Ib actually let out a strangled sound when she heard the voice of the blonde, turrning around to stare in horror (occasional illicit horror movie watching after her parents had gone to bed and her experiences in the gallery had warped her expectations, she’d been half expecting the mangled, scorched creature that haunted her dreams) at the rapidly approaching girl - who looked no different, and no less happy than she had been, if not somehow happier.
“–” She choked on whatever words she was trying to produce, again; instead, stepping back slightly, she turned to her phone (which had been a godsend since she’d arrived - and so much easier than misspelling things written down on notebooks and handkerchiefs!)
[ “Mary - what are you doing here? I thoug –” ]
(In her nerves, she’d pressed the text-to-speech button halfway through the word, and the last sentence came out as something like “I thug.”)
She thug? She had no idea what that meant, and thus ignored it in favor of answering Ib’s first question.
“I have no idea!” Well, at least she was being honest. “One minute, I’m being turned to ash,” the venom in her voice was as abrupt as it was fierce, but disappeared in the next instant, “and the next, I’m here! I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth, though. I mean, this is what I wanted, right?”
She was still oblivious to Ib’s turmoil as she plowed on. “Plus, you’re here, too! I mean, I didn’t know where you lived, but somehow we found each other again! Maybe it’s fate?”
