like black holes in the sky

                               MEET MERRICK WOOD // A QUICK NAVIGATION.

Maverick wasn’t bothered the storm. Per say. having grown up in Seattle, crappy weather and storms were something he was used to. And having traveled through the entire country and the vast array of weather the different areas brought, he wasn’t worried about the storm itself. No matter how severe it got, they would be fine within the thick walls of the building they were sheltering in.

It was the walls that surrounded the town that worried him. A month or two back, he had noticed a couple of the support beams on the back wall looking weak but was unsure if the council had gotten the maintenance workers to replace them. Not that he knew much about construction…actually he knew nothing about construction, it just seemed like a problem to worry about. Strong winds could destroy a lot of stuff. Who knows how strong the walls really were.

With the sounds of the storm seeming to die down, he made his way to the front with intentions of going to check out the wall if the weather allowed. Opening the doors, he was met by a strong gust of wind and a downpour of water. Not that he minded. The cool rain was refreshing after so much humidity. Although the severity of the storm put a halt to his plans of checking the wall. He was about to go back inside when he noticed the blonde on the steps.

After calling her name, he made his way down the steps, lowing himself down beside her. “My mom always said you’ll catch your death being outside in a storm. This time I think she might actually be right.”

Merrick smirked at his reply; but was grateful he didn’t try and lure her inside. They hadn’t ever really talked about everything that happened - the Kit Stamp ordeal was not his fault, but she wasn’t sure she ever told him she didn’t blame him. She wondered if he still thought about it as much as she did - how that one event changed so much of her inside, some days she thought she might scream from the burden of it all. But they worked well together - he was focused where she was scattered, and when they were on runs together they’d always  been successful in the past. 

He was probably not being sidelined for runs now, though. Merrick wondered if it was Holly’s doing, Holly’s closeness to the council that left her sitting on the sidelines. 

“holding out? every time i offer you knock me back.” she takes another toke on her joint, lets the smoke fill her lungs before she blows it out, the aroma of burnt green filling the room “and m’not hiding, i just didn’t really feel like dealing with what’s goin’ on out there. not when the parties more interesting in here.”

yale was god knows where really, probably taking advantage of the hyper-busy atmosphere throughout town hall and breaking into offices undetected searching for blackmail material and madison was with her sister, so colette hadn’t wanted to intrude.

besides sometimes, especially now, when she could never be sure who to let near her or who to trust, she just liked to spend a little down time away from the masses of people and while the social creature that still lived dormant inside her kind of wanted to break loose and throw herself into the centre of everything, the cautious side of her won out, content to sit back somewhere out of the way.

“you look like you’ve been for a swim - shouldn’t you be down at the sheds holding tall, dark and silent’s hand?” she raises an eyebrow in inquiry, holding out the joint for merrick despite the fact she’d probably just turn it down yet again “considering the fact he’s only just begun venturing out of his cocoon i can’t imagine he’s dealing with this crisis all that well.”

merrick hesitated for a moment before taking what was offered to her - if they were gonna talk about ethan and logan, and really it was past time that they did - she was going to need some help doing so. she inhaled, letting the sweet smoke fill her lungs before passing the joint back to colette, only coughing a little as she did, trying to let the drugs take over her. 

“he’ll be fine,” merrick shrugged, though she knew that wasn’t true. but without lulu to worry about, he’d only worry about merrick - and the two of them both knew merrick was perfectly fine in a storm. “he’s trying, at least. and almost talking again.” it was  like raising a baby, sometimes, marking milestones. the first time he was eating without merrick forcing him to, the first time he showered before merrick made him. now if he’d talk to someone besides merrick, using full sentences - 

“i think something happened with his sister. i mean, i know something happened - i know she’s dead. and seeing you - “ she closed her eyes, even as she leaned against colette. “you two look very similar. dark hair, dark eyes, even your personalities are similar sometimes.” she doesn’t think about how she stuck to colette because it was almost like having lulu back - how in some capacities, she replaced her childhood best friend. “but he’s never been good with any sort of trauma, and his whole life has been nothing but that. for once, i don’t want this to be another trauma to add to the list, you know? i’m tired. i’m just - “ she sighed again, closing her eyes as she did. “i’m so tired, ‘lette.” 

