A Pink Corner House in Bristol, Saturday

[chosehumanity]

	"We moved into this place together. He asked me to marry him on the radio, and I said yes." Annie fidgeted with her own fingers. She didn't seem to know where to put them. "I was so excited, I'd only been here for two weeks..." She trailed off, smiling briefly. "And then-- I mean, after I'd... died, my family got here." A pause. "At least I was surrounded by friends and family," she said, distantly, "I mean, I got that part right. But it was just... so much, everyone was crying. And they couldn't see me. They couldn't see me. I just... needed some time to think. I kept following from room to room, shouting at them, and no one could hear me either, so I waited for them to leave, I didn't know what was happening to me, and I just... wanted everyone to leave me alone." She pursed her lips, pulling her face into a wry look that didn't belong there. "My fiance's got this brother in Saudi, I think that's where he went," she said, "But he must've started letting the place, because people kept turning up--"
	"You can still see it," George bitched, stomping into the kitchen with bright yellow gloves on and a bowl of hot, soapy water in his hands. "The whole wall has to be painted." He hit the tap hard. It squeaked.
	"Oh! You have to let that run for a while--" Annie started, but she was quickly interrupted.
	"Yes, I'm aware of that, thank you." George's voice was as snappy as the sound his gloves made while he yanked them off.
	"When the people moved in," Mitchell said, interrupting them before it turned into an argument, "What did you do?"
	"I just wanted the place to myself just... a little bit longer," she confessed, shrugging. "So I just kind of... moved some stuff."
	"That was you?" George violently shut the tap again. "Moving our things? I found a chicken nailed to the cupboard last night. And someone rearranged my books. That was you!"
	"Oh, no, that last one was me," Mitchell volunteered. Off George's affronted look, he added, "George, they were alphabetized. It's like living with Rain Man." George had to glare at Annie for thirty straight seconds to stop her laughing fit. "Do you go out at all?"
	"Not really," Annie said, fiddling with the tap a bit herself. "I mean, I've been to the garden, but I've been here for a year now. I don't... really know what would happen if I'd go out." More fiddling about.
	"Why are you here?"
	"I told you!" she shot back at him. "I just like it here."
	"Why," Mitchell repeated, "are you here."
	"...I don't know," she finally sighed. "I haven't really... thought about it."
	"Okay!" George had his trying-to-cope voice back on. "This has been great!" He clapped his hands. "My first ghost." He mimed a fight. "Knock-out. But it's getting late, sooo..." He made terribly unsubtle motions towards the door.
	"...Hey, you don't have to keep going on about me being a ghost!" Annie shot back. She was more than affronted. "It's a bit rude, you know, if someone's fat, do you say 'god, you're fat'?!"
	"I'm sorry that I'm a bit tetchy, considering that you just tried to scare me out of my house!" George hollered back.
	"Yeah? Well, it was my house before it was your house, you know!"
	George pulled a face at her. "That's not even an argument! It's not like calling the backseat of a car!"
	It took the both of them a little while to realise that Mitchell wasn't responding at all. He had simply curled himself up against the side of the doorway, watching them, quietly. So they quieted, too, until Annie spoke again. "I'm not your first ghost, am I." It wasn't a question.
	"No," he said, evenly, "You're not."
	"I know what you are," Annie said. She crossed her arms and looked at him, steadily. "And you." George got a slightly darker tone, for all that. "I've been listening to you." Beat. "Not that I mind, or anything." Abruptly, she threw George a glare. "I'm not prejudiced! I even voted Labour last time."
	"It's why we can see you," Mitchell said, quietly. "George, you, and me, we're all... from different parts of the same country. So to speak."
	"Normal people can't see me," Annie filled in. She rubbed at her own arms, quietly.
	George's kneejerk was still firmly in play, though. "We're perfectly normal!"
	"Fine," Annie shot back, "By 'normal', I mean 'doesn't turn into the household pet once every month'."
	"How did you die?" Once again, Mitchell was interrupting before this turned into a cage fight.
	Annie shrugged, her hands travelling up to her shoulders for a good rub. "Fast," she muttered.
	"Where will you go?"
	"I don't know." Annie tried a smile. "I haven't... really got anywhere." A silence fell. "Nowhere."

---

Two minutes later, Mitchell pulled George aside.

"We can't kick her out," he said, simply. "She has a bond with the house. It's keeping her here. If we kick her out--"

"What," George snapped back, incredulous, "It'll kill her?"

"George, trust me, there are things worse than death," Mitchell said, his voice full of quiet certainty. It came through in a violent rush. George seemed to wince, as if it served as a reminder - of his own curse, of Lauren and Becka in that alleyway, whatever it had turned out to be.

He shook his head, finally. "Why is she even here?"

"Something's keeping her here," Mitchell muttered, rubbing at his brow. "Something unresolved about her death."

George pulled in a thick breath of air to compose himself. "But why does she get to stay in a place she was happy in?" he asked, pointedly.

Ah. So that was the rub. Mitchell let go of his brow. His voice had a gentle chastisement in it. "George, you're already getting your second chance."

"That's--"

George made a noise so frustrated it couldn't be defined, collecting his thoughts.

"Can't we just have something-- anything in our lives that isn't about monsters?" He exhaled loudly. The irritation, that frustrated sense of something was obvious in his face, and Mitchell would have felt guilty if he hadn't seen the sheer loneliness in Annie's eyes before. "...She gets the box room," the werewolf said, finally.

Good. Mitchell closed his eyes.

"Shall I put the kettle on?"

Annie waved from the couch where she'd just materialized, beaming at the both of them.

George made a choked noise, and snarled, "Could she please stop doing that?" before shoving his way past Mitchell and towards the stairwell.

Mitchell sighed, still feeling utterly off balance for all that, and flashed Annie a light smile before retreating back to his room.

---

"Your mate looks pretty down in the dumps," Annie said.

George jumped. Literally. "Could you not do that?!" he asked, glaring at the spot where up until two seconds ago there had only been a sofa.

Annie just shrugged. "He's been sitting up there in his room for the past two hours staring at the ceiling," she said. "We never wound up painting that."

"He's had a rough time of it lately... he's actually supposed to teach on Monday, up at this school in America, but I'm not sure he's going to." George rubbed at the bridge of his nose, just under his glasses.

"Wait," said Annie, snorting. "He's a teacher? And a vampire? Somehow, I'd have expected more tweed!" She laughed, and kept on laughing until she realised George wasn't laughing with her.

"This isn't Wendy the Werewolf Stalker," he said, glaring back at her. "We don't get-- poignant romances, or saving the victim of the month, or... or hanging around in libraries wearing tweed, Annie. This is real life. This is vivid, this is mean, this is--" Wait. "...Did you leave the kettle on?"

"Yeah," Annie said, swinging her legs about, "I thought I'd make more tea."

George made a faintly desperate noise in the back of his throat, and ran for the kitchen.

[[ nfb, nfi, OOC-okay, and taken and tweaked from the Being Human pilot. also, with Annie here, I feel like sharing this short, spoilery but amazing fanvid for her. ♥ Annie. ]]

Comments

[vanillajello]

[ooc: ...So, apparently chewing gum + scrolling through flist = sudden laughter + nearly choking. (Three guesses why I started laughing. ILU.) Also, oh, Annie. Nailing a chicken to the cupboard was classic. ]

[chosehumanity]

[[ YOU BROUGHT IT ON YOURSELF. Also yes. You have to admire her gift for ghosting, really ]]