JESSIE
After breakfast, I missed my mom's beignets. God, those things are delicious!
I march toward Rosa's, and I'm not angry; I'm just confused, and I have to get to the bottom of this. Sebby knows something, and he's going to tell me what he knows.
So I walk into the building, and of course, it's a busy morning, everyone's here to have coffee and eat breakfast. I am here to look for Sebby to give me answers. So I go to the bar, but he's not there; there's someone else here, though. A black, feminine, flamboyant man in earrings, eyeshadow and colored nails looking me up and down with flirty eyes.
"Well, hello, handsome. What can I get you? You're gonna love my eggs."
"Uh, nothing, thank you. I'm just looking for Sebby," I say a bit shyly. I don't do well when people flirt with me. I know I glowed up or whatever, but I am not used to people hitting on me at all.
The one person who was always being hit on, though, was Sebby. And he was also the only one hitting on me, but at the time, I didn't know it because I thought he was just being friendly.
The man looks me up and down again, but this time, confused. And it looks like he's trying to figure me out.
"Wait a damn minute." He giggles. "You must be the reason Sebastian doesn't want to fuck me or anyone. You're Jessie Humphrey," he says loudly.
What?
"Jessie Humphrey?" a feminine voice says. And I turn my head over to see who must have called my name like that.
And there she is. The hottest ever, the girl I always admired.
Pilar De La Rosa Sebby's older sister.
"Oh my God, it is you!" She stands up from her chair and walks over to me to hug me. I hug her back, and she still smells like the girl I always admired.
You know the way every gay guy has a female celebrity they stick to, like how a gay guy loves Ariana Grande, Mariah Carey, Britney Spears or in my case, Taylor Swift.
Yeah, I love Taylor, and Pilar isn't a pop star, but I still admired her.
She's beautiful, sexy, and confident. Just everything. I have missed her so much.
She went to college when Sebby and I were juniors in high school. I left while she was still in college. So the last time I saw her was Christmas the year before I graduated.
"You look so good," she says, looking at me.
"And you look hot as always," I say, and she flips her hair. She would have been great as a model. But her passion has always been science-based. And she's doing a fine job at that. She's like a hot scientist.
"You know me. I keep it hot. I'm sorry about your dad. But honestly, I'm not sorry he deserved it, no offence."
I giggle. Finally, some honesty. I missed the De La Rosas so much. "None taken."
"God, it's so nice to see you. And honestly, Sebastian hasn't stopped talking about you since you left for college."
"She's telling the truth." The guy behind the counter says.
Pilar looks away from me and raises her brow at him.
"Don't you have something to fry, Antoine?" she asks him, and he gives us the side eye before walking away. I look at her and she smiles back at me. But then her smile begins to falter. She looks at me with that observant look she has on when she's trying to figure something out.
Her eyebrows furrowed, and her eyes squinted.
"There's something different about you," she says.
"Ah, must be the facial hair," I say.
"No, there's something else," she says, sounding weird, like she can sense death surrounding me or something. She looks concerned, like really concerned.
"Jezzy!" I whip my head at Sebby's direction, and he's walking toward us in a panicky way, almost like he's running from someone or trying to stop something.
"Hi Jezzy. Uh, Pilar, I see you've seen Jezzy. Jezzy and I are quite busy right now." Sebby tries to take me away from his sister. And he's acting suspicious. I want to know why. I don't think Pilar understands why her brother is acting this way. No, she doesn't, she's genuinely confused.
"Wait," she grabs me by the hand.
"Pilar, we don't have time for this," Sebby says.
"Sebastian, what the hell did you do?" Pilar asks, looking scared as fuck right now.
Sebby doesn't say anything; he just stares at his sister. And from the looks of things, he did do something, and why do I have the feeling it has something to do with what happened last night and the claws and the green eyes?
"You didn't," she says in a deep voice.
"I had to; he died." He says in a sad voice.
Wait what? I whip my head at Sebby.
"Okay, we shouldn't be talking about this here." Pilar grabs both my and Sebby's hands, and she leads us outside the bar.