“yeah i don’t think so.” she’d only been taking a small break, a second to duck outside, still close enough to the open doorway to be relatively safe or to race back in if she needed to when she’d spotted the young woman sitting on the bottom steps and had called out to her “i value my safety a little too much to tempt fate like that.”

the girl, merrick, was an obvious daredevil, that much was clear by the fact that no request seemed too small when she’d go out on runs, always willing to find what the people (liv included) asked for, pretty much no questions asked.

liv had no such adventurous side, preferring the safety and relative stability remaining inside fairvales gates offered her.

“how about you do me a favor and head inside with me?” she calls out, the rain pelting downing, flattening her hair and dampening the light weight top she’s wearing as it whips around her “pretty sure staying out here at this stage is just a recipe for disaster.”

merrick sighed dramatically, mostly for effect, but knew it was starting to get dark again - that the lull in the storm would pass, and soon she’d be risking her own life by staying outside. she wasn’t a storm chaser, knew nothing about meteorology - just appreciated the aesthetics, the danger that was presented to her. 

natural danger, not manufactured of her own disastrous mind or the mind of others. 

“only because you asked nicely,” merrick agreed, pushing herself off the steps and heading inside the doorway, helping livia close it tightly behind them. “and because i’m going to need to change out of this before i get sick. i don’t think my sister wants to deal with me having pneumonia on top of everything else.” 

Eventually, when the loneliness grew too heavy, Chahid went to look for Maverick. Their brain warned them against it, suggested alternatives. They should hide somewhere else, surely there were still rooms in Town Hall unoccupied. They could even hide out in the toilet. They could sleep as well, it wasn’t as if the sound of the rain would keep them awake.

Instead they wandered once again. 

They noticed a figure outside of City Hall and called out Maverick’s name, not sure if they yelled loud enough. The figure responded in movement and Chahid took a step outside, hugging their jacket to their body in an effort to fight off the cold. 

When they reached the figure it turned out not to be Maverick. They offered a slight smile, chilly in the wind. “Sorry, I thought you were someone else,” they said, not catching a single word she had said.

Merrick smiled up at them; she hadn’t exactly ventured outside of her circle lately, but she knew enough people by face around town to have recognized Chahid. Being someone else - god, a thought that she’d craved for weeks, really, the desire to be in someone else’s skin. Someone who wasn’t her, who wasn’t feeling hopeless and mournful over things she had no control over. 

“Who are you looking for?” she asked instead, standing and leading them back to the relative safety near the doors, at least. “Maybe I can help you find them. If you want help.” It would give her a reasonable excuse for evading her sister at this crucial time, at least, for avoiding the question of why she wasn’t more worried about those that were out there, lost to the whims of nature. 

At least it’s only nature they have to contend with, she thought bitterly, glad she could bite that remark down - a storm was worse than people, she knew, could leave you isolated and stranded and gone. But she still couldn’t find it in her to worry - not yet - and instead offered a smile to Chahid. “I’m a particularly good hider, so I can usually find people pretty easily too.”

For a moment, everything seemed to settle in a place that felt normal, like Before… except Ethan didn’t think about Before. It was too much and too far away and it made his head hurt and spin and feel cloudy all over again.

But Merrick was here. And she really was here and alive and with him and it made him… feel. It didn’t even matter what he felt. Everything had been numb for so long that anything was better. Right? That’s what he was supposed to try to be. Better.

“Iris,” he said and it almost made him smile. “Miss that.”

He really did. She used to scream it at the top of her lungs, arms stretched towards the sky, hair wild. Happy. Free.

She’d sing it with Lulu.

Lulu liked to sing the guitar solo like it had words.

His heart seized and he felt like he couldn’t breathe again. Lulu was gone. She couldn’t sing anything anymore. So nothing was better. Nothing could ever be better. 

But he had to try. 

“Can I… hear it?”

“Me, or the song?” she tried to joke. She didn’t miss it - the way his body shut down, every time he thought of Lulu. She was sure that’s what he had been thinking about - the pain was etched into every inch of his skin, the ache in his heart, the only thing he’d ever cared about more than her. 

Lulu would have dragged him out of this. There was no doubt about it - she’d have given him a couple days, and then she’d have said ‘enough’ and pulled him out. Demanded he go outside. Merrick was going to have to do that soon. 

