If she could, Olivia—or rather, the ghost of the girl once known as Olivia—would have an expression of sadness and reminiscence. "It's been a year, you don't have to keep coming… we weren't even friends."
"Well, that didn't stop you from stalking me for weeks when I found you at school and then following me everywhere, did it?" Kath shrugged, her demeanor showing that she wasn't really upset despite her words.
"That's because you're the only one who can see me." The guttural echo of Olivia's voice did not fail to convey her defensive stance when called a stalker.
"Don't remind me, I used to forget that little detail in the first weeks, and now everyone at school thinks I'm crazy." While complaining, Kath took her tools and moved to the next grave, trying to make the most of her visit by leaving the place as clean as she could.
An uncomfortable silence filled the air for a second before Olivia responded, somehow making her voice sound even drier and more expressionless than usual. "The whole town thinks you're crazy."
AWOOOOOOO!
The distant howl of a wolf interrupted the conversation before Kath could come up with a witty response, drawing Olivia's dark gaze to the north and sending an almost unnatural chill gripping Kath's spine.
"…Olivia, have you ever seen a wolf in this forest?" Though she tried to hide the fear seeping into her bones, Kath's hands weren't steady as she hurriedly put her tools back into her backpack.
"Kath, there are no wolves in England; they were driven to extinction in the 16th century." Kath had a strange expression on her face when she heard Olivia's response, looking at the ghost as if the strangest thing about her wasn't her supernatural existence beyond death but that she knew such an oddly specific fact.
"Don't give me that look. If you paid more attention in classes other than literature and history, you might remember these things." Olivia didn't seem pleased with the look she was getting, so she didn't hesitate to take a jab at the redhead.
Kath didn't need anyone to remind her of her illustrious academic career, as she was very aware of her failings, not to mention there was a much more important matter at hand. "Well, if what you say is true, then there are two possible scenarios: the first is that we just heard the first wolf in several centuries to set foot on the British Isles, and the second is that whatever is in the forest howls very similarly to a wolf."
Kath didn't even look behind her as she quickly tightened the straps on her backpack before slinging it over her shoulder. "And guess what? I don't plan on staying to find out which of the two scenarios it is. No offense, Olivia, but I'm not too eager to join your ranks anytime soon."
If she could express her emotions through the mask of paleness and coldness she wore for a face, Olivia would have rolled her eyes at the redhead. "Really, ghost jokes?"
Quickening her pace on the way back, with no intention of claiming the discovery of a new species of British wolves or anything similar, Kath simply replied. "What? You don't stay with me for my sense of humor; you do it because I'm the only one in this godforsaken little town who can see you."
Olivia Greenwood's ghost wisely chose not to argue or criticize Kath's terrible sense of humor any further. After all, even though they couldn't be said to be super best friends, she hadn't forgotten how her non-life had been before meeting Kath and had no intention of going through that experience again.
With the conversation over, Kath poured every drop of her limited physical capacity into getting out of the forest as quickly as possible. Normally, a not-so-athletic girl like her wouldn't have made such an effort just because of a slightly spookier sound in a forest she often visited, but that changed when the same howl repeated a couple more times and seemed to be getting closer.
"Olivia, I swear to God, if this is another prank by one of your ghost friends, the next time I come, I'll wash their graves with holy water and cover their tombs with salt." Finding the possible pursuit nothing funny and already feeling the burn in her lungs, Kath vented her frustration by threatening with the only means she knew to deal with ghosts, something she had learned over the years more out of necessity than curiosity.
To Kath's surprise and fear, Olivia never responded. Scared, Kath tried to steal a quick glance behind her. In doing so, she discovered that, at some point, Olivia had disappeared, which was strange since she only did that when there were other people around or when she encountered something supernatural besides herself.
Such thoughts were still crossing the reckless redhead's mind, who dared to run through a forest at night without watching where she was going when the feeling of colliding with something solid filled Kath with surprise and a hint of pain.
A second round of pain quickly escalated from her backside as Kath found herself forcibly backing up and falling on her back after colliding with something… or someone?
Kath had to look up considerably to fully contemplate the person she had crashed into. One could imagine her surprise when what she found was a figure with an imposing physique dressed almost entirely in black, wearing a leather jacket and a dark helmet that concealed their face.
Considerably dazed by both the collision and the sudden appearance of a super suspicious person in the forest in the middle of the night, Kath took a moment to react when the other party extended a hand to her. Coming out of her stupor, and feeling that the other party had no ill intentions, no matter how somber their appearance, Kath accepted the help and stood up.