by Ollie Middlebrooks

Created on: June 03, 2008

"Did you hear that?"
The little girl's voice was high-pitched, even more so than usual, stretched thin with fright. Her brother rolled his eyes as he looked back at her. Sighing he gripped her hand, her tiny pink fingers entwining with his own. He could feel her pulse pounding fast through the delicate skin of her wrist and he thought briefly about warning her...but he couldnt think of why he'd need to.

Instead he made his voice as soothing as possible.
"What do you think you heard Melia?" His sister looked up at him and frowned, blue eyes more worried than he'd ever seen them.
"The screams. Didn't you hear them?"
Peter groaned, his patience with her dying quickly.
"Christ Amelia, it's Halloween. Of course there are going to be some people screaming. You're always jumping at shadows."
Her fingers tightened around his hand and she ducked her head in shame, brown ponytail sliding forward over one shoulder. Almost ideally she turned her head enough so she could catch the tail of it between her teeth and chew. It was a tale-tell sign of nervousness that irritated him.
It was as if she didn't trust him. And she needed to trust him, he needed her to know tat he would always keep her safe, always protect her.
He had to.
Had to.
Had t-
he felt something then. Something that had his stomach tightening in denial. The dark stain of memory spread through his thoughts like freshly spilled blood and his jaw clenched as he shook the feeling away.
Pushed it away and buried it.
At his side, in her pink tutu and purple Wal-Mart fairy wings, and the faint coating of glitter kissing the freckles splashed across the bridge of her nose, Melia whimpered as his hand tightened painfully around her own. Tugging her hand from his grip she darted away from him and into the night. The streetlamps were bright enough that he caught a flash of brown hair whipping in the wind before rage overtook him and he cried out.
"Stop it! Come back here right now. Don't you ever pull away from me again!" Fear, and a kind of helpless rage made his voice ring out sharply, cracking through the air like a whip and several children along with their parents turned to look at him curiously. He supposed his reaction was a bit severe but something.something
His brow furrowed in confusion, and Melia, who stood a short distance away, paused in her flight at the sound of his voice, and cocked her head to one side as she turned back to him. She waved the star shaped wand in her hand at him as if bestowing a blessing,

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