Let Light In.

dialogue prompts from the seas: a novel by samantha hunt.

the roads only go south from here.

there's no privacy in this town.

we live here because we hate the rest of you.

we're getting out of here. let's go.

fuck the dry land. i'm a mermaid.

how come i don't know you?

love is a broken down old car by the side of the road. sometimes you have to rig a fan belt or an alternator with what you've got.

i wanted them to know you were mine, even if it wasn't true.

the older i get, the vaguer things become.

you make me feel like a pony.

sadness can be like a political cause, almost, or a religion. or a drug habit.

don't forget: the ocean is full of everything, except mercy.

nudity is more painful to me than loneliness.

you're young. you should travel. meet people. see the world.

i don't really like people, i think.

drinking helps us continue living in remote places. there's no one to tell us how swallowed we are.

have you ever thought your life was an experiment?

i'm afraid you'll disappear if i blink.

please don't be afraid of me.

what's making you so sad?

what you've done is quite serious.

you should be dead. it's a miracle.

i could almost fall asleep down here.

just don't get stuck here like i did.

isn't it after your bedtime?

don't forgive me. i wouldn't, if i were you.

will you get out of the car, please?

you're spooky.

you can see me?

you can't kill what's already dead.

you are the only warm thing to me.

only mothers can really know what being scared is like.

what are you in for?

tell me your story. i've heard all the others.

love can be like a well: steep sides, with no way out.

i don't know what to believe, just now.

❝ right, right, ❞ she followed along, a breathy laugh in response to his reaction — how crazy would that be, right? if he was stuck in her room for infinity? definitely not tinged with too much relief. ❝ uh — you got a name, caller? ❞ rogue added, realizing she hadn't asked. gave her more time to ponder, too, and wipe the metaphorical sweat from her brow.

There's a grin that won't leave the ghost's face now, good nature shining from beyond the veil; when Rogue laughs with poorly masked relief, the lights on the radio glow just a little brighter, like all that warmth and joy is overflowing. It's been so long since he laughed with someone. If Patrick could touch the ground like he used to, he'd be rocking back and forth on his heels.

(He still does, just a little, but it mostly feels like floating. )

"Oh, yeah, I've got a bunch!" he answers, perking up at the thought of being known. ( Maybe if someone else says his name, he won't feel so detached; just to make sure, he leans into the static as he lists each one on his palm. "Robin, Pat, Artie, Patch, Patty... I groove with all kinds of monikers, man. Call me whatever."

As long as she keeps calling, he won't mind; he's been so lonely watching the world move on without him.

neither  does  she.  tensions  were  steadily  skyrocketing,  and  her  eyes  are  bleary.  there  was  smoke  in  her  eyes,  and  her  fingers  were  curled  around  his,  free  hand's  knuckles  rubbing  white  spots  into  her  vision. 

he  was  leading  the  way,  and  she  squeezed  his  hand  a  little  harder  as  she  stumbled  into  him,  because  she  couldn't  make  this  decision.  she  couldn't  see.  “it's  okay,”  it  didn't  matter  where  they  were  going,  “andrew,”  as  long  as  they  were  together.  “we  can  turn  around,”  smoke  bomb's  detonation  had  her  ears  ringing. 

he couldn't see a fucking thing through all the smoke. burning eyes squinted through the haze in desperation, stubborn instinct to survive only strengthened by sadie's presence; he couldn't risk her life in the chaos, couldn't risk their future before its start, their intertwined digits a silent promise. they wouldn't be separated. he wouldn't break her trust. if she was letting him lead, then he would guide her to safety, and once they drove off into the sunset he’d tend to any wounds caused by smoke bomb’s blast.

drew steadied a hand at her shoulder when she stumbled into him. the warehouse was eerily quiet, paralyzed by choice as he tried to assess what he could not see; stay here, and they were sitting ducks, but move forward and risk stepping headfirst into the fire. wait for smoke to settle, and they'd lose any chance of escape they've got.

the moment she calls his name, the world rights itself in startling clarity. keep going, baby, she says, and so he does — pulling her into his side as her grip tightens, he reached with free hand until he found a wall. he’s spent enough time in this shithole to know vaguely where they are. across the warehouse and a stairwell away, to the left a safe room and the right hidden exit; he takes a chance on the shortest route, taking about three steps before all hell breaks loose.

“fuck,” he hisses, more annoyed than surprised when shots ring out. “here we fuckin’ go.”

no time to hesitate, he steers them forward and tugs the gun from his waistband just in case. “side door’s this way,” he murmurs, an explanation when he knows his love can’t see; she was in on every plan, she was usually the mastermind, he’d keep her on track even if she was disoriented. “stay close. i got you, baby.” they just have to make it to her car, and they’ll be home free.

