Lyssa Norwood found herself sitting alone in an empty house not too far away from Thorndale. She was only about an hour away, anytime she tried to move farther out it would cause her pain. It was like a part of Lyssa’s soul was forever stuck in Thorndale.
Anytime she worked up the courage to finally move on she’d be hit with yet another wave of painful grief and depression. She just couldn’t bring herself to leave it all behind her, no matter how hard she tried. More often than not she would find herself at Rebecca’s grave, just standing there. She always made sure to go at times when she was less likely to run into anyone. The last thing she wanted was to run into Rebecca’s family or her friends.
The truth was, Lyssa just wanted to be alone for the rest of her life.
She had always known that it would come back to this path, it always did. No matter how hard she tried, she was just destined to lose all of the people she loved. Being alone was better, she told herself. That way no one can ever hurt you again.
Lacy was right, Lyssa had concluded. There was no other way, no easy way out, no happy ending for Vampires. Just constant pain and misery.
Lyssa was done with it all. Done trying to find that light in the dark. Done trying to be happy. Just done with everything. Losing Rebecca had caused Lyssa to lose herself too. She didn’t know who she was anymore; if she was anything but a blood-sucking monster. Maybe she didn’t want to be anything more, a monster didn’t feel after all. And that was what she wanted most of all right now, to not feel anything.
A knock on her door caused her to flinch.
“I know you’re in there.” A girl’s voice sang.
Lyssa sighed.
She rarely ever stayed at this house because it was so far from civilization and other people. Making it twice as hard to find a decent meal without raising alarm in the tiny town. Her neighbor’s daughter as she had found out was quite a curious girl. And the night Lyssa had moved back in, the girl had broken into the house just to see who lived in the once-abandoned house. Lyssa had caught her, yelled at her, and threw her out.
But the girl was persistent in getting to know her new neighbor.
The girl reminded her of Rebecca in that way.
Lyssa got up and answered the door.
“Ta-da! A welcome to the neighborhood basket. Made it myself.” She handed it to Lyssa.
Lyssa eyed the cookies and muffins, all things she couldn’t eat.
“Wait are you sitting in here in the dark just so I won’t think you're home?” The girl put a hand on her hip and raised an eyebrow.
“Go away.” Lyssa slammed the door in her face.
“You could at least say thank you! Jerk.” She screamed through the door.
Lyssa sighed as she thought about how Rebecca would have reacted, giving her that knowing Rebecca look and chastising her for being so rude. So, Lyssa opened the door again just as the girl was walking away.
“Thank you,” she said.
The girl turned around and perked up. A bright smile on her face. That smile caused Lyssa physical pain and she had to look away.
“Your welcome. So where are your parents? Do you have any siblings? Do you live by yourself? My name is Annalee, but everyone just calls me Anna.”
“Anna! Stop bothering the neighbor!” Anna’s mother called from the doorway to her house.
“I’m being hostile mom!” Anna called back.
This made Lyssa smile, and then laugh.
“What?” Anna asked in confusion.
“I think the word you are looking for, is hospitality, or hospitable. Not hostile which means the opposite.”
“Oh, hehe, English is weird. I’m a natural-born American and I still can’t figure it out. My grades suck.” The girl nervously rubbed the back of her neck.
“Anna, come on. I’m sorry about her, I swear some would think I dropped her on her head when she was little.” Anna’s mom came over to drag her daughter away.
“Mom!” Anna snarked in embarrassment.
“Get in the house, do you want our neighbors to think we are weird, this isn’t the 50’s Anna. Gosh, you are so embarrassing.”
“I’m embarrassing you!? You are embarrassing me!” Anna said as her mom dragged her away.
Lyssa just smiled after them, then caught herself and quickly went inside. Wiping the smile from her face, and feeling guilty for smiling in the first place.
Lyssa glanced at the basket of goodies and sighed as she set it to the side, then she once again found herself sitting alone in the dark.
Later that day as the sun was setting Annalee came back, knocking once more on the door.
Lyssa got up and opened it.
“Hey, sorry about earlier. If anyone was dropped on their head as a baby it was definitely my mom, not me. Also sorry for breaking into your house the other day. I was just curious, you know? This house has been the mystery of my childhood and then boom all of a sudden you move in like a thief into the night. Carrying that creepy casket. Do you have a dead body in here? Because if you do that would be so cool, and creepy, but mostly cool.”
“Can I help you with something?” Lyssa raised an eyebrow.
“Oh uh, my mom said you can come over for dinner since you know we’ve been bugging ya so much.”