Still, she left him only momentarily, to retrieve the discman she’d been playing for him. It still had the same CD she’d been listening to in the dark more often than not - track three, the opening chords beginning. She set it to repeat, letting it play once through before she sang along quietly, her voice rough and scratchy and vastly out of tune to the melodic verses being sung, but familiar, hopefully - pulling him closer to himself than he’d been. 

She let it play quietly, the headphones the only sound in the room as she snuggled closer to him, her fingers skating over his stomach, his arms, his skin. Anywhere she could touch, lightly, comfortingly. She’d done this before. Many times.

She used to be enough to pull him free. 

He knows he needs to get up.

It’s been… a while. He’s confident it’s been at least a week but there’s a space of time where he can’t be sure of anything. The passage of time has only started to mean anything at all because Merrick has been telling him the days of the week lately. And Merrick never cares about that kind of thing, so it must be important. And he’s pretty sure, at least mostly sure, that Merrick is real.

Merrick is real. Which means that… he’s real. And here. And here is real and somewhere. Which means that he needs to get up. 

He can’t though. Everything feels too heavy and hard and it’s only Merrick on his chest that feels anything close to right.

Anything close to Ethan.

He’s supposed to be Ethan.

He listens to her talk, like she always has with him. A long time ago, he felt like he was her diary, always there to hear her secrets. But now she just sounds sad. And maybe sad is okay but he’s never wanted her to be sad. He remembers that at least.

Ethan never let her be sad.

He feels her sigh against his neck. It feels nice. Maybe he can make her feel nice. He shallows and his throat is so dry, he’s not sure he can manage to say what he wants to say. But he does; it’s a croak more than anything but he says it: 

“Number one.”

It’s not a lot, but it’s something. Enough to bring a smile to her face; that was the nice thing about Ethan. She never had to question her position in his life. When he said she was number one, he meant it. And if they were honest, they both knew there would never be another number one. 

She used to wish there was. She used to want him to love someone so completely beside her so she could feel less guilt. But she loved him, and she loved Logan, and her heart had been split in two for both of them since she was twelve years old. 

These days, though, she was selfish. Every single time she watched Holly blush as she and Logan flirted, each and every time she watched Logan’s eyes follow her sister around the room, it filled her with an innate sadness that she had no room to feel. A broken heart that her sister had once harbored, when it was her on Logan’s mind. 

And so she started spending more and more time with Ethan. Which wasn’t fair to him, but she was also pretty sure he barely knew what was happening. She prattled on and on for hours, filling silence with her own voice, and sometimes, she could swear, he even seemed to almost respond. 

who: open starter ( @thecatastrophicstarters​ )

when & where: one of the offices inside town hall, night of the 26th of july.

getting high during a natural disaster was probably not the smartest way someone should cope with yet another shitstorm (this time hilariously she could say that in the literal sense). using a council persons office as her own private drug den was probably a bad decision too but honestly at this stage colette was running out of fucks to give.

what could possibly happen if she got caught anyway? they lock her up for the night? make her sit through a lecture? ‘don’t do drugs, drugs are bad!’

anyone with any authority had better things to do.

the green fay had provided her with at a decent token rate was hitting the spot though, stronger than what madison grew, smoother too but she suspects that has something to do with all the sweet talk fay exposes them to, all the ‘you’re growing for me so well babies’ colette likes to amuse her self with imagining they mutter in the crops direction.

by the time she hears the door creak open she’s got a nice little buzz going on, her thoughts blurring pleasantly so she’s not at all bothered by the events happening outside her own little private cocoon.

“i’m warning you now if you’re planning on settling here - if you ruin my high we’re gonna have issues.”

soaked to the bone, merrick needed some extra layers after storm chasing for a little while. stella had directed her to her office - “i always keep extra clothes in there,” she admitted, before rushing off to help someone else - and while the two weren’t particularly close, merrick figured if her sister trusted her, so could merrick. 

she hadn’t expected to find colette in said office, clearly stoned out of her mind. the two, who had once been damn near inseperable, hadn’t exactly had much time together lately. merrick had been too self involved, she knew, and colette had found solace in madison ( thankfully ). but she smirked, pulling off her soaked shirt and finding one of stella’s sweaters in a filing cabinet to pull on and keep herself warm before knocking into her roommate, settling down on the floor beside her. 

“i can’t believe you’ve been holding out on me,” she snorts, though the truth is merrick hadn’t smoked in....years, really. she hasn’t felt a need to, hasn’t really wanted to without the fun of a party or a club and the chance to feel someone’s body pulsing against her own. weed, especially, had always made her more affectionate, more physical - that wasn’t exactly ideal for current circumstances. 

