Olivia's POV
With her eyes still on me, Eliza drops the last petal onto the kitchen table and stands up. In three wide strides, she diminishes the distance between us, but instead of stopping a step away from me, she presses the tip of her nail against my forehead.
"Do you feel that?"
"Of course, I feel it." I swat her hand away and rub the throbbing bruise she managed to press her nail into.
"What happened?" She runs her russet eyes along the purple bruises and the red scrapes scattered across my arms and stops at the visible edge of the deepest cut running diagonally across the inside of my left forearm.
"Car accident. Are you a stalker, too?"
"Stalker?" Eliza furrows her eyebrows.
"I mean Guardian." Apparently, Samuel isn't the only one who has never been called a stalker before. "Are you my Guardian just like Samuel is?"
"Aren't we self-centered?" Eliza snorts and makes her way back to the table where she leans against its edge. "What makes you think you're special enough to deserve not only one, but two Guardians?"
"What else am I supposed to think considering you're inside my home?"
"Since when are you the only one living here?"
"So, you're Mom's Guardian?" Now, her comment about being old friends with Mom makes much more sense.
As if on cue, Mom walks back into the kitchen. This time she has her naturally straight hair styled in soft waves. "We need to go, or we'll miss the bus."
"Are you sure you can't see anyone at the table?" I try one more time.
"I'm this close," Mom puts her thumb and index finger a breath's distance from each other and points them at me, "to grabbing a pair of scissors and cutting your hair. Are you willing to let me?"
"Let's go." I move the crutches as far as possible and take a giant hop away from her.
With me leading the way, Mom, Eliza, and I exit the house and make our way down the front-drive. We make it only past our neighbors' hedge when Mom stops. She opens the black bag she's carrying and begins to roam through it.
"Shoot. I forgot my phone. You continue to the bus stop and I'll be right behind you." Without a backward glance, she hurries back to our house as fast as her heels allow her.
I expect Eliza to follow her, but she remains rooted to her spot beside me.
"Aren't you going to follow her?"
"Do I look like I'm in the mood to act like a lost puppy?" Eliza deadpans.
"Aren't you as her Guardian obligated to follow her?"
"Not really." Eliza turns back to the road, and we begin to make our way to the bus stop. "We can't stick to all our charges all the time."
"All of your charges? You mean to tell me you have more than one person you're stalkingâI mean guarding?"
"Obviously. Right now there are more humans living on this planet than there are people who have died all throughout human history. Not to mention how lenient the One upstairs is being about who needs to be punished for their sins."
"By the One upstairs do you mean Him?" I point at the clear blue sky. "God?"
"Him." Eliza scoffs. "Another typical example of how gullible humans are. The Higher Power doesn't have a human gender. Deciding to call it a him is nothing but a man-made decision. And you're all dumb enough to believe the words of a few males who decided they were above an entire race of females."
"I never thought of it this way." Right then we round the corner of our street and the empty bus stop appears a few feet in front of us. "But what did you mean with the sin part?"
"Do you know nothing about Guardians?"
"Since both you and Samuel act like me being able to see you is something novel, I'm guessing I'm not supposed to know of your existence. So, I think you can cut me some slack."
We stop next to the sign with the bus schedule glued to it.
"I'll give you that one," Eliza says. "Story short, Guardians are souls of deceased people who had sinned during their human lives. This is why instead of our souls being reincarnated, we're punished by watching over humans, yet never able to interact with them. Our job is to protect humans from forces far beyond your understanding."
"So, you're notâ" I begin, but then the sound of the approaching bus catches my attention.
While the vehicle begins to slow down, I glance along the street we had come from. What is taking Mom so long?
A second later she finally rounds the corner and hurries over to us. Her heels stump against the sidewalk until she reaches my side just as the bus driver opens the front door. Together the two of us pay our fares, while Eliza simply walks onto the bus. Just like with Samuel no one, not even the driver, makes a peep in protest.
Mom motions for me to take the nearest empty seat, while she moves further down the bus to another empty space. I sit next to a plump lady and lean the crutches against my shoulder. While I expect Eliza to head over to my mother, she grabs onto the pole of the chair in front of me and remains rooted to her spot.
"What did you mean when you said sinned?" I ask. "What did you do as a human to be punished like this?"
