my heart is gold, and my hands are cold.

Rachel forced herself calm, just listening for any trace that the girl was lying to her.  All she could sense was fear, at least for now.  "You’re something, don’t try to play it off like you’re not.“  Rachel searched her mind for the thing that she’d been told about, the thing that can tell when someone is going to die, or someone has died. It was right there, it was on the tip of her tongue, but it just wouldn’t come out and she couldn’t for the life of her, remember what the name of the woman was.

She backed away from Beth now, taking a seat on her bed, and looking at the floor.  She was mumbling to herself, still trying to figure out the name of the thing that she knew the blonde girl in front of her was, but it wouldn’t come to her, just wouldn’t.  "Do you find yourself in strange places a lot?  Places where bad things happen?  Wake up screaming in the middle of the night for no reason?”  These were all questions, things that could be attributed to many disorders, as well as the one she had in mind, but it was all starting to click together for Rachel, and she’d only just met the girl.

“Besides that, all of my doors and windows were locked, so how in the hell did you get into my house?”  She wanted answers, but apparently threatening the girl was getting her nowhere, so she was going to have to try a different approach.

The breath Beth had been holding flew out when the girl stepped away.  Now that she was feeling a little less like she should have made a will at 16 years old, she could have focus on the situation at hand.  

The brief calm was quickly destroyed with the questions Rachel was asking.  “How did you- how could you possibly know that?” Beth asked quickly, feeling her heart begin to jump in her chest again.  “And I already told you, I have no idea how the hell I ended up here.” She added shakily.  

Malia sat there for a long moment, just going over in her mind what Beth had said, tapping her finger on the table.  She hadn’t even realized until it was too late, that she had made an indentation on the table with her fingernail.  She wasn’t exactly sure what was going on with the blonde across the table from her, but she was going to try whatever she could to figure it out.  It couldn’t take long… could it?

“You know, I don’t think that anything is wrong with you.  I do think that there’s something going on in this town, and that you’re a part of it.  You have to be, otherwise why would this be happening to you?”  She thought back a little, to a time where there were night terrors that she herself was dealing with, but what was going on with Beth seemed far different than that.  Who knew what was going on in this town?  Was there some sort of test that they could do to figure out what she was, or would she just be confused for the rest of her life?  

“Well, since I told you that I’d help you, I think we should start figuring it out, don’t you?  I have some books, we could read through them, see if we can figure anything out from there.”  Malia pushed the chair back, standing from the table.  She returned shortly, carrying the books that she’d checked out from the library, sitting them on the table, and looking over at Beth.  "If you’ve got something supernatural going on, we’ll find it in one of these,“  Malia murmured as she opened up the first of four books.

“Reading.” Beth let out a sigh of relief.  “Now this I understand.” She let out a shaky laugh, pulling the next dark leather bound book towards her.  The word ‘supernatural’ definitely caught Beth’s attention, but she wasn’t particularly surprised or disturbed by the idea.  At this point, Malia could probably tell her that she was being haunted by evil non-sleeping spirits and Beth would be nonplussed.  

Beth devoured a few pages quickly, before speaking again. “Did you get these from our library? At the school?” She asked curiously.  She had probably read three quarters of the English books at the school, but she had yet to come across many that were this old, and interesting. She traced an inky drawing of some kind of tailed creature on the page.  

Malia was almost stunned when Beth spoke again.  The girl really had no idea how to figure out what was going on, on her own.  It struck a chord with Malia that she didn’t necessarily understand herself, but she knew that she had to help her.  "I definitely mean more than just a vibe.  I mean, you have to have at least some sort of feeling that something is about to go down, right?“  She chuckled at the way she’d phrased it, but then cut herself off, this wasn’t exactly a laughing matter.

"Look, I’m going to help you.”  Malia tapped her finger over the spiral, looking up at Beth, “You’re right, this town has something, but I mean… you know some of the things, and no one here is exactly normal.  But I’m sure you knew that too.”

“It’s like you said- I just get feelings, that sort of thing.” Beth sighed.  “I overhear things in the halls, and I’m not blind, I know something is going on.  It’s like I know all the players but I don’t understand the game.” She explained, trying to word it all correctly.  