“how come  you’re hiding out in here?” she asked; you could barely hear the storm inside, the wind rushing against the sides of the building. “i figured you’d be attached to yale or madison - though i guess the latter is probably with her sisters.” 

merrick loved storms. 

growing up in an old farmhouse, storms brought wind and noises one that could send shivers down your spine, power outages easily putting them into pitch darkness, a spookiness that, as a teen, merrick adored. 

storms were a burden when she got older, something she had to endure as she went to work, traveling through blizzards and blustery winds and torrential downpours. but there was no work now - she was still being sidelined for supply runs, though she often disappeared on her own, finding herself in the papers office or the bar working on her own novel more often than not. 

which meant, for the first time in years, she could truly enjoy it. 

everyone else was terrified - a sound reaction to a summer storm like this - huddled inside the makeshift town hall. she should have been comforting her sister, a small voice lecturing her for not immediately running to holly’s arms. logan was out there, ethan was in the warehouses - but merrick couldn’t make her feet move towards the one she knew needed solace the most. 

instead, she sat on the steps of the town hall, the rain seeping into her pores as she let it wash over her. the winds were still strong, but not strong enough to pull her away - instead, she let it envelope her completely, only startling when the sound of someone’s voice called her name. 

“i’m fine,” she yelled back - she had to yell, to be heard - but the clouds were darkening again, and she knew it was probably not long before she had to return to the inside world again, her shoulders sinking slightly as she did. “come out here for a minute,” she invited instead, “it’s incredible.” 

Ray kept his eyes on Merrick for a moment. He had to make sure that his drink passed the first taste test. When he was rewarded with a smile, Ray figured it was good enough. Lord knew that the drinks he came up with nowadays would have had pre-outbreak Ray wrinkling his nose, but beggars could not be choosers. Their supplies were limited, the liquor was half water, and the bartender basics that he had taken for granted were long gone. If Fairvale hadn’t had a farm, the Hard Times would have been just as vacant at the other buildings around town, lost to a time that was too soft to exist now.

“I don’t know if the place I worked at woulda been bougie enough for you,” Ray teased. “We had cheap mixed drinks and theme nights, a real college dive.” The bar hadn’t been that bad, truthfully, but it was a local haunt sort of place. Ray had a hard time picturing girls like Merrick and Holly there, in his old life bar. “I got to spent most of my time back at the distillery after I graduated, anyways. Not much time for the front of house stuff.”

Ray poured himself a finger of his favorite whisky they had at the bar. He dropped a single ice cube in, swirling the glass a couple of times while Merrick talked. It was a rare indulgence, for him to drink at the bar, but it felt nice to share a drink with someone and the bar was dead enough that he could enjoy it.

“Everything happens for a reason, I think,” Ray shared after a moment. The life they all had planned was nonexistent anymore. All of their plans were gone, rewritten by a virus hellbent on destroying them. This was their new life, their new destinies, and Ray didn’t want to waste the opportunity. The whisky had a warm burn as he takes a sip, but Ray was so used to it he didn’t flinch. “Everythin’ we do or did leads us to where we’re supposed to be, one way or another. The universe musta had somethin’ bigger in store for you, Merrick. That I’m sure of.”

“I think you think I am a lot fancier than I actually am,” Merrick laughed. "I used to love dive bars. We had two in the area that we’d sneak into in high school - I used to hustle pool with Ethan and con men into giving me their money just because it was fun.” She hated the fancy bars her friends had brought her to in New York, and even though her and Holly would find a pub over a wine bar in Boston, they still weren’t the same as the dives and pits that littered the south. “Even in Boston, I would have preferred dive bars. I just didn’t have many friends who would go to them with me.” 

All of those, she’d left behind in Georgia. 

“Bigger than running away from zombies and grabbing medical supplies and storages of food in the middle of the apocalypse?” she grinned; it was easy to be cavalier about her situation again, though she was sure it would never feel temporary again. The Kit Stamp ordeal had taught her one thing, if nothing else: this was what her life was like. The plans she’d had, the ideas and goals she’d never admit to - they were gone. 

