Through Her Eyes (JenLisa)

Star Light, Star Bright

When Sparkles was mentioned again it actually was Friday, although Lisa thought this was probably more by coincidence than it was Jennie actually keeping a realistic track of time.

Ever since Jennie had gone missing the previous week Lisa could not help but feel a bit nervous when she wasn't around. It wasn't that Lisa was lonely, it was just, if Jennie wasn't with Lisa, where was she exactly?

When she thought about it, Lisa didn't know that much about Jennie. She didn't know a thing about Jennie's past and she really didn't know much about Jennie's present, either. Jennie liked things that reflected the light and she liked to talk about the stars and she had some friends with odd names who Lisa had never met. Jennie had never mentioned anything about her family or where she lived. If she lived anywhere.

Lisa was pretty sure Jennie lived somewhere, but after a month of knowing Jennie and six days of losing her, 'pretty sure' wasn't quite cutting it anymore.

So, sitting down for a breakfast of stale cereal on Friday morning, Lisa devised a plan. First she would lead Jennie into her house with promises of food and then she would sit Jennie down to have a very serious discussion about her living arrangements, and, did Jennie have heating and central air and running water and food in her fridge? Because Jennie was actually much a bit skinny and probably didn't hold up well in less than perfect conditions.

Lisa hoped Jennie liked pasta.

She went to the supermarket instead of going to work that day and when Jennie came to dig through Lisa's trash that evening, she was ready.

"Come inside," Lisa invited, as had been their routine after Jennie had gone missing the week before. It was turning out to be an unusually cold and overcast winter and Jennie looked a bit too fragile to be left outside.

Which was exactly what they were going to talk about.

"But the trash!" Jennie protested as Lisa dragged her towards the front door, her hand wrapped securely around Jennie's bare upper arm.

Lisa rolled her eyes fondly as Jennie made quiet whining noises and they both stepped through the doorway. "You can go through it later. The trash isn't going anywhere, I promise."

"You promise?" Jennie asked, and it sounded like more than Jennie just repeating Lisa's words back to her the way she sometimes did.

When Lisa turned around, Jennie was staring at her with large, trusting eyes. It made Lisa oddly uncomfortable to have Jennie's eyes on her that way, focused and faithful. "Ah, yeah, I promise." Lisa shifted nervously under Jennie's intense gaze. "Come on, you're going to help me make dinner."

Jennie followed along obediently into the too large kitchen and Lisa set a pot full of water on the stove and turned it on, metal clanking hollowly against metal, echoing off the walls as Jennie cocked her head oddly.

Lisa had seen those designer shows on television (she was bored, okay? It hadn't been on purpose or anything) where the prospective house buyers were always talking about the kitchens. Too small, too cramped, needs updating, stainless steel, granite countertops.

They never said too big, too hollow, too cold, but Lisa was pretty sure once Mr. and Mrs. Disgustingly-Sappy-Newlywed moved into their new cookie cutter home in the suburbs they would find it frozen and vast around them.

Everything in her grandmother's house was too big, too empty. Lisa wondered how her grandmother had lived there alone all the years she had and not gone crazy. Lisa wondered how she'd lived there the last year and not gone crazy.

Lisa wondered if this thing with Jennie qualified her as crazy.

Probably.

Jennie was still hovering across the room by the stove, eyeing it curiously as Lisa stood in front of the pantry, collecting the simple ingredients for their meal.