Mirrors |NH|

Chapter Twenty One

Edie was awoken by her phone ringing.  She looked at the time, it was two in the afternoon.  She mumbled some unintelligible words as she fumbled for her phone.  With eyes half open and glossed over from sleep, she made out an N and four LL's.  Her vision focused a little more to see that it was Niall calling her.

"Hello?" she answered, a little more groggily than she had wanted.

"Edie?" Came his now familiar Irish accent.

"Niall?"

"Did I wake you?"

"Yeah, was just taking a little nap." She lied, not wanting him to know this was when she slept now.

"Oh, I'm sorry.  I can call back later?"

"No, it's okay.  I'm awake now," she said.  "What's up?"

"Huh?"

"Why did you call?"

"Oh, yeah, ha, I was, uh, wondering if you were doing anything today?"

"Well, my dance card is quite full of gentleman callers, sooo..." Edie rested her head back on her pillow as she waited for Niall's response.  There was a long pause, and she had to hold her hand over her mouth to keep herself from giggling. 

"Um, okay, well, I guess nevermind.  Sorry for bothering you."

She couldn't contain it anymore and let out a laugh, "Niall! I was kidding.  I was joking with you."

"You were?"

"Yes, silly.  Haven't you ever heard of a dance card?  You know, at dances back in the day girls had dance cards that had the names of any boys she had agreed to dance with.  Trust me, dude, I was only messing with you.  My calendar is wide open.  What's up?"

"Oh, okay, great.  I was wondering if you wanted to grab something to eat?  There's something I wanted to talk with you about and, uh, show you."

Edie's interest was piqued.  "Um, yeah sure.  When and where?"

Niall rattled off the name of a little pub where he promised they would be left alone and they had low lighting to make her comfortable.  When she hung up the phone, she laid back down for a few minutes before she swung her legs out from under the warm covers and went to take a shower.  She wanted to take a bath but knew that would take too much time, so she took a deep breath and braced herself for the shower.

She had never moved so quickly in a shower in her entire life.  Although she missed the way it beat down on her shoulders, it still gave her flashbacks.  She practically ran out of it when she was done and quickly dressed.  She sat down in front of her vanity and began doing her makeup.  All of her mirrors were still covered with black fabric but she had become adept at putting on basic makeup to cover her scars without needing a mirror.  Lilac watched her from her perch on the bed, probably wondering why her human was out of bed at this odd hour.

Once she was ready, Edie gave her cat a quick, tight hug and kiss, "Wish me luck, Lilac," she whispered before heading out the door.

Edie had arrived on time but stayed in her car as she watched the entrance to the pub.  She wasn't going in until she saw Niall.  She saw a dark SUV pull in, but the windows were tinted so she couldn't see who it was but watched as it parked, waiting for the person to get out to see if it was him.  It was.  She smiled a little as she got out of her own car.

Niall saw her and waved as she crossed the lot towards him.  "Hey," he said.  He looked a little as if he wanted to give her a hug but stopped himself.  He had a rather thick folder in his hands.  Edie wondered if this is what he wanted to talk to her about.

"Hey," she said back. 

They both turned to head inside.  The pub was quaint and dark, which she definitely appreciated.  Niall made his way over to the farthest table away from the door and away from the other people inside.  They would have their privacy and not be bothered.

As they sat down, Niall ordered himself a beer and told Edie to get whatever she wanted.  She simply ordered the same thing he did.

"How've you been?" He asked, looking up at her as he laid the folder down on the table in front of them.

"Fine.  You?"

"Same."

They sat there for a minute until their drinks were brought to them.  After having her first sip, Edie couldn't wait any longer to figure out what was going on.  "So what did you want to talk about?  Something inside that folder?" She asked, pointing to it.

"Uh, yeah," Niall said, looking down at it nervously.  "I, uh, have been doing something that I think most people would find to be completely unhealthy but I can't seem to stop myself.  But, I also can't seem to find anything else to help me out and I thought maybe a fresh pair of eyes might work.  If you're interested?" He said, looking back up at her.

"Umm, okay, sure.  What is it?" Edie was definitely curious now.

Niall opened the folder and pulled out the top sheet and handed it to her.  She looked down and saw that it was a police report.  His police report, for the night of his shooting.  He handed her another sheet and another.  Eventually he just handed her the whole damn thing to look over.  He had been doing what she had been doing - trying to find the person who had hurt him.

"Wow, Niall, this is a lot of stuff.  You seem to have really been working hard on this." 

"Well, I want to get the bastard who did this to me.  I know it may be a far stretch but I can't let it go.  Not yet, anyway.  Do you think you can help?"

Edie looked at Niall and back down at the papers.  She couldn't believe he was trusting her with this.  "Why me?" she asked.

"Because I believe you understand," he said quietly.  "I know we don't really know each other and perhaps that's part of the reason.  But I also think that, right now, you're the only one who gets it; the only one who might understand why I need to do this."

Edie nodded her head slowly as she looked back down at the papers.  She had wanted to tell him about her own investigation of her rape but had backed out but now she felt as if she could because he was doing the exact same thing as her.

"Is this him?" she asked when she saw a sketch.

"Yep."  She could hear the uneasiness in his voice as she picked it up to study it.

"I'll be happy to help, Niall.  It might actually do me some good to get my mind on other things.  Plus, I suppose we have a better shot of finding your guy over mine," she said, softly.

Niall just looked at her sadly.  Edie could tell that he felt bad for asking her to help knowing he couldn't help her.  Of course, she was running her own covert operation but she just didn't think she was ready to let him on it.

'Let's see how this goes,' she thought, 'And maybe, just maybe, I can ask him for help.'