HUNNY

Jackson was a small town with little to do if you were a teenager, so the seventeen-year-old residents favoured a drive to Cindersnap forest just on the outskirts to chug back beer and complain every little thing that nipped at their minds. The night sky was so clear that you could count every star, and the air was filled with the scent of pine and the earthy aroma of the forest.

These yearly camping trips shifted in nature when Jesse and Dina got together. Ellie appreciated that they would let her tag along with them but she couldn't help the slight bitterness that crept into her thoughts when she watched the two of them whisper and giggle in hushed tones. It was no different around a campfire than in the school cafeteria or the back of her geography class.

Jesse's playlist hummed softly through an old speaker while Dina stood up, plunging her hand into the cooler to pull out a can of the shittiest beer they could find. "Guys, watch," She spoke, calling the attention over to herself before she punctured a small hole into the bottom of the beer can, cracked the top open and chugged. Dina was far from loving the flavour but drank nonetheless until beer dribbled down her chin and onto her bright red hoodie. 

"Was that meant to be impressive?" Ellie asked but she couldn't fight the smile on her face.

"Yeah, because you can out-drink the shotgun queen," Dina sunk back into her foldable lawn chair, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Who gave you that title?" Jesse looked to his right to face his girlfriend.

"Sarah McKinnon, April twenty-third," She announced, very matter of factly.

"Didn't realize we were carbon dating," Ellie pushed herself off the log she had been perched on for the last hour while she stared across the fire pit at her two friends through flames the colour of tangerine. "Alright, shotgun queen," She teased Dina, grabbing a beer from the cooler and holding her hand out for the pocket knife "I fear this is the day you get dethroned."

She sucked a sharp breath through her teeth, reaching into the pocket of her hoodie for the blade "I fear you are very mistaken."

Jesse raised an eyebrow, smirking. "You sure you can handle it, Williams?"

Ellie shot him a defiant look, popping the can and preparing to pierce it with the pocket knife. As she positioned the knife, the metal gave way too quickly, and the blade slipped past the can, cutting into her palm. "Fuck," She hissed in pain but simply switched the hand holding the beer can, wiping her bloody laceration onto her denim shorts. 

"Jeez," Dina said, a crease forming between her brows as she watched the blood soak into Ellie's shorts "Might wanna back down."

Ellie ignored her and sunk the blade into the can which sprayed its foamy contents into the fire before she quickly stopped the eruption by attaching her lips to the puncture and guzzling it back, tilting her head upwards to the moon. She crushed the empty can in her hand, smiling victoriously. "What do we think?" She asked "New queen?"

"Debatable, one of us cut their hand open and the other is perfectly intact," Dina held out her palm, expectantly "I'm taking away your knife privileges for the night, you are still permitted to drink beer like a regular human."

"Jesse?" Ellie looked toward the drowsy man, he pulled his hood over his head and leaned back with his arms crossed.

"I hate to say it Dina's got a pretty strong argument," 

"Wow," Ellie drew out "Not a shred of honesty around here."

"Please enlighten me," Dina says, leaning forward, elbows propped on her knees "How was butchering yourself better than my perfect chug?"

She was nearly offended that she had to explain herself "Uh, because I'm gonna have a sick ass scar and I cut myself and kept going."

"That was pretty badass," Jesse nodded.

"Yeah, sure," Dina scoffed though her tone was light-hearted "I expect you to write me an apology song for getting blood on my knife but I'll also accept gift cards."

"Too bad I will not be doing either of those things," Ellie wrapped her flannel higher around her body. She held her bleeding hand out in front of her, watching the red liquid pool out and drip down.

Jesse caught onto this small act "Does it hurt?"

"Nah," Ellie looked up at the pair, flyaways had fallen out from her ponytail and framed her freckled face "I should probably call it a night though." She could feel eyes on her as she rose to her feet, awkwardly holding her hand out so she didn't wreck her clothes further. Part of her wanted to stay up until the morning light hung overhead but the more rational half of her brain kindly reminded her that the last time she was tipsy by a fire she lit the cuffs of her pyjama pants on fire and had to endure the jokes to that very day.

"Goodnight," Jesse readjusted in his chair, tugging on his hoodie strings to tighten the hood clinging around his head.

"Night, Els," Dina gave her a little smile, scootching her chair closer to Jesse.

It would've been nice if they thought ahead enough to bring bandaids but alas, Ellie had to pour some water from her plastic bottle over it and let the cut encrust with a scab. Though the campsite was barren that night, usually, she could hear the sounds of families and couples chatting amongst themselves but then it had only been crickets chirping between blades of grass and the distant sound of her two friends laughing.

It wasn't rocket science to remember where they pitched their tents, it was the same every time they visited the sight: right next to the wood-splitting block, a red axe wedged in the center for whoever needed to cut firewood. 

She paused, her senses sharpening. The habitual sounds of crickets and rustling leaves seemed to have stilled. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up as if responding to an unseen presence. Ellie turned her head slowly, scanning the darkness. She couldn't shake the feeling that eyes were on her, watching from the concealment of the trees.

Without waiting another beat, Ellie ducked into her tent, bright yellow and a stark contrast to the black one that Dina and Jesse would be sharing. That was another thing she hadn't been fond of when the couple started dating, they used to share one big tent to simply sleep under the stars but now that they were separated Ellie was still kept awake by the pair's constant flow of conversation.

Ellie didn't bother to change out of her flannel, all she did was take her bloodied shorts off and slip into a pair of clean sweatpants. She wasn't one to be neurotic over what she wore, especially when she was camping and the only ones to behold her were the beedy eyes of animals. 

She lay in her sleeping bag, nestled within the comforting embrace of her tent, a duffle bag propped under her head as a makeshift pillow. The day had been long and filled with hours of roaming around the woods and eating smoked hotdogs by the lake. As the night dragged on, Ellie's weariness grew, her eyelids heavy with exhaustion. Despite her unease, sleep eventually claimed her, and she drifted into a fitful slumber.

It was nearby rustling that had woken her. She heard it then, pounding against the beaten dirt ground, at first Ellie had assumed it to be either Jesse or Dina until she checked her phone and saw the time read two thirty-seven am. Looking at the thin walls of her tent she was searching for the warm surge of light peaking through that signalled her two friends were still at the fire though all that shone was dim moonlight, no sign the pair were even in the vicinity.

A low, menacing snarl, so deep it reverberated through her bones. The sound was close, too close. Her breath hitched, and her heart pounded in her chest. She could barely make out the shape of something moving just beyond the circle of light cast by the moonlight, a hulking shadow blending into the darkness and dancing on the canvas of her tent. 

With the sound of a guttural growl, her heart lurched in her chest. Fear shot through her veins like ice as she realized she was no longer alone in the darkness of her tent. She scrambled to sit up, her hand instinctively reaching for the zipper to flee, but before she could even make a move, a massive weight crashed into her. A muzzle with jagged black rotting gums tore through the yellow polyester tent.

Pain exploded in her thigh as sharp teeth sank into her flesh, tearing through fabric and skin alike. Ellie screamed, her voice drowned out by the ferocious growls of the creature attacking her. She fought back desperately, kicking and flailing, but its grip was unrelenting, its strength overwhelming.

Through the haze of agony and panic, Ellie caught a glimpse of yellow eyes gleaming in the darkness, filled with primal hunger and fury. It was a wolf, its fur matted and stained the colour of a rusted penny with dried and crusted blood, a creature driven by instinct and desperation. It was unsettlingly large, it’s haunches muscular.

It had felt like every part of her leg was torn apart, fangs clamping down in a new spot every time to get a good grasp of its prey. It was like someone was using a dull axe to butcher her, an axe so dull you had to muster up all of your brute force to make an impact and whoever was wielding the axe wasn't a skilled woodsman, their cuts were messy and they never landed in the same spot. Ellie was sure this would be it for her, dead in the Cindersnap forest, her remains never to be found, discarded in her ruin of a tent until animals picked apart her dead carcass. 

Her mind raced, adrenaline coursing through her veins as she fought for her life. She clawed at the ground as the wolf began to drag her away from the tattered wreckage, her nails leaving marks on the ground as cried out. She could feel her strength waning, her vision blurring as darkness threatened to consume her.

Just when she was ready to end her thrashing and let herself be eaten alive, a flurry of movement and shouts echoed from nearby. Through the haze of pain, Ellie heard Jesse and Dina's voices, their cries filled with fear and urgency. They had heard her screams, and now they were screaming themselves. 

Jesse didn't wait another second before he pulled the red axe from the wood-splitting block, he raised it over his head as he had practiced for years of cutting logs and brought it down onto the spine. The wolf let out a yelp, its body contracting, teeth scraping over Ellie's calf as it turned its attention to Jesse. 

He didn't want to take the risk that it would take its turn at him or Dina, so he swung again, hitting it in the neck. Jesse's grip had slipped from the handle, letting the axe sink into the neck, the wolf staggered and whined. It growled low for a few moments that stretched into eternity until its abnormally large body collapsed on the ground over the top of Ellie. She could hear its ragged breath, see the life slipping from its amber eyes as its sanguine blood pooled over her. 

Everyone waited for the animal to go limp but it just writhed there until Jesse used his foot to repeatedly kick the beast until it rolled off Ellie, he pulled the axe out and swung again, this time it fell flaccid, with no more unsteady rise in its chest. Just stillness.

"What the fuck!" Dina shouts, her arms thrown out in front of her in exasperation, eyes pulled wide by the terror before her.

Dina ducked down, hooking one of Ellie's arms around her, urging Jesse to grab his car keys from his bag. In a short amount of time, both of them were on either side of her, supporting Ellie while they practically hauled her to Jesse's truck, leaving everything behind.

Both Dina and Jesse were speaking affirmation into her ears, trying to reassure her that this memory would long pass them but everything just rang in her head, mind going numb. 

She couldn't focus on anything other than the bloody mass that consumed her leg. Long serrated wounds and sunken teeth markings lined all the way up her leg, from the scrapes on her thigh to the flab of flesh on her calf that was being held together only by tendons. She finally released the sob that was building in her throat, it was like every awful thing she had ever felt was seeping through the gaps of her teeth. 

Looking down at her clothes soaked in blood that wasn't one hundred percent hers and clung to her body she saw her future slipping away. The soccer scholarships she had put everything towards gone in the span of the few minutes that it took the wolf to maul her.

They reached the car, and Jesse opened the back door while Dina carefully eased Ellie into the seat, trying to keep pressure on her wounds. Blood stained the seats, but that was the least of their concerns. Jesse jumped into the driver's seat, starting the engine with shaking hands. Dina climbed in beside Ellie, never taking her eyes off her friend and gently caressing her head with wiry hands intended to soothe.

Inside her head, thoughts rang through like bullets, each coming faster and more panicked than the last. She couldn't look at Dina or the street lights gliding past them, it was just Ellie staring at her near mangled leg. She couldn't even hear her heart beat like it was a prisoner to her rib cage. She closed her eyes, clamping them and trying to wake up from this terribly painful nightmare but there it was burned into the forefront of her brain, the wolf with rotten gums and jagged teeth digging into her leg and peering into her head with those loathsome yellow eyes. 

"Ellie?"

Ellie groaned and blinked several times, trying to get her eyes to readjust to the stark light flooding into her bedroom from the hallway. It had been three days since the mauling and Ellie was more than happy to seclude herself so she could avoid those pitiful stares from the public.

Joel stopped in the doorway as his eyes hit the darkness of the room. The first sign that something was really wrong was just how dark it was. There were blankets up over the windows, blocking out any trace of daylight that might be able to bleed its way in. In the blackness, as his eyes adjusted, he could see her in the middle of her bed, blankets pulled to her neck despite the warm weather, facing away from him, staring at nothing.

"Kiddo, are you sure you don't want me to take the day off?" He furrowed his eyebrows, studying the limp figure of his daughter. She had been in the exact same position when he came into her room the night before.

"Yes."

His eyes shifted to the plate of food he had left on her dresser last night before he went back to the dining table to eat his dinner alone. The pasta was untouched, the sauce became gelatinous, and everything in the bowl just stuck together as one thing. With a disgruntled sigh, Joel took the cold bowl of pasta and replaced it with warm French toast and a little side of syrup. "Ellie, you gotta eat something."

"Okay." She had been saying that for the last three days, agreeing with whatever Joel asked of her without actually doing it. This included showering, her auburn hair was greasy and unkept in a ponytail. The gauze wrapped around her leg and tucked beneath the splint was beginning to smell like vinegar.  "I mean it," He said firmly "It doesn't gotta be this breakfast, you can go downstairs and get something from the fridge or ask Dina to bring some takeout, maybe Tommy and Maria could come over and cook ya something. Some sunlight wouldn't hurt either."

"Okay," Ellie repeated, voice mellow. Had there been another source of noise in the room Joel wouldn't have heard her at all.

The animosity simmers for a minute while Joel regards her with fretful eyes "Is it the painkillers?" He asked "Or the antibiotics? We can try a smaller dosage."

The figure on the bed looks lifeless, had she not spoken to him moments prior, Joel would've assumed the worst. She only been released from the hospital the morning before and she had spent her entire time back home staring at her wall like a blood-sniffing shark.

"I can't sleep," She said, voice flat. "I'm so tired and I can't sleep."

"Do you want me to grab some melatonin?" 

"No."

"Maybe if you got out of bed for a bit it would tire you out."

"Please just go away."

Joel pressed his lips into a thin line, lowering his chin in the slightest "I'm gonna head out now, just thought I'd come to say hi," He waited a moment for Ellie to respond then waited another, accepting the stillness he spoke again "I'll be home at three, maybe we can cook dinner together."

"I just want to sleep."

"Alright," He turned "I'll let ya sleep."

It had been seventy-six hours since Ellie last slept, a moment before she was dragged out of her tent and chewed up like gum between a heavy jaw. She had spent the first two days gazing up at the obscenely bright hospital ceiling, the lights burned her retinas but she couldn't look away. 

In the hospital, she had refused to eat when the nurses insisted she had thrown up her guts and they decided that a drip feed would be mandatory. If only she could sleep or drink. The insomnia was worse than the thirst. It was driving her mad. It had been days, full, entire days since she had slept.

 She was afraid to look in the mirror or at the camera of her phone because she had an idea of the gaunt face that would be looking back at her and the vague idea mortified her. 

On the fourth night from the mauling, something had begun to seethe inside of Ellie, she shot up, drenched in sweat. Her body felt as if it were on fire, a searing heat coursing through her veins. She threw off her blankets in a desperate attempt to cool down, but the air in her room was no relief. The heat radiating through her body was so intense it felt like there were bugs crawling beneath her skin, burrowing and laying their eggs before they chewed their way out. 

She stumbled out of bed, her legs shaky and weak, barely supporting her weight. Her skin felt raw and tender, the sensation unbearable. Instinctively, she began to scratch, her nails digging into her arms, trying to soothe the burning that seemed to radiate from within. The throbbing pain from her leg had been subdued by the fire burning beneath her skin.

Ellie began to scrape the skin on her forearms, followed by her neck, torso and legs, everything was stinging with this scolding sensation. She had gashed at her skin frantically, twisting her body and clawing at it in an attempt to make it stop, all that this did was turn her skin red and leave nail marks across it. 

Summoning all her strength, Ellie crawled to the bathroom. She pulled herself up to the sink, using the counter for support, and then, with determination for this to end, she stumbled into the shower.

She turned the handle to the coldest setting and, without a second thought, stepped under the icy spray, fully clothed. The shock of the cold water took her breath away, but it also brought immediate relief. The burning sensation began to fade as the cold water soaked through her clothes, cooling her fevered skin.

Ellie leaned against the tiled wall, letting the cold water wash over her. Her breath came in ragged gasps, but she felt her body temperature slowly beginning to drop. The pain and burning subsided to a dull ache, and for the first time in what felt like hours, she could think clearly. 

Without meaning to she let out a choked cry, hands running down her face while she looked down at her body. The splint was now soaked with ice water and the red scratch marks covering almost every inch of bare skin visible. 

Ellie stood there, her mind foggy and overwhelmed by the fever. She had no idea what was happening to her body, why it was betraying her in such a painful way. The room spun around her, shadows dancing on the walls, and she fought to stay conscious, fearing what might happen if she let go. Suddenly the concept of sleep was feeling very frightening.

On the fifth night, Ellie had hobbled her way down the stairs, splint dragging behind her after Joel had told her he was worried and went to bed. She was driving herself insane, she could hear her own heartbeat and the wet squelch of her blinking pounding in her ears.

Her thoughts often returned to the shotgun in the shed. She craved death in the same way she used to crave a Gatorade at a track meet. She was loyal to her numbness like a penny in the pocket of a priest. 

She hadn't before thought about killing herself, not until she had been kept awake for five days by the image of glowing amber eyes ripping her apart. Something was most definitely wrong with her body. She knew the very second she looked in the mirror, past her baggy clothes her collarbones had jutted out and her ribcage was prominent beneath freckled skin. How her spine grated against everything she laid across would have almost any other person in a ward.

Joel's casual steps in the hallway had morphed in her ears to the sound of heavy boots stomping on sheets of metal. The night was preferable to the day when children would run through the streets and throw water balloons at each other on neighbours' lawns. Each screeching laugh she heard brought her closer to hammering nails into her ears just so she could avoid those little sounds.

It didn't help that she could smell everything too. Joel's morning coffee was usually the scent that kept her awake staring at the ceiling followed by all of his wallflowers which she had taken the liberty of unplugging and hiding in the shed next to the shotgun. She had also sniffed out her almost ancient body sprays from middle school and thrown them out, it had taken her minutes to source out the smell that was burning in her nose.

