6I
"My mother is a ghost."
It's strange, really, how little people believe that statement.
It isn't that surprising.
Honestly.
It isn't an exception this time around - the raven-haired female beside me throws her head back and lets out a braying laugh when I tell her that.
"Y-you're kidding, right?" She manages to gasp out between laughs, practically rolling on the floor as I stare at her dispassionately. I've seen this very reaction thirty four times since I started counting two years ago, so I know what's going to happen next. "How?"
Bingo.
"I have absolutely no idea." I tell her matter-of-factly, shrugging. Because it's true. I don't. I would've gotten a Nobel prize ages ago, if I knew. That necromancer father of mine managed to copulate with my mother, and I somehow popped out along the way. Numerous times, I must add - that see-through mum of mine has a habit of recounting every single sordid detail of her love life with Dad, usually immediately after it happens. The former, not the latter (unfortunately).I know more about their 2378 coupling times (and that isn't counting the times when I was too young to understand a single word!) than I'd ever care to know. The fact that she likes singing loudly about it around the house and no one but Dad and I can hear her doesn't help.
Raven Head (whose name is, perhaps rather aptly, Raven. At least, that is what she says her name is. I'm not particularly inclined to believe her, but to each her own) evidently doesn't believe me, for she lets out a loud snort before shaking her head at me. "You shouldn't lie about your parents just to get popular, you know?"
What balderdash. She's the one claiming she has a vamp for a dad, when vamps have permanent EDS because their hearts don't pump anything for nuts and the subsequent lack of blood pressure and systoles and diastoles means that blood pretty much pools around and makes sure the cells stay hydrated, so gushing there at the height of excitement kind of ends up being out of the question. Not a very fun thing to put up with for eternity, I would say. My uncle Eddie found out the hard way a couple hundred years ago, when his blonde wife gave birth to a black-haired child. Uncle Eddie is a redhead. Or at least, he was - he dyed his hair blue to 'fit his mood' after it all. No one knows where he found such a colour in the 17th century, though - Dad suspects he somehow travelled into the future. Not the point, though. He decided to walk into the sunlight and let his cells dehydrate and disintegrate the year I turned six, anyway.
I don't bother pointing out that she's a blatant hypocrite (and a lying one, at that), though - because at that moment, the very person I had been waiting for stalks out from the minimart with a great swish of a black cloak, the grand exit he no doubt was trying to make much diminished by the numerous bags in his hands that bear the 'Mimi's Minimart - Good & Cheap!' slogan proudly.
Raven doesn't seem to think so as she lets out a long low whistle and starts adjusting her tank top, though, her head whipping around so fast that I'm surprised it doesn't spin all the way around and back. "Who is that?"
"Latrina! Over here!" Said person booms, and I can't help letting out a groan of disgust at my name (honestly - who in their right mind names their kid after the word toilet in Latin? That father of mine, apparently.) as I leap down from the wall I was sitting on.
"Wait you know Mr. Tall Pale and Handsome?"
I screw up my face in disgust at that and ignore her, already making my way to said person (and frankly more than eager to escape her and her currently-very-low tank top).
I hear her feet pattering behind me and quicken my footsteps, practically running towards the male in question and skidding to his side. "Okay we can-"
"Hello." I can't help but flinch at the sultry greeting behind my back. Too late.
I pointedly ignore Raven (why oh why did I make that intelligent decision to go all 'thank you - my dad gave it (which was sort of true - some crazed Egyptian spirit he called up shoved it into my arms and insisted that I keep it a couple months back. Did Egyptians even have peridot in their time anyway?)' and strike up a conversation when she went all 'nice necklace!' on me? I should've known by now that my friend-making attempts never do end well!), tugging on one bag-covered arm impatiently. "Can we go now?"
"Just hang on a moment, Latrina." He holds out a hand and turns towards Raven, nodding his head solemnly. "Hey."
Even though such a situation has happened before, I still nearly puke at that, especially after said girl twirls a chunk of glossy black hair around her finger and shoots me a smug glance. "Hi there."
