Page 74 of Marked by the Demigod

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* * *

The moment she gets back to her apartment, after the long quiet drive where Trixie slept, Aimes flops onto her couch and lets her cats curiously sniff her all over.

"Fuck," she says, aloud to the empty room. It doesn't help, so she says it again. "Fuck."

* * *

Dave's funeral is muted,small, and full of librarians, half of whom Aimes knows. Or at least can recognize by sight and which branch if not know their names, and most seems to know her.

The other half is clearly not-normal people. Their eyes skate over Aimes, as if not wanting to look at her. Though their constant glances mean they are at the very least curious. Or mortified.

Katya sits near her, a barrier between the two worlds, absorbing all the glances with a stony face and a crisp suit.

It's not the sort of funeral with a lot of milling around and talking afterwards. Most people just moving out as quickly as possibly, as if uneasy.

And it is uneasy, like half the room has been to too many funerals and are starting to worry about themselves instead of mourning the dead.

* * *

Aimes slowly walksto her car, kicking at the pebbles in the tiny parking lot as she does. Katya stays behind, to obviously talk to some of the members of the community threatened by this.

Her head feels full of fuzz. It's not directly her fault that Dave's dead, or gone, or whatever, but it feels like it is. That if she hadn't been the one to talk to him then he would be fine.

It's not the most destructive way to think, but it certainly isn't that helpful, and the mature part of her knows it. But the hurting part of her wants to go home and crash with Trixie and have too much wine to be healthy.

Trying to grasp her thoughts as one would try to grasp a cloud, she doesn't notice the two men sitting on her ancient Toyota's hood until it's too late.

Seated on the hood of the car, as if it is the most comfortable thing in the world, are Pieter and Vanya.

And it's like seeing double, so much that her eyes almost cross. They both have the same black hair and the same grey eyes and the same rough skin and the slump to their shoulders.

They watch her, a sharp look in their matching eyes, for too long, before she turns abruptly to the church.

"No, don't go," one of them drawls. With a wave of his hand, her shoes stick to the asphalt of the church parking lot, and no matter how much she struggles she can't lift a foot.

As she tugs at her legs, they flank her, as if standing near her after a funeral is the most normal thing they can think of.

"So we wondered if anyone unusual would show up to a funeral out here," the other says. "Imagine our surprise when it's the random girl from Vegas."

She straightens her back so she doesn't slump in on herself, resisting the urge to curl in. "Dave's a co-worker. I work with the library," she says, her heart pounding too hard, but yet, a feeling of odd calmness stealing over her.

They look far too curious to kill her, and that's probably the one reason why she's not dead. The longer that she can intrigue their curiosity, the longer they won't just off her.

A group of people leave the church, then stand at the doors, chatting with each other. She silently wills them to look over at her, but none of them do. She can't see Katya's familiar black bob, but she keeps an eye out.

One of the twins looks at the other. "A co-worker."

She nods, and even the physical motion of nodding feels difficult. "Yeah."

Silence, then - "He must've explained to you what makes you new. Interesting." His voice is coy, playing.

"Yeah, but we don't know who it is," she says, forcing the words around the lump in her throat. "It was some blond guy," and her throat almost closes up around her, and she coughs. "Can you stop?" Still no one heading to the parking lot, but a lot of hugging happening in the group by the church.

One laughs, but the other remains stony faced. "Nothing quite like being lied to after the death of a friend, right Pieter?" He says. At least that puts the stony-faced one as Vanya, and she can start attaching names to their faces.

"I wouldn't say the ghost was a friend, Vanya," the laughing one says, and his eyes are dancing. "A man can't be friends with an ant."

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