What brought her downstairs that night had been her appetite, intense and sinking. She was sure hunger would have killed her. Five days of an empty stomach that rejected everything she put into it ended with a brief shaking moment where she was filled with an insatiable craving that hit her all at once like a thousand knives to the gut.  

During one of Joel's daily checkups, he informed her that he bought ribeye steaks and suggested they have a mini barbeque with Tommy and Maria but Ellie did little more than sink further into the mattress where she had rotted. It was clear with every passing second that something was deeply wrong with Ellie at first she chalked it up to side effects from all the anti-biotics and painkillers and insisted to Joel that was the only issue but with her smell and hearing overwhelmingly strong she was sure the problem was something more unnatural. 

The moon hung low in the night sky, casting a silvery light through the kitchen window. Ellie stood at the stove, the sizzle of the steak in the cast-iron skillet filling the quiet house. The aroma of searing meat was intoxicating, stirring a deep, hunger within her. She tried to ignore the gnawing craving that had plagued her since the transformation, but tonight it was particularly strong.

The house was quiet, but her senses, now heightened beyond the norm, picked up the smallest sounds. She could hear the soft creak of the house settling, the distant hum of a car engine on the road, and something else—something closer.

Her ears twitched at the faint sound of soft footsteps outside. She focused, and the noise became clearer. Tiny, deliberate steps on the wooden porch, accompanied by a rapid, almost fluttering heartbeat. A cat.

On the patio, she could hear the neighbour's overweight calico cat, Fudge. He favoured the Miller household on the nights the Andersons fell asleep before letting him inside. She could hear his little paws padding up the wooden steps and then find his perch on the rails of the patio that Joel renovated himself, they were sturdy enough to support the pudgy cat. 

She turned her attention to meticulously seasoning the steak, her movements precise and controlled, a desperate attempt to hold on to the rational part of her. As the meat cooked, she watched it intently, the marbling of fat melting into the rich, red flesh. The scents were overwhelming, and she swallowed hard, trying to maintain her composure. She stood right in front of it, counting down the seconds she had to cook it.

Compared to Joel, Ellie was awful at cooking meat. He prided himself on his barbeque skills, one of his most valued possessions was his meat smoker and the thoughts of warm July days, sitting on the back porch and eating whatever Joel had cooked made her eyes gloss over with craving. 

After a few minutes, Ellie flipped the steak, listening to the satisfying crackle as it hit the hot pan. Her mouth watered, and her senses were alive with the sounds and smells of cooking. She focused on the task, grounding herself in the familiar routine, hoping it would keep the feeling at bay.

Once the steak was perfectly cooked to a rare finish, she plated it carefully, adding a simple garnish of herbs for no other reason besides she thought it looked fancy. She carried the plate to the dining table, her steps measured and deliberate. She wanted to eat like she used to, to enjoy a meal with dignity and grace, but the primal hunger was a constant, roaring presence in the back of her mind.

Ellie sat down, taking a deep breath to steady herself. She cut the first piece of steak, the juices running onto the plate, and brought it to her lips. The taste was incredible, a burst of flavour that seemed to ignite every nerve in her body. She closed her eyes, savouring it, trying to hold on to this semblance of normalcy.

But with each bite, the hunger grew stronger. It was a living thing, a beast clawing its way to the surface. Her hands trembled as she cut another piece, the silverware clinking loudly against the plate. Her entire body shook as she raised another piece to her mouth, eyes focused on the slab of meat with an untamed desire. 

Unable to resist any longer, Ellie dropped the fork and knife. She reached for the steak with her bare hands, the warm meat pulsing in her grip. She brought it to her mouth, tearing into it with a ferocity that shocked her. Juices ran down her chin, and she barely noticed, lost in the primal act of feeding.

She devoured the steak, her senses overwhelmed by the taste, the texture, and the sheer satisfaction of fulfilling her deepest hunger. It was messy, undignified, and utterly freeing.

When the steak was gone, Ellie sat back, her breathing heavy, her hands and face smeared with the remnants of her meal, juices from her bloody steak dripping down her arms and chin. She bordered between a mix of shame and relief.

Ellie stared down at her empty plate. She was sick. Sick with the hole in her stomach that screamed at her for more, slowly it began to grow.

She rose from the table, her movements now driven by instinct rather than conscious thought. Crossing the kitchen, she opened the refrigerator door, the cold air washing over her. Her eyes scanned the contents hungrily. There, in the pull out meat drawer, were several packets of lunch meat. She grabbed the first one, ripping it open with ease. It was roast beef, and she shoved slices into her mouth, barely chewing before swallowing. The taste was salty, a little too salty yet she still choked it back.

Next, she pulled out a packet of pepperoni, her fingers working frantically to tear it open. The rich, spicy scent hit her nose, making her mouth water. She devoured the entire pack in seconds, the flavours bursting on her tongue, she discarded the plastic packaging on the floor. She reached for more, tearing through packages of ham and turkey, ripping them open effortlessly with her teeth, the cold cuts vanishing almost as quickly as she could open them.

But even after consuming all the lunch meat, she wasn't near satiated. Her gaze fell upon a package of raw chicken breasts. A part of her recoiled at the thought, but the urge overrode any hesitation. She snatched the package, ripping it open, the raw meat cool and slick in her hands. She brought a piece to her mouth, hesitating only for a moment before biting into it. The taste was different, raw and unseasoned, it was delicious.

Ellie ate piece after piece, the raw chicken disappearing into her ravenous maw. She didn't understand the compulsion, the gnawing hunger that drove her to this. The raw meat was smooth and slippery against her teeth, leaving a small coating of gel on her lips. The sensation was alien and unnerving, yet she couldn't stop herself from biting down.

When the last piece was gone, she stood in the dim light of the open refrigerator, her breathing ragged, as she stared at the empty meat drawer. 

She walked to the sink and began to wash her hands and face, the cold water a shock against her skin, grounding her once more in the reality of her situation. She watched as the water ran red, the remnants of her raw feast swirling down the drain. When she was clean, she dried her hands and looked at her reflection in the kitchen window, the moonlight casting her features in a pale glow. The mess she had made, juice from animal carcasses dribbling down her chin and her pale green eyes seemingly brighter than ever. 

Ellie wanted to be terrified by her actions but the truth was that it was the leading cause for her to finally fall asleep when her head hit the pillow. It was also the reason why she woke up the next morning feeling amazing. 

She was up even before Joel. After wrapping her splint in a plastic bag to keep it dry, she stepped into the shower, letting warm water run over her skin. The last few days she felt too weak to even carry her own weight and now she could see the muscle of her skin like she had just gone for a run and they were still burning.

Closing her eyes she gently washed away at the grease of her scalp with her head and shoulders shampoo and scrubbed at her skin with body wash until the smell of the previous night's binge was gone completely. 

For a few minutes, she felt almost at peace until she stepped out of the shower and wrapped herself in a towel. Last night's rampage had been undeniably weird but she kept coming up with new excuses for her behaviour. With extensive googling she found out she wasn't the only one to crave meat so intensely, it was a symptom of malnutrition and while she knew that couldn't be it she tried to accept the coverup to repeat to herself. 

Using her forearm, she wiped the steam from the mirror. She looked at her reflection, expecting to see the familiar face she'd always known. But something was different. She leaned closer, frowning at the sight of her eyes, which seemed to have strange, golden flecks over her usually pale green iris. Shaking her head, she dismissed it as a trick of the light.

She grabbed her toothbrush and toothpaste, eager to complete her morning routine. As she squeezed the toothpaste onto the brush, she caught a glimpse of her teeth in the mirror. She paused, her heart skipping a beat. Her teeth looked sharper and more prominent.

Ellie dropped the toothbrush into the sink, her eyebrows furrowed as she brought unsteady hands up to her mouth. She ran her fingers over her teeth, feeling the unmistakable points of her canines, now lengthened into fangs. It wasn't real, it couldn't be. Maybe her teeth had always looked like that. She pressed her finger into the canine until it drew blood. 

A wave of panic washed over her. She opened her mouth wider, examining the fangs from different angles. They were not the teeth of a human—they were the teeth of a predator. 

It felt like her blood had run cold. Maybe she was turning into a vampire, she remembered watching those corny series about teen girls sprouting fangs and drinking blood. There were werewolves, she had been bitten by a feral beast and barely escaped with her life. 

She never even believed in myths and legends, it felt all too ridiculous to even consider the possibility. 

Ellie hurriedly pulled on clean clothes, the shock of seeing her fangs still reverberating through her mind. Determined, she went downstairs and perched herself at the dining table. She sat hunched over with her phone out in front of her, an absurd amount of unanswered texts that she didn't plan on responding to. Her fingers hesitated over the keyboard. What was she even looking for? Strange teeth growth? Uncontrollable hunger?

She took a deep breath and started with a simple search: 'sudden appearance of fangs'

The results were varied and mostly unhelpful—articles on dental anomalies, vampire fiction, fang cosmetic procedures, teeth shaving, and clickbait about dental surgery gone wrong. Ellie scrolled past these, her frustration mounting. 

She tried another search: 'uncontrollable hunger for raw meat'

This search yielded more unusual results. Articles about rare medical conditions and eating disorders that favoured odd cravings. But also folklore and myths about creatures that fed on raw flesh. She clicked on a few links, her eyes scanning quickly over the text.

One phrase kept popping up: 'lycanthropy.' Her heart pounded as she typed the word into the search bar.

Pages upon pages of information about werewolves appeared. She read through them, her disbelief battling with the mounting evidence. Accounts of transformations triggered by bites, the phases of the moon influencing behaviour, the insatiable hunger for raw meat—all of it sounded disturbingly familiar.

She stumbled onto forums full of people discussing what they would do if they were a werewolf, how they transformed and who would they kill. There were others posting about their favourite horror movies based on werewolves, an entire article about Remus Lupin. She hesitated, then searched for 'werewolf bite symptoms' There wasn't anything useful that she had read. 

All she had were three of dozens of symptoms. Ellie didn't have weird hair growth, super strength, claws, or abnormal aggression. Typing in werewolves onto Google she was met with a subreddit full of discussion. Ellie began writing out her issue, ready to air her weird behaviour to equally weird strangers on the internet who might offer up some answers. 

astronautical: I think I might be a werewolf- Okay, I know I sound really fucking stupid saying that but please just listen to me. Last week I was on a camping trip and was pulled out of my tent and mauled by a wolf, the first three days in the hospital they had to drip feed me because I wouldn't eat and when I got home it was more or less the same. I didn't sleep since the attack until last night after I binge-ate raw meat and dead ass when I woke up my canines were fangs. A couple nights ago I had a weird hot flash kinda thing but I'm far from menopause, it was like my skin was on fire. My hearing and smell is crazy strong, like I can hear the heartbeat of my neighbour's cat. Can someone please tell me if they have experience with werewolf stuff or if there's another medical issue this could point to? I'm not crazy, I swear. 

xHexical: honestly sounds like rabies 

hunnylagoon: bro thinks they're teen wolf 

cocoah00ves: This could be purely psychological. A lot of times animal attacks can cause trauma even if you don't realize it. PTSD can put you on edge which could be why you're hearing and sense of smell seem to be very strong, trouble sleeping and lack of appetite are other symptoms. If you really restricted food for a few days then your body was likely suffering from iron deficiency and was telling you to eat meat. The heat flash could've been caused by your injury and enunciated by your mental state. As for the canines, hallucination, your teeth are not as sharp as you think they are. 

zylez: Mate you have rabies 

aggravating_olive_38: I wish this was real bc it would be sick asf

littlethought63: This that girl from Wyoming? 

schumber: You mentioned a lack of sleep and that might be causing you to spiral a bit. Take some sleeping pills and mellow out. 

dazednaware: I think it's a PTSD response :( try therapy 

     mcwhoremick-responding to dazednaware: try getting some dick you dumb cunt

          dazednaware-responding to mcwhoremick: ???

multifandomtrash258: friendly reminder this subreddit is intended for discussion of werewolves, not fictional stories or roleplay accounts

With an exasperated groan, Ellie turned her phone off and put it face down on the table just as she heard Joel thumping down the stairs. She felt like her brain had rotten entirely, there was no way she had seriously considered that she was a werewolf.

"Wow," Joel said, one hand up his gray t-shirt and scratching his back "You're up."

"Yeah," She tried for a smile but it still came across as melancholic, it was hardly a smile just lips pressed together in a thin line that carried the ghost of one.

"Well-uh, ya' want breakfast?" He asks in a beeline for the coffee maker, pulling out a mug from the cupboard which reads 'Worlds greatest farter (I mean father)' Ellie thought the corniness of it was hilarious and gifted it to him just a month earlier on Father's Day.

"Sure, if you make bacon." 

Joel was a little taken aback that she was finally accepting the invitation to breakfast. He was shocked that she even had an appetite albeit thankful "Sure, kid." He left his mug beneath the coffee maker, as he waited for it to fill he went into the fridge to retrieve the bacon. He opened the fridge, his brow furrowing in confusion as he scanned the shelves. "Ellie, where did that chicken go?"

Ellie's heart skipped a beat, panic rising in her chest. She hadn't thought about the consequences of her meat-eating binge the night before. "Um, yeah, I got pretty hungry last night," She kept her voice as nonchalant as possible. 

"You ate all of it?" His eyebrows furrowed slightly, newly mourning the loss of his forty-dollar pack of chicken. 

"Yup," She was just thankful he hadn't noticed the missing steak and lack of lunch meat. 

 "I'm glad you're eating but Jesus Christ girl," he muttered "Next time don't eat us outta house and home."

Joel expertly flipped the bacon in the skillet, the sizzle of fat hitting the hot surface and filling the kitchen with a mouthwatering aroma. The savoury scent drifted through the air, tempting Ellie's senses as she watched her father work his culinary magic. The smell of the bacon worked to conceal the stench of coffee that Ellie despised. "How many pieces do you want?" He asked her.

She craned her neck up to look at the bacon frying on the pan "Whatever's left."

His brows shot up, wrinkled creases forming on his head. This wasn't the first time Ellie had some odd eating tendencies, when they had first met and she was still in the foster system, she felt too out of place to eat. Once again when she was fourteen and starting high school, she lost all appetite, only picking apart her meals and leaving almost a full plate. Had she not starved herself for five days, Joel would've said something other than "Alright."

As soon as the bacon was cooked to crispy perfection, Joel transferred it to a plate lined with paper towels to drain. He turned to the stove, cracking eggs into the same skillet, the eggs sizzling in the bacon grease. He slid slices of bread into the toaster, the anticipation of a delicious breakfast filling the kitchen.

Ellie's stomach growled impatiently as she watched the food being prepared. The hunger that had plagued her for days now surged back with a vengeance, the scent of the bacon driving her wild with craving. She tried to resist, tried to focus on the eggs and toast that would make a complete breakfast, but her attention was fixated on the plate of bacon. "What are gonna do this summer?" Joel asked. She had intended to work her job at the movie theatre and plan the rest of the summer around that but with her leg torn up she couldn't possibly stand for hours on end, she could hardly walk. 

"I dunno," When Joel placed the plate of bacon on the table, Ellie's restraint snapped. Without a word, she lunged forward, snatching a piece of bacon and devouring it in a single bite. She barely registered the hot grease burning her lips as she reached for another piece, and then another.

Joel watched in surprise as Ellie wolfed down the bacon with alarming speed, barely pausing to chew before reaching for more. He opened his mouth to speak, concern etched on his face, but Ellie ignored him, her focus solely on the plate of meat before her. "Maybe pick up a new hobby?"

The eggs finished cooking, and Joel plated them alongside the toast, but Ellie barely spared them a glance. Her attention was consumed by the bacon, her hunger driving her to eat faster and faster, as if afraid it would disappear if she slowed down.

By the time Joel sat down across from her, his own plate in hand, Ellie had already polished off nearly half of the bacon. She barely acknowledged him as he began to eat, her eyes fixed on the remaining strips of meat.

Joel watched her with growing concern, the realization dawning on him that something wasn't right. "Ellie, slow down," he said, voice firm. "You're going to make yourself sick."

"Sorry," She halfheartedly spoke through a mouthful. 

"Christ," He muttered under his breath, taking a long swig of coffee "What's the plan for today?"

She shrugged "Sleep, I guess." 

He wished Ellie would do anything other than lay in bed and wilt away. Even if she just sat on the porch, he would be grateful.  "You should invite Dina over, she's been wanting to see you."

"Yeah, I know," Ellie's damp hair clung around her neck while she reached forward for more bacon. 

"Are you two fighting?"

"No."

"So what's going on?"

"Nothing, I just feel like shit and want to be alone." 

"Okay," he pressed his lips into a thin line, bringing his mug to his lips while he watched Ellie devour the rest of the bacon, paying no mind to the eggs or the toast. She finished her meal with a large glass of water that she chugged back in mere seconds before plopping herself on the couch and scrolling on her phone. 

As glad as he was to see that his daughter had finally showered and eaten, he had that deep lingering feeling in his gut that something had shifted inside of her. He feared that she wouldn't be the same without soccer or prospects on the horizon. 

While Joel was at work, Ellie had the bright idea of watching werewolf movies to gain some kind of grasp on whatever was happening. She refused to believe it was purely psychological and she was making all of this up in her head.

She started with the classics, fast-forwarding through the filler parts and scrutinizing the beginning when they were bitten and then the transformation. She chewed on a piece of jerky canines separating it with ease, wondering how much of what she was seeing was based on myth and how much might hold a kernel of truth.

