I’ve stumbled several times into the furniture while I toddled in. I’ve drunk several bottles but that wouldn’t be the case. Strong beer isn’t exactly my alcoholic downfall. I just had to wobble out the queasiness after being dragged off the pub to Sin’s apartment. If I had to pretend for several hours until dawn I’d do it to spite Sin. She’s on to me like a bloodhound.

The locks clicked shut. I stood hunched at her living room fumbling in the dark until she had her fingers on the light switch. I winced, my back turned from the brighter side of the room. “Seriously?” I uttered.

Sin furiously snapped. “What?”

I turned around. “Typical you had to hunt me down and kill the girl I was with, I mean that’s old-school ex-girlfriend bravado.”

Sin’s shoulders trembled. “Do you always have to flatter yourself?”

I jeered, flung my hands above my head. “Do you always have to assume this is some desperate chauvinistic move to flatter myself?! I like you, Sin! I can’t help it! I fucking like you! Still you had to live those days when I just fucked up and left you for dead! That was twelve years ago, Sin! I was fourteen! How should I know you’ll disappear?!”

“Because I know, Cal!” Sin shot back, “Because I felt it! I fucking felt it!”

I stared. Every inch of resentment, every crinkle from my scowl, it thawed into utter bafflement. What did she mean she knew? Had she been stalked for several days? She didn’t tell me. No, that was Marcy. She was clever not to tell me. I would be moseying around like an eager lapdog telling everyone how batshit paranoid she was. She walked to the kitchen, propped her arms at the sink, smothered her face with her palm and breathed as though she was composing herself.

“That one who turned you,” I said, “he didn’t just choose you did he?” You didn’t stay fourteen, you’ve grown. You were abducted.”

For a moment, she didn’t say another word. Her eyes however, scanned restlessly across the kitchen until she uttered, “About time.” Then swiftly she pulled open a cupboard and a drawer to draw out a bowl and a pack of cigarettes. She then placed them crudely on the center table, propped down on the floor with her back against the sofa and gave the table a nudge with her foot. Twice, she flicked a lighter before indulging in a whiff of her own stick then motioned me to sit on the floor with her. I crouched down as well, while her eyes were far adrift and staring ahead.

“That time they said at science class that the human body is 60 percent made up of water,” she began, “I took it as some rationalization on how intentions manipulate water by its intensity. By close proximity I could tell which ones are alive and which ones are… not. Growing up a catholic, you had to elaborate every single occurrence in the most logical way possible. That frequency, I tune into it every day unintentionally and it terrified me. Every day, he knew I was tuning in.”

“He,” I said, “He turned you.”

“Yes.” Sin replied.

“How long before that?”

“Six years.”