Everything was soft all around her. She moved her feet back-and-forth and hugged her pillow closer to her. God, it felt so good to be in her own bed again. Erin turned her head towards her bed stand to peek an eye at the time. It was already going on 11:00 A.M. How had she slept so late?! She buried her face into her pillow and sighed. She had needed it. There was no denying that fact. She had been running on fumes and sleeping in her own bed had been exactly what the doctor ordered. Her dreams/nightmares started to dredge up in her mind. She ran through them but didn't want to process them. She wasn't ready to. There was something dark and heart-wrenching and such fear of what she had seen but also something desperate and yearning at the other end. It was a jumbled ball and she didn't want to start unraveling it to figure it out. Her mind would do it and when she had the focus she would delve deeper into it and finally "look" at what she had "seen."

She closed her eyes, not quite ready to get out of bed.

Erin's eyes shot open as she bolted up in the bed. She was in her own bed in her own room that was completely dark from heavy curtains blocking the window. She began to feel instant panic and fear. Where was Larten? Had he left? Erin felt tears forming from her distress. Had he really left? Surely not. Surely he wouldn't abandon them like that, abandon her, without any sort of communication. Right?

Erin threw the covers off of her and walked into the bathroom. There was a single rose, slightly wilted, by the bowl of her sink. Her heart stopped. He had left. He was gone. He left them! Oh God, what if he ran into Murlough in his condition?! She started to feel very sick to her stomach and a pain burned in her chest. She wiped a tear away from her eye briskly.

She was going to find him. She would go immediately through her dreams and stretch her mind as much as possible to catch anything, even the smallest of blips, to find him as quickly as she could. It was day so he would be in one spot which gave her a jumpstart in her search.

Erin splashed water on her face, brushed her teeth, and went to open her closet door to throw on some clothes. Reaching for the light switch she felt her foot hit something which caused whatever she had hit to give a low growl.

A new panic came over Erin. It had been a while since she had seen something out of the ether of the otherside. She heard a strong nasal exhale and whatever was on her closet floor shift.

Erin opened her closet door a bit wider so the light from the bathroom would illuminate inside.

The gap of light showed a long-limbed figure with a shock of orange hair laying on a pillow and scrunching his face from the light and growling again. Erin quickly closed the door to where there was just a small crack. She stared through it. His features immediately went back to normal now that the light was out of his face.

Erin closed the closet door the rest of the way and leaned against the bathroom counter, a hand cupping her mouth, as a few tears spilled from her eyes. She stifled her sniffling but it was hard. She had been so scared, so hurt. More tears fell. She lifted her head up and wiped them away composing herself.

He was still here. He hadn't left.

She tried to remember how she had gotten into her own bed. She had fallen asleep on the couch. He obviously must have carried her upstairs and placed her in her own bed to sleep. Her closet would serve as the next best place to sleep where it was completely dark. Yes, that made the most sense.

But why hadn't he just laid her in Brigid's bed? He knew that's where she had been sleeping.

Whatever his reasoning she appreciated the gesture. It was all the more endearing to her that he had done so.

Erin breathed in, fully calm again. She went to the bed and pulled off one of the blankets. Creeping into the closet she draped the blanket over him as best she could without disturbing him and then slowly slipped out again.

She couldn't explain the relief she was feeling. She wasn't going to disturb him again and would go down to the laundry room to look through the clean clothes she hadn't hanged up yet for something to wear.

She brushed her hair quickly, went through her skincare and make-up routine, and switched off the light taking one last look at her closed closet door. She left her dark bedroom and headed down the stairs directly into the laundry room. She looked through the folded clean clothes finally deciding on a pair of grey jeans and black-and-white striped ribbed turtleneck shirt.

Stepping out of the laundry room through to the kitchen she saw her purse and pulled out her phone. The entire screen was cracked. Had she dropped it? No, that was impossible. It wasn't like that when she got home from her shift and she hadn't even taken it out of her purse.

"Ugh!" Erin let out exasperated. She would have to go to the mall and get a replacement. She couldn't remember the warranty...whatever, she'd deal with it later.

She remembered Brigid's note from last night and since she wasn't here, she had obviously spent the night with Ellie. But even though she knew that, she still had been very, very particular about knowing where Brigid was basically at all times. Psychic abilities or not, Murlough was still out there.

Erin texted Brigid. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the two dishes from last night in the drying rack. Her eyes started to water a little. Another endearing gesture. He was still here. He hadn't abandoned them. Erin blinked her eyes clear.

Everything was fine except for the dreams she had had. She would grab her dream notebook and write them out, including every detail. Sometimes what she dreamed would end up flashing through her mind again when she was awake. It was like Brigid's millions of notebooks with everything recorded, but Erin only had five to her name. Just in case.

Her phone buzzed with a response from Brigid. She was still at Ellie's and said she had called her last night and Larten had answered, (ah, perhaps that was the cause of the cracked phone screen; vampire strength at its best). Brigid texted again saying she planned to hang out with Ellie all day and if she spent the night again, she would let Erin know.

Erin responded and put her phone on the bar. She was hungry. It was technically lunch time but a bowl of cereal was all she wanted.

Taking her cereal into the living room, she turned on the television, and propped her feet onto the coffee table. She checked her DVR to see what had recorded. Normally she had the news recorded for when she missed it during her long shifts but, once again, Brigid had changed the recording to a t.v. show she was following that was at the same time as the news. She would catch it later that evening. She could have checked it on her phone but there wasn't the full local news which she preferred.

She scrolled down to a new episode of a show she liked and hit play. As she watched she started making a list in her head of things she needed to get done now that everything had somewhat settled down. It had only been 4 to 5 days since Larten almost died on her kitchen floor but things were starting to slowly evolve into a routine, which Erin preferred.

She should take Larten shopping for a few more articles of clothing. His cloak was still hanging in the laundry room. She had spritzed it lightly with Febreeze to freshen it up. It didn't stink per se, but it smelled musty and like wet grass. She had had to throw away his jacket so she could finally replace that and then anything else he wanted to give him more choices in attire. He was very particular about his appearance. Erin laughed in her mind at that particularity of his personality. He preferred all red taking after his mentor. She didn't know the specifics of vampire mentors but it wasn't hard to apply logic and understand the gist of it.

Erin liked small blips about the people around her. Small insights into their behavior and thought patterns and reasons behind their actions fascinated her. Unless they were malicious, selfish, cruel, or even evil. Brigid and Erin sometimes took things into their own hands when facing certain...characteristics of people, particularly when those aspects were going to fuel heinous acts. When they could prevent people from being made into victims, they did so.

Ah, speaking of blips, she needed to grab her dream notebook.

Erin got up from the couch and washed out her bowl and spoon. Her notebook she was currently writing in was in her room in the drawer of her bedstand. She didn't want to take the chance of disturbing Larten; she would grab one from Brigid's room.

Climbing the stairs she entered Brigid's room and found a blank notebook. Brigid had her notebooks in a particular order but the recent ones, that could span from 1 to 7 at a time, were strewn haphazardly around her bed and on her desk so they were all within easy reach. Erin had no idea how she did it but Brigid had her own method to the madness.

Erin tip-toed back down the stairs and plopped down onto her spot on the couch, knees pulled up against her chest, the notebook resting against them. She clicked her pen back-and-forth a few times trying to prep herself. She didn't always like having to go deep into her subconscious. She never really pushed her ability because it always ended in her being closer to hell than she ever wanted to be.

But that was neither here nor there. She placed the tip of her pen against the paper, wrote the date, and started remembering everything she had seen during the night.