Crimson Haired Girl

A gentled breeze danced through the night sky, carrying the lingering scent of alcohol. Ash stood in front of the bar, slightly tipsy from the drinking. He walked down a dark road illuminated by the moon's stolen light and the drifting fireflies dancing throughout the night. 

After a short walk, Ash paused before a ramshackle house, its porch sagging and the paint chipping away. He placed his hand on the doorknob and held his breath. He wanted to make sure he didn't make any unnecessary sounds to prevent him from waking his sister. The door creaked open, and Ash stepped into a room that felt neglected and worn, with patches of wood covering the gaps in the walls and floor. 

It was not the prettiest house in the town, but Ash could not bear the thought of leaving it behind. Cypress had offered many times to have him and his sister move into the tavern, but the twins refused for their own personal reasons. While Ash wanted to keep the few memories of their late parents, his sister wanted little to do with the man who took them in. 

Ash carefully walked through the dark room until he stopped at a small oil lantern that hung over a fireplace. As he lit it, he dimmed the light low enough to keep his sister from walking up. The room was barely lit, but the dim light was enough to make out a small makeshift kitchen area and two beds, their outlines scarcely visible. His sister lay tucked away in one of the beds, her form obscured by a mound of pillows and blankets.

"Heh….how can you sleep like that?" Ash muttered as he slowly walked over to her bed. He sat on the edge and gently removed the blanket from his sister's face. He wanted to ensure her fever had not returned before he hit the sack. "Huh…?" He expected to find his sister, but the girl she saw under the blanket was not her. 

A girl around his age slept peacefully balled up in her long crimson hair. Her right arm was wrapped with bandages, and her clothes were torn. The ends of the torn fabric had yet to fray, forcing Ash to assume that they were recently torn. 

"Ash?" Behind Ash was a sleepy voice that called out. It was a young woman with long brown hair frizzed from sleeping. She was Ashley, his twin sister. She looked very much identical to Ash, except for the long hair. Ashley is one of the top beauties of the town, which causes trouble for Ash as his appearance reflects hers. She stretched and yawned as their brown eyes met each other. "What's wrong?" Her question was laced with innocence as she tilted her head, her brow furrowed in thought. 

Ash, dumbfounded by the current events, said nothing and pointed towards the cute girl sleeping in his sister's bed. 

"Oh, right. While you were at the tavern, I stumbled across this girl after walking the kids home for the night. The girl was pretty badly hurt, so I rushed her here and patched her up. She was quiet the whole time, so I don't know much about her besides her saying some deranged hunter attacked her in the forest." She got up from Ash's bed and sat next to him, looking down at the cute girl. "After I patched her up, I gave her some food, and she's been curled up and asleep ever since, looking so peaceful." She said with a small smile as she tried to hide a yawn. 

Seeing his twin sister's carefree smile failed to ease the problem of letting a random stranger sleep in their house just after meeting for the first time. "Hmmm…" Ash shook his head. "I am surprised that you know how to dress a wound." His voice had a bitter tone as he looked at the neat wrapping of the bandages and compared them to his own loose bandages that were about to fall off. 

"You know, brother." Ashley grabbed her brother's arm and dug her finger into the loose bandages. Ash let out a pained groan. "If you weren't so prideful about letting your beautiful twin sister tend your wounds, you would heal faster." Ashley then puffed out her small chest. "I learned from books and watching you fail. So I know what not to do, at the very least."

"Ouch…" Ash said, rubbing his chin and shaking his head, admitting defeat. While he'd never admit it, his sister was right. He was a disaster when it came to patching up wounds. "What's her name?" Ash wanted to change the subject.

"Dunno." Ashley yawned again. "She never told me, and I never asked." Ashley crawled back into Ash's bed.

Ash sighed. "I guess we'll just have to ask in the morning." Ash turned off the oil lantern and crawled into his bed. He left ample space between him and his sister. While staring at the dark ceiling, he spoke in a hushed voice. "You are far too trusting." 

"And you are far too untrusting, dear brother." Ashley barked back in a sassy tone. "That is why you complain about living a boring life. You don't know how to take that leap." She giggled as she kicked him in the side. "Use this as a good opportunity to mean a new face and 'escape.'" 

"Eh??? You heard me talking to myself last night?" 

"Nope, and if you did that, you are lame as hell. But we are twins, so we have a surprisingly similar mindset. I am also bored of this town. I wanna travel to Pandora. Something about that place just calls out to me. I wanna see if the rumors that Ma and Pa spoke of are true." She let out a small sigh. "Like you, I wanna meet someone who can show me life in a new light."

"I'm surprised, sis; I thought you loved it here." 

Ashley took a moment to think before responding. "I don't. The memories of that day still haunt me. And besides that…I cannot trust him. Something connects him to that day, and I wanna find out what." 

Her tone was hashed towards the end, but Ash still managed to hear it. He wondered who the man she was referring to was, but when he asked, she refused to say another word. He then gave up and closed his eyes. Deep down in his heart, he began to hope that maybe the girl sleeping in the bed next to them would be the one who would help him escape.