Ellie had intended for these movies to be research for her condition, however, she had gotten distracted while watching Twilight and spiralled through the saga. If she really was a werewolf, were there vampires? What about witches? 

Were vampires like Dracula or Edward Cullen? Maybe there was a wide variety of them. It was also a strong possibility that she was suffering from something else like the continuous comments beneath her post suggested.

Rabies didn't click in her head, she had been given a shot almost immediately upon entering the hospital or so she was told. Nothing could rationalize, she was feral at night and that was a fact that she couldn't link to anything aside from insomnia which wasn't known for making people eat raw meat. 

Abruptly she turned the TV off, her thoughts proving to be too overwhelming. She chose to opt for another one of the suggestions under her post, take some sleeping pills and mellow out. It was at three pm Ellie took five sleeping pills and headed to the bathroom to brush her teeth.

Ellie closed the door softly behind her, flicking on the light switch. The harsh brightness of the bathroom light made her squint momentarily, but she forced herself to face the mirror. The reflection staring back at her was both familiar and disturbingly alien.

Ellie parted her lips, feeling her stomach churn with anxiety. She carefully pulled back her upper lip, revealing the source of her dread—her canines were no longer the small, nondescript teeth they had always been. Instead, they had elongated into sharp, pointed fangs, glistening ominously under the bathroom light. It wasn't a hallucination. They were growing even longer than they were that morning.

She turned her head from side to side, examining them from different angles. Her fingers trembled as she touched the tips of her fangs, feeling their razor-sharp edges. It was undeniable; these were not the teeth of a human. 

Tears welled up in her eyes as she grappled with the reality of her transformation. She closed her mouth, trying to make her fangs less noticeable, but the sensation of them pressing against her lower lip was impossible to ignore. 

-

She had successfully slept for seven hours. The moment she woke she had forgotten about her reality until she mistakingly bit her tongue, the taste of iron flooded her mouth and she wanted to cry all over again. 

Ellie lay in bed, her heightened senses picking up the smallest sounds around her. The house was quiet, but outside, she could hear the faint, delicate footsteps of a cat on the porch. The sound was unmistakable: soft pads against the wooden boards, a rapid, fluttering heartbeat. The primal hunger, which she had fought so hard to suppress, flared up once more.

She tried to resist, gripping the sheets tightly. Fudge sat on the spot on the patio that he always favoured. Ellie's hands pressed firmly into her ears as she dug her face into her pillow, trying to ignore the sound of the Anderson's cat stretching and the ravenous knawing inside of her. 

Once again, she was lying in bed and contemplating her own death. She needed whatever this was to go away as fast as possible. She thought she could keep it to herself so she wouldn't have to concern Joel but every passing second her mind flung between crying while she confessed or putting a shotgun in her mouth and pulling the trigger.

Ellie dragged herself out of bed, and moved down the hallway, her eyes lingering on Joel's bedroom door, slightly ajar, he was fast asleep inside. There was a hunger within her, she needed to eat something or she would chew through her own hand.

Back in the kitchen like the night before, there was nothing left for her in the fridge. Ellie moved to the freezer, where more meat awaited. She ripped open a package of chicken breasts, the frozen flesh burning her hands, but she didn't care. She gnawed at them, the icy texture a strange contrast to any other thing she'd consumed. She continued through the freezer, consuming everything she could find: pork chops, sausages, a roast that she chewed on like an animal.

Her fingers claw at the frozen packages of meat. She tore into packs of ground beef and pork chops, barely waiting for them to thaw. The coldness of the meat did little to dampen her fervour. Each bite was a temporary reprieve from the hunger, but it was never enough. Like a nicotine patch, it hardly worked then it was over. 

As the last of the meat disappeared, Ellie stood in the wreckage of her binge, her stomach churning with the mass of food she had consumed. Yet, the carnal hunger persisted, more powerful and demanding than ever. She felt a surge of desperation, a hankering that could not be satisfied by the lifeless offerings of the freezer.

She needed something fresh.

Her heightened senses picked up the faint sound of a heartbeat, the shuffle of tiny paws against the floorboards. Ellie moved to the door, her senses locked onto the cat outside. As she stepped onto the porch, the cat froze, its eyes wide and reflective in the moonlight. It sensed the danger, but it was too late. Ellie's vision sharpened, her hearing intensified, and her muscles coiled like springs. She could hear the Fudge's rapid heartbeat, see the minute twitch of his whiskers, and smell his fear.

Before the cat could react, Ellie lunged. She was fast, much faster than any human could be. Her hands, flexing, grabbed the cat with unerring precision. Fudge yowled, a high-pitched scream of terror, but the sound was cut short as Ellie's teeth sank into its flesh. Warm blood filled her mouth, and the taste sent a shiver of satisfaction through her body.

She tore into the cat with a ferocity that frightened her, the human part of her horrified by what she was doing, yet unable to stop. Ellie was a passenger in her own body. She devoured the cat quickly, the small body offering little resistance as she consumed it entirely, bones crunching under her powerful jaws.

When the last piece was gone, Ellie sat back on her heels, blood dripping from her mouth and hands, her breath coming in ragged gasps. The hunger was finally sated, but the reality of what she had done crashed down on her with overwhelming force. She looked around, dazed, the remnants of the cat scattered around her. The porch was now a scene of carnage.

Tears filled her eyes as she stumbled back inside, slamming the door shut behind her. She rushed to the sink, scrubbing her hands and face frantically, trying to wash away the evidence of her actions. The cold water stung her skin, but it did little to cleanse the horror she felt inside.

Ellie braced herself against the sink, her body shaking with sobs. She had lost control, given in to the craving, and now she was left with the consequences. The taste of blood lingered in her mouth, a bitter reminder of what she had become. Upstairs she could hear Joel shuffling and quickly moved to the sink to wash the blood off her. It was futile, it had covered the bottom half of her face and sunken into her T-shirt and grey sweatshirts.

When Joel reached the bottom of the staircase and saw the numerous empty packets of meat strewn across the kitchen along with the seventeen-year-old frantically wiping at her skin with a dirty dishcloth. Ellie knew Joel was behind her, she could hear his quickened heartbeat. Never had she felt so terrified, she couldn't face Joel and let him see what had soaked into her clothes, all she could do was let out a strangled sound that bordered between a scream and sob. 

"Ellie?" Joel inched closer, one hand gently landing on her shoulder. She dug her face into her collarbone, trying to prolong the inevitable until Joel used his free hand to face her toward him. He staggered back. Joel's eyes widened as he took in the scene before him—the sanguine covering Ellie, the bloodlust burning in her eyes. His voice was barely above a whisper as he spoke, his words heavy with disbelief.  "What the hell did you do?" 

That was how Ellie Williams spent the first week of her last summer. 

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Athens, Greece- October- 412 BC

Come back in one hundred years, you'll always find me here.

Rain splashes against the skin of your face in lands of ancient Greece, where the winds themselves whispered stories of gods and heroes, neither of which you were. You were nothing more than a frightened woman running away from an unforgiving husband in the dead of night where your quickened heartbeat falls in rhythm to the ocean which is almost as angry as the storm that roars above.

Carefully you dodge the jagged rocks sticking out from the sand, you had memorized each and every one after days of burning your skin on the shores. Water surged against the rocks near your feet, white froth sizzling in the waves retreating like it was trying to drag you in and take you for its own.

Your heavy breathing was devoured by the heavy rain and cracks of lighting, the sounds of thunder so deep it was like Zeus himself was stomping in the clouds. Despite the night being dark you trusted the moonlight that glimmered off of the ocean to guide you. You have nothing more than the soaking wet clothes on your back, jewelry to sell, and the drachmas you had stolen from your husband tucked away safely in a wool tagari purse.

Someone grabbed your wrist, stopping you in your tracks "Hey!" They say, though you can't quite make out the figure in the dark you know it's a woman from the voice alone. "You need to go home." Fear pushes adrenaline to course through your veins at the sound of an unheard tongue babbling in your ears.

Your eyebrows furrow, clutching the bag even harder in your free hand. "Φύγε από μένα!" You scream, trying to force your voice to be louder than the malicious storm that brews over your head. You try to pull your hand away but the woman stands firm hardly even moving.

"Fuck," She mutters, you don't understand a word. In this moment you feel like a rabbit preparing to get devoured by a wolf, whoever this woman was you were shaken to your core like you had just uncovered a dead body. "I forgot that you can't speak English yet."

You struggle under the grip of the woman, using the hand which was holding tightly onto the tagari and begin to hit the woman before you to pry her off your wrist "Δεν θα πάω πίσω, τον μισώ μέχρι θανάτου!" You shout voice loud as thunder.

"Ow!" She said wrinkling her nose and trying to apprehend the hand that was hitting her "Can you stop?" She asks, even though you can't understand her it's worth a shot in her mind.

This does nothing to stop your protest, you only hit her harder hammering your purse against her head until she finally lets go of your wrist to block your swinging. Lighting cracks and just for a moment you catch a glimpse of her. Short brown hair that falls at her shoulders, and freckles across her face, something you had never seen before. What frightened you wasn't the sharpness of her green eyes but her clothes, an alien concept to you. She didn't wear a tunic but a scratchy blue fabric tight on her legs and what to you resembled a baggy grey burlap sack with a piece of cloth hanging off the back. In recent years it has come to be known as jeans and a hoodie.

"Δαίμονα, μάγισσα, φύγε!" You smack her once more for good measure and turn quickly on your sandal-covered heel to get away from her. You were as wild and untamed as the ocean itself, with eyes that sparkled with a craving for more than honey dripping down your tongue and salt smeared across your lips.

"Remember I tried to help you this time!" She shouts, her voice is so far off in the distance that you barely heard it through the storm. Even if her words were clear it made no difference, you didn't speak her tongue, and any warning fell unheard upon your ears "Have fun being twenty forever!"

You ran even faster than you had before, you didn't even turn around to see if the woman was still on your tail.

The salty spray stung your cheeks as you ran, your breath ragged and steps unsteady. The wind howled in protest, whipping at the wet hair that stuck to your face and neck, tearing at your white peplos, turned translucent on your body by the water. But you paid no heed to the fury of the elements, for you were driven by a desperate need to escape.

As you reached the edge of a rocky outcrop, your leather sandal caught on a slick stone, sending you tumbling to the ground. With a sickening thud, your head struck against the unforgiving rock, and the world around you spun into darkness.

You were dead. Body limp on the plethora of rocks, the tide slowly lulling over your body until it swallowed you whole and sucked you in deeper. Ropes of hair twist before your dull eyes, unmoving into the deep.

You sink further in and open your eyes though you are still deceased, your body still falling cold. Selene stands before you in the form of midnight. Her body was ebony and deep blue, half woman, half moon. Long black hair like ink tipped with moonlight spills down her breasts and her hips, she watches you with her pale eyes imploring.

The goddess before you turns to lead the way, enticing you to follow. Each step sends knives through your limbs. Your mouth tastes like blood and your lungs burn red hot though every time you try to breathe you choke and sputter of nothing, still, you follow Selene into the nothingness ahead.

Finally, she turns, one finger pressed to her lips, signalling you to be quiet. Beside her, a pale soldier appears in fine silver armour chiselled against his muscular body. The areas that the armour does not cover, his arms and an area of his legs between the middle of his thighs to just below his knees, tattered bandages hang around his limbs, They sway in the nothingness and shed by themselves. You see open wounds deep and red, beginning to bleed but his pasty skin sews itself up, leaving no scar behind, nothing but smooth flesh. Wings larger than the man himself sprout from his back. Thanatos.

Thanatos bows his head, hiding his deep sunken eyes beneath a Corinthian helmet. You should be afraid that you face the god of death but you aren't. This is a better fate than being hauled back to your husband.

He takes his helmet off, long dark hair falls onto his shoulders and he regards you. Thanatos is wordless as he stares at you, taking in every of your face, every curve of your body. He doesn't speak but you understand him well, too much beauty to go to waste.

Selene has left you to take her place back in the night sky, she watches you were she hangs on a beam of moonlight. In one hand Thanatos holds a silver knife. Your voice betrays you, for once your loud screeching voice is lost.

He holds out his hand, pitch black at the fingertips. You can tell he is trying to strike a deal as if he had put his words into your mind without ever even moving his lips.

You look at his hand and then at his face, death was less frightening than you had imagined, handsome for a god who took so many lives. He lets his offer sit and settle within you, he doesn't try to sweeten the deal, he offers you another chance and that is that.

The second you shake Death's hand, he pulls away from your grip and takes the silver dagger to your heart. With ease, he slices back layers of flesh in one swoop leaving your bones exposed before him. Using what seemed to be little effort for the god of death, he breaks your ribs and pulls out your heart.

You watch it beat in his hand, the blood drifting out of it like ribbons that hook around your limbs, you know you have made a mistake. For the first time, Thanatos smiles. Oh, how the wolf wore the sheep as a wicked disguise. he squeezes the heart and at the crush of his hand, you feel ice shoot through your veins.

Your eyes open, properly open. You were alone. You wake up in nothing more than a metre of water and immediately cry out in pure terror at the horrifying images that your mind has conjured up. You run through the salty ocean and back to the shore.

The storm hadn't subsided which helped to camouflage your sobs as you frantically felt around your body with shaking hands to be sure that the god of death hadn't ripped out your heart. Surely enough, your rib cage was intact. You fall onto your hands and knees heaving up all of the ocean water you had swallowed.

The purse that held your resources for escaping had either been devoured by the ocean or stolen off your body. Your wirey hands touch the back of your hand, you expect to shudder under the pain of the open wound that knocked you unconscious. Instead of pain shooting from a gash in your head, you are perfectly intact.

You look down at your hands, no trace of blood.

Maybe it was time to start believing in myths because you were in one.

Rome - July- 116 AD

Don't they know it's the end of the world?

At the center of the world, you had been buried alive for three years after switching places with a Vestal Virgin who looked remarkably identical to you in exchange you gained a large sum for your alleged death. When you were buried you hadn't thought much about how you would get out, you just knew that you wouldn't suffocate or starve.

After the second year passed you were beginning to think that offering to get enclosed in a stone tomb with bread, water, oil, a candle, and a bed wasn't a great way to live your abnormally long life. The air grew stale, and the silence of the tomb echoed with the whispers of the dead that surrounded you on all four walls.

Before sleeping every single night, you prayed to the gods to take your life but they never listened. What you once thought to be a blessing had turned out to be a curse, no blessing would make you crave death the same way you craved sunlight and cream. You had given away the gift of aging for a sweet pleasure that quickly became bitter on your tongue.

The first few moons after you had slipped into unconsciousness you truly believed it at all been some strange hallucination caused by smacking your dead until you took a steep tumble and fell on your husband's hunting knife only to pull it out of your body and watch the skin over your stomach fix itself up, leaving no evidence behind that it had ever happened aside from the blood on the knife.

All you know to do is survive.

It's not like you hadn't tried to find a way out of it, some loophole that would shatter the deal and set you free. You had 527 years to try and make some sense of it, but you had given up and resorted to trying to find a way to end your life. Every time you did that, Ellie always showed up to help but you were back together.

You didn't understand the words that came from her mouth, all you knew was that her name was Ellie and she was cursed like you. What was she cursed with? You weren't sure but she seemed a little less miserable with you.

Ellie would come into your life now and then, usually an unwelcome surprise, she always knew where to find you. The only consistent face that you've seen for 527 years. She seemed to know more about you than you knew about her.

Overhead of the tomb, you see a crack of light slip through one of the stones that sealed you in. A tremor shook the earth, and the ancient stones of the tomb began to crumble. Light spilled into the darkness as the walls collapsed around you.

Surely enough Ellie's head looked down at you. She smiles and extends a hand to help you out "Sorry I took so long, I had to time it right with the earthquake, you picked poor timing to get buried alive." She hauled you up, and you stepped over the rubble with bare feet, careless of whether you gut them on the freshly shattered stone or not, you knew that they would heal over regardless.

Despite still not understanding her tongue you were for a change, glad to see her. As you suspected, your feet had been sliced up, leading a little trickle of blood in your wake. The moment you reached the surface, you collapsed to the ground. The city was crumbling around you but they were the ones who locked you away in the first place. You ignored Ellie's unknown words and felt the lush grass for the first time in three years, the heat of the sun resting on your skin.

Beside you, Ellie wrinkles her nose. "You've definitely smelled better," This is one of the times when she dresses appropriately for the era, a toga slung around her toned figure. "Oh, I thought you might be hungry so I brought this, I know you don't have to eat but I figured it would be nice," She unfolded a piece of cloth beside her revealing a small stack of round pastries that had little brown dark spots in it, nothing you had seen before.

You furrow your eyebrows, partly in confusion, partly because your eyes were still adjusting to the light after being enclosed in darkness for three years. "Τι κοιτάζω;"

"They aren't bad I promise," She says, she had made an effort to learn Greek for you but it proved too difficult, all she knew was the odd word. "They're cookies and don't tell anyone because I'm pretty sure they don't get invented for six hundred years."

Ellie speaks freely like you comprehend every word that she says. You make a face that almost resembles a snarl as you eye her and the cookies suspiciously.

"In a few more centuries we're cool with each other," She eats one of the cookies, slowly taking a bite to show you that they were edible. The cookies are a little too good however and she eats the entire thing in mere seconds, speaking through a mouth full of crumbs "Maybe more than a few centuries," She corrects herself "It's like a thousand years and then some but you come around."

She looks once more at the confusion on your face and gives up on trying to verbally communicate, instead she just holds the cloth holding the chocolate chip cookies towards you and looking into her eyes as sharp as a wolf, you hesitantly take one.