My question causes the lady beside me to look at me with wide eyes, but I don't pay her any mind. She, after all, isn't the person I'm speaking to.
"I don't know." Eliza shakes her head. "We don't remember anything about our past human lives. All we know is that the age we're stuck in is the age at which we died and that we did something to deserve to be punished. Nothing else."
The man sitting in the seat in front of me stands up, which causes Eliza to scoot to the side. He passes by her without as much as a single glance; as if her mustard shirt doesn't scream at him to look at her.
"Are the pants and the shirt an official Guardian uniform?" I ask, remembering that Samuel had been wearing more or less the same thing, except in a different color.
"I'm not wearing pants," the woman sitting beside me says.
I turn my head to her and note the dotted dress she's wearing. "I didn't mean you. I'm talking to my mother's Guardian."
I turn back to Eliza to find her glancing between me and the woman sitting beside me, while an amused smirk sneaks onto her lips. "We don't have uniforms. But we do wear clothes that fit within the era we're in. We only get a change every two decades or so."
"Wait, you mean to tell me that for those two decades you don't change clothes? Like ever?"
The woman beside me begins to scoot away from me, but I ignore her.
"No. We don't eat, sleep, sweatânothing really." Eliza shrugs. "We just exist to protect humans, but never interfere with their lives."
"What do you mean not interfere with our lives?"
"Liv?"
Mom's voice pulls me back to the bus and I turn around to find her already standing next to the double door in the bus's middle. I quickly grab the crutches and with the help of the surrounding poles hop over to her side. Not a second later the bus comes to a screeching stop, where Mom, Eliza, and I exit.
The moment my feet are on the sidewalk, Eliza points to her right. "Look over there."
I follow her gaze, while Mom begins to roam through her purse.
"Do you see the woman with the short red hair? Now, look at the guy with the long brown hair on her right and the man closing in on her left side."
Several feet down the street stands a woman in her early thirties, who is talking to someone on her phone. Next to her stands a much taller guy with wavy long brown hair, which reaches just shy of his shoulders. He has his eyes focused on the man wearing a baseball hat, who is closing in on the woman's other side.
I'm just about to turn back to Eliza when the covered man reaches the woman's side. Without stopping he slips his hand into the dark brown purse she has wrapped around her left forearm. A second later, he pulls his hand back out, and this time he's holding a dark green rectangle in his hand.
The long-haired guy obviously sees the man steal what I assume is the woman's wallet, yet he doesn't say anything, let alone tries to stop him. He only continues to passively observe him.
"Why isn't he doing anything?" I ask.
"Because he's a Guardian. We aren't allowed to interfere with human matters. What we can do is protect you from supernatural forces."
By then the thief is already several steps away from the woman and is making his way right toward us. He removes his hand from the inside of his black jacket, where I guess he hid the woman's wallet.
"Liv, let's go." Mom nudges me.
I, however, keep my eyes on the thief. Just when he is about to pass by me, I push the bottom of the crutch under his feet. This causes him to tumble straight onto his face, just like Samuel did beside our neighbors' hedge.
"I'm so sorry." Mom hurries to the now lying thief and offers him her hand. "My daughter is still not used to her crutches. Isn't that right, Liv?"
"No." I keep my eyes on the thief's back. "I did it on purpose."
"You're not supposed to say that aloud." Mom groans.
"Mina?"
At the sound of Mom's name, we both turn to the side where we find the red-headed woman and her Guardian hurrying toward us. The woman is glancing between the thief, Mom, and me, while her Guardian has his penetrating eyes focused only on me.
"Anya?" Mom says, but I cut her off before she can say anything else.
"Check your purse," I tell the woman and then motion at the thief, who is now in the middle of getting back up. "He just stole your wallet."
With a moment of hesitation, the womanâAnyaâopens her purse and begins to search through it. "It's gone! My wallet is missing."
"Mom, hand me your phone. It's time we call the poâ"
Before I can finish my sentence, the thief whose face is still hidden underneath the baseball hat reaches into his jacket and pulls out the wallet. He throws it straight at Anya and then sprints away as fast as his feet can take him.
"You might not be able to do anything but I can." I wink at Eliza.
***
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- E