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When Annabelle walked back in, I could tell something was up. She may not realize it all the time, but when she gets red from blushing at something, even once it is still fading her cheeks can remain sort of pink for a while before it goes away completely. “I see you found Qiao,” I said curiously as I saw her petting Qiao. Annabelle put Qiao down and let her run off around the house, the little bell tinkling around her neck as she went. “It won’t be hard to figure out where she goes anymore, but I think at some point we both may want to kill that bell,” I said with a laugh as I moved to the couch. “So where did you end up running to because you were gone a decent while.”

Annabelle moved into the kitchen as she began to talk, and I felt like she was doing it for a reason. “Well, Qiao decided to go all the way to richer side of Barton,” she said from the kitchen. “The rich side that everyone knows how they got their money or the side that are rich but will die if you try to find out how?” I asked as I leaned back on the couch. “The safe side.” I nodded and looked towards the kitchen. “So what happened? Did you manage to catch her before she went into someone’s yard?” “No, because she decided to jump in through an open window and into the living room,” Annabelle said as she leaned against the hallway opening. “I’m making some tea, would you like some?”

“Ew, sorry, but no. You know me; I don’t do well with the stuff. Think you could make a pot of coffee though?” I asked kindly. “Oh, so whose house did she jump into and what did you end up seeing?” For all I could have figured, Annabelle had managed to interrupt some lovely couple’s romantic evening, even worse could have been one of the lonely guys. The thing she said next was what surprised me though, “It was Edmund’s house and I ended up seeing AND talking to Louie.” My jaw dropped a bit, “Wait, wait, wait, what do you mean by talk? Do you mean a few mumbled words or…?”

“No, we actually talked.” I heard the whistle coming from the kettle as she made her tea. “Really? What did you talk about?” “Qiao, mainly. It was a short conversation. Now do you want two sugars or one?” “One, and don’t forget the cream, please,” I said politely. A few moments later, she came out with her cup of tea and my cup of coffee. Looking her in the eye, I knew she was telling the truth and I was immensely proud of her for finally talking to him. “Well, bravo then. So what are your plans for tomorrow?” I asked as I stirred my coffee a little more with the small spoon she had left in the cup. “Well, the band was planning on coming over tomorrow for some rehearsals. We have a performance this weekend at the House of Muse in town.” I nodded and was glad at the prospect of the band being over. Next to Annabelle, they were pretty much the only other people I had trusted and could call friends. “It’ll be nice to come home to some music after the people I am meeting with tomorrow. I am telling you, I never thought that this whole pseudonym and secret identity thing would be so hard to continue to manage. Then again, I don’t need another Evan.”

“No, no you do not. That guy was creepy. We’re lucky you even started with a pseudonym or the creep would probably still be tracking us.” Annabelle said before she took a sip of tea. “He probably still is with me, from the comfortable distance of 200 feet. At the very least he probably still goes on my website.” I shook a little before taking my next sip of coffee. “Let’s not bring him up anymore.” “Good idea,” Annabelle said. “Well, I am going to put Qiao in my room and get ready for bed. Are you going to be heading to bed anytime soon?” she asked. I shook my head. “I’m going to be staying up a while. I need to get some ideas written down and make sure everything is planned right for tomorrow.” “Alright then, well good night Nyx,” she said softly. “Good night Annabelle.”

Annabelle left with her tea as I continued to sip on my coffee. I wasn’t entirely lying about what I had been saying about my intentions for the night, but I wasn’t completely truthful about it either. I pulled my laptop out from its place inside the coffee table and turned it on. I could still hear Annabelle moving around in her room and the bathroom across the hall from her room. I worked on a few stories I had been commissioned for until I was sure she had settled into her bed for sleep. Once she was definitely in her bed for sleep, I opened a new tab and pulled up a page for a newspaper in Dref Dur. They were covering Meili’s recovery process and I had been hearing in town that there was supposed to be a major update about it today, and it had my nerves wrecked.

It was only a few minutes before the site would update for the evening edition and I found myself chewing on my lip. I took another sip of my coffee and thought to myself that I shouldn’t be caring as much as I did. I needed to cut ties with Meili, but then again, I could wait to do that until I was sure that he would be perfectly fine. I continued to work on the story hoping that time would pass by just a bit faster. Focusing at this time was a bit harder than normal, but once I got back into the flow of the story it was a lot easier for me to stop checking the clock every five seconds.

I became a little carried away writing straight without the checking the clock. It wasn’t until I realized that I had just written a good couple of pages for the story that I noticed the time. I went back to the page and refreshed the page and closed my eyes. I took a deep breath and prayed that the moment when I opened my eyes I wouldn’t see the thing I would fear the most. I opened my eyes slowly and looked over the page, and saw the main headline was about Meili. It read ‘Meili To Be Released In Morning After Mysterious Attack.’ A breath of relief escaped my lips as I went on to read the rest of the article to see what else had been said. “Good thing you’re a god Meili, otherwise, I don’t think you would have pulled out of it so quickly.”

The rest of the article was a lot less interesting to me than the title was. I closed the page after reading it and cleared my browser history for safety reasons. Annabelle sometimes used my laptop and I didn’t want her seeing that I was checking up on Meili like this when I should supposedly be hearing it from him at some point. I went back to working on the stories that I had to finish soon and send to the respective clients. It was late by the time I ended up heading to sleep but I wasn’t entirely sure just how late it was since the time didn’t matter as much. I ended up just passing out on my bed after making sure my alarm was on so I could make it out on time to my appointment the next morning. At least as I feel asleep I could sleep without worrying about Meili. He was safe and that was all that mattered. Now I could move on.