Anri watched him move – that slow and painful unspooling, a rusted-over mechanism set into reluctant motion.  The weight of him was heavy even in silence, heavier still in the way his hands curled around the railing, in the careful, stubborn deliberation of each descending step.  Something in his gait spoke of hidden hurts, of a pain so long endured it had folded itself into the marrow of his bones.  She followed at a distance, fawn-like and obedient, her steps light as if afraid to provoke the house into waking.  

For all his heaviness – for all the callus and grit that surely lined his palms – he treated the hens with tenderness.  That low whistle, nearly lost to the wind, seemed part apology, part lullaby.  A ritual performed with or without an audience, in the way Anri herself sometimes whispered to the half-wild creatures at the edge of the settlement, trying to convince herself she was one of them.  

When Wesley returned the basket to her, the eggs within had lent it new weight.  Small, warm, as alive as a heartbeat held in her hand.

She ought to have left then, back down the barely-there dirt path that had carried her here, but his words – I’m real sorry – clung to her, filling her with an ache that had nothing to do with hunger.  As if he had something to atone for by offering her all he had.  As if she, of all people, could be a vessel for absolution.

Her grip tightened on the wicker handle, fingers brushing the frayed edges of her own sleeves, too thin for the season’s shifting moods.  The wind stirred again, lifting the scent of faraway rain and something stranger and nearer beneath it. Something buried, or rotting, or waiting.  

Slowly, she set the basket down.  From within it, she lifted sprigs of rosemary, brittle and green.  Tugging free a faded ribbon looped through the neckline of her dress, she used it to bind the wiry stems.  The motion drew her collar loose – just a breath, no more – and revealed the stark columns of her collarbones, pale as porcelain.  All prey animal grace, she stepped forward and held out the little posy.

“It keeps sickness away,” she murmured.  “Spirits, too, if you believe in such things.”  A girl most ghost-like, now with a soft, wry curve of her lips, though there was no mirth in it.  “It’s not much, but… I’d like you to have it.”

With transaction complete, and no money to be pressed in scraped-up palms, Wesley expected the girl to walk away; it would have been the smart thing to do, after all, the furthest route the safest. But then again, he never was very good at convincing people to leave. ( Or maybe they just didn't want to listen; maybe they thought a short life in hell was better than enduring a long one with Wesley. )

The wicker didn't creak when small fists formed a weak grip around it, but Wesley's keen eye caught the movement anyway, watching the minute twitch of emaciated digits as the moment stretched heavy between them. Wind caught the dull ends of her hair like fields of corn left to harvest; he thought it was the same color, too, gathered around her hollowed face in illusion of abundance. He desperately wished that he could offer her more.

It came as a shock when she apparently thought of the same thing — setting her basket down just to pluck the herbs from its belly, slow and decisive like startled prey — only to lose her hesitation when she tore a ribbon free from her collar, using precious thread to tie the bundle together. He didn't even have time to protest, no chance to refuse before sharp bones and pale skin were peeking out behind cotton; only slightly, but enough to tinge his cheeks pink, guilt swaddled up with the same politeness that made him shift his steady gaze. He didn't mean to take advantage. For all the folks in town said about him, he tried his best to be a decent person.

Tension pulled the strings taut as she stepped closer, and Wesley held his breath in wait of something awful. He tried to trap her in his blank gaze, searching for hidden meaning in that tired twitch of the lips; altogether too soft for a place like this, too giving in her charity, a gentle nature foreign to he of barbed wire and rusted edges. Even her voice felt too sacred for these blighted grounds.

Who in their right mind would wish such a kind thing on Wesley Crane? Who would tend to thing so disheveled and dirty? He almost feared to touch the small bundle so as not to see it wilt; it wouldn't be the first time Wesley had ruined a nice thing.

The chickens squabbled behind him as he blinked, strutting their little bodies around the gate as if they could plot some new way to escape — or at least, they hoped to find another route to Wesley, because the damn fool things were just smart enough to know they wouldn't make it far without him. He knew if he opened up the fencing, they'd all fall in line at his feet. ( And it was nice, he admitted, to be needed every now and then; even better to be wanted, if only by the hens he looked after. It'd been a long time since anyone tried to keep him similarly safe. He can't remember the last time anyone offered him anything. )

"...Are you sure?" he asked, all quiet hesitation and uncertainty. He stared at the sprigs but didn't reach, ever a statue built to crumble in an overgrown lawn; soon to be forgotten, gravel toppled in the yard, nothing left to be said for the wreckage in the mud. There would be no tokens left in his memory. He only hoped Jacob and his mom had the sense to escape at the end of it.