Norwich, England- November- 1327

I can't take my eyes of you.

In the dimly lit streets of the town, where the stench of death hung heavy in the air and fear gripped the hearts of its inhabitants. People no longer walked freely around town, they were either sick and on the trek to become puss-filled corpses or they locked themselves away and observed the demise of friends and foes from their windows.

You had seen civilizations rise and fall and witnessed the ebb and flow of history itself, but nothing could have prepared you for the horror that awaited you in the plague-ridden streets of the town. As the death toll rose with each passing day, you donned the garb of a plague doctor, your face concealed behind a grotesque mask adorned with beak-like protrusions filled with aromatic herbs that helped to cover the sickly sweet smell of rotten corpses.

Armed with little more than your knowledge of ancient remedies and a desperate desire to ease the suffering of the afflicted, you ventured into the heart of the epidemic, where the sick lay writhing in agony and the cries of the dying echoed through the night like they were eating themselves alive.

"Jeez, this isn't good," Ellie appears beside you, out of thin air like she tended to do. Now she was wearing a green dress, long bell sleeves and a golden trim around the dress, she wore a white vale pushing her hair back. Though she was dressed for the time period she looked out of place in the garb of a noblewoman, surrounded by the sick and dying peasants. "I can't stick around too long because an official vaccine for the bubonic plague isn't developed until 2072."

"How many people will die from this?" You ask, voice somewhat muffled from the leather mask, stuffed with herbs.

"About fifty," She trails off "Million."

You were not a god's chosen but a god's cursed. You had already suspected her to say something along those lines. Your voice failed as you watched the searchers who had been employed by the city, dragging dead bodies off into a pit to be buried in a mass grave.

"Look on the bright side-

"There is no bright side," You turn to walk away from her, shoving Ellie into the back of your mind.

With each patient you tended to, you felt the weight of your immortality pressing down upon her—a burden too heavy to carry, yet one you could not escape. You watched as the plague consumed the bodies and souls of those around you, leaving nothing but death and apathy in its wake, a dream that this would be over soon.

Immortality was a mockery, you thought yourself to be a spectacle to the gods above, nothing more than cruel entertainment. As much as you run, you get nowhere, you always end up in the same place, watching those you developed bonds and memories with die.

As the days turned into weeks, and the weeks into months, you fought tirelessly against the tide of death, your resolve unyielding even in the face of overwhelming odds. But with each passing day, her heart grew heavier, burdened by the weight of countless lives lost and the knowledge that she alone would bear witness to their suffering for eternity.

A boy on his porch cries for his mom and dad who will never be coming home, his sobs echo through the narrow streets like a wolf's howl.

As the moon cast its ghostly glow upon the desolate streets, you stood amidst a sea of bodies, your gloved hands stained with the blood of the fallen. The plague had taken its toll, claiming the lives of all those you had sworn to protect, leaving you alone in a world consumed by darkness.

Henry, a stonemason who had no family aside from his little brother now cries over his body. Sam, the young boy had been hit hard with the disease, the sores covered almost every inch of his body and turned black upon his ebony skin. You had watched every stage of his sickness, there was no cure other than comfort, the only thing you couldn't offer to Henry at that moment.

You could turn the brothers into poetry but you couldn't offer up the immortality that you carried like a cross you had to bear.

He held Sam's corpse in his arms, hugging him close and sobbing. Henry was freshly infected there was no way he would make it out alive though you weren't sure that he even wanted to after watching his baby brother's hands turn pitch black and seize up.

How strange that you, someone who was not deserving of eternal life, was the one burdened with it. People are dying and you can't get a grip.

With a heavy heart and tear-streaked face, you cast aside her mask, the symbol of your futile efforts to defy the inevitable. For in that moment, you realized that no amount of healing could undo the damage wrought by the plague, and no amount of compassion could ease the pain of those who had been lost.

You turned your back on the town that had become your prison, the echoes of its suffering fading into the night. For though you were immortal, you were not invincible—bound by the chains of your own existence, condemned to wander the earth as a silent witness to the fleeting moments of life and the relentless march of death.

Salem, America- April- 1692

Immortal she, return to me.

The paranoid colonial Massachusetts was not the place for a woman who never ages. You grew careless of covering up your secret and lived on the outskirts of Salem, seen by few but that didn't aid the treacherous rumours whispered about you.

You had been there when they settled in 1626 and hadn't aged a day from the time you settled. This had spread into rumours of you dancing with the devil, practicing witchcraft, and bewitching townspeople.

Though many denied your existence, all fingers pointed towards you when two young cousins began acting erratically and were given the diagnosis of being under an evil hand.

The courtroom was a hallowed chamber of unjust judgment, where the accused stood trial before the watchful eyes of the magistrate and the hushed voices of the gathered crowd. You stood, with your hands bound and your head held high, faced your accusers with a steely resolve, eyes burning with a fire that refused to be extinguished.

As the trial unfolded, it became clear that justice was but a mere facade—a thin veil masking the insidious machinations of those who sought to rid the town of its perceived evils. Witnesses were coerced, evidence fabricated, and lies spun like silk until the truth became little more than a distant memory lost to paranoia and skepticism. In the crowd, mixed in with the townspeople, you saw Ellie.

Her steady gaze on you was unmoving and ever-focused, a small smile played on her lips while she watched you face the accusations, anger simmering deep inside you like a curse.

Despite protestations of innocence, you were found guilty of witchcraft—a verdict as unjust as it was inevitable. With a silent prayer upon your lips, you were led to the gallows, where the noose awaited you like a taunt.

You had still been bound by your hands in front of your grime-covered dress from being imprisoned in a dark cellar for a month which felt like mere hours in your lifespan.

A man named David, one of the wealthiest residents of Salem and the first to seek warrants against the accused innocent aided you into stepping onto the back of a cart. The crowd surrounding you cheered while a church member slipped the noose tied to a tree around your neck.

"Hang the witch!" Ellie shouts and you lock eyes with her, feeling nothing more than bitterness and resentment. She still seems unfazed and somewhat amused like she's seen this a thousand times, she likely has. You know she had already watched you 'die' over and over again, Ellie was desensitized to it.

"Hang her!" Another man yells, following Ellie's act in tow. They scream all around you, jeering for your death which would never come. David and the churchman step off the wagon and the crowd gets even louder, anticipating a broken neck and lifeless eyes. David gave a command and the horses pulling the wagon were off, leaving your feet to flail helplessly over nothing.

Even as the rope tightened around your neck and the crowd jeered and spat their curses. Though you couldn't die the pain of the rope restricting your breathing still ran you ragged. For just a brief moment you pretend to die, and those around you cheer. There is so little hesitation in their voices, they were glad to see you dead.

You begin to thrash around, kicking your feet. When the townspeople realized you weren't deceased their cheers of victory fell into silence as you coughed and sputtered on the build-up of saliva and blood choking you. An eery silence falls upon the land while they watch in horror, waiting for you to die. Ellie bites back a smile from where she watches you. You bring your hands, bound together by the wrist to reach up and grab the rope that you hung by. Gathering all the force you can you yank it harshly, over and over again until it finally snaps and you fall to the ground.

David's face falls completely. You had known him to not truly believe in witchcraft but the murder of innocents and threatening women. The look in his eyes when he saw you stumble to your feet. "Witch!"

"Ay, I am the witch!" You shout, the townfolk backing away. You slip your hand where the rope strangled your bent neck, the moment the noose comes loose you pull it off over your head, holding it in one hand. In only seconds the broken bones in your neck heal and you bring your head up, chain raised tall, the wound where the rope dug into your neck disappearing "I am older than your oldest god, I am more ancient than the winds, and more sacred than your cross." You say, only to frighten them.

"Kill her!" David shouts to which no one answers, they are either running or frozen in terror, saving themselves before anyone else.

David isn't fast enough to run, you grab him by his hair and drag his struggling body back beneath the tree where he had hung you. In the blue hour of the day, you hooked the severed noose around his neck and began to walk, dragging his trashing body back to your home on the outskirts of the town. David's body eventually fell limp, still, you dragged it over the rocks and lumps of cobblestone. You had succeeded in making him as afraid of you as you were of him.

You were the first woman who hung in the trials, far from the last. "Headed west now?" Ellie asks, walking beside you, utterly unfazed by what she just witnessed.

Boston, America- March- 1770

In the darkness I will meet my creators, they will all agree that I'm a suffocator.

In the cobblestone streets of colonial Boston, where the talks of revolution were murmured, propaganda poured. There you resided, someone once worshipped as a god whose true name had long been forgotten by history.

But amidst the fervour of the American colonies on the brink of rebellion, you found yourself drawn to the heart of the struggle after the church bells had been rung sending confused people onto the streets covered with snow and out of their homes.

It was on the night of March 5, 1770, that tragedy struck with a swift and merciless hand where a pull of a trigger would be written into history textbooks—the night of the Boston Massacre. As tensions between the colonists and the British soldiers reached a boiling point, you stood amidst the thronging crowd.

The air crackled with tension as the soldiers, emboldened by their orders to maintain order at all costs, faced off against the angry mob, assaulting them with snowballs, chunks of ice and oyster shells for hours on end. With shouts and hollers ringing through the night, protesting the raise of tax brought by King George.

Before the rage-filled crowd stand nine English soldiers holding their ground while the mob grows more and more impatient. This had started when a wig maker apprentice got in a spat with a private stationed outside of the customs house who in turn clobbered the boy with his musket.

The eight soldiers and the captain endure the jeers of the crowd led by Crispus Attucks. The Captain, Preston, refused to fire upon the crowd though as he commanded them from the front, in the line of fire.

You push your way up through the crowd, interweaving through hundreds of people. You watch the nine men stand tall against the sea of angry colonials. One of the men is hit hard in the head with a jagged rock, he falls back to the ground his musket clattering neck to him, just then, behind them in the darkness shouts a voice "Fire!"

With little to no hesitation, the man who fell over quickly scuttles to his feet, firing into the darkness of the evening. Then, in an instant that seemed to stretch into eternity, the first shot rang out—a deafening explosion that shattered the silence of the night and sent shockwaves rippling through the crowd. The other men follow, firing a volley one at a time. Beside you, you hear the thuds of heavy bodies hitting the ground, you don't have much time to process it before a bullet lands right in your head, the bullet finds its mark, striking you down with a force that seems to rend your immortal body asunder.

For a moment, time stood still—the world around you spinning in a dizzying blur of pain and confusion. "Hault!" Preston the captain orders, the soldiers cease fire at his command, confused as they believed him to be the one who ordered fire.

You used the rising surge of anger and fear emanating from the people around you to disappear into the crowd. Men grew even more angry at this, some dispersed but many stayed put. There were only a few women in a horde of hundred, it was difficult to go unnoticed with a bleeding gash on your head, you looked more monster than human, skin on your face replaced by a mass of flesh and blood. You brought your hands up to rest on the top of your head, arms out in front of you to cover what was once your face so your already scared neighbours wouldn't see a breathing corpse.

You stumbled around on your feet, pushing yourself through the mass of people, all moving in your opposite direction, making it harder for you to keep your head down. "Is something wrong?" A woman asks, you disregard her, shoving her away from you to keep moving. Your head rang with a high-pitched whistling, echoing through your brain, and you could hardly see straight with the one eye you now had, eyesight fuzzy. Each person ahead of you blurred into the next, blood gushing down your face, so much that it trickled into your eye and tinted your vision.

The wound wasn't clean by any means, not a neat through and through. The gunshot had got you right up the cheek and into your forehead, half of your face entirely blown off. The close impact of the shot caused your right eye to burst, you were scrambling away with no face and one eye.

Already you could feel your body working to put itself back together, still blood flowed down from the horror that was your face, down your neck to soak into your stay and your once grey skirts. You leave a trail of blood in your wake, dripping into the snow that is sure to be found my morning.

At last, you finally pass the crowd, though you don't stop. You stumble into the dark streets, running until you tumble on cobblestones slick with snow and slush, eyesight heavily impaired. "You've seen prettier deaths," Ellie sucks a breath through her teeth, she isn't in the dress that a woman would wear in that decade, instead, she's clad in a red coat, the uniform of a British soldier, her hair tied up and tucked beneath a black cap that all of the soldiers adorned.

She stretches her hand out to help, you take it. Instead of being gracious that she came around to help you off the ground, you take a swing at her face, and when your face makes contact with her cheek you hear a crack. Ellie takes a step back, shocked as you haven't hit her since the night you first met, 2181 years prior to that moment. "Why would you scream fire?" You cry. The second you heard the voice, you knew it was Ellie though you hadn't had time to process it before your face was blown off. "Those men are dead, Ellie, they will never go home to their families or take another breath!"

"They die anyway," She retorts, one hand hovering over her now broken cheekbone. You look at her now, your skull re-intact, eyeball sewn itself up and found its place back in your socket, flesh weaves and stretches over your bones to its rightful place. "Fuck," Ellie mutters, wincing as she touches to fingers to her newfound injury "The second that soldier gets hit with that rock, he gets back up and starts shooting, every single time."

You freeze "Every single time?" The very moment the words fall from your lips, Ellie curses herself "How many times have you been here, on this day?"

"Maybe like," She raises an arm in defence the other still cradling her cheek as she winces"Thirty-seven times give or take."

"You've never stopped it?"

"I have," She says, eyebrows furrowing with a certain longing "It ruins everything, if those men don't die, the American revolution never takes place." Ellie's gaze softens "I know that it's awful but it happens whether you're here or not, it was meant to happen."

Ellie reaches out to hold one of your blood-covered hands, but you are quick to retract it, pulling it away. Your eyes move from where her hand waits for yours to intertwine with it to her freckled face. "How many lives have we lived together?"

Her outstretched hand falls to her side. "I don't want to answer that."

"I want to know."

She shakes her head "You'd hate me."

"I already hate you," Your mouth acting faster than your head.

Ellie doesn't seem shocked by this statement, just a little hurt. "We've had good lives together, you don't hate me every time."

"Who have I been to you?" You ask, new questions surging through your scrambled mind, questions you were sure you wouldn't like the answer to. You knew Ellie had the ability to jump between time periods, though you hadn't known that she'd met you in other timelines.

Looking deep into her downturned eyes your mind runs rampant with who you could've been to her in other timelines that defined what you meant to her now. It was like trying to recall memories that didn't belong to you, but another version of yourself- what could've been.

The hushed silence finally dissipates when Ellie opens her mouth again "I'll see you in a hundred years." With that, she turns and walks away into the darkness, her body shrouded by the cold night where screams of the freshly dead hang in the winds like sickening howls.

Nebraska, America - June - 1883

I'll be seeing you.

"Not a bad place to camp, huh?" Tommy smiles at us while the sun blazes overhead, the group disregards him as they set up camp in a grassy clearing with just enough trees to offer shade to the overworked horses. Few pitched tents while the majority prepared for a night of sleeping under the clear sky, unprotected from the elements.

His question falls upon deaf ears "What's in Montana?" Another man, Issac asks. "We're going all this way and I want to know what I've uprooted my life for."

"Untouched land, you'll be a rich man." Tommy takes the cowboy hat off the top of his head, using it to fan himself off, protesting the sweltering heat that devoured him whole beneath layers.

You eye him, unsaddling your horse, Shimmer. You were in a group of people headed to settle in Montana, many of whom you had never spoken to and didn't necessarily want to. The only ones who you had properly known were the Miller family, Maria had been the one who told you about the trip initially, telling you they needed more gunslingers. With a face that doesn't age, a decade was getting a little too long to stay in Cody and here was your offer to get away.

Joel was speaking in hushed tones to his daughter, Sarah. She was nodding along to each word her father said, you had guessed it was a set of rules, him telling her not to run off or chase down wild animals.

You shower your sweaty chestnut horse with little pats and scratches, and she gives you a snort in response as you begin to wipe away the grime she's accumulated over the day's journey. Your entire life was packed away into two saddle bags, there wasn't much room for luxury in the Wild West. Times were harsh and lands were rugged, more commonly violent than anything you'd ever seen.

As you move in front of Shimmer to pet her soft face, she sneezes on you, reverberating on the rubber lips. You scrunch up your nose, and bring your sleeve to wipe your face "You're lucky you're cute," You mutter, hearing the sound of giggling and looking to find Sarah "Hey little lady."

"Hi," Her accent was thick, she came straight from the heart of Texas. Sarah was still young, the things you knew about her dad were only what she had told you, oversharing their personal life.

"Leave her alone now," Joel walks up behind Sarah, her wide eyes looking up at him.

"I don't mind, Joel," You answer. "I saw some sour cherries by the river if you care to come pick 'em with me," You say looking at Sarah whose head immediately shoots to her dad "As long as your father says it's okay."

Sarah silently pleads with her daughter, his gaze is still cold like steel. "Maybe tomorrow," He answers and Sarah's face drops. Despite knowing the Millers for months, Joel was always iffy about letting Sarah out of his sight. He knew almost as well as you how vile the world was, especially to young girls.

"Maybe tomorrow," You repeat Joel's words, digging around in your saddlebags for a small wicker basket and cloth to spread out at the bottom "I'll see y'all around," You give the pair a nod before heading down the bank.

The walk was quick and scenic if you ignored the overwhelming heat and the entirely too many layers you were sweltering beneath. You closed your eyes and let your spirit lift with the sounds of rustly grass and the flowing river nearby. The air was thick with the sweet smell of wildflowers mixed with an earthy bitterness from the ground beneath your feet.