“No thank you.” Lyssa declined.
Annalee frowned.
“What’s your name, I told you my name so you have to tell me yours now. Them is the rules.” The spunky blond crossed her arms.
“Lyssa, you can call me Lyssa.”
“Cool, so Lyssa are you like from like England or something? You have a cool accent.”
“You ask a lot of questions.” Lyssa frowned.
“Yeah… I get that a lot actually.” Anna rubbed the back of her neck.
“You should be careful who you talk to. You never know when you are talking to a killer.”
“Whoa you are so right. You know I saw something about how over half of murders go unsolved. Creepy right?”
Lyssa sighed, she always thought the dumb blond thing was a myth, but now she was starting to wonder.
“Do you live by yourself?”
“Yes.”
“No offense but why did you move here? This isn’t exactly a town you move to. My school only has like 40 people in it.”
“You don’t say,” Lyssa leaned against the doorway.
“Yeah! I hear some schools have like 500 people, or even 1000. Whoa, can you imagine?”
“What if I told you this town didn’t use to be a town at all?”
“What really?”
“It was once a rest stop for travelers, the only thing here was a whore house and a few bars. During the civil war it became part of the underground railroad. Slaves would come here to seek refuge from the south. But the whites found out, set a trap and burned the station down. Killing all slaves in the town. They settled down here just to make sure a new station didn’t open up. Some say the slaves still haunt this place.”
“Whoa, that’s crazy! You know I always did think this town was haunted. How do you know all that stuff?”
“What if I told you I was here when it happened?”
“What! That would make you like really freaking old. Like more than I can count.”
“Well I actually didn’t come to America until way after that, but I knew someone who was here when it happened.”
“What! Who!?”
“Anyone ever tell you how gullible you are?”
“Wait, hey! You’re pulling my leg?”
Lyssa giggled.
“That’s so not fair.” The girl pouted.
“You remind me of someone.” Lyssa’s smile slowly faded away.
“Who?”
“Nobody.” Lyssa looked away.
“Oh come on, tell me. Is it a famous person?”
“No, just someone I used to know.”
“You sound sad, are you sad?”
“I recently lost her, that’s all.”
“Oh, well I’m sorry for your loss. You know my mom says my dad died when I was little, but I know the truth. She got knocked up at 16 and has no freaking clue who my dad is. She pretends he died in a war though, like what war?” Anna laughed.
“There are secret wars all around you, you never know,” Lyssa said.
“Whoa really?”
“If you look up, you’ll see gullible written on the ceiling.”
“Hardy har har. So funny.”
Lyssa giggled.
“Come on, come eat dinner with us. Please. You look so lonely. Like a little lost puppy. I just want to squeeze you and hug you, and smooch you on the head. Not like smooch you, it was just a metaphor, because I like don’t really want to smooch you. That would be so weird.” Anna nervously laughed as her face turned red.
“I’m sorry but I can’t.”
“Aw, well next time then. I’m gonna tell you a secret. At night, all the kids on the block sneak out and go play over down in the secret tunnels. By the abandoned post office. You should totally come tonight. They would love to meet you. We have like our own secret club going on. We are like the children of the corn.”
“Have you ever seen the children of the corn?”
“No, but Mr. Conners says we are, and it sounded cool so that’s what we call ourselves.”
Lyssa laughed.
“What!? What does it mean? Tell me.” Anna pouted.
“You should really look up the Children of the Corn.”
“Can’t, town don’t have no wi-fi. I swear we are still stuck in the stone age. My phone hardly ever has service out here. Mom started a petition for the town mayor to fix it, but he ain’t done nothing about it yet. So, we are stuck.”
“Sounds rough, how’s about I rent out the movie Children of the corn and you see for yourself.”
“Really!? Heck yeah, movie night.”
“Don’t celebrate just yet, you got yourself into this.”
“Well now you have to come tonight, please, please, please.”
“Fine.” Lyssa gave in.
“Yes! I’ll meet you here and we can walk over together.”
“Sounds wonderful.” Lyssa said.
“Cool, um see you tonight then.” Anna walked backward, then tripped on herself and quickly bounced back to her feet before nervously laughing and waving then running into her house.
Lyssa smiled after her. But then her smile faded away and inside of her she felt that familiar hollowness. She turned and walked back inside, chastising herself for already looking for another connection, knowing how the story always ends.
No. she told herself. She wasn’t going to get attached again. No more. Rebecca would be the last person she ever lost because she would never get close to anyone to lose them again. It wasn’t worth the risk. Or the heartache that always followed.
Comments (0)
See all