April 11, 2010 (29)
11:45 a.m.
Mimi’s Diner

I stood there, dumbfounded and speechless, as Michael approached Shaun. He obviously recognized him as the guy who had told him off when he came to visit me a few months ago. He had told Michael to get out of my house, told him he wasn’t wanted there. He’d even called him “Mr. Sweater Vest”, which had been really funny but stupid at the same time because now Michael was back. He had practically threatened to kill Shaun before and now he had his perfect chance. Now he lived close enough to get to Shaun with ease. My stomach turned just thinking about it.
Michael got to his table and Shaun looked up from his menu. I searched for any signs of recognition in Shaun’s eyes, but he seemed completely oblivious to the fact that his waiter was the psychotic murderer who had threatened his life. Shaun ordered, Michael scribbled something down on his little notepad and I watched helplessly.
After writing down the order, Michael turned away from Shaun’s table and came walking back towards me. He was about to walk right past me, but I grabbed his arm to get him to stop. I couldn’t help but notice how strong and toned it was. Knowing that scared me even more. I let my hand drop to my side with a small shudder.
“Do you need something?” he asked, looking down at me.
“Yes,” I told him. “I need you to promise me that you won’t hurt Shaun. I know he p***ed you off that day when he was smarting off to you, but he really is a good person. He was just doing what he thought was right.”
A hint of a smile flickered across his lips when I said this. He was obviously amused with the fact that I was getting so desperate. It infuriated me. “Don’t worry. I won’t hurt him.” he replied, but I didn’t trust what he said. He turned away from me and headed into the kitchen to give his order to the cook.
I bit my lip, not feeling good about this situation whatsoever. Sighing, I walked over to table seven, where a family of four just sat down. I took their orders, jotting them down on my notepad. And as I was walking towards the kitchen, I heard Shaun’s familiar voice call out my name.
“Evalynne?” he said. I turned around to face him and his eyes lit up with recognition. I smiled weakly and approached his table.
“Hi,” I said to him.
“Hi!” he replied enthusiastically. “I didn’t know you work here,”
“Yep, I just started today.” I informed him.
“That’s so cool!” he said.
My heart began to ache for him. Shaun was such an incredibly nice guy. Michael couldn’t just go and kill him. It wasn’t fair. “So what are you doing here? I thought you had class today,” I told him.
“I do, but I have an hour until my next class starts.” he said.
“Evalynne,” Michael said from behind me. I whipped my head around to see him standing there, holding a tray with Shaun’s food on it. “you’re not trying to steal my customer, are you?” He said this with a playful tone to his voice, probably trying to get Shaun to think he was just a nice boy who didn’t murder people just for the thrill of it.
“Nope, just saying hi to a friend.” I replied, trying to keep my tone light.
“Yeah, I go to the University of Michigan and my roommate is her boyfriend…or ex-boyfriend. You and Cole are so on-again, off-again that I don’t even know.” Shaun said, smiling at me.
I wanted to smack him upside the head for this though. Not the Cole thing. I already knew that Cole and I had an extremely complicated relationship. But he had just told Michael where he lived. As if he wasn’t in enough danger already.
Michael glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, hiding his complacency. “I see,” he replied. “Evalynne, not to be rude or anything, but you should probably get that order to the kitchen.”
“Oh yeah, sorry to hold you up. I forgot you’re at work,” Shaun said to me.
“It’s fine,” I assured him. “It was good to see you again anyways.” I turned around on my heel and padded off towards the kitchen. After giving the family’s order to the cook and bringing them their drinks, I decided it would be a good time to warn Shaun about who Ben really was. He needed to know.
But just as I was about to head over to his table, the sound of my boss’s voice stopped me. “Hey Evalynne,” she said.
“Yeah?” I replied, turning around to face her.
“We’re running low on ice. Could you go down to the basement and bring some up please?” she asked.
“Sure,” I told her. I turned around and headed back through the kitchen, into the small hallway in the back of the restaurant. I stopped at the second door to the right, the door that led down to the basement.
I opened it up and stepped inside, flipping on the light switch, witch lit up the staircase leading down into the basement. Then I made my way down flight of stairs and flipped on the light switch down there. However, the light bulb in the basement was dim and flickered a little bit. I sighed and headed over to the large freezer, lifting up the top of it.
Cold air came out of it, causing me to shiver. I reached inside, and grabbed a bag of ice, using all of my strength to lug it out of the freezer. I got a good grip on it and set it down at my feet so that I could shut the freezer. But when I turned around, I found myself face to face with Michael.
Startled, I let out a small gasp of alarm. “Don’t do that! You scared me half to death!” I cried.
However, the look on his face was one of anger. And it didn’t ease up either. “I know why you were talking to Shaun earlier, Evalynne. I know that you’re going to try and tell him the truth about me.”
I glanced down at my feet, not knowing how to respond to this. I couldn’t just deny it. Michael was a smart boy. He’d know if I was lying. So I stayed silent, keeping my eyes focused on the cold cement floor of the basement. But Michael grabbed my ponytail of hair and yanked it back, causing my head to jerk up so that I was looking right at him. A sound of pain escaped from the back of my throat.
“Look at me when I’m talking to you.” he commanded, his voice thick with rage.
“I’m sorry,” I choked out desperately. My breathing was shaky and tears were beginning to well up in my eyes, causing my vision to go blurry. I blinked them back, sucking in a deep breath.
He ignored my apology though. “If you tell that boy the truth about me, I promise you that I will kill him. If you even drop the slightest of hints as to who I am, he’s dead. So you’d better work on acting like you like me, because you’re friend’s life is depending on it. Is that clear?” he demanded.
“Yes,” I uttered back to him, my fear audible.
“Good,” he remarked. He let go of my hair and turned around on the heel of his Vans, heading back upstairs. But I stood there for a moment to catch my breath and let the tears subside.

I walked away from table seven, leaving the family to eat their food in peace. Shaun was still there. He was almost done with his cheeseburger and fries. He would be leaving soon. Now was my chance to tell him about Michael. But I couldn’t do that unless I wanted him dead.
He smiled at me as I walked past his table and I smiled back, feeling beyond guilty. This was my fault. I was the one who had put Shaun’s life in danger. If he had never met me, he never would have met Michael. He never would have been a part of all of the psychotic drama that my life consisted of.
But now that he was a part of it, there was no going back. I needed to help get him out of this. I just didn’t know how. I didn’t know what to do. I desperately needed someone to help me, to comfort me, to tell me everything was going to be ok. I needed Ash. My heart was aching for him.
He had stopped coming around though. Before Michael tried to murder me and Will, I was always seeing Ash’s ghost in my times of trouble. He was always there to protect me. It was as if his spirit couldn’t pass on until he knew I was safe. But I was now in a position where I was anything but safe. So why wasn’t he here to protect me? To give me advice? Didn’t he know how much I needed him?
As I headed into the kitchen, a thought occurred to me though. What if he stopped coming around, because he had possessed Ashton’s body. I had a very strong feeling that this was the reason he never visited me anymore. Because his spirit had found a way into Ashton. I of course didn’t know for sure what the truth was, but I knew that I was definitely onto something.
And once I got Ashton alone again, I would get him to tell me the truth.

Author's Note: Check me out on Youtube if you wanna! I posted videos for the EC+AM=4ever series & my username is LexiWrites (: