come. I felt like I needed to scream - but my voice was as terror-stricken as I was.

So I watched - in fear, in nausea, in slight amazement - as the little girl before me came undone at her seams, skin falling into puddles around her, muscles and tissue withering and dying. Her skeleton, still standing, staring at me with a look of desperation in the sunken but still visible eyes.

Harlow, the green globes pleaded, warn her, please.

"Not tonight."

The voice was cold as a blast of arctic wind. As deep as the ocean, vehement and terrifying. It was behind me. I turned. I was ready.

But I was wrong.

The scream that had so desperately tried to escape my lips before made it's way out. I didn't know what I was seeing, but I remember the entire world go black -

and I saw no more.

"Tonight, you are mine."

Author's Note:

I've been away forever, I know I'm sorry sorry sorry! This chapter ... not pleased with it. But my life has been a nutty ball of hectic lately and Ipromise next chappy will be better! You munchkins ready for it? Chapter 25. It's next. And that's when the shit hits the fan. Actually no, shit doesn't just hit the fan - a Hummer filled with fecal matter, vomit and teardrops of starving children hits the fan. Yah. Not even joking, it's all downhill from here on out. BUT, that doesn't mean I'm any less cheerful. Or crazy. Let's face it, I'm nutty as squirrel poo. I have legitimately just finished nine days in a row of work and am so exhausted I actually think I might pass out. So very quickly, and I apologize for my laziness, I must thank; XDeadlyImperfectionX, xoxoMyRealityIsFiction, PSUPRS, akahitoha, kcollins720, nouseforaname89 and WinchesterAngel3389!

As always, my undying love for all of you is only matched by your mother and or father's love for you. But even then, it's pretty fuckin' close. I'm sorry I didn't reply individually, I just need to crash or I legit think I'm going to explode into a million exhausted pieces. I must scamper off now - there sleep to catch up on, chapters to write, hearts to break, dreams to crush! MWAHAHAHAHA *flails off*

love; ellahhhh! xo