"That's real nice of you, but I don't want it to go to waste."

His heart was a clenched fist wreaking havoc against his ribcage, beating and beating until the ache made it hard to breathe; when she looked at him, he felt fragile, broken and starved as the sharp curve of her cheek. He didn't even know her name. He hoped she wouldn't be desperate enough to return and let him learn it.

HE APPRECIATES THE CONCERN, HE REALLY DOES. But it feels like all he does these days is deal with other people's pity and worry and concern. Like he's walking a tightrope between too happy or too sad, that always varies person to person. (And nothing about his situation is normal so it's not exactly like he can ask other people if this is how it usually goes when someone you care about dies because of you?)

"It's just-" A pause. "Everyone's expecting me to be this, big artist who goes to art school and I, I don't want to let them down." Because what's the point of anything if he does? Disappointment, and a ruined dream he's not even really sure if he wants, and a best friend he only gets to see at night. (Because he got distracted and let Mapplethorpe go off alone and he can't let him have died for nothing.)

Laughter rings out from another part of the park, bright and unapologetic over the hiss of hydraulics and metal. Beside him, Chester teeters on a precipice, lips pressed in a thin line with all the weight he's holding in — but Wesley is persistent, and patient. He has all night to wait if it takes that long for the other boy to let it out. Thankfully, it doesn't take that long; only a few beats of silence pass before Chester starts to talk, blurting out his concern before once again clams up.

Wesley thinks he just might explode if he keeps going on like that. He's seen it happen in the sickly heat of summer, when all the pressure in a can finally caught up to a bad seal: glass shards exploding off the shelves in a chain reaction, leaking tomatoes and corn and mushy bits until it formed a slop on a bed of hay. Some things, there's just no going back from.

A slow blink fills the quiet as Wesley stares, and when he's sure Chester isn't going to say anything else, he delivers a harsh reality.

"I don't got anything to do," he says, not a complaint or a lament but simply the truth. "I'm dead. And I ain't exactly as social as Mapplethorpe." Pretty much the polar opposite, actually, which is how he found himself in this quiet corner with Chester while the rest of the fun kids started up another game — and that suited him just fine, most days. If he wanted any other company, he'd go and find Gonzo.

"Besides, I didn't ask you just because. I asked 'cuz I wanted to hear it; it ain't good to keep all that bottled up." He tugs at his earlobe as he thinks, tilting his head from side to side until it finally cracks; he thinks he and Chester have the opposite problems. Nobody ever expected Wesley to amount to shit, and he never really had a chance to try, either. Still, it sounds like a bad deal either way.

enjoy the fights.

i know you're good at killing.

i figure only one of us is walking out of here.

maybe i pegged you wrong.

who are you?

where did you get the armor?

hand it over.

i'm sure you call the shots where you come from, but around here, i'm the one who tells folks what to do.

take it off. or i will.

we gonna do this in front of the kid?

right here, then?

do you gamble?

i'm prepared to pay you for the information.

i'm not leaving my fate up to chance.

thank you for coming to me.

give it to me now, or i will peel it off your corpse.

i thought you said you weren't a gambler.

all right, stop! stop! i'll tell you where he is!

you must promise that you won't kill me!

i promise that you will not die by my hand.

my information is good, i tell you.

you can't leave me like this. cut me down!

that wasn't part of the deal.

this little thing had me worried sick.

you know he doesn't like droids.

may as well let them have at it.

you don't understand what it was like.

i've got an idea.

get its attention.

you still have that detonator?

what's the plan?

what are you gonna do?

wish me luck.

maybe we can work something out.

they might be open to some fresh ideas.

it's not to scale.

it's a whole lot bigger than i guessed.

might be time to rethink our arrangement.

that's more like it.

where are they getting the reinforcements?

i hope someday our paths will cross again.

you know what that means?

we've heard the stories.

this one's got a problem.

looks like it remembers me.

how much do you want for it?

just kidding. but not really.

can i help you?

we don't get many visitors in these parts.

you want to tell me what's going on?

i'm here on business. i need your help.

can you tell me where it used to be?

you know this is no place for a child.

wherever i go, he goes.

you can't just get help anymore.

you still have that speeder bike?

what am i supposed to do with this?

you drink it.

lower your voice.

you're agitating them.

how do we kill it?

what brings you here?