Chapter Eight: Addie:

Where do I begin with Addie? She was black. She was black and loved ghost stories. That’s probably why she took interest in me in the first place. She didn’t try to be annoying about it, though.

“You don’t talk much, do you?” Addie asked.

“No,” I said. I shrugged my shoulders.

“Hm,” Addie said. Now, Addie had many brothers and one baby sister. Probably another reason she latched onto me. She always wore her hair in black pigtails. I remember her wearing worn hand-me-down overalls. Fashion was not on her mind at the time. Addie could fend for herself just fine. In return, she didn’t let anyone pick on me. She knew how to deal with boys.

“Five older brothers,” Addie told me on that first day of school.

“Wow,” I said.

“Do you have any?” she asked. “Brothers or sisters, I mean.”

“No,” I said.

“Heh, lucky,” Addie said. I wasn’t too sure about that. Sure, Victoria Manor was never empty, but it still felt lonely in way. I wasn’t around too many kids. Miranda made things a little bit better, but still. Speaking of Miranda, she never spoke a word around Addie. She just stared at her. I couldn’t tell exactly what she was thinking.

“Do you like Addie?” I asked her when we got home from school that day. I saw her shrug in the mirror.

“I don’t know,” she said. I turned my head, but there was nobody there.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I don’t know anything about her,” Miranda said. “The only human I know about is you.”

“She seems really nice,” I said. She didn’t say anything. Honestly, I think that Addie was just lonely. Every day at school, she would come looking for me and start talking to me. Granted, she didn’t try to talk my ears off every time she saw me. I just she really was happy to talk to a human girl her age.

“I am just so tired of seeing pigs all the time,” Addie said. “Daddy won’t let me keep one as a pet.”

“How come?” I asked.

“He says that we have to eat them,” she said. “He says that it is ridiculous to get attached to them.” There was nothing in her voice as she spoke. Addie didn’t even blink. She must have seen the look on my face because she frowned.

“That’s just how it is,” she said. “It’s what my family does.”

“Oh…” I said in a quiet voice. Nevertheless, Addie proved that she did have a gentle side with animals. She’s the type of person who will stop on the side of the road to help an injured dog. In fact, she took that dog home. There are more stories about her. She will keep popping up as I keep telling you this. It’s like I said, she is one of the few people that stuck around me who’s still alive. Whether it’s by a miracle or something else, I do not know. All I know is that Addie was the first real friend that I ever had.