You walked towards the tree, carefully plucking ripe cherries. They reminded you of the same ones you once picked back in Greece, as you ate them the juice smeared down your lips you laughed with your sibling, pretending that you had been blood drinkers or angry gods drinking the wine that was poured for them.

You often find solace in reminiscing over all of the people you have been in the span of one lifetime. You've been a wife, doctor, witch, god, poet, farmer, handmaiden, dressmaker, priestess, and now you were just a woman picking cherries and planning out her next facade. What awaited you in Montana? Hopefully somewhere peaceful, a cabin by a stream where you could live alone and lay outside in a grassy meadow, waiting for the sun to swallow you whole.

After filling the wicker basket, almost to the brim with small sour cherries, a little larger than the end of your thumb. You turn to walk back to the campsite, though you pause at the incline of the riverbank and decide against it, instead, you find yourself sitting under the shade of the cherry tree, staring to the other side of the riverbank.

You thought that you could've spent the rest of eternity under that cherry tree where you listen to the songs the earth sings for you. Here, the air is clean. The river itself was a sight to behold, a ribbon of shimmering blue that wound its way through the landscape, its waters sparkling in the sunlight like a thousand diamonds. Here and there, small ripples danced across the surface, creating patterns of light and shadow that played upon the sandy riverbed below.

Someone sits next to you, you can sense them awkwardly shuffling around to try and get comfy, from that alone you knew it was Ellie. "Hi, it's been a while," You say, voice quiet.

"Hey," She takes a cherry out of the wicker basket beside you, she bites into it, juice dribbling down her chin, nose scrunches when the sour taste hits her tongue. "Fuck, that's sour."

"They're supposed to be, they're sour cherries," You look at her face to see a large dark bruise engulfing one of her cheekbones, it spreads under her puffy eye bag, giving her a real shiner over her eyelid. "What happened to your face?"

"You," She says, pressing her lips together "After the Boston massacre you hit me pretty hard, remember?"

Your eyebrows furrow "That was more than a hundred years ago."

"For you," She corrects "It's been a little under a week for me."

Your gaze shifts to the glimmering river in front of you "That must be nice," That familiar sense of bitterness set in once again, the reason why you could never stomach being around Ellie for too long. She could blip in and out of your life as she wanted but you were the one forced to sit through thousands of years of torment and longing for the sweet release of death that taunted you in mirrors and the eyes of those who thought they knew you well.

She falls short of words to say. In your eyes it was nice, in her eyes, she faced the woman whom she had married in another life who held nothing more than a little resentment for her now.

"I am sorry that I hit you," You mutter, spitting out the pit of a cherry beside you. "You did cheer for the colonials to hang me though."

"And I am sorry about that," Ellie rolls the stem of a cherry between her fingers, more focused on it than any of her beautiful surroundings. She had seen every bit of scenery that there was to see, her favourite was seeing the dinosaurs, they were much more scary in person than they had been "At least you're an urban legend now."

"What's it matter to be an urban legend when you've already been a god?" You say "It just does not get more interesting than that."

"Yeah, watching you eat your own heart in front of terrified ancestors was pretty cool." Ellie flicks the cherry stem into the river, watching it get swallowed and pulled away by the currents "I'm glad you aren't still mad at me, if I were you I'd probably have a knife to my throat by now."

"I think I'm finally getting wise after two thousand three hundred four years," You joke, digging your teeth into the flesh of another cherry.

"What? You don't look a day over one thousand," She teases, a smile ever so slightly playing on her face.

"Thanks, I was worried."

"Don't be, you look great for your age."

She was joking, her tone light-hearted but something inside you breaks just a little more. You look at your hands, not a wrinkle or callous, no sign of the exciting and extremely terrifying life you had lived, just smooth young skin stretched over ancient bones.

You should've been nothing more than a skeleton buried beneath centuries-old rubble and flora by now. "Yup."

Ellie fiddled with her hands, trying to think of something else to say, she didn't want the conversation to be over just yet. She clung to every word you spoke like it was scripture and she was the most devoted follower. "What are you gonna do in Montana?"

"I think you know better than me," You answer, eyes focused on the water glittering in the blistering sunlight, beads of sweat resting on your brow. "Care to share?"

"Can't say."

"How come?"

She shrugs "I don't think you want to know."

"Well, how many times have I travelled with this bunch?"

"I've lost count," Ellie lies through her teeth, she knew every statistic, she had turned back time to the ancient cities 872 times to be with you. It slowly got easier to face you every time though it never replicated the love you had that first time, a high Ellie was forever chasing.

"Oh," You respond, leaning against the trunk of the cherry tree, sinking into yourself.

The silence stretches between you two. You had actually missed Ellie in the century that she disappeared completely; you found yourself waiting for her to show up around a corner and say something to annoy you.

After swallowing back another cherry in silence you open your mouth to speak "Ellie, whatever I meant to you, whoever I was, I need you to know that I'm not that girl-

"I know-

"I don't think you do," You say, discarding the stem of the cherry beside you "I need you to forget about any life we had together, at least until you get bored of this one."

"I don't get bored of it, I could never get bored of you," She answers.

"Then why start all the way from the beginning over and over again?" You ask "Just to watch me beg for death?"

Ellie shakes her head "I just can't let go of you." She listens to herself "I guess you're right, I'm holding onto someone who doesn't exist anymore." You watch the realization strike Ellie, with each rapid blink her eyes get more and more watery "I'm sorry, I know it's selfish."

"It is," You answer, feeling no urge to coddle "I'm not her, I know that you loved me but I don't remember what you used to be to me. I'm sure I loved you a lot, but I doubt that I do every single time."

Ellie nodded, using the heel of her palm to wipe at the tears that threatened to spill "Okay," Her voice hardly above a whisper "Just see this life through and I promise I'll fix everything, you live a good life, I promise." You stare at her blankly for a moment before nodding. She must know what waits for you in the future, something sweet perhaps, like sugar resting on the tip of your tongue. "I'll always hold you close but I'm learning you let you go."

"I appreciate it," You say, the ghost of a melancholy smile on your face.

The heat of the day finally disappears into the coolness of night and with that, Ellie disappears too, likely to be seen in another year.

The night was draped in the thick, velvety darkness that you only got in the west, where the only illumination came from the crackling flames of a campfire. Around it sat your sorry crew of companions, their weary faces highlighted by the flickering light, casting shadows that danced across the rugged landscape. They had ridden hard all day, herding cattle across vast plains and navigating treacherous terrain, but now, as they rested under the vast expanse of the starry sky, they sought solace in camaraderie and laughter.

"Y'all hear the one about the preacher who walked into a saloon?" Tommy began, his voice gravelly from years of dust and tobacco. Several others in the group had already called it a night, resting their heads beneath the stars that hung in the ink black sky.

The others leaned in, eager for the punchline.

"He says, 'I'm lookin' for the man who's been sleeping with my wife!' And a fella at the bar stands up and says, 'You'll have to narrow it down, preacher!'" The group erupts into bellowing laughter at his words and you can't help but smile at the pure joy written on these gruff men's faces.

"Alright, alright, I got one more for ya," Wyatt announced, his voice carrying a hint of challenge. He was an unnerving man from the looks of it, tall and intimidating but after the first day you had spent with him, he treated you like a baby sister, ready to go to war for you at the drop of a hat. The others perked up, their interest piqued by the promise of one last ribald tale."So there's this rancher," the cowboy began, "and he's got himself a problem with his bull. See, this here bull is getting up there in years, and he just ain't performin' like he used to."

A ripple of knowing laughter spread through the group, anticipation building for the punchline. Joel sat beside you, he had no interest in the jokes nor did he find them funny, all he got from it was a small detox from his life of overworking himself into exhaustion.

"Now, this rancher, he's heard all kinds of remedies for puttin' a little pep back in a bull's step," the cowboy continued. "But none of 'em seem to do the trick. So he finally decides to consult the local veterinarian."

The rest leaned in, hanging on every word.

"The vet takes one look at the old bull and says, 'I got just the thing for him. There's this new experimental treatment I've been workin' on. It involves a little bit of whiskey.'"

The campfire erupted with uproarious laughter, the group hooting and hollering at the unexpected twist, it ws far from the funniest joke you had ever heard, still, you laugh. Some slapped their thighs, others doubled over with mirth, and a few wiped tears of amusement from their eyes.

"And you know what?" the cowboy concluded with a grin. "After that little glass bottle was emptied, that ol' bull was buckin' like a bronco."

As the laughter at last subsided, the fire crackled softly as men began to say their goodnights and lull for the night. They sat in comfortable silence, their thoughts drifting to the vast expanse of the frontier and the challenges that awaited them come dawn and dreams of the promised land of Montana.

"Y'know, fellas- and madams," Wyatt addresses you and Maria, "We've been tellin' jokes and carryin' on like a pack of fools, but there's somethin' to be said 'bout the bonds we share out here on the range," he began, his husky voice tinged with sincerity.

The others nodded, aside from Joel who was studying the fire in front of him, tuned out from the conversation.

"I reckon there ain't nothin' quite like the brotherhood of the trail," he continued. "We ride together, we work together, and when the chips are down, we stand together. Through thick and thin, come hell or high water, we got each other until death takes us all." Wyatt takes another swig of his moonshine "We may come from different walks of life, but out here, under these stars, we're all just cowboys," the cowboy mused. "And there ain't no bond stronger than that."

"That ain't true," Issac poked up "I know that not one of us will see each other once we get to Montana, we're all goin' our separate ways."

"Don't mean there's no bond," You peep up.

"How's that?"

You shrug "Your heart is just too young to realize."

The group stops for a moment before erupting into ragged laughter, Tommy almost has tears in his eyes at the fact that you had called the man seemingly 15 years older than you young "Kid, you're too young to realize how bad life gets."

"Sounds about right."

Cape Cod, America - May - 1937

To say the things he truly feels and not the words of one who kneels.

In the hazed ambiance of the club, the air reverberated with the lively tunes of Duke Ellington, and the floor pulsed with the infectious rhythm of swing. Amidst the whirl of dancers, there you were, dancing so exuberantly that others backed away in fear of you swinging on them; though that was the nature of swing dancing, almost a fight to keep your nose unbroken.

But even the most seasoned dancers could only keep up for so long. As the night wore on and the music continued to play, you found yourself in need of a moment's reprieve. With a smile still lingering on your lips, you tapped your partner, Richard's shoulder, signalling your desire to take a break. You hadn't known him well by any means but he was a good dancer.

Leaning against the cool plaster of the club's wall, you breathed deeply, chest rising and falling in time with the music. You closed her eyes, savouring the lingering sensations of the dance. Little did you know, your moment of respite was about to be interrupted in the most unexpected yet delightful manner.

A voice, smooth and warm, broke through the cacophony of sound around you. "Mind if I join you?" the voice asked, accompanied by a gentle tap on your shoulder. Opening your eyes, you found yourself face to face with a strikingly handsome man, his eyes twinkling with a hint of mischief. His black hair parted to the side and slicked over as well as his dark eyes soft as snow added to his undeniable charm.

A bemused smile tugged at your lips as you nodded, welcoming the interruption. "Not at all," you replied, voice carrying a hint of amusement.

With a casual elegance, the man leaned against the wall beside you, his gaze drifting out across the dance floor. "You're quite the dancer," he remarked, his tone tinged with admiration. He was wearing a white button-up tucked into pinstripe trousers being held up by black suspenders.

"Thank you. I've had a good bit of practice." You smile softly "Your name is?"

"Jesse," He answered "Care to tell me who I'm talking to?"

"Midge," you lie, it was the name you had picked up for your residence in Cape Cod.

"Midge," he repeats smiling as the name rolls off his tongue "You might just have the prettiest smile in Cape Cod."

You can't help but grin "And I thought I had already met all of the gentlemen around these parts."

"Must've been wrong," He said with his crooked smile. Then, after a moment's pause, he extended a courteous offer. "Can I buy you a Coke? It's the least I can do for such a captivating dancer."

You couldn't help but be charmed by his sincerity and manners. With a twinkle in your eye, you nodded in agreement. "I would like that very much."

Your conversation flowed effortlessly as you sipped on your cokes, exchanging stories and sharing laughter amidst the ringing of the club and chatter of individuals all around. With each passing moment, the two of you scrambled for things to talk about, desperate to keep the spark of conversation alive. You had just prayed that you could pull yourself away from his magnetic charisma.

As the night wore on, the music gradually began to fade, signalling the end of another unforgettable evening. Reluctantly, you rose from your seat, a sense of disappointment tugging at your heart while you watched Jesse lean back in his chair studying you like a textbook.

"Well, it looks like the night's coming to an end," you remarked, a wistful smile gracing your lips.

Jesse nodded, his expression mirroring her sentiment. "Indeed it has," he replied, his voice tinged with a hint of hopefulness. "But perhaps it's just the beginning of something new?"

"Perhaps," You agreed, gaze lingering on his handsome face.

That was when you had broken the only rule you created for yourself 'Don't fall in love'. One year later you were so head over heels for Jesse that you were getting married. Dressed in your floor-length wedding dress, hair carefully curated after spending hours trying to perfect it.

You hadn't any family to fill up your side of the aisle, so instead you had asked your friends from work and the jazz club to take their places. After telling Jesse you were orphaned, he didn't bat an eye at this. You had frantically searched for someone to fill the shoes of your father who walked the earth centuries prior on the shores of Greece, it was a relief when Jesse's father stepped up.

Walking down the aisle of the church, arms hooked with Jesse's father you see him then, standing at the end waiting for you and he looks like the rest of your life. "You clean up nice," You mutter to Jesse quietly to be sure no one else can hear your little remark.

"I try my best," He smiles, hands in front of him as he waits patiently for the pastor to speak up. He looks handsome as the day you met as you look remarkably the same, not a new scratch or wrinkle upon a single inch of your skin.

As you exchanged vows, the both of you unable to fight the wild smiles on your faces, the world seemed to stand still, as if holding its breath in anticipation. With each word spoken, you pledged your love and devotion to one another, promising to stand by each other's side through all the joys and challenges that life would bring and you meant every word.

The reception was nothing short of perfect in your eyes. Everyone gathered at Jesse's parents' home, flowing in and out as they pleased. You however preferred the outdoors aspect of it, where people chatted happily with a glass of champagne in hand.

"Congratulations," Ellie says "Little bummed that I didn't get an invite," There's an odd sense of bitterness in her voice. She's wearing a blue tulle dress at tea length, blending in perfectly around the other guests, long white gloves to cover the tattoo on her forearm, and she even had her shoulder-length hair pin-curled.

"I figured you would be coming around either way."

"You know me too well," She takes the champagne flute out of your hand and swallows it back.

"You're actually the one who knows me too well."

She nods, faces expressionless while she looks around at the scenery of the yard. "Good luck."

"I'm sorry?" You furrow your eyebrows trying to seek out some tell on Ellie's face that would give you any indicator of what's racing through her head. Still, she's unreadable.

"With your marriage."

"Okay?"

"What's the plan here anyways?" She asks picking up someone's glass of wine the second they place it down on the garden table and turn their head away. "In thirty years, you're still married to Jesse, he's sixty getting wrinkly and you're still young and beautiful?"

As Ellie goes to drink the wine you take it out of her hands, putting it back on the garden table. You think of something to say to her, anything, but the words die in your throat, shrivelling up, never to be said.

"I will say that you becoming a history teacher is very funny."

"Did you just come here to sulk?" You ask.

She shakes her head slightly "I've come here to celebrate your union," Ellie glances around the yard once more.

"Then celebrate," you throw your hands out "I don't see you doing anything other than slinking around."

"Honey, who's this?" Jesse strolls up beside you, putting one hand on the small of your back. He smiles brightly as he looks at Ellie, he has known all of your friends which wasn't a bountiful number to begin with, just other teachers you worked with and some people you danced with.

"Oh!" You force a smile onto your face "This is my old friend from New Orleans, we really have some catching up to do."

"Nice to meet you, I'm Jesse," He holds out his hand.

"Ellie," She says shaking it.

"When did you become friends?" He asks "Midge hasn't told me a whole lot about her school days."

Ellie looks at you, she doesn't say anything but you get the message being conveyed. 'What the hell are you doing?' she shifts her eyes to look at the groom "God this one was just wild, keep an eye on her," Ellie forces a fake laugh.

"Really?" He has that goofy lopsided smile painted on his face as he looks at you.

"Yup," Ellie says "So, when are you planning on having kids?"

"Oh," Jesse chuckles, somewhat nervously "We haven't discussed that much."

"It seems like something you should talk about before getting married-

"Thank you," You cut her off "Ellie," You couldn't stand the idea of outliving your child let alone your husband, though it was already an inevitable fate.

"Of course," She's wearing a smile that is bordering somewhere between penitence and condescension, Ellie's looking at you like you're in the gutter.

"Looks like rain," Ellie glances up at the increasingly greying sky before walking inside the cover of the house. "Bad idea," She whispered in your ear as she brushed past. In mere moments after she enters the house thunder cracks and rain dumps from the sky, heavy and harsh, beating against your skin.

Everyone rushes inside, covering their heads as rain showers and soaks them. You and Jesse are frozen, you watch Ellie's figure retreat into the group of people clamouring into the house while Jesse's eyes are trained on you, he can't hold back a laugh.

"Oh no," Jesse's eyebrows furrow as he takes one of your hands in his own and puts the other on the back of your head, staring at your face, makeup running from the rain, hair weighed down by fat droplets dribbling off your collarbone "You spent so long on your hair, what are you gonna do?"

You shake off Ellie's words, cryptic as usual. Your attention snaps back to Jesse once you can no longer see her. The gentleness of his touch, that is his beauty "I'm not sure but I've got half a mind to kiss you," You giggle.

