The Girl in the Forest

Left Waiting

Maleny paced back and forth inside her room while having a heated conversation with someone over the phone, "No, Isabelle, it's fine, honest. Well - Isabelle, please-"

"Mal?" Hayley knocked on the open door, concerned with the blonde's expressions.

Maleny motioned to be given a minute so she could handle the phone conversation, "Isabelle, I don't need help here. And no, please don't send her either - Amarrah said she would be going back to the police station anyways. I'm fine, please. Bye."

Hayley arched her eyebrows and crossed her arms, though having heard everything on the other line she still remained confused, "Who exactly was that? She sounded French."

"She is," Maleny sighed, tossing her phone on the bed, "and she's beyond worried."

"Wait," Hayley came into the room, "is she part of that family-"

"The Collins," Maleny clarified.

"They're the family that took care of your original body all these centuries?" Hayley asked, receiving a confirming nod from Maleny, "What's going on?"

"Isabelle - she's worried about my condition here," Maleny shrugged, "She's so worried she wants to send in her daughter to 'look after me'. As if I didn't already have enough babysitters."

Hayley knew Maleny was mostly overwhelmed with all the problems they had, so this small new thing was like the tip of the iceberg for the poor blonde. She walked up to Maleny, "Listen, maybe you should go take some air. I can go with you if you'd like," she knew under no circumstances was Maleny supposed to go out on her own. Despite the tensed air in the house, that was still rule number one (behind Maleny's back of course).

Maleny silently walked over to her bed, sitting on its side and leaning towards the nightstand to open its drawer. Hayley watched her pull out her old journal in which she wrote every detail she could remember from her past lives. Maleny skimmed a couple pages before growling in frustration and glancing back at Hayley.

"I can't look at this anymore," she said, almost to tears suddenly, "I need to get rid of it."

"Those are your lives, Mal," Hayley softly reminded, but received a harsh scoff in return.

"And yet, it may not matter anymore. I can return to my cycle at any moment. What does it matter if I tear these memories to shreds? They're just constant reminders of what I may be going into again."

"So...what do you want to do, then?" Hayley curiously asked.

Maleny stared long and hard at her journal before deciding, "I want to burn it."

"O-okay..." Hayley looked around, unsure of the idea.

"I mean it," Maleny rose from her spot, turning to the hybrid, "Can you...can you go downstairs for me? We can make a little fire in the kitchen."

"But Mal-"

"Hayley, please?"

With a sigh, Hayley agreed and left the room. Maleny waited a minute after Hayley left to grab her phone and journal and stuffed inside her bag. She snatched her jacket from her dresser and hurried out her room. As she went down the stairs she looked all around the place as she made her escape out the compound.

By the time Hayley returned to Maleny's room, the blonde was long gone. Hayley called out for her friend, going to different rooms hoping to see her somewhere. Eventually, defeated, she came into Klaus' art room where he was currently working on an artwork.

"Klaus, we have a problem," Hayley released a big breath, wondering how he would take it. However, something completely different came out instead.

"Maleny has escaped," Klaus casually said, raising a jar of blue paint to inspect its color shade. Hayley blinked just as he glanced at her, "You're about fifteen minutes late."