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Part II: Mari

The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have [it] more abundantly.

- John 10:10

From the earliest I can remember, I believed that I was being haunted.

My name is Mari Hanes, and I was sixteen years old the spring that everything started coming together. Of course, by then, I'd known that my life would probably never be normal.

At that time, I was living with my aunt in a house on the outskirts of a small town called Ithaca in New York. Not much usually happened there. Like most typical small-town USAs, it was fairly quiet. That was, for most who lived there.

My Aunt Farah was born and raised in Ithaca, along with my mother. The reason that I was living with her now stemmed from the fact that Mom had died when I was eight. She was killed in a horrific fire, the cause of which was never figured out. All anyone knew was that it had spread very quickly, and only I had managed to make it out.

I can't say I'd had much of a good life after that. In fact, for a while, I was shunned by the other kids. I was a witch because wherever I went, bad luck always seemed to follow, along with tragic and unusual deaths.

I'd never had the chance to know my father. He'd committed suicide when I was only a baby. No one really talked about it, so I never asked what he did. Mom and Aunt Farah never spoke of the darkness around us either, but I was aware of how frightened my mother had become before she died.

I can still remember overhearing her conversation with my aunt just a few days before the fire that took her life. There was something evil after me. She was sure of it. She'd even been begging our pastor for help to fight it and drive it away. But he never got a chance to come to the house and help us. Instead, she died in the fire the night before, and the thing that had been following me for years continued to do so.

This was why I never let anyone else close to me. I feared what would happen to them. What I never counted on was meeting the one person who would know how to help set me free from this darkness that stalked me.

That day had started out like any other school day. It was lunch time, and I'd retreated to the library to bury my nose in a book. It was my everyday routine, and I never deviated from it.

The library had become my safe haven in high school. I wasn't really one to eat a lot anyway, so skipping lunch didn't bother me one bit. But also, being away from the lunch crowd ensured that I'd be away from the ones who enjoyed calling me a witch and saying cruel things about me. I dealt with enough of that before and after classes. It still hurt, but I was also somewhat used to it. After all, it seemed like they were right when I really thought about my life.

I barely noticed the sound of the nearby door opening and closing. I wasn't the only one who found refuge in there during that time, so there was no need for me to take much notice. No one really noticed me in there anyways.

However, today would be much different from all the rest.

My attention was pulled away from my book as someone pulled out the chair beside me. I didn't look up as they sat in it.

"You don't mind if I sit here, do you?" a male voice asked.

The unfamiliar voice was enough to make me look at him, and I was kind of surprised when I did. I didn't know this guy at all, and I was sure that I would have noticed him if he'd been in the school before. His hair was more white then blond, and he had ice blue eyes. He looked like he was around my age or maybe a year old.

I honestly couldn't believe that he was sitting by me too. He had to be the most incredible guy I'd ever seen.

After a moment of actually finding my voice, I was able to answer him.

"No. It's all right." I managed.

Something must have been up here. A guy like this definitely wouldn't want anything to do with a girl like me unless someone was putting him up to it.

A moment of silence passed before he decided to speak again. His voice was soft, and as smooth as silk.

"So, what's your name?"

I couldn't ignore him, but I also could look at him as I answered, "Mari Hanes."

"I'm Noah Renaldi. Nice to meet you." he introduced himself.

So, his name was Noah. I definitely didn't recognize the last name either, and I knew a lot of the kids there. Living in Ithaca, most names rang a bell at least. Families were known around there, and his last name was definitely unusual.

"Are you new here?" I couldn't help asking as I finally forced myself to look back at him.

"Yeah, I just moved here. Is it that obvious?" Noah asked, resting his cheek against his hand as he leaned his elbow on the table.

"It's a small town. Besides, I think that the name Renaldi stands out too." I informed him.

"Probably, although my dad has lived here before. We just moved back from the big city. It's a lot quieter here." he commented. I noticed that his voice really didn't change as he spoke. But he seemed pretty at ease too.

"That's probably true."