"Yeah?" He takes a step forward "I like that half," Jesse plants a gentle kiss on your lips "The other half is great too."

"You're so odd."

-

It was a quiet Saturday evening in the summer of 1943, the echo of a fuzzy-sounding record player scraping a vinyl filled the room, enveloping you in a certain tenderness.

Jesse, in his crisp white shirt and neatly pressed trousers, held you close, his hand resting gently on the small of your back as they moved together in perfect harmony. Your hair cascaded softly around your face as you rested your head against Jesse's chest, feeling the steady rhythm of his heartbeat matching the cadence of the music.

As you danced, the cares of the outside world didn't seem to exist, leaving only the intimate space you shared. The faint scent of your flowery perfume drowned out concerns. In the dim light, your shadows danced on the walls. Jesse had never been the better dancer between you though he was particularly tense on this night, his eyebrows were stuck furrowed like every thought running through his head was a worry.

The final notes of the song faded into the stillness of the night, Jesse hesitated, his embrace tightening around you as if reluctant to let you go. Sensing his unease, you looked up at him, concern etched in her features.

His unease wasn't difficult to sense, you pry yourself away from him to take him in completely. "Jesse, what's wrong?" You asked softly, voice barely above a whisper.

Jesse took a deep breath, steeling himself for what he knew he had to say. He held you at arm's length, his eyes searching over your features. "I've been drafted. I received my notice this morning." His voice trembled just the slightest as he took a shaky breath.

Your heart skipped a beat, breath catching in her throat and you thought that this must be what death feels like. For a moment, the world seemed to spin out of control as the weight of Jesse's words sank in. Six years with Jesse was not enough, you needed an eternity.

"We can find a doctor to exempt you-

"You know that's not right," He spoke so softly and you knew he was speaking the truth. You could never convince Jesse to do something as heinous as faking some disease or injury to get him out of the war.

"I know," You say and he steadies himself, staring deep into your eyes and through your soul "My whole life, all I've ever known is loss and I have never cared about anything the way I care about you-

He pulls you forward into his arms, rubbing that familiar calloused hand on the small of your back to soothe you "It's all gonna be alright, love, I'll be back before you know it and then it's smooth sailing for the rest of our lives."

You copied the crook of his neck, the warmth of his arms, the curve of his nose to memory. You caught all that you could before it slipped through the empty gaps of your mind. You hadn't realized that he had been doing the same, memorizing the smell of your perfume, the texture of your hair, the way your eyes caught the light.

He told you to look to the future when he finally walked back through that door and you could dance again but the only thing you could see was the end of the world, starting with you saying goodbye to him.

July 12, 1943

My Dearest Love,

I hope this letter finds you well and in high spirits. It's been quite some time since I last wrote to you, and I apologize for the delay. The days here in Europe seem to blend into one another, filled with moments of both intense action and serene contemplation.

As I write this letter, I find myself missing you more and more. You are what keeps me going through these harrowing and relentless days

Please know that you are always in my heart, my love. No matter where I may be, you remain my constant source of hope and inspiration. I dream of the day when this war is finally over, and we can be reunited once more, never to be parted again.

Until then, stay strong, my love. Know that I am fighting for you, for us, and for a better tomorrow. Keep me in your thoughts and prayers, as I do for you each and every day.

With all my love,

Jesse

December 18, 1943

My Dearest Love,

As Christmas draws near, my thoughts turn to you more than ever. I find myself reminiscing about the holidays we've shared together, specifically the weekend we spent at the cabin. How I long to be by your side once more, to hold you close and celebrate the season of peace and goodwill together.

But even amidst the turmoil of war, I see you in every good thing. Here in the trenches, my comrades and I have found solace in each other's company, we are united in our common humanity and our dreams for a home cooked meal.

I am reminded, now more than ever, of the importance of compassion in times of strife. It is love that sustains us, that gives us the strength to endure even the darkest of days. And though we may be separated by miles and oceans, our love remains as strong as ever.

As I write this letter, surrounded by the sounds of gunfire and the cries of my fellow soldiers, I find comfort in the knowledge that you are thinking of me, just as I am thinking of you. Your love is my guiding light,

This Christmas, as you gather with our loved ones know that you are in my thoughts and prayers. Though we may be apart in body, our spirits are forever intertwined, bound together by the enduring power of love.

Wishing you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year. May the coming year bring us closer to ending this war.

With all my love,

Jesse

March 19, 1944

My Dearest Love,

The world is now brighter than the sun because you're here, that is why I will remain giving you everything that I have.

I have been looking at the moon over and over again and wondered if you stare at it the same time as I do, please say yes. I think the battlefields are turning me into a poet, I would love some critique from a wordsmith such as yourself.

Everything here is frightening (redacted)

In light of the events I've just shared, I am looking forward more than ever to waking up and saying good morning to the sleepy woman lying next to me, that's you if you were curious. Here's to the future!

With all my love,

Jesse

August 8, 1944

My Dearest Love,

It is with a heavy heart that I write to you today, for the horrors of war have taken their toll on both body and soul. The past few months have been filled with unimaginable hardship as (Redacted)

The knowledge that our sacrifices are not in vain, that we are fighting for a better future for generations yet unborn keeps these weary bones standing straight.

But oh, how I long for the comforts of home, for the warmth of your embrace and the gentle touch of your hand. In the midst of so much death and destruction, it is your love that reminds me of all the beauty that still remains in the world.

I fear that I may never see you again, my love, that this cruel war may rob us of the future we had planned together. And yet I'm not ready to give up. For as long as I draw breath, I will continue to fight for a world where love triumphs over hate, where you and I can go back to life as it was.

All of the living are dead and I have noticed an oncoming silence.

With all my love,

Jesse

May 7, 1945

My Dearest Love,

I can scarcely believe it – the war is finally over, and victory belongs to the Allies!

We won! Or we think we did, a true win would likely have less bloodshed.

But amidst the celebrations and rejoicing, my thoughts turn to you. How unmanly to cry though I find myself doing so as I write this. The thought of being reunited with you fills my heart back up despite those who have emptied it, for you are my everything, my reason for living.

I cannot wait to return home to you, my love, to begin our lives anew in a world free from the shadow of war. Until then, know that you are always in my thoughts and prayers and that my love for you knows no bounds.

It looks like I'm coming home soon! I'm looking forward to some dance lessons with my one and only.

With all my love,

Jesse

Though you weren't the only one occupying the seemingly empty house, you lived with ghosts. Every step you took they lurked behind you as permanent reminders of everyone you've ever let down; months stretched into years and you clung onto each word in Jesse's letter like it was doctrine. The moment you received that final letter from Jesse you ran out into the streets and hugged the very first person you saw.

"Ellie now isn't a great time to be here," You tell her as she stands behind you in your vanity while you reapply your lipstick "Jesse's home today," You can't help the smile that stretches across your face. After years of hearing from your husband in nothing more than ink over paper, you would see him again and not just in the pictures that you had hung around every corner of the house.

"I'm here to celebrate," She says though she doesn't seem enthusiastic in the slightest. She wears black cigarette pants and a short-sleeved blouse tucked into them. You, on the other hand, had pressed your hair flat only to do it up in pin-curls, wearing your finest dress and most expensive jewelry for your husband's return home.

"If you're going to water down today, you could at the very least pretend to be happy." You were so ecstatic that you didn't even mind that Ellie had chosen today to bum around your house. For once it wouldn't be empty with nothing but your hollowed cries.

"I am happy," She answers "Are you going to wait here for him?"

You shake your head while you put in earrings that Jesse had gifted you on your third anniversary "I'm going down to the train station so I can hug him the second he sets foot back in Cape Cod."

"Nice," She nods "Have you thought about what you're going to do if it doesn't go as planned?"

You furrow your eyebrows, putting the other earring down on the vanity so you can turn back and look at her. "What do you know?" Your smile dropped at her words. Ellie isn't as unreadable as usual, she has traces of guilt across her features and that makes you all the more concerned. "Ellie, what happens?"

Before she can even open her mouth, you hear a firm knock at the front door. "That," Ellie says, you push yourself up from the vanity so fast the chair tips over. You snatch the other earring off of the vanity and awkwardly force it into your piercing as you rush down the hallway as fast as you can in your heels, clickity clack over the floorboards, Ellie trailing slowly behind you.

Your heart was pounding so fast that it reverberated in your head like an echo bouncing off the walls of your mind. A click. A slow creak and you open the door. Sun floods into the room and your heart pinches at the sight of the officer, clad in military excellence with baubles and an olive green jacket.

"Who are you?" Your stomach drops at the sight of the stranger who stands in the place where your husband should be.

The man stared at you, a certain solemn yet controlled grief lurking in his pale eyes. "Ma'am, I am Sergeant Reynolds of the 45th Infantry regiment. Are you Mrs. Midge Maisel, wife of Jesse Chang?"

Your throat went dry. "Yes," You curled your fingers inward, feeling nails push into the soft palm of your hand until the skin broke and you pushed even harder.

You didn't know who helped you sit down when you couldn't move. You only remembered fuzzy voices and the pace of your heart becoming too fast for your body to handle. There was not enough air in the world for you to swallow. The world felt so far away, as did anyone who tried to comfort you or explain the circumstances of Jesse's death.

"After Germany was concurred, he intercepted a grenade ambush from stragglers, saving the lives of many in his platoon."

Everything had stopped spinning, leaving you nauseous where Ellie sat beside you her face smeared in your vision blurry from tears.

Accept our sympathies

Funeral arrangements

The return of personal effects

Bits and pieces of Reynolds's words jumped out at you but you couldn't hear them. Restless nights for centuries were instead what clouded your mind. Outside you could hear families and friends celebrating the return of their loved ones, while you ushered the man out of your door screaming at him to leave. Music played, a celebration you would not take part in but watch bitterly from afar while you plan out the next life you will live.

Ellie begins to speak when the eery silence becomes unbearable "I know you don't want to hear it but this was inevitable-

"Leave," You mutter, resentment simmering inside of you.

"What-

"Leave," You repeat "You knew this was going to happen and you didn't tell me? You didn't stop it?"

"I can't turn the world upside down just to make you happy-

"Then why are you here?" You ask, rage carved in deep despite the tears across your face "I thought you were in love with me and that's why you won't leave me alone."

Her words fail her. She stares at you blankly, trying to scrounge up an answer that would put you both to rest. "We have a good life-

"Ellie, this is not a good life, for you maybe because you don't have to watch me suffer since you can keep skipping to the parts where I'm happy again," You correct her words, fat teardrops streaming down your face while you try to compose yourself the same way that you would a song or a speech. "I'm going to tell you now so you have to get it into your head- We are not friends, I certainly don't love you, I don't even like you and if I ever see your fucking face again, I'm bashing it in."

Bethel, America- August - 1969

If we were vampires and death was a joke, we'd still go out on the sidewalk and smoke.

They wandered through the makeshift villages that sprung up amidst the chaos, where hippies and freaks shared food and shelter, and strangers became friends in the blink of an eye. Your hand was clasped tightly with Dina's while your pupils went wide under the influence.

She refused to let go and lose you in the crowd of sweaty bodies, despite your states you understood well that you would easily lose each other in the sea of people at the music festival and wouldn't cross paths again till night time. She was wearing a turquoise bell-sleeved top paired with a skirt of all sorts of funky patterns and had on at least six beaded necklaces. You'd think that she'd be hard to miss but in this crowd, she blended in perfectly, looking a little bit like everyone else as everyone seemed to bleed together.

You were already high out of your mind the world warping around you, everything moved in frames like an old film. The ground was morphing and breathing under your feet, you giggled with each step, following behind Dina to find the rest of the little group you had come to Woodstock with.

The two of you were nowhere close to the stage, you had only partially come for the music. To you, it seemed like another historic event to add to your list. While most people sit on the ground swaying to Janis Joplin, your small circle of friends was dancing; it was something like them loosely waving their bodies around.

"No one asks me for dances because I only know how to flail!" Dina shouts, laughing so hard that she leans on you for support. You laugh too, head resting on top of Dina's. Her words weren't funny at all but everything seemed funny when fractals hoovered around your eyes. You lifted your head just slightly to see that same freckled face that had haunted you for centuries.

"Ellie!" You shouted, letting go of Dina's hand and making your way towards her, eyes half-lidded and hazy. Dina lulled in place watching you run away from her.

Ellie looked frightened that you had stuck true to your promise of bashing her face in the next time you saw her but instead, you wrapped your arms around her tightly and began to sway gingerly. It was just the beating of hearts like two drums in the rain.

"I'm sorry," You mutter into the crook of her neck. "I missed you, you should visit more."

Hesitantly, Ellie hugged you back, folding her arms around your torso and letting herself sink into you. In the past 2380 you had never hugged Ellie, you hardly touched her. She closed her eyes letting delusion flood her brain, thinking back to the first time she had seen you and then seventy years later when she realized you were immortal and every other timeline she had lived with you.

"I missed you too," She muttered, trying to ignore the fact that you were only saying this because you were high.

You pull back away from her and take her in, all dazed. You give her a boop on the nose with your index and erupt in giggles while Ellie furrows her eyebrows. An idea strikes you and it's apparent on your face as you light up, eyebrows shooting up. "You should come to tell my friends about all of your time-travelling stories!"

Ellie starts to shake her head but you pull her away despite that. She trails behind you as you refuse to let go of her hand, dragging her back to the grassy patch where your friends danced, some of them taking a quick break flat on their backs. "This is Ellie, we've been friends for a long time."

The group acknowledges her, mainly with waves and giggles but Jimmy goes the extra mile, standing up and extending a lanky arm "It's good to meet you."

"This is my best friend in the world forever!" You sling an arm around Dina, calling for Ellie's attention. Dina leaned into your touch, a drowsy smile on her face. "Ellie can actually travel through time."

You tell the group and they all look toward her, eyes squinted and bodies relaxed. Ellie didn't mind, knowing that they were too high to believe her by the time they sobered up even if they did she could go back and fix it. She nods along "It's true and she's immortal." Ellie points at you.

"No, you're not," Dina pokes you.

"I believe it," Weston speaks up from his spot on the ground where he lies with Patricia, her ash blonde hair strewn across the grass "I have never seen this woman so who am I to not believe her." As opposed to the majority of the group whose pupils were dilated from LSD, the whites of his eyes had turned red from the herbs he smoked.

Stevie is still dancing, her loose white dress rustly so slightly in the gentle breeze. Dawn dances with her, her hair the colour of fire tied neatly into two twin braids, she doesn't care about anything besides the way her feet carry her.

"One time I cut out my own heart and I ate it," You giggle, head resting on Dina. Her face was sunkissed, accentuating her freckles. She had let her dark hair run loose.

Jimmy looks at you, through his sunglasses. He has Ellie sitting next to him, his ebony skin a contrast to her paleness. "How does that work?"

"I slice my skin open and then I break my ribs, rip out my heart and shove it in my mouth.

He looks you up and down "Ribs look fine to me."

"I can show you," You look around to find something to cut you open, and you see a large rock with some smaller ones stacked around it. You walk over, all eyes on you as you put your wrist on top of the larger rock.

In your free hand, you pick up a smaller jagged rock that fits into the claw of your hand. You raise the jagged stone up and smash it into your wrist with little effort after the strength you have gathered over the years.

Dina lets out a scream watching your arm bend out of shape, wrist twisted so your hand doesn't sit where it's supposed to. You bring the rock up and slam it down again, making sure to dig into your skin, flesh mangled up on your arm and you brought it up to show everyone. Jimmy scrambled to his feet in a panic, racing through the crowd to find a medic.

"No, it's healing!" You shout after Jimmy. Weston looks at your mangled arm with wide eyes before buckling onto his knees and throwing up. Dawn and Stevie pause their dancing, Dawn froze in fear and Stevie backed away. "Do you see?" You shake your arm trying to show them that the wound was fixing itself.

-

"I can show you," You look around to find something to cut you open, and then your eyes settle on Ellie who shakes her head at you. You knew this meant she had seen the outcome and it wasn't good so you decide to drop the topic, plopping yourself onto the grass.

"Don't you wanna dance?" Dina asks.

You shake your head. You had reserved dancing for Jesse who you knew you wouldn't see again, not even in death since it would never come for you.

The day had eventually faded away into night, the concert still rang loud but you stayed far in the back of the crowd, lying on the ground with Ellie and looking at the stars. "I'm really sorry for everything you've been through," Ellie breaks the pure hum of music.

"I'm really sorry for everything you've seen," You answer. "I thought the war would finally be over," You murmur, thinking back to Jesse and the idea you conjured up of his corpse; you imagined him to be blown into a million pieces, a thought that never left your mind no matter how high you got or what you drank you knew it wouldn't end. You had thought World War two to be the last until the Vietnam War plagued the news and began to pluck men from neighbourhoods all around.

"It doesn't end, not ever," Ellie tells you.

"You should fix it."

"I've tried," There's a hint of sadness in her voice "If one ends, a new one will always spring up."

The two of you fall silent for a moment, heads side to side but you don't look at one another, only the stars. There's something so calming yet unnerving about the inky black sky; it reminded you of the nothingness that consumed you on the night you had given up your mortality.

"I don't want to live," The words fall from your lips so effortlessly. The LSD was wearing off, leaving you to be in control of your thoughts and your body all over again.

"I know."

"I've seen more men die than I can count."

"I know."

"I can't seem to hate you though."

Ellie turns her head to look at you and you do the same. Her green eyes are shining beneath the moonlight, just the shadow of her face illuminated. You lean forward just the slightest and connect your lips into a kiss, Ellie seems surprised but she doesn't fight it.