A black cat chooses that moment to stalk past, worsening my already-foul mood when it brushes against my jean-clad leg momentarily. I suppress a shudder as it turns to me and pierces me with cold yellow eyes, shooting me an eeirly-humanlike glare that screwed of condescension and hatred. It's the thirteenth cat to cross my path this week (something I note with trepidation - there must be a reason why no one likes the number thirteen, after all) - the neighborhood has had a sudden influx of cats lately, it seems.
I scowl, irritated and eager to escape. "Can we go?"
Raven shoots me an annoyed look. "Stop being so possessive, Latrina. It's not like he's yours, anyway - can't you tell that we're busy?"
I let out a snort and decline to reply, resisting the urge to smack that amused look off The Male Who Caused The Entire Problem's face.
Raven must have taken my silence as something else though, and sneers at me. "Why - hoping he would be your boyfriend?"
A smirk crosses my face.
"Hardly. Raven, meet my dad."
#
"That was utterly unnecessary, Latrina." Dad scowls as we step through the various wards he had casted by the doorstep to keep 'the bad spirits from taking your mother' and a cheery ding! (courtesy of the motion sensor Mum dug out from god-knows-where and planted rather smugly by the door after Dad and I went through a phase of 'Let's-Sneak-Into-The-House-and-Scare-a-Ghost-ha-h a-ha-the-irony' a couple years back) announces our arrival into the house. "That poor girl turned so pale she could have rivaled your mother."
I scoff. "Oh please Dad, everyone knows you just liked the attention and I spoilt your game."
"Hmph." He sniffs noncommittally in reply, dumping the bags in his hands on the parquet floor and stalking off, presumably to his office, as usual.
I roll my eyes at his dramatic exit - it isn't anything new, after all. Even after Mum and I popped into his life, the surliness he'd gotten from five hundred years of lonely existence (even though he consistently claims that he had an entire harem of women at one point) never really went away. (Although Mum says she has 'ways' to get him out of his surly shell for a bit - and frankly, I'm not sure if I want to know how).
It's a shame he is so blindingly white from all the I-stay-indoors-and-raise-the-dead-to-solve-mysteri es-for-the-police-so-melanocytes-on-the-epidermal- layer-of-my-skin-doesn't-react-to-UVB-and-produce- pinkish-melanin-that-is-oxidized-by-UVA-and-daaaaa arkens-and-messes-up-my-perfect-skin work, though - he would make the very epitome of tall dark and moody (and handsome enough as well I suppose - to anyone else, that is) otherwise. Apparently being stuck indoors for the better part of 500 years makes people ghostly pale. Maybe that attracts ghosts more easily- "kindred spirit" (literally - or so they assume when they first see him) and all that that. It seems to work though - ghosts flock to Dad in swarms.
…especially female ones.
Yet somehow, even with hoards of dead people catering to his every whim (or at least, being more than willing to do so) and an actual one to do unmentionable things with at night (and rob me of my sleep), that father of mine takes a nearly sadistic pleasure in pretending that he is only as old as he looks (five hundred going on twenty five. How charming.) and running around encouraging the attentions of women twenty times younger than him.
Goodness knows why people are even attracted to his whole I-am-a-scary-and-brooding-necromancer act in the first place, though. Giant capes and Edward-Cullen-like skin colour never really does it for me. (Not to mention the fact that he is my father)
It is a good thing he is utterly devoted to Mum at the end of it all, because she could be a pretty darn good poltergeist when she wants to.
A loud yelp and the sound of shattering porcelain in the sitting room causes me to leap out of my skin (and simultaneously realize that I've been standing at the foyer staring into space all this time while the tub of ice cream in one of the plastic bags happily melts away).
"Oops!" A tinkling laugh sounds in my ear, causing me to jump another feet. "I heard you two come in and wanted to say hi, but forgot that I was polishing that Ming Dynasty vase!"
I let out a sigh of resignation and musters up a long-suffering grin. "Hi Mum."
The air to the right of me shimmer as it is heated up by the energy given off as bonds between (ghost) molecules reform and a petite blond woman flickers into view, the sight of the Steinway behind her fading, but not disappearing entirely.
"No matter!" She declares confidently, screwing her eyes shut, and the softest swoosh can be heard as the edges of her form blur and fade slightly. I don't need to move from my spot to know that the porcelain shards on the sitting room floor are fitting back together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle - Mum's clumsiness, so unlike her graceful form, has resulted in three hundred and nineteen similar situations in the past years.
