Christina didn't have much trouble setting things up. I was under the impression she had done this all before anyway. She wrangled Michael into attending the meeting, and then tracked down his sister, Lucky, on Earth.

She kept me updated on text. At least I could feel a little better now- I had gained a couple new phone numbers since last night. My only task was to make sure Mannie came, a subject I had been dancing along the edges of all morning.

"So I was talking to Michael last night..." I said, pouring myself a glass of water. The scene of my apartment was surreally strange compared to a few months ago; Ria and Adeline, newly reunited, watching TV while Mannie lounged on my bed eating.

"Hate him." Mannie said, her mouth full of food.

I looked over. "I'd really rather you didn't eat anything crumbly on my bed."

Mannie grunted and rolled onto the floor.

It was weird having her around. Last night, I had asked Christina and Kell about Mannie, and the both of them had cringed before thinking of answers.

"She's too wrapped up in her own thoughts to think about anyone else's." Kell had said. "But she cares. And she'll admit to caring if you press her. The only thing she won't admit is how much she's affected by other people."

"She makes everything into an argument." Christina said, looking at Kell.

"You have to argue with her though. She's an ass about everything, but she appreciates people who call her out on it."

Later, Christina showed me a few videos from my first visit to Hell. There wasn't much, but she pointed out what she could. A security feed of nineteen year old me walking down a hall with Mannie, nervously looking around and chatting constantly. A shaky cam of a large crowd of people getting gunned down in the central square as the military rushed in. Christina paused at one point and pointed to a blurry shape.

"That's you." She said.

There was another few photos she showed me. A party. A younger version of me- and it still felt weird to identify that, to point at a situation and a person I never was and label it 'me'- sat on a couch, smiling cautiously next to Michael. There were other pictures, of me eating dinner with The Few, of me talking with complete strangers. Sometimes I was blurry and in the background. Rarely was I the center of attention.

Christina had pointed out each of my appearances. I had wondered where Mannie had been.

Now, I sat down on the floor next to her. "I wanted to know more about that. Why you hate him. I mean, I know some awful things he's done lately, but-"

"Lately?" Her interest was piqued. "What do you mean?"

I smiled. "We can have a little gossip exchange. You tell me what went wrong with Michael, and I'll tell you how fucked up he's been."

"No. I'll just find out from Kell."

"You haven't visited him at all, you know. We could swing by together." The meeting was scheduled for this afternoon at his apartment. It wasn't the smoothest way to get her to attend, but it would work.

"No."

I held my head in my hands. What exactly was I trying to achieve here? "You can't loiter in my home forever. Now that Alexander's finished his serial killing and you've told me your true identity, what exactly are you lingering around me for? The whole bodyguard shtick is over."

Mannie looked at me, wide eyed for a second. I nearly guessed her thoughts, I swear. I made eye contact and I knew what she was thinking.

'We're friends.'

Well. You used to be.

She didn't speak, just went back to stuffing her face with bread.

"You don't have to be so freaked out by me." I said, sighing. "I want to pretend we're both adults and talk this through."

"There's not much to say." Mannie looks down. "Michael and I were close- very close. We-"

She stopped. I waited for her to continue.

She looked at me in silence.

"We think we can fix everything." I blurt out. The pressure of her gaze getting to me. "The cycles. Your immortality because of them. All we have to do if fulfill Alexander's wish and get you guys to get along again."

Mannie burst into laughter. I wasn't not sure, but I think it's the first time I've heard her laugh. It was harsh and pained, but seemingly genuine.

She didn't say anything until she stopped her laughter. "I don't doubt it. Wishes have always been complete bullshit. What time is this going to take place?"

"Like an hour?" I said. My heart didn't feel like it was beating. I wasn't sure why.

"Let's go now. Kell's place?" She asked, but she got up and started walking immediately. "God. Fucking friendship therapy."

"Yeah." I managed to chuckle.

"I hate this. And them." Mannie looked back at me. "It's going to a bloodbath."

We were the last ones to arrive despite being perfectly on time. As we entered, the room collectively turned to watch us- it was incredibly unsettling. Despite Christina telling me last night that, if needed, I was free to leave, my stomach turned.

Michael sat on the couch, and sitting as far away from him as possible was Alexander. Christina had her eye on both of them, calmly sipping tea in an armchair. Across from her, in the other armchair, was Michael's twin sister Lucky. She looked particularly displeased.

In the kitchen, standing about awkwardly, was the rest of the Lexington brothers, and Kell.

"Hey!" Christina, at least, sounded happy. "Come sit down. Let's try this thing."

"Hey." I said, half raising a hand in a wave. There was nowhere for me to sit.

Mannie, meanwhile, was eyeing the couch. "I'm not sitting in the middle."

"What? Come on Ella!" Alexander chattered. He spoke warmly towards her. I still had trouble imaging they were actually good friends. "You've always been the most amicable of us."

"I'm not sitting next to Michael."

"The couch is plenty wide. Just sit down." Christina said.

Mannie's voice was calm. "Alex, you're absolutely gay for Michael. Why don't you scooch over and cuddle with him?"

Alexander frowned. "Just sit on the fucking floor Mannie."

Michael was grinning all the while, looking about at everyone's faces in delight.

Mannie crossed her legs and politely sat on the floor across from the couch. I continued to stand where I was, unsure of what my role was supposed to be.

