Rehomed Souls

Chapter One

Primrose Adair was used to people dying. People dropped like flies around her, the other women on her mother's side weren't limited to this either. Her mother always told her that what happened to the people around her was not her fault, that it wasn't murder, and that eventually she'd get married and have kids. Prim never quite understood how her mother thought she could just settle down with a person knowing that they'd eventually kill themselves as everyone else did and as she sat in the dim bar, sad and alone she knew that the fact her best friend was removed from their apartment in a body bag solidified the fact she would never have a family or friends again.

She threw back the rest of the honey-colored liquor, it no longer burned her throat, she had been drinking for two hours straight and now the liquor tastes like strong water? Maybe she was so drunk that the liquor was making it impossible to feel the burn of it. The sticky barstool clung to her grey sweatpants like it wasn't ready to let her go. The barkeep kept his distance but eyed her hard ready to pounce if she tried to skip out on paying, no one in the town bothered to talk to her, they avoided interactions with her at all cost, but they stared at her always waiting on her to spontaneously combust.

She fished out a couple of crumbled-up twenties out of the dirty sweats and left them on the nutmeg-colored bartop. She stumbled towards the door of the nearly empty bar, dragging attention towards herself, not that the handful of people weren't already watching her like she was some kind of spectacle. She locked eyes with a stranger as she neared the puke green door, his eyes were a luminous light brown that filled her to the rim with calm. She found the casual display of eye contact quickly turned to a stare, he wasn't a profoundly handsome guy he had thin lips and long eyelashes and a cheeky smile that displayed averagely straight white teeth. Primrose wondered what was so enticing about him, why she had the urge to just be around him?

Finally snapping out of the weird trance she closed the gap between her and the horribly colored door and tripped out into the chilly autumn air. The few street lights that didn't flicker were dim in color and covered in built-up grime from pollution and dust. She struggled to get her foggy brain to properly aid her in walking straight, she was a small young woman, Ashton loved to joke about her auburn curls being the heaviest thing on her, however, her newly departed best friend might've been onto something. Her memories with Ashton replayed in her head like a depressing movie, the memories themselves weren't depressing it was the fact that she wouldn't get to add any new memories to the movie. Primrose slowly noticed the light footsteps behind her and stopped walking in hopes of the person passing her. The footsteps behind her slowed and then eventually stopped.

¨You can relax. I'm not following you.¨ The voice was softly firm and brought an uncanny amount of contentment to her. She believed that there were several different outcomes, One: she gets kidnapped Two: she gets killed Three: the government wants to do experiments on her because of the curse and possibly weaponize it. It's quite clear Primrose has been watching far too many movies lately but in a world where being around people is enough to kill them, anything is possible.

¨That is exactly what someone following me would say.¨ She turned around to face him.

¨And seeing that after I stopped, you stopped. It's not helping your case very much either.¨ The corners of his mouth curled up into a smile, well less a smile more a smirk which sent serotonin to places Primrose didn't know serotonin could affect. He looked at her intensely and unblinkingly. She stared back watching him slowly crack under her gaze.

¨Fine I am following you.¨ he said defeatedly, he blinked rapidly as if the small time he hadn't blinked had dried out his pretty brown eyes. Primrose raised an eyebrow questioningly and he looked up to the sky thoughtfully. Then his gaze fell back on her.