"So, are you related to Farah Hanes?" Noah asked.

"Yeah. She's my aunt. Guess you've met her." I confirmed.

I wasn't surprised that he'd know Aunt Farah. She was a pretty well-known real estate agent there.

"No. I just heard her name when we moved here because Dad bought our house through her." Noah explained.

Now I was curious, "Where do you live?"

Noah thought about it, "The street's called Mulberry. It's the house all the way at the end."

I stiffened as he said that. Yes, I knew that house. It was one of the nicest houses in town and had been on the market for quite a while because it was fairly expensive. My aunt had thought that it was an impossible sale because people with that much money just didn't move to Ithaca.

The bell rang, signaling the end of lunch. I sighed, knowing that this nice little time that I'd just gotten with the new guy was probably over. How depressing.

But it seemed like Noah wasn't ready to walk away from me yet.

"Hey, what's your next class?" he inquired.

"English with Mr. James." I answered. I heard the hesitation in my voice, but he'd seriously caught me off guard. I hadn't thought he want to talk to me anymore.

"Good. Then you can show me where it is."

I almost couldn't believe that one. He actually wanted to be seen with me? Not only that, but he was in one of the same classes?

"Are you sure about that?" I managed to ask.

"I don't see why not. You seem nice enough." Noah answered.

Maybe he didn't know my reputation. But for now, I decided to let it go and be nice. I was sure that I'd hear about it later with daring to be near the cute new guy, but it might be worth it for the few minutes of basking in an almost friendship.

Thankfully, the walk to Mr. James' class wasn't that long. I breathed a sigh of relief as I sat down at the table. I knew that Noah was sitting next to me, but the others couldn't really say too much about it once class started.

Of course, to my dismay, I saw that Jenna Wells was also coming in. Her eyes narrowed as soon as she caught sight of Noah sitting next to me.

Oh, lucky me, I thought. She's already spotted it.

English wasn't my favorite class, but I still found some of what we studied interesting. At that time, we were busy working on year end projects. We had to read a book and do an essay on it. Of course, there was also the process of the essay, which involved turning in notes to the teacher on our books.

Noah seemed to take to all of it easily from what I saw. He'd already picked out a book, and quietly began writing notes as he read it. I couldn't stop myself from sighing as I glanced at him. What I wouldn't give to have him as a friend. But I had no doubt that he'd fall in with the popular crowd soon enough, then he'd forget all about me.

As class finally ended, Jenna decided to make her way over to me. I didn't bother looking up from my seat as she leaned down in front of me.

"Hey Witch. You gonna look at me today?" she asked quietly.

"What do you want Jenna?" I asked, keeping my voice quiet as well.

I knew better than to attract any attention. The worst would come later if the teacher was alerted. It wasn't like they did anything anyway.

"Just what are you doing sitting next to him?" she asked.

She must have thought that Noah wouldn't hear her since he was standing nearby, talking to another guy in the class. It was Shane Lawter. It surprised me a little that Noah had spoken to him so easily too, considering the fact that he was the class nerd. But Shane had earned respect too, considering that he often bailed out the preps by helping them improve on their test scores.

"He sat down by me. That's all." I told Jenna.

"Don't be trying any spells Witch. You know he's out of your league." Jenna warned.

"I don't cast spells. Just leave me alone." I countered.

Jenna stood up straight. But before she could knock my books off and pretend that it was an accident, like she often did, I became aware of someone standing behind me.

"I didn't think that anybody believed in witches anymore. You sound like you walked out of the fifteenth century." I heard Noah say.

Jenna immediately took half a step back. I looked up to see Noah there. He didn't look very happy seeing her there. His expression didn't really show it, but his eyes did.

I could tell that Jenna was trying hard to come up with an excuse, "You shouldn't sit with her Noah. Bad things happen to people who hang out with her." she tried to reason with him.

"I can learn lessons for myself, and I'm not superstitious, so leave her alone." Noah ordered. This was enough to make Jenna turn and leave. I felt Noah pat my shoulder as she did, "Come on. We're gonna be late if we don't go now."