Once you pull away, you can only seem to make out one sentence "Don't leave this time."

Greenport Village, America - April - 2011

A handshake of carbon monoxide, no alarms and no surprises.

As the late afternoon sun cast its golden hues over the rolling hills of the Greenport, you made your way home planning a quick visit to the beach before doing so, arms laden with bags filled with groceries from the quaint village market, arms laden with provisions that you had no need for, save to fill the endless hours of your existence.

You walked with your timeless beauty that seemed to shimmer like a mirage in the fading light, you had called the Greenport Village home for six years now, finding a position there as a history teacher, your favourite job of the hundreds you had worked. Though the passing decades had left their mark on the landscape and its inhabitants, you remained unchanged, frozen in time like a moth preserved in amber.

You still struggled to come to terms with the fact that death would never take you though Ellie tried to make it easier. All these years and it never felt any better, it was still difficult to swallow the truth.

There was no solace to be found in the quiet beauty of the world around you. For two thousand years, you had walked the earth with Ellie, you, a solitary figure doomed to wander the endless expanse of time and her, the shadow that trailed behind and mocked your existence without intending to. You had seen kingdoms rise and fall, witnessed the birth and death of countless generations, and yet you remained unchanged, untouched by the ravages of time. All of the identification you had forged didn't make you into who you said you were.

Walking towards the beach, you could've sworn that you recognized every face you saw but that was just how long you had lived; everyone you've ever known slowly bleeding into everyone else like a suicide cleanup. You would outlive the kids playing on the seesaw and the toddlers scrambling around them, you would outlive their offspring too and every other generation after that.

Eventually, you found yourself in your usual spot in the park, an old beaten bench outlooking the sea where sunlight danced off of it like sparks.

After the seventies, you had accepted that the land was your only friend, ever-changing just like you, yet it remained miraculously intact. You had Ellie, on occasion, though calling her a friend would be a loose term. You weren't sure what she was but butterflies and maggots had a field in your intestines every time you thought of all of the things she knew about you and how little you know of her.

The lack of trust always lingered. You never knew if she had gone back in time and forced you to forget about something she said or something you asked. How many times had you begged her to go back to the beginning and let you ebb away with old age?

As you sat in silent contemplation, lost in the labyrinth of your centuries-old thoughts, a frail figure approached, leaning heavily on a gnarled cane. It was an old woman, her face etched with the lines of a life well-lived, her eyes twinkling with a spark of something you couldn't make out.

You shifted slightly on the bench, making room for her unexpected companion. The old woman, her steps slow and deliberate, lowered herself onto the seat beside you, exhaling a contented breath as she settled into place.

For a long moment, you sat in companionable silence, each lost in your own reverie. "You must be an old soul," The woman next to you speaks, covered in sunspots and wrinkles, grey and white streaks all through her black hair. "When you're old all you want to do is sit and stare at the scenery."

"Yeah," You give her a tight-lipped smile "I'm mature at heart."

The woman furrows her eyebrows for a moment, deep in thought as her brown eyes rake over every single one of your features, studying you like scripture. "I'm sorry," She shakes her head "You just look like a girl I used to know."

"Really?" You ask and then it strikes you like lightning. Despite the withering of her face, it's the same bump of her nose, the freckles across her skin, the curve of her jaw, it was your Dina.

She waves it off "She's long gone by now, haven't heard from her in years." Dina looks off to the ocean, the screech of kids is far off in the distance. Her face drops just the slightest at the mention of this.

"Who was she?" You press, just wanting to hear Dina's voice after decades of replaying memories and performing autopsies on expired conversations like you could somehow revive them and the people who came with.

"Oh, um," Dina hadn't expected you to carry on the conversation, people had stopped caring about what she had to say when time hit her and dragged her skin down. "A friend of mine, way back before you were born. If you could see her, gosh," Dina mutters, salt and pepper hair braided down her back "You could've been her twin."

Your heart was slamming against your ribcage like it wanted to be set free. "Uh, I'm sorry if this seems odd," You say with a shakey breath "But could you just keep talking? I don't want to have to think right now."

Her eyebrows knit together just the slightest, concern growing with your words "About what?"

"Just," You shrug "Reminisce maybe," Nearby there were birds on a wire chirping, it felt like every one of them was talking to you, beedy eyes prying into your veins "I just like stories."

Dina slips a small smile, her teeth not quite as white as they used to be but her smile holds all of the comforts nonetheless "My stories are no good, I'm sure you'll have better ones when you're my age."

You shake your head on impulse, grasping the pieces of her that you still held close to your ancient heart. "No, I don't think I'll get there," You aren't trying to ramble yet here you are, scrambling to reconnect the two of you like this is a film that ends well.

Her smile falters, trying to comprehend the odd woman beside her, beginning to contemplate that you're high on something, suspicion growing more solid with each shake of your hands and blink of your watery eyes. "Are you alright?" She lowers her voice.

"Yup," You nod, already feeling her slip through the space between your fingers all over again like she had years prior. At this point in your life, you should've been a better liar but you just sat there, tears rolling down silently while you forced your teeth to bear a smile. You wanted to tell her how nice it was to see her and remind her of all of the days and nights alike you had wasted on each other.

It was easy to see how she didn't believe you, from your trembling hands gripping your thighs in an attempt to steady them to the manufactured smile you wore on your face, sadness seeping from your pores. Unlike Dina, you felt that age had made you no wiser. Years you spent studying and chasing careers just to end up faking death and restarting all over again from scraps, losing a little piece of yourself every time.

She places one of her calloused and withered hands over yours where it grasps to the fabric over your thighs. She meets your gaze "Whatever it is, you'll be okay."

Something inside you shifts, then cracks, and crumbles completely. The agonizing pain accumulated by thousands of years spilled out of you in the form of tears as salty as the ocean spray that simmered on your skin. It was like every awful thing you had ever felt was going to burst through the gaps of your teeth.

There was entirely too much going on in your head when you inched forward and wrapped your arms around Dina, chin resting on her neck. It took a minute but you felt her bony hands rest on your back while she returned the gesture, albeit confused.

You were glad you got to see her again. Every time someone passes through your life you think of all of the things you would do to speak to them one more time. You had finally been given a blessing, something that balanced out the bitterness of eternity. "I'm sorry, Dina."

The second you spoke you regretted it. With what little grace you have left you manage to pry yourself up, sheepishly standing to your feet and trying not to wobble like a colt. Dina's bygone face held more confusion than ever, mouth slightly ajar as she watched you with wide eyes like a doe. "Honey, I think you have the wrong person."

Your feet move faster than your head, not leaving Dina behind a second time but a complete stranger. You had only been sick with nostolgia. Panic shot through your veins like box cutters trying to find their way to your heart, which they surely would.

Your day's shopping had been left behind at the bench along with all of the dreams you once etched into indigo skies and sandy shores, now all they did was rot at your feet, at least they had the pleasure of aging.

The feeling of screaming was creeping up your body in shivers, you hugged yourself all the way home, swivelling your head every minute to be sure that ghosts weren't following you but they always had a way of sneaking up on you.

What purpose did you serve? Anything mildly important you had ever done was lost to time, gone, forgotten. You didn't get the luxury of having children with the one you love, you didn't even have anyone to love. You drag your mud-covered heels all the way up the steps of your stoop slamming the door behind you.

With trembling hands and a mind consumed by anguish, you began to tear through her home with frenzied desperation, your movements fueled by a maelstrom of emotions too powerful to contain, the urge-no, the need to die. You ripped books from their shelves, their pages fluttering like wounded birds as they scattered across the floor in a flurry. You overturned furniture with reckless abandon, the sound of splintering wood and shattering glass echoing through the empty rooms like a orchestra of destruction.

You open your cabinets, dragging your hands behind all of the ceramic and glass, pushing it to the ground and watching them shatter at your feet. What need did you have for a fridge full of food when you don't have to eat? Or a feathered bed when you don't need to sleep, you can't even bring yourself to sleep these days.

Each crash and thud seemed to reverberate through your empty, a haunting reminder of the pain and turmoil that threatened to consume her from within. Memories, once cherished and dear, now lay shattered and broken like all of the ambition you should have forgotten, fragments of an overwhelming life that had slipped through your fingers like grains of sand.

With a guttural cry of anguish, you sank to your knees amidst the wreckage, body racked with sobs that seemed to tear at your very core. You clutched at your hair in despair, her fingers intertwined in the tangled strands like thorns in a bed of roses.

Your eyes snagged on the cabinet below your sink. You crawl over to it, shards of shattered glassware sticks into the soft palms of your hands, porcelain china cutting up your knees. It didn't even feel like anything, you just wanted to feel something.

You pull the cabinet open pushing the other cleaning supplies aside and grabbing the ammonia and bleach. Twisting the caps of and discarding them among the wreckage, you take a deep breath before raisng the bottle of bleach to your lips and drinking, the harsh and ancrid taste making you cringe but you kept swallowing until you could feel a burning in your throat, taking a quick shallow breath and then doing the same with the ammonia, tears brimming your eyes and hitting the few beams of sunlight that struck through your closed curtains like the glimmer from the ocean.

God, it tasted rancid but for a moment, a brief one it had felt like death or something similar. Mouth feeling like plastic throat burnt to rubber you drank until both bottles were empty. You pressed yourself as flat as you could on the floor, soaking in the last moments of feeling as your insides contorted before stillness.

All of the cells you killed were fixing themselves up and after a minute, you felt numb like you tended to. You hiccup, body jerking upwards just the slightest, a spat of vomit now dribbling at you chin.

Deep inside of you, you knew Ellie would be back to fix your wreckage and leave you oblivious to the destruction you not only caused but craved. She would just keep going back until you help something on the spectrum of happy.

Define happy.

Smiling?

Joking?

Laughing?

Not digging through the dictionary to find new ways to try to kill yourself?

That last one sounds right.

"Ellie, I can't do this anymore!" You screeched hoarsely to the empty room, despite the freckled girl being nowhere in sight. "Can you please let me die now!"

You call for her until your throat is as dry as sandpaper, hollow words scraping themselves dry before they can leave your mouth. Your voice is reduced to a pathetic rasp and you pray that she regrets stealing blood from your veins.

"Please!" You scream, fingers gripping onto the marble counter to haul yourself up. You stumble for a moment as you adjust to the jagged shards you stand on. "I know we've done this before but you'll just lie and make me sound like I'm fucking crazy," A sob falls from your mouth like a howl.

You pull a long kitchen knife from the knife block, and watch the silver blade glimmer, a warped reflection of yourself staring back at you. With little hesitation, you plummet it into your stomach, again and again until your midriff is a mangled fleshy mess. Blood pooling out of you like cherry wine. Nothing new.

"Asshole!" You cry out "I know you're hiding around here somewhere!" Your mind immediately went to how many times this situation had played out, on this same day. Maybe you had done something worse.

Lungs burning from screaming, cries throbbing inside of your throat, you have one last idea that had to have happened before. "Can you please stop?"

You turn to face the voice, hair matted, clothes torn and bloody, vomit from makeshift mustard gas sliding down your chin to your neck. You drop the knife, it clatters against the tiles "No," You approach her, each step more certain than the last. "You need to stop, this isn't right."

"I know," She says, face stone-cold a hint of irritation in her tone. She's back in her grey hoodie and jeans, finally, she fits into the time period.

"If you know then why have I been pleading with you to go back to the start and stop me from dying in the first place and making that deal?" You're inches away from her, voice carrying challenge if not bitterness. "Like I've asked you over and over again." Your voice is unsteady like it's being crushed beneath the weight of the world.

"Because I love you," She says, raising one hand to cup your face.

If it were for the chemicals flattering through the air making you nauseous, this act alone almost brought you to your knees with sickness. You don't bother to move her hand though, just shuddering under the touch. "Do you really?"

She nods, gaze softening "Yes."

"Then you'll go back and you'll fix all of this right?"

Her hand falls from its resting spot on your face. "You want to forget?"

"No, I want to die." Silence falls between you. Each rise and fall of your chest shaky and ragged "You keep forgetting that I'm a person, I'm not a concept you've curated in your head." It was hard to find yourself being gentle to her. It was hard to feel bad for her in general with how she treated your entire being as something for her to tune in and out of as she pleased.

Ellie takes a breath in, eyes unwavering from yours "Okay."

"Okay?" You don't believe her "You'll fix this and you'll leave me alone and let me live a regular life without knowing you?" You breathe the moment in, the hopes that this will be over soon. The taste of heartache and war could be washed away from your mouth, you wouldn't meet Joel and watch his daughter die in front of him or meet Jesse and fall in love. The humiliation to be made of rotting flesh then it hits you- how many times have you had this conversation? "I want you to promise-

Athens, Greece- October- 412 BC

I prayed for your breath right here in the shallows.

Rain splashes against the skin of your face in lands of ancient Greece, where the winds themselves whispered stories of gods and heroes, neither of which you were. You were nothing more than a frightened woman running away from an unforgiving husband in the dead of night where your quickened heartbeat falls in rhythm to the ocean which is almost as angry as the storm that roars above.

Carefully you dodge the jagged rocks sticking out from the sand, you had memorized each and every one after days of burning your skin on the shores. Water surged against the rocks near your feet, white froth sizzling in the waves retreating like it was trying to drag you in and take you for its own.

Your heavy breathing was devoured by the heavy rain and cracks of lighting, the sounds of thunder so deep it was like Zeus himself was stomping in the clouds. Despite the night being dark you trusted the moonlight that glimmered off of the ocean to guide you. You have nothing more than the soaking wet clothes on your back, jewelry to sell, and the drachmas you had stolen from your husband tucked away safely in a wool tagari purse.

This time around, Ellie doesn't intervene. She watched you, panic-stricken, fumble over wet sand and glide past slick rocks. Trying to outrun your fears of wasting your life.

As you reached the edge of a rocky outcrop, your leather sandal caught on a slick stone, sending you tumbling to the ground. With a sickening thud, your head struck against the unforgiving rock, and the world around you spun into darkness.

You were dead. Body limp on the plethora of rocks, the tide slowly lulling over your body until Ellie kneeled down next to your body and gingerly guided it into the ocean for it to take. The blood from the wound in the back of your head is sucked away into the sand. She watched your corpse drift out and get pulled down, all she needed was another lifetime with you. You didn't know how miserable you were with her anyway. 

This is not a story about love.

A/N: guys I’m breaking hiatus to post this bc I realised it’s been hanging in my drafts for a century (century haha) Anyways I actually hate this but it felt too long to scrap so thanks for reading.

The gym was busy on this particular day, I absentmindedly judged others for being at the gym at noon on a Saturday like they should have been doing something more interesting with their time until I realized I was at the gym at noon on a Saturday with no other plans for the rest of the day "And she's hot?" Abby asks me while she effortlessly benches something around 170 and I do nothing more than lean on the wall behind her.  

"She's hot," I answer, scrolling through her feed on Instagram like the weird little stalker I was. I hadn't gone full FBI, just looked her up and possibly watched some of her videos "It's kind of cool that I have an internet celebrity living next to me."

"Define cool," Abby props the bar back onto the saddles of the machine and sits up, taking a chug from her water bottle.

"She is cool," I defend "It's not that weird Minecraft roleplay that your grimy cousins watch, it's just like video games and vlogs, that kind of stuff."

Abby looks back at me, sweat drips from her blonde hairline and rests above her brow "How is that even a career?"

I shrug in response "Sponsorships and donations and shit." 

"Why do people throw so much money at streamers?"

"Parasocial relationships, I wrote an article about it last year which you said you read."

She sucks a sharp breath through her teeth "You were writing a lot of articles, hard to keep up with."

"Define a lot," I mock Abby's words. I glance at a guy in between the rows of gleaming machines, their metallic frames reflecting the obnoxious glow overhead. He had been using the leg press upside down, his neck hunched over into an almost horrifying posture, his shoulders pressing against the top plate. It might've been the most normal thing I've seen in New York.

"So are you going to ask her out?"

I wrinkle my nose, thinking about it "I met her last week, I just don't think I know her that well." Within the past week that I've met her, I've been crawling out to the fire escape every morning just so her drowsy eyes could peer into my vacant skull and in recent months I had given up on dating, like a spider, I devoured my own heart.

"That's kind of the point of dating," She lays back down on the bench press "Getting to know each other."

"I think I'm too busy to date," I tuck my phone into my pocket, crossing my arms while I watch Abby. I wasn't entirely sure that I was too busy to date but I tended to consume myself entirely and make everything far more complicated than it needed to be. I still perform autopsies on conversations I've had years ago, clinging to every word like I need them to survive.

"Why don't you wanna be happy?" She asks, furrowing her eyebrows "You're always getting in your own way, is it a tortured poet type of thing?"

My breath hitches in my throat. How I hate when she's right. The last serious relationship I had was in college and even then I had sabotaged myself, I didn't know where it came from other than a nagging feeling that I wasn't deserving of the love that had been offered up to me on a shining silver platter. "I do I'm-

"Just not ready?" Abby cuts me off, finishing my sentence so perfectly as if it had been words on a script for some boring play about a woman who hates her life and won't do anything about it.

"Yeah," I say, my voice is quiet, she's got me in a box here.

"If you're not ready to date, you might as well be friends with her," She puts the bar back onto the saddles but this time, stands up after completing her reps. "You need to get out and it seems like you get along well."

"I guess," I say and Abby raises an eyebrow "No, you're right, I need to dig myself out of the grave I've dug for myself." What added to my overly apathetic mood was the season, I was so sick of February. It felt like winter had forced mold to grow on my bones to way me down onto the dirty city pavement where careless New Yorkers would gladly stomp over my body.

