Since I had taken a fateful and metaphorical fall from grace on the couch of my sister's neighbor's apartment, I had found it very difficult to be alone. Never before had I any kind of discomfort in my own company, generally preferring the ghosts of my mental abyss to those that haunted my immediate vicinity. Their shadowy companionship filled voids that no tangible, human physique could ever completely embody; I had often been slave to memories and emotions from a time far enough in my past that I shouldn't have let the chains follow me. Thrust into memories that became visible and all but tangible in the basement of the young witch's home, who had become my unfortunate (for her) unbidden companion in the nightmare her power manifested as, I had accepted an invitation to revisit a dark corner of my existence that I would preferably pretend to believe had never existed. Then again, the brutality of who I was and the scars I had left on my own soul were more than visible to anyone who looked past the war front that was my exterior, the exoskeleton that held my fragile bones upright.

I could never pretend who I had been didn't exist, and that he wasn't waiting for the right moment to surface and bring with him a tide of destruction to whatever life I had built for myself.

If you could call it that.

The first night of detox reminded me that my lapse in judgement, or lack of judgement when I had allowed a needle to pierce my vein in a methodical and routine manner, meant that I would have to rebuild my tolerance against the temptations that my opiate friend offered. Oh, how her arms had been comforting until the tendrils of infection swam their way through my body and I actually needed medical, professional help. That wasn't a predicament I'd run across in nearly five years; it was enough of a disaster that I didn't want to suffer through the sting of a medical facility, I didn't want to suffer through the addiction and the detox and the relapses. The lapse in judgement was painful enough, and I felt guilty enough to build myself a castle with a deep trench of a moat and hide there until the shadows waned from under my eyes and the amber had left my body. Instead, my personal siege was halted at the hands of the red-headed vampire I was becoming all too familiar with. She'd coaxed the dark secrets off of my tongue, trading her own stories as if they were playing cards for us to marvel over.

Each hand we played was more insidious than the last.

Isolt, Elenore, and Finley had become my personal body guards; they attempted to keep me safe from myself in a time when I probably needed it more than I ever had before. At least, this time I was on their side, attempting to support myself instead of angrily turning away from health and safety. Surely it had been a tremendous ordeal to literally relieve scenarios that had given me cause for addiction in the first place, but now? After my trip to South Africa, after saying goodbye... There was more than one mistress I really wanted to extract myself from. Even if it was equally painful. And so, instead of allowing me to wallow in the fresh particles of my past dancing behind my eyes, waiting for the moment I shut my lids, Isolt had demanded I accompany her to the establishment she and Damon ran together. Somehow, without too much argument did I follow, quietly settling at the end of a bar to assist the vampires in some paperwork with a freshly ordered ginger-ale nearby to ease the discomfort of the withdrawal that was finally beginning to wane.

At first, I attempted diligence in my perusal of the paperwork that investing in the business required. All too quickly that diligence and determination ebbed away as my attention was caught on a myriad of different situations playing out in the bar. I ran a hand through my hair, attempting to give pause to my wavering attention as my Shadow began boredly tinkering with glasses behind the bar, characteristically finding itself becoming a nuisance to those around. It was only when the Shadow seemed to note a familiar face or essence that it stopped it's shenanigans, borrowing my attention from the astounding display of vampiric feasting that was occurring in a far corner. With a minute inclusion of familiarity and tenderness did the Shadow approach the familiar figure, gently stretching it's long, spindle-like fingers to caress the shoulder of the woman it had approached.

Surely she didn't want to fraternize with a figment, no - ... a monster of her nightmares, but I couldn't stop my eyes from fixating on what had become a familiar face in what was often a whirlwind of unexpected in my life. Serafina looked haggard, and what affection I harbored for her felt the sting of offense as I realized it was my existence that had created such turmoil in her life. I should never have come back to her shop. I should never have thrust myself into her life. I should never have thrust myself into anyone's... not until I realized that the skeletons in my closet were coming for me.

Had come for me.

Wanted to consume me.

But now, with the bones diminished to dust and ash, those skeletons were in the open for the wind to carry and I felt as if they would no longer be the cause for lines of worry to begin settling in my skin. With a sigh, I extracted the glasses I'd been wearing to ease my aching eyes from the tiresome paperwork and set them quietly on the counter near my water before finding a good-natured but quiet laugh slipping through my lips.

"Beg your pardon, ma'am, but my ... Shadow is unamused with my lack of antics and therefore feels as if it must generate its own." With concern beginning to lace the tired blue of my eyes, I tilted my head as if trying to get a better look at her through the dim lighting of Red on the Water. "I'd offer you a penny for them, but I think your thoughts are worth more... "I trailed off, offering Serafina the opportunity to wave me off and find her answers the bottom of the Tom Collins glass in her.