"So." Christina said. "Excellent! I can't believe I managed to pull this off on my first try. All of you guys in one place. I'm not quite sure how this will work or if it will do anything to break the cycles. But hey, it should be beneficial anyway, right?"

"I'm sorry." Michael said, laughing a little like he was interrupting a funny story with a quip of his own, "I've been told I'm here to try and rekindle the embers of palship with my old crew. My godawful sister and this fucking asshole. So who's the chick?"

"Man!" Alexander laughed. "Heard 'bout this." He looked in anticipation to Mannie, whose frown had turned into a toothy grimace.

She put a hand on her face, inhaled, and looked him right in the eye. "Do you remember me?" She asked, bobbing her head and slightly smiling.

"No."

"Don't fucking give me that." She continued to shake. "You know who I am."

"I don't!" Michael flared his hands up defensively. "I don't. I've never seen you before."

"You have though." She was crying, flat out crying. "You have."

"I'd know your face." Michael seemed near apologetic, though his smile nervously hung on his face.

Mannie stopped crying as suddenly as she had started. Her face was still coated in tears, and her voice cracked as she yelled. "Who is in your heart now, then?"

There was quiet. A lot of quiet. Michael only watched, stone-faced. I walked over to Mannie and grabbed her hand, helping her stand. As I tried to lead her out, she jerked out of my grasp.

She grabbed Michael by his shirt. It was an aggressive move, and she bared her teeth- but then her expression softened. Weakened. "It's not you, is it?" She said softly. I grabbed her hand again, leading her away, "You've never loved yourself," she said as I closed the hallway door.

I let her breath for a few moments.

"Want to sit?" I said, gesturing to the floor.

"No." She leaned against the wall, looking away. "Sorry."

"You did warn me you had problems with him."

"I always think I'll be better. God. I always think I'm going to act normal, and then I fuck things up." She glanced at me. "You can sit if you want."

I had a feeling she was asking me to. I sat cross legged on the floor by her feet. Eye contact seemed to bother her.

"Michael and I were very close." Mannie said. "Not romantically. Not sexually. But... close. We grew up together, me, him, Phinny- that is, Alex- and the boys. He lived in Deerfield until an unfortunate fire. My mother was friend of theirs, and hey, used to run an orphanage. Phin was already living there, an abandoned bastard, so..."

"But what went wrong?" I asked. I wasn't sure if it was a good idea to interrupt her thoughts or not.

"We weren't always this fucked up." She seemed to ignore me. "But we were always like this."

She swallowed.

"Michael had this huge crush on me when we were kids, back when I still thought boys were gross. He gave me things, and as we grew up, he never really stopped. He picked flowers for me, and sung me songs. He always treated me sweetly. Phin noticed this, over the years, and started acting the same way."

I tried to keep quiet, I really did. "Are you implying that the grand war between Heaven and Hell is actually just the result of a shoddy love triangle?" I laughed.

Mannie didn't seem to care. "No." She scoffed. "It got resolved. Anyway, though we always doubted if he was gay, Phin was clearly more interested in Michael than he was with me. Course, I never was too interested in either of them. When we were teens, Michael would try and flirt with me, always calling me a 'late bloomer'." Even though she wasn't facing me, I watched as she formed air quotes to a desolate hallway. "Never really got into boys."

"You get into girls then?"

"Nah. I actually dated Lucy back in the day. Never did anything." She said. "Two hundred years later and I've yet to blossom. Kell always tried to give me labels, but I'm not sure if they help or not. I'm not sure if it's me or the people I've known. I've had sex before."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. After all those years of hanging, I guess I thought I owed Michael something. We dated. He always wanted more from me than I wanted to give him- you know, fucking- but he had a lot of problems of his own. I spent most of the relationship trying to figure out if I wanted to be in a relationship. We had sex once."

"So that's why you're upset?" I said. I planned on finishing my thought, but my words faltered. I wasn't sure if Mannie was saying this to appease me or herself.

"Sex is gross." She swallowed again. "You know, though, he never was too bad. Never went to a therapist for god knows how many mental issues, but he coped right through. He really loved me. Really loved Phin. Loved all of us, really. His parent's death was a game of a new beginning to him, just the start of some adventure novel. He never learned to fucking read, but that was what he always told me. That this was just the start."

I waited for her to continue.

"We've always been so close. He was a bit of an idiot, and something was clearly wrong with his mind- he got worse as he aged, his memory fading and his mind losing balance- but we were very close. I taught him latin while I was learning it in school. Surprised him with bouquets. Cuddled platonically, nearly sitting on his lap. Taught him about birds, told him stories of romans." She sighed. "Gave him a statue of an angel."

She turned around and sat on the floor next to me, looking weary and practical. Her eyes were still red, but the tears had dried.

"I'm only pissed with him because he doesn't remember me. Just the things we did. Just what I did for him." Her face fell back to emotion. "For fuck's sake. It's like he took every aspect of our- thing- and bloated it. Exploited it. How we used to sit is sacred. Our joke of a language is canon. And my favorite flowers have become his sigil of death."

"Why can't he remember you?"

"A lot went wrong with him. But I suspect he's pretending."

"Why would he want to do that?"

Mannie frowned, looking down at the deep red of the carpet. "I'd love to know."