"How's it going with the family?" Abby is writing something down in her notes which I assume is her number of sets and reps.

"Nothing new," I answer.

She peers at me over her phone, digging for a more solid answer "Are you still sending your parents money?"

"Yes-

"Why?" Her arms dropped to her side, her phone still in one hand "You shouldn't have to play caretaker for two people who don't care about you," As true as it was, it didn't hurt any less to hear it out of my best friend's mouth. 

"It's easier said than done, those are my parents," I'm almost overtaken by a delicate drowsiness from the thoughts of leaving behind the one connection I had to my small-town life. My parents were so careless that I would run around barefoot on the road with the neighbour's kids for hours, narrowly dodging cars that flew past us like it had been a game; everything was a game back then, when I came home to my father's drunkenness, I could hide away in the treehouse and read Harry Potter until the screaming came to a stop.

I was bonded to them like I was to the stray cats who raised me. There was no getting rid of them, we ricocheted between hatred and love like the game of catch I never got to play.  

"I'm sorry," She says though I know it is ingenuine "I shouldn't get in between your family."

Abby didn't know them the same way I did. All she knew was the bloodiness of the relationship that I had cried into her arms, she didn't know how kind the wolves were after they tore me apart. The way my father would cheer for me the loudest at my soccer games and how my mother baked for me after a fight, wasn't the apology that I yearned for but the one that was shoved down my throat.

I dug through my brain to search for a way to change the topic "I saw Owen at the market yesterday and he said he wanted you to call him."

"You're fucking kidding."

My deadline had passed with no issue and I was finally blessing myself with a day where I wasn't chained to my desk. I could finally let my poor bloodshot eyes rest and for once I didn't have to drown them in eyedrops.

I was freshly out of the shower when I heard a knock at my door, Margot yelling at me to answer it. I slipped into a matching pyjama set that Abby gave me on my birthday, hurrying as fast as I could to the door. Margot's consistent screaming did nothing to aid this. 

Ellie was the last person I expected to see on the other side of the door but there she was. I couldn't help the smile that cracked onto my face "Am I the one being loud now?"

She grins at me "No-it's just that my chat has been begging for you to come back all week and I was wondering if you maybe wanted to do a stream with me?"

I looked down at what I was wearing and suddenly felt like the scrouge, all I was missing was a nightcap and a taper candle. "Can I change first?"

"Go ahead but I think this is one of your best looks."

"Really?" I raise an eyebrow "You have poor judgement since you've never seen me in anything other than pyjamas."

"We should probably fix that then."

"I guess we should." I smile. I decided against changing, it wasn't like I was going out, just heading to my friend's apartment that was three feet away.

"Say as much or as little as you want," She opens the door to let me in "I owe you big time," Ellie says this like I don't want excuses to spend time for her. Like I haven't been freezing my ass off every day just to talk to her when she watches the city wake up as she prepares to rest her head. 

Ellie's apartment is more lively than the last time I visited, she's adapted some plants that are already beginning to wilt "Have these been getting any sunlight?" 

She furrows her eyebrows "No? They're fake."

"Ellie," I stifle a laugh "I'm like ninety percent sure that fake plants don't wilt."

"Nuh-uh," She walks toward one just rubs its wilting leaf between her thumb and index, it begins to crumble in her hand and she sucks a sharp breath through her teeth "I guess they are real," Ellie pokes a finger into the bone dry soil and wipes the dirt onto her pants "How much do you know about plants?"

"I'm going to go out on a limb and guess more than you."

 She nods "Sounds about right," Ellie walks over to her sink to fill a Game of Thrones mug with water before circling back to water her plants "Drink up little buddies."

"looks like you need some sunlight too," I watch her attempt to revive the dying plants and 

"Yeah," She keeps hyper-focused on the plants but she cracks a small grin, I could've sworn her smile burnt down the library of Alexandria "I think I'm turning into a vampire."

"The sparkly kind?"

Ellie shakes her head as she stands back up to put the mug on the kitchen island "Like the guy from Sesame Street."

I wrinkle my nose "Yeah, you're looking kind of purple."

"Damn, I was worried you would notice," She smiles again as she opens the door to her office, the purple LED lights are still running but the overhead light is turned on and washes away the colour.

The second I step into the room, Ellie rushes ahead of me and almost jumps to grab the folding chair. She sits herself down and pats her fancy gaming chair for me to sit in it. "Guys, she came!" 

I stare at her, eyes wide, jaw slack. "Ellie."

"What?"

"Do you hear yourself?"

She takes a minute to think about it before nodding her head, I could see the exact moment it clicked "No, I hear it," She addresses the camera "Not like that guys but I don't know what she did with her day, not our business though."

Ellie looks at me like she's waiting for approval of her chosen words. After a moment's reflection, I answer dryly "Thanks." 

"Sorry for taking so long, I had to water some plants," She watches the chat bar scroll by, squinting before she leans back in her chair, hand running through her hair "No, that's not code for sex."

"Could be," I shrug.

"They wanna know what your name is."

"Top secret."

"Okay," She reads some more comments from the chat "Can you tell them what you do for work?"

"I'm a ghostwriter," I say, giving a little thumbs up. I saw myself in the monitor and wanted to throw my hands at myself for being so awkward.

"Spooky," Ellie smiles "She writes about people instead of interacting with them, that's why she's socially inept." She reaches for her soundboard and presses a button, sounding a prerecorded effect of a crowd cheering and laughing.

"She's never had a girl in her apartment, that's why she can't flirt." I counter as she throws her hands up, I can tell she's about to retort with something before I cut her off "So what were you doing before you kidnapped me?"

"Guys, I didn't kidnap her, she willingly walked in here without the use of excessive force and I have had many a girl in this apartment," Ellie tells the chat before clicking something on her screen "So, they send in videos and we have to not laugh, which isn't hard because they aren't very funny." 

"You're not funny either but they watch you," I tease, Ellie fights a smile trying to uphold our image of back and-forth pocking and prodding at one another.

"Laugh three times and you're out."

"Of the apartment?"

"No, you just laugh three times and you lose."

"What do I get if I don't lose?"

"Fuck, I dunno," She furrows her eyebrows, searching the room for something. Her eyes land on a small silver tin, she snatches it up into the palm of her pale hand and sits back down "You get my dill dough."

"I'm sorry!?" My head snaps to look at her "Are you sure you aren't a cam girl?"

"No," She pauses "No, I mean no it's not what you think, yes," Ellie backtracks again "I mean I am sure I'm not a cam girl, not that that I'm not sure I'm not a cam girl, because I'm not," She looks like she's sure of what she said like it made perfect sense "Not a cam girl."

"You're not-not a cam girl?" I ask, pointing out the double negative "So you are a cam girl?"

"No," Ellie runs a hand down her face "Can you guys please tell her that I'm not a cam girl?"

Dcknb4llz:She's a cam girl

Nataliadepressed:I just subbed to her only fans!

Mclovin_fury26:She just wants to show you her dill dough 😕

Yayayalorde:I wish she was a cam girl 

The3nd_isn3ar:Ellie pls stop joking about it and become a cam girl already 🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

Ewmarryme:hahaha Ellie ur so funny now get serious and make an onlyfans

"Anyways," Ellie ignores the chat as they clearly aren't helping her case "This is my dill dough," She shows me the small tin she picked up, there's a picture of a pickle on the front. Over the translucent lid, it surely enough says 'Dill Dough! pickle scented'. It was just green silly putty with an oddly incredulous name.

"I weirdly want that," I answer.

"If you win, it's yours." She tucks it away into the pocket of her sweatpants "Mods, let's get this moving."

We sit through about fifteen minutes of videos; mainly people getting hurt, occasionally one of some type of animal. Nothing funny enough to make either of us laugh except for one of a man falling through a glass table which gets a little chuckle out of Ellie who denies it. 

Another video began playing, it was Ellie in this exact spot, screaming during a game of Fortnite. It looks like it's from the first time she showed me her odd job choice. In the distance, you can hear a knock on the door and this is when I'm sure it's from the day I had been thinking of. Ellie pulls her headphones off and looks at her camera "Shit, I think that's my hot neighbour again."

I slap a hand over my mouth and turn to see Ellie who's looking disappointed at her chat, shaking her head at the camera. "Whoever sent that is fake as fuck."

"So you think I'm hot?"

"Pfft, no, dude, you're ugly as fuck," Ellie makes an overexaggerated confused face like she has no idea what I'm talking about "I was talking about my other neighbour."

Kaylnncourting:Ellie y r u fumbling so bad???????

Overdam00n:You guys were right for saying she doesn't get 🐱🐱🐱🐱

Sestwouth:bruh she's ruining it for herself

Connerstollit:WHY DID SHE SAY THAT 

Cruel_summer:What is wrong with Ellie? Genuinely

F0gg4t:If El doesn't want her, I do

Aliinnnnnaaaaa:First girl she's ever met and she's ruining it

Randelwthehandle:Ugly as fuck??????? who says that 😭😭

Dcknb4llz:wow nice cover up Ellie

Marie_739:Bro Im gonna start calling the girls I like ugly as fuck

"Mr. Quigley?" I ask to which Ellie nods immediately "You think the eighty-seven-year-old veteran who is missing a foot and has swallowed four of his teeth is hot?"

"Yeah," She says, immediately regretting the hole she was digging herself into "I have a thing for older men."

"I don't think you have a thing for men at all, actually."

Her eyes go wide, Ellie opens her mouth to say something and she leans forward in her chair so fast that she falls out and smacks her head on the desk, folding over and onto the ground. I have the biggest smile on my face as I reach for her soundboard and press the cheering crowd effect.  I'm laughing too hard to offer her help, clutching my stomach and keeling over so my head is out of frame. Ellie gets up, and puts herself back in the folding chair pointing at the camera "Do not clip that."

Almost seconds after she says that a video gets sent in of her smacking her head on the desk in slow motion while I burst out laughing and now I'm cackling even harder. You can even hear her yelp in slow motion and she sounds like the dinosaurs from Jurassic Park "You guys are way funnier than Ellie," I say, addressing whoever was watching the stream. 

Another video pops on the screen right after the last one ends, it's Ellie again. She screams at something on her computer and you can hear me bang on the wall on the other side. Ellie goes quiet immediately going back to her game and muttering "She's so hot guys."

"I think my mods hate me," Ellie shakes her head.

"Thank you mods!" I smile at the camera.

A little clip of Ellie back at her desk pops up, she's wearing a Garfield shirt. This time she isn't playing anything, she just sits in front of the camera with that familiar lopsided smile "Guys, how do I trick my neighbour into going out with me?"

There's another video, it's a longer one with the caption 'Ellie Williams calling her neighbour hot compilation' Ellie's eyes go wide and she clicks off the video immediately, the camera goes to us full screen. "That's enough of that."

I pull my phone out and type in the caption of the unfinished video into YouTube, it comes up right away and I click on it. Ellie clicks around on her computer, unaware of my viewing until she hears her voice, echoing in low quality from my phone. She reaches for my phone but I pull it closer to myself. 

I'm dead set on finishing the video until something on the other side of the door, catches my eye. It rushes past the small crack in the slightly ajar door and instinctively, I drop my phone with a slight jolt "What the fuck is that?"

Ellie takes this opportunity to snatch my phone and place it face down on the desk, out of my reach. "That's just Kitty." She pushes herself out of the folding chair and steps out of the room. She walks back in carrying what looks to be a mound of cotton balls, looking a little closer, I realize it's a rabbit. He looks more fluff than flesh.

"What the fuck," My mouth falls open in awe "Can I hold it?" She places him in my lap "He just walks around your apartment?"

She nods "He's litter trained so he just kinda hangs out." 

I pet him, he's soft as a million feathers, and he looks like a mascot for a paper towel company "You are the only person I know that would name their bunny Kitty."

Ellie tries to wipe off the mass amounts of rabbit fur on her, it seems the more she tries to get it off, the more firmly it refuses to budge. "This is a good time to show you guys this new shirt that Dina ordered for me," Ellie stands up walking off camera. She has a couple of Amazon boxes stacked on her couch, she reaches into one of them and pulls out a T-shirt. Ellie turns towards the wall so her back is facing me, she pulls her hoodie off over her head.

All I can see is the back of her sports bra but I force my eyes to go wide "Guys, Ellie Williams has a tramp stamp that says cum dumpster," I lie and the chat goes wild and I grab my phone off her desk as she turns around in her Five Nights at Freddie's tee with a 'Seriously?' face. I take a picture of her with the flash on "I'll sell this rare image of Ellie for six hundred dollars on eBay."

Ellie walks back over to the desk with a stack of Amazon boxes "Every donation goes toward my tattoo removal," She jokes, digging around in the boxes. "I'm a little over your videos, you bunch of snitches so I think it's about time I finally open these up." 

I look in the boxes too, leaning over slightly, being very careful of Kitty where he sits in my lap. I see something and pull it out to hand to Ellie "You should try this one."

"World's hottest gummy bear," She reads the package "Why is there only one? What if I want another?" Ellie yanks the gummy bear, squishing it between her fingers. It looks like Red-40 personified. 

Melanie_felony:She's setting her up lmao

Dcknb4llz:Nobody say anything pls I rlly wanna see this

Elliewsidechick:YALL SHES TOO WHITE FOR THIS STOP

She eats the gummy bear in one bite. As she begins to chew it, she seems absolutely unfazed and partially confused about why it was labelled 'World's Hottest Gummy Bear' A moment later she begins to cough, balling her hand up into a fist and pounding on her chest. Ellie's little cough quickly turns into a deep wheeze.

Ellie lets out a scream, her face going red as she slams her hand onto her desk with watering eyes. I could see visible sweat on her face as she dry heaved, it only took thirty seconds until she sprinted out of the room.

"Oh my god," I watch her run out of the room while I give Kitty a little pet between his ears, he's so still I almost think he's taxidermy. "Guys, I think we killed her." You can hear her vaguely screaming and gagging from the kitchen "So what did everyone do today?"

Thelastgreatamericandynasty:wrote a fanfic about you and Ellie

Dcknb4llz:I got jumped at waffle house 

"Yikes, sorry to hear that." I suck a breath through my teeth "Tell me what I should know about Ellie." Her name feels so right on my tongue.

Jesse_chang:She's a virgin

D4aughter_:OMG HI JESSE

A_birthday_card:The only s3x she's ever had was in Minecraft

Whathasshegot:She has a crush on you 

Touching_theyouth:She's lactose intolerant 

Dcknb4llz:She sold me ketamine in an ally 

Gusty_queefqueen:She homophonic 

Torxhmydreams2:Pretty sure that’s two words that have the same pronunciation but different meaning

Gusty_queefqueen:Bruh it means she doesn’t like gay people

Heytheredelilah7:She has a boyfriend

When Ellie comes back she's filled her Game of Thrones mug with milk and has a bag of shredded mozzarella cheese. She reads the chat "Can you guys be cool for once?"

"They're cooler than you."

"Very funny," Ellie eats a handful of mozzarella before she digs back in the boxes "What's next?" There's one box huge envelope that looks like it has a slip of cardboard in it. Ellie tears the corner open with her teeth and rips the rest of the top off with her hands. She pulls the content out of it, throwing the envelope over the computer for it to land on the ground. Just as suspected there was cardboard in it, not just a slip but it unfolded into a cardboard cut out of Ellie, she looked to be a younger teenager in it, giving an awkward little peace sign and showing her green braces off with a huge smile.

"Aww, you actually look cute in that."

She disregards me "Chat, interrogate Dina about this and report back."

"Dina?" I ask "Is that your girlfriend?"

"Nah," Ellie props up the cardboard cut-out and places it behind us, right in the middle to watch over us "She's my enemy as of right now."

"What did she do?"

"Send this shit," She eats some more mozzarella, holding the bag out to offer me some, to which I decline. Ellie shrugs it off and eats another handful, washing it down with a long chug of milk and putting it on the desk. She grabs a t-shirt, he eyes go wide and she pushes it against her chest so I can't see. "Are you ready?"

"Yes, ma'am," I watch a smile spread across her face as she turns the shirt around to show me a graphic of her on it. In the picture, her face is close up to the camera covered in a white powder (presumably flour). "Oh, wow!" I feign shock.

"I know!" She holds it out toward me "It's yours, you deserve it."

"Wow," I draw the word out, taking the shirt from Ellie "This is really great, I was always hoping I would get a shirt of you covered in flour." Sarcasm drips from tone but I accept the gift regardless.

"I know!" Ellie grins brightly "You should put it on now."

"That's fine, I think I'll save it for our date," I tease.

She perks up just the slightest "Ooo, when's that?"

"The second this stream ends."

"On that note," Ellie looks at the camera "Thank you guys for hopping on tonight and thank you to my neighbour who came here without putting up a fuss," Ellie clicks around on the screen a little bit before addressing them again "Alright, go bug Dina now."

With that the stream comes to a close, the blinking light on the camera turns off, and Ellie and I are left alone with ourselves and Kitty.

“So,” Ellie thumps her foot up and down repeatedly like those anxious kids in high school. “Do you maybe wanna get coffee tomorrow?”

“I don’t drink coffee but I’ll pretend to so I have an excuse to hangout with you.”

A smile splits onto Ellie’s face “Phew, I hate coffee I just thought it was an adult way to ask you out.”

A/N: This is super short but I’ll make up for it in the next part, thanks for reading! We got some angst on the way 👀

Perm tag-list: @veeveeisgay @whenlostinthedarkness @gold-dustwomxn @ellslvr