Unfortunately, we just go on.

[It feels familiar to fight with her, too comfortable to just want to change it by kissing her. But he can’t fall back into that, fall back into her. She’d leave again and it wasn’t as if he’d do it right the second time around anyway.]

[Already he's pulling away, fading back into the couch like he wants to stand and leave her there. It was stupid to think of this happening any different way. Even when it was just them, no one else, they always had this uncomfortable silence, something that trickled from their throats into the air, until it was unbearable and one would leave. It was how they worked, and also how they didn't.] Course. [But she knows it's rather he doesn't want her too. Because apologising meant they had to backtrack, reliving all the faults that lead to it. Lourdes for the first time ached to vanish, just to dissipate into nothingness, but she had to stay solid, settling herself on the other side of the couch, at arms length just the way he liked. Enough for walls.]

Lou, I don’t wanna talk about it. It means enough, that’s not what I mean. You just… it’s fine. You don’t need to say sorry.

  [Thom shakes his head because despite that he doesn’t know what she’s thanking him for, he doesn’t think he’s done anything deserving of it so far. That and, she could be thanking him for the past, only coming here for a few days just to say she’s found herself a cure, she’s successful somewhere, and she’s thanking him for whatever experience he gave. That’d be worse than her saying she’s back here because she loves him.

[He doesn’t want to talk about it the same way that he never wants to talk about it, never wants to talk about anything. And he feels bad for it, but he redirects the conversation. He doesn’t want emotions pouring out, even if there was any time to do it it would be now.]

[Lou has to stop herself from laughing, from pouring out some sort of hysterical remark that would likely reveal her true disposition. Was she staying? Yes. But not in the sense that either of them wanted]

It's probably better than me showing up here...[and finding no one. But maybe that would have been better. Maybe Lou could have sat by herself in the snow. She could have walked the halls in silence, visiting each room like a true haunting. Even now, watching as he sat- uncomfortable in all regards. She didn't really know what to do.] and you being gone. I don't know.

[This was the moment she hadn't thought of yet, because it was packed with far more questions than Lou could answer. Why was she still here. But it wasn't something to address now. Not so blatantly in front of him. The old couch was a remnant of the past, a reminder of where Ben had spent the majority of the evenings, and she eventually had crept around him. Friends at some point, they had deteriorated like a seam ripping at both ends. 

[Thom’s fingers are shaking and he wants to tell her yes, wants to tell her that he loves her just as much as he did when she left and he’d given up waiting for her to come back, assuming that she died as some point (and he wants to say that there was a day he felt like she did, where he was certain, mostly because of the drugs). But he feels like he can’t. He feels like, as is his nature, he has to push her. Maybe it’s for him, for once. Maybe it’s because he can’t go through that again.

[Thomas' reluctance is apparent, and it comes as no surprise to Lou as she hurries in after him, if she were alive, there would be some relief in leaving the cold winters night, but walking down the hallway slowly, waiting for Thom to gain his nerve to talk, there is none.

[Thom just stares despite her slew of words between space and pauses. He just stares. Because he’s not sure why he never expected to see her back, but it doesn’t make sense that she doesn’t look like she’s dying. Maybe she found a way to cure herself. Maybe she figured it out while he couldn’t. He’d just chalk it up to the failure word he’d been tossing around when he was alone. And he doesn’t speak or move until the cigarette burns through so short that his fingertips feel like they’re catching fire and he looks down at the cigarette now in t he snow. And then he stands, slowly and careful to grab the railing (because the high always kicks in when you stand).

[It wasn’t like he didn’t imagine her once in a while, but it was towards the beginning, before Hamish came about, and then before he pushed Hamish away. He would catch a glimpse every now and then out of the corner of his eye and then when he looked again, she was gone. But she never spoke, never smiled, never looked healthy like she does now.

[Her smile fades almost as quickly he says her name, because it's all wrong, all screwed up and wonky, like he had worn out saying it in his sleep, when she spent all her time away. Immediately she halts, bringing  fingers up to her face to brush the strands from her vision. Thom looks worn out too, like he needs a warm bath and soup, and for once maybe she can take care of him, the way he wouldn't let her when she was alive. But she can't tell him that part yet, because he's already looking at her like she's a ghost.] 

[Everyone was gone now. There wasn’t a person left. Meg visited, but she moved on with her life. Cormac and Ben were off on some soul search, “killing all the bad guys,” Cormac had told him just before he left.

[She's been biding her time, trying to find the right excuse that might make an appearance warranted. But it's harder than she thought, after a lifetime, and then another, spending her existence in the dark had become somewhat mundane. So when she fathoms just a few meters away from sight,the girl isn't sure if she's supposed to be surprised, or delighted, but walking up the drive to the old house, lights still blaring out the windows into the darkness. Like a beacon she supposed would guide her home. She could feel her non-beating heart caught in her throat, and the wind, if she let it, could easily pass through her.