After what seems to be an eternity, Mum lets out a soft sigh and slumps down in relief, eyes opening as she solidifies back to her normal translucent self. "Well!" She grins, and claps her hands together. "That's sorted, then!" She glances down at the floor, seemingly noticing the groceries for the first time. "Oh! Need some help?"
I grin. Ghosts (those Dad does his mumjo-jumbo and somehow summons into this world, at least) can touch objects, and don't need any energy to do so (with them being dead and all). Which probably explains why poltergeists can lift whole beds and still shriek their hypothetical lungs out. While I may not have had inherited those powers from Mum (shame!), there are still benefits to having a translucent mum. "Sure."
#
"She, she is the one that I can't fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiind / How can the only thing that's killing me make me feel so aliveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee?"
I have to stifle a laugh as I hear Mum stubbornly belt out Parachute's She (For Liz), especially after a loud holler of 'Elizabeth! Tone it down! You're dead!' is heard from Dad's office and Mum's only reply is to repeat the chorus at 5.3 times the volume.
Parents. Daily amusement, they are.
Shaking my head fondly, I turn back to the thick book on my desk and continue to twirl the chain of the peridot necklace I'm wearing subconsciously. Biology. The study of life. Ironic, really, considering the fact that half of me is technically dead, and the other is immortal. There's nothing more awkward than listening to your teacher prattle on about how death is a part of normal life and how there has been no scientific proof of life after death when there is the offspring of a ghost and necromancer in her AP bio class. Annoying, really.
Speaking of life and annoying things… I glower at buzzing black spot on my arm, smacking a hand down. Of course, said insect simply detaches its proboscis from my arm nonchalantly and flies merrily away - dang those superposition compound eyes! - , leaving me to hit myself and leave an angry red mark on my bicep as my blood rushes back after the momentary pressure. Blasted mosquito.
Said insect swaggers back into my line of vision as my arm slowly recovers from it's unintentional abuse, this time settling on my inner thigh.
This time I decide to go at it via stealth - not that it works, anyway. Like before, it darts away before I can reach it, and I end up smacking my own leg and howling in pain.
This continues for a moment or so (approximately 2.53 minutes, actually), and by the time it decides to give up (finally!) and flits to the other end of the room I'm fuming and red all over.
Of course, it's only when there's practically no spot on my body that I haven't smacked that I notice the can of insecticide tucked in the corner of the bookshelf. How wonderful.
Still. A late victory is better than no victory at all, so I snatch it up, pop off the cap and aim it at the now-cowering insect at the corner, feeling a smirk gracing my features as I do so.
Repressing the triumphant cackle that threatens to emerge, I lift my shirt to my nose and press the nozzle, a jolt of (rather sadistic) pleasure coursing through my body as I watch that little black body struggle against the noxious fumes and eventually fall to the floor. That act jerks me out of the reverie I'd fallen into and back to reality and the still-fume-covered bedroom of mine, and it is at this time that I notice that the can is still spewing out thick clouds of sharp-smelling gas even though my finger has already left the trigger (and had been supporting the can ever since I'd first sprayed at that obnoxious and now-dead creature).
Thick clouds, that are far, far more than a 200ml container is ever supposed to hold, even in high pressure.
And then I realize that the clouds are not dissipating (like it is supposed to do), my bedroom is starting to smell like a(n admittedly nice) combination of pine and sea spray (isn't insecticide supposed to be smelly?) and IS INSECTICIDE SUPPOSED TO BE GOLDEN IN THE FIRST PLACE?!
I soon get my answer though, because in that instant the minute particles coalesce together to form a six-foot-three, scowling man.
A six-foot-three, scowling, naked man.
…oh shizzle.
A/N 1 MAY 2012
YEP another chapter for now. Smile. You can probably already tell that this is going to be rather nonsensical story (if you haven't already figured it out from the title). Also, this is entirely unedited, so there's going to be a couple of grammar/spelling mistakes scattered around. Do let me know if you find any! Also... PUNS. I like puns. XD
INANE FUN FACT: I originally didn't mean for this to be humorous (at all), even though the plot was ridiculous. It was supposed to be a light-hearted adventure-fantasy thingamajij, but it wasn't meant to be funny.
Let me know what you think!