She takes us to a place where no one can hear us. We're standing under the shade of a tree being protected by the summer sun. It's scorching hot out.
"What the hell happened?" Pilar asks Sebby.
"He died, Pilar, he-"
"Yes, I'm aware, but how what happened?" she asks him, and I want to know as well. How the hell did I die?
Oh my God, that monster…it wasn't a dream after all.
"I don't know. I went out back to get some wine and vodka, and then I came out and I saw a scratch on the floor, and then I saw Jezzy…" he doesn't want to say the words because it looks like if he says the words right now, he's going to lose me again.
"I knew it was something supernatural that killed him. I didn't want him to die, so I brought him back, I lent him one of my lives."
"Oh, Sebby, you idiot. You know that is forbidden." Pilar says, looking distressed.
"I know, I just couldn't lose him. I couldn't."
"Wait, wait, wait, wait. What the hell is happening? What did you do, you said you lent me one of your lives, what are you talking about?"
Pilar sighs with her eyes shut.
"Jessie, dear. There's something about us you don't know." Pilar says in a whisper, moving forward. "We're not like everyone else."
Of course, they're not like everyone else. They're special, my second family. I love them so much.
"We come from a long line of werecats called the Nytheri," Pilar says.
"Werecats, as in werewolves?" I ask.
"Ew, God no, we are not like those creatures," Pilar says with full-on disgust and Sebby grimaces. Oh my God, they're serious, they're not joking.
"We are more graceful."
"Peaceful." Sebby continues.
"We were created by the great Goddess Bastet. She created us to protect humanity from demons and creatures that lurk in the dark. We've lived among humans for thousands of years. We have abilities such as sight, we can sense evil and see through people's auras, we're strong, fast, flexible, have strong eyesight, super hearing, long claws and our true eye colour. Emerald green."
I remember the claws and the eyes. I also remember hearing mom walking up the stairs. I never hear anyone walk up the stairs cause my room is far from the stairs. And me hearing my mom in the kitchen. That also never happens.
"And we Nytheris have nine lives." Pilar continues. "Sebastian here, lent you one of his lives to bring you back to life."
Oh my God. I died.
"You came back to life, but not as a human. Sebastian's venom turned you into a Nytheri, and I know he was scared to lose you, but that was the dumbest thing he did because we're forbidden to bring human beings back to life for a reason. You're not just a Nytheri, but you're a Nytherkin. A human turned Nytheri… you cheated death, so you have one foot in the land of the dead and the other in the land of the living.
And that is not a good thing. Humans who were turned into Nytheris end up losing their minds. Going rogue and killing people. The earlier Nytherkins had to be killed because they caused commotion in the village they were in. Not to scare you, but you are going to end up like those other Nytherkins, you-"
"No, he's not! I saw him running with us, fighting monsters with us, I saw-" he stops then looks at me. I stare at him with my jaw on the floor, my mouth hasn't been closed since. "He's not going to go rogue."
"You are such an idiot."
"You're the idiot."
The two argue and argue, and they act like someone isn't standing in front of them.
And right now, I'm pissed as fuck.
"SHUT UP!" I yell at them. "I don't know what the fuck is happening, or what the fuck that thing is that… that killed me?"
"You saw it? You remember what it looked like."
"Oh yeah, it was scary as fuck. Oh my God, I can't believe this." I place my hand on my head and I shake it. "Look, I only came back for my father's funeral," I say, and I probably shouldn't have said that because now Sebby looks hurt. But I'm just scared, he has to understand that.
"I don't need all this, I really don't. I don't care if I'm a nythos or whatever."
"A Nytheri." Sebby corrects.
"Yes, that. I do not care! I'm going to bury my father this weekend, and after the weekend, I'm going back to New York and I'm going to forget that all this happened."
"Jezzy." Sebby walks up to me.
"No, don't. Just leave me alone." I say to him, then I turn to Pilar. "Pilar, it was nice seeing you again." I turn and I walk away from them at a quick, angry pace.
What the fuck am I going to do?