"I have Chemistry next. What about you?" I managed to ask as I stood up.

I was still in shock that he'd just defended me. But I also couldn't imagine someone like Noah being black listed for doing such a thing. Noah had an "it" factor that the preps loved. In fact, they might even follow him in trying to be nice to me later. I wasn't sure how I'd handle that one if it happened.

"Mrs. Kelly, right?" Noah guessed.

How lucky was this? He had the same afternoon classes. I wasn't sure if fate was smiling on me, or laughing at me. But again, I sucked it up.

"Okay. Let's go." I sighed.

Shane was also following us out, "So, were you really serious Renaldi? Is your dad really buying them?" he asked. Apparently, whatever Noah had told him had caught his interest big time.

"Of course I am. Dad's probably closed the deal today." Noah answered.

"What are you talking about?" I asked them.

I always did hate being in the dark about things. I had enough of that with the things that I couldn't figure out.

"You didn't hear?" Shane responded, "Noah's dad is buying Eastwood Realtors."

I was shocked again. Eastwood Realtors was where Aunt Farah worked. But she hadn't said anything about someone buying their business out to me.

"When?" I asked.

"Like I said, it's probably a done deal. Dad's been working on it for a while now. But he's planning on keeping the people who are there too. He says that he likes how they work and how good they are with people." Noah answered, not sounding the least bit concerned.

Well, at least I knew my aunt still was going to have her job. But sitting down in Chemistry, I had another bone to pick with Noah.

"Hey, why did you do that anyway?" I asked him.

"What?" Noah responded, sounding like he didn't know what I was talking about.

"Defend me." I clarified.

Noah shrugged, resting his chin on his hands, "Why not? It's stupid to call someone a witch just because you happen to be jealous of them. Besides, you seem like you're too nice a person to do anything against them. That's the reason they think they can target you."

He seemed so matter of fact about the whole thing that it almost floored me. I'd never met anybody like him before.

"They're not jealous of me Noah. Why would they be?" I muttered, looking at my things as I opened a notebook for class.

"Beats me. Guess you just intimidate them because you're prettier." Noah replied.

I froze as I heard him say that. Did he just call me pretty? This guy was just too much. He might exhaust me before school let out at this rate.

"Trust me, I'm not pretty, and it's better if you just left me alone. I'm not good for people. They're right about that." I said quietly.

I felt him look at me, but he didn't say anything else. I was grateful for that. I knew that I was getting too close again. Getting close to people was dangerous, especially with what was following me. It may get them killed, and I didn't think that I'd handle it too well to see someone like him get hurt because of me.

The class went by like it always did, and soon the bell was ringing again for the day to end. Standing up, I fully expected for Noah to heed my words, but he didn't.

"You know, I'm not exactly believing that you don't want me to try and be friends with you." he said as he stood beside me.

"Believe what you want. I already told you the truth." I responded, trying to act indifferent.

"That's fine. But until I see otherwise, I'm not going away. I think that you're pretty interesting, so I'll stick around for a while." Noah stated.

Okay, so he was pretty direct with whatever he thought. I was coming to realize that much in the last two hours that we'd been together. But I couldn't stop myself from smiling too. Something about Noah just drew me in. I had this gut feeling that he was genuinely kind by nature, and it made me feel good to know that he seemed to like me. For the first time in my life, I began to forget somewhat about all of the bad things. I'd just have to be careful around him. That was all.

"I guess I can't argue with you anymore about it." I relented as we walked out of the classroom, "So, did you drive here, or do you have a ride waiting?"

"I drove. Did you need a ride home?" Noah offered.

I shook my head, "That's all right. I've got a car."

In all honesty, I didn't want him taking me home. I still needed time to make myself more comfortable with this first maybe real friendship. Not to mention that I feared what might happen if he did.

Still, saying goodbye to him in the parking lot and climbing into my little old Neon, there was this warmth inside of me that I couldn't remember feeling in years.

I only hoped that this time it would last.