Black Blood

Frank clearly needed to let off steam and maybe he wouldn't hesitate to confess some little secrets.

Was I sneaky?

Maybe, but that was my job and I loved it despite the downsides.

Since I was a little girl, I used to play the journalist, I loved investigating, solving mysteries and bringing out little secrets.

In high school, when a rumor was born, I had to go to the bottom, understand what was true to confirm or deny it. Then I reported everything in the school newspaper, my friends were waiting for nothing else but reading my articles.

I thought it was my calling and, in the end, I made it a profession.

«Yes, of course she did. I have never abandoned my sister.»

«Did she speak with... Rose?»

Mr. Weather stared at me for very long moments, I had exaggerated, but I was convinced that in life you had to take risks, sometimes it was better to throw yourself without thinking too much.

I looked forward to his response.

«Reb, my sister is mentally ill, she has always been since childhood. Mary claims that Rose and Claire are still alive and that they were taken by the Thirsty».

I didn't sleep that night.

I had the constant feeling of being close to something disconcerting.

An idea perhaps, a suspicion that was anchored in me, feeding my desire to keep searching.

Maybe mine was just hope because, let's face it, Hazycreek was boring.

It was the first time that the city's balance was altered to the point of being perceived in the air.

Something was really happening, that feeling was standing still in the pit of my stomach taking on more and more consistency.

Chapter 5

Rebecca

The next day I convinced Hanna to come along with me, to scour Elinor and Bryan Cross’ house. My parents.

When they weren’t there, I was just visiting to water the forest of plants they had. My mother had a green thumb, she loved flowers.

So, while they were traveling on their research missions, I took care of that home garden with meticulous attention.

Entering Cross' house meant entering a high-tech laboratory full of plants. A Victorian-style villa that inside was transformed into a spaceship, futuristic and super modern even in its furnishings.

My parents were two Cambridge-graduated researchers with a Biological Science degree.

Dr. Elinor Cross was a molecular biologist and Dr. Bryan Cross specialized in medical, veterinary and pharmaceutical biotechnology.

Their work was never really clear to me, they spent whole days in the laboratory or traveling in search of any subject to study.

They rarely talked about it and I never asked.

It had always been like that and with time I learned to accept their secrets.

They said they couldn't share certain information, so I made up my mind even if it brought a certain detachment between us.

They loved me and I loved them, I had never questioned this, but those small shortcomings had an effect on me, making me grow quickly and alone.

«What are we precisely searching for?» Hanna asked me right entering the house's door.

I hurried to open a few windows, letting in some light and having the air circulating. I stopped to smell a white orchid, gently caressing its white petals.

It was my favorite flower.

«Do you remember my old casket where I was hiding my diary?» I retorted, asking her to follow me upstairs.

She obeyed.

We walked through the large entrance, completely white from floor to ceiling. To break that glow, a black carpet on the right traced the way to the stairs.

We walked along it until we reached the forty-three steps that would have led us to the sleeping area of the house.

My room was the only part being a little more human and less alien.

I was hoping that everything was unchanged. I perfectly remembered hiding the clippings of old newspapers in what as a child was a magical casket for me, where I kept a few objects inside, linked to some precious memories.

I had kept the articles about those disappearances from high school for no particular reason, I never thought they would come in handy ten years later.

We went into my room and turned on the light.

Everything was unchanged, as if time had stopped six years ago, when I had moved to live with Hanna.

I observed the environment: the bed was placed on the right wall facing the sun while the wardrobe and the dresser occupied the side wall. On the opposite side where my bookcase and desk.

I dived in the past, seeing myself bending over it, absorbed in writing my first articles for the school's journal.

They were good memories, the beginning of everything.

Every piece of furniture was smeared with sentences of mine. I had covered the surfaces with simple blue ink pens, a job that lasted years.

Thoughts, fleeting moments that crossed my mind, sometimes simple words without any sense, only the moment I grabbed and then wrote clearly in the wood.

I went near the desk and touched those tangled marks with my fingertips. A puzzle for anyone but it all seemed perfectly clear to me.

My attention was captured by one particular sentence, I had written it in italics along the right edge of the desk.

Violet like her blood.