“I’m asking you, because you’re in my room in the middle of the night.”  Rachel was trying to keep herself calmed down, but honestly, it was a little hard to do when there was a stranger in her bedroom in the middle of the night.  She’d heard about things like this before, things that had happened in the past, but how did you get the person to spill.  "You’re here in my room, you don’t know how you got here, or why you’re here…. and I have no idea who the hell you are.  You’re… you’re one of those things… you’re going to tell me that I’m about to die.“

She paced the floor in her room, breathing heavily, trying to keep herself under control, but it was taking all of her concentration to do so.  "I’ve heard about people like you.  Confused as shit all the time, turning up places without knowing how they got there, never really knowing what they’re doing from one minute to the next.”  She paused, shaking her finger in Beth’s face, growling softly, “If I could only remember what you’re called, that would be great.”

Rachel stopped talking now, pacing the floor again, her hands squeezing together in a fist.  She only wished right now, that she knew exactly what was going on.  Hell, she was probably just as confused as the other girl at this point, but she wanted answers.  No matter what it took, she was going to get them.  

“I am not a thing. Not a werewolf, just a measly human.”  The blonde replied slowly.  “I have chronic somnambulism. Probably.” She cringed.  This was probably not a very convincing argument, but how could she begin to explain her idiosyncrasies, when she couldn’t even explain it to herself?

The growl stopped Beth’s internal monologue in its tracks as it reminded her that she was talking to a wolf.  Partially, anyway. A teenage werewolf who didn’t seem to have a spectacular amount of control over the animalistic side that seemed to be more interested in killing Beth than remembering anything. 

Malia was trying to eat her pizza, but she kept thinking about the spiral that she’d seen Beth drawing.  She wondered if it could mean the same thing that Derek had said it meant, or if it was really just nonsense as Beth claimed.  She wanted to believe that the girl really didn’t know what she was drawing, but something about the entire situation wasn’t sitting right with her.

“You know…”  Malia started, trying to figure out how to word the statement she was about to make.  "You know, the spiral… especially in this town, it isn’t something to play with.“  She thrummed her fingers on the table for a moment, chewing a bite of the pizza, before looking at Beth again.  "It means revenge.  It also kind of makes me wonder if there’s something in you, struggling to pull itself from beneath the surface.”  She furrowed her brows, now seriously thinking about how she’d found the smaller blonde.  "There’s got to be something there, Beth, something that wants out, that needs to be said.“

“Maybe that’s why I’ve had an itch in my throat all week.” Beth joked, touching the dip near her collarbones subconsciously.  “The way you say something beneath the surface... You mean something more than just a vibe, don’t you?” She asked apprehensively.  

Rachel leaned in close, sniffing at the other girl, before grabbing the front of her shirt, her fist clenching into it.  She could literally smell the fear coming off of her, and she briefly thought that maybe the blonde was telling her the truth, but that thought passed as quickly as it came.  She had to know, even if it wasn’t in the front of her mind, perhaps Rachel could scare her enough to find out what had actually happened.  But it didn’t take long to realize that there was something more going on with this girl than Rachel had previously thought.

“You…”  She stopped, thinking back to the stories that she’d been told in her old pack.  Stories of those… what were they called again?  The often found themselves places, and didn’t know how they’d gotten there, but they were messengers of some sort.  If only she could remember what it was now.  Maybe that would help her figure out what was going on.

She let go of the blonde’s shirt, letting her shift fade and shaking her head.  "You… you’re a… a…“  Dammit, why couldn’t she think of it.  What was it again?  "I’m going to die aren’t I?  That’s why you’re here.  You’re here to tell me that I’m going to die.”

“Die? You?” Beth’s fear faded for a moment, and she shook her head before she realized what she was doing.  “Wait, why are you asking me?! How would I know when you’re gonna die?” The blonde asked, growing hysterical.

As if it weren’t enough to dream every night of death, and to occasionally find dead bodies, now people were asking her about death? This was too much for Beth.  She shook her head and shut her mouth.  She as done, absolutely done. Also she was probably never going to sleep again, after this incident.