“I dunno,” she admitted, allowing a little bit of vulnerability to come across. “I mean, I can’t write the next big American novel - there’s barely an America left, barely anything left. And I can’t get married and have kids - not like I wanted to, at least. I mean, I can find someone, and I can be with them until one or both of us dies, but procreating now....” 

She lets a shudder run through her, the idea of bringing more life into this world - it wasn’t something she would do. Not something she could do. “It feels irresponsible, you know? And I wanted to be a mom so bad. Now I don’t know if I’m gonna make it to see 24, much less if I’m going to get that ‘happily ever after’.”

merrick leads her into the home - close to what holly imagined, not just an antique store, bookcases lining the walls filled to the brim, seemingly waiting just for her - and leaves her to explore, holly forcing herself not to get too lost amongst the organized chaos as her fingers skim along dusty spines breathing in the nostalgia of a forgotten paradise.

it isn’t long before she joins her sister outside though, a kiss brushed to the apple of the younger woman’s cheek as she settles in beside her, takes the offered glass of juice and toasts along with her.

“the plaza was overrated anyway. way too fancy for my tastes…this is perfect.” she comments with a shrug, breaking off a small piece of the cookie merrick had placed in front of her, forcing herself to eat despite how difficult she finds the act these days, her stomach rolling as she chews, if only because mere’s the one that had baked them and she doesn’t want her to think she doesn’t appreciate the effort “remember those pre-pageant meet and greets mom used to force us both to attend, you practically tearing at your dress trying to jump out second story windows and me hiding in a corner trying to stave off multiple panic attacks?”

too terrified to talk to anyone -a room full of beautiful girls holly could never utter a word beyond hello to for fear that once she opened her mouth they’d realize she didn’t belong.

(the ice queen reputation she’d managed to procure for herself because she’d been too shy and awkward to put herself out there, the way merrick had knocked down anyone they heard whispering behind their backs trying to defend her honor - always the brave one even then)

a home.

if they survived everything the world threw at them, if they could build and sustain fairvale so it remained something real and tangible - a life, a home she could fill with nieces and nephews, with big blue eyed children of her own, weekend barbeques and sunday night movie marathons, walls bursting with life, laughter and love.

it’s everything she could ever hope for.

but its a pipe dream, one she’d given up on along with her wish to see an MD attached at the end of her name. all she could hope for now - all anyone could hope for - was something close. for the people she loved to survive, with some sense of peace in tact. a new, more fragile kind of happiness.

"maybe” she nods anyway, content to dream of what might have been’s instead of dwelling on the fact holly’s not even sure they’ll both survive long enough to make an attempt “i…i’ve always imagined going back to riverside eventually - if we get lucky, if someone out there finds a cure - rebuilding there, but it’s lovely here.” maybe not in fairvale as a whole but this one quiet and perfect spot.

“we’ll do some exploring if you like, after we eat, i very much doubt we’ll run into any trouble, since no basement could ever be as freaky as the one back home, but if the stairs cave in at least we’ll fall together.”

an eyebrow raises as she unwraps her sandwich; she hadn’t thought about returning to riverside, not the way they had left it. but the wood home was supposed to travel from father to son, decades and generations that had grown in the walls. in time, one or both of the wood sisters would have resided in it as adults - it was the plan, after all. merrick had assumed, once upon a time, that it would become the home she lived in with logan, a place for him to rest while he took on the world of professional football, two beautiful children with his eyes and her hair and the reckless behavior they both inhabited running around the property merrick had spent her entire life exploring. 

that dream had changed and shifted throughout the years - logan had been replaced by a faceless man, but the children had always stayed, and her own parents were always nearby. downgraded, into a small condo for themselves, just as billy’s parents had done when whitney was pregnant with holly, a plan she knew whitney would have gladly taken if only so she stopped having to clean a monstrous home on her own. 

now, the picture shimmers in front of her - the return of logan makes that part of the image clearer, a pang somewhere deep in her chest as she erases it. as she pictures him with holly instead, with ethan on her own arm, their children sporting golden hues of honey instead of vibrant blue, even more curls unimaginable to tame, sloped smiles and the desire for a quiet place to hide. 

“if we could manage it,” merrick hums, glad her sister couldn’t see what merrick saw in her minds eye, “i think it would be nice. the four of us, back home. we’d have to take the others with us - colette and yale, fletcher and madison. basically just move who we like from here down to riverside, start our own colony right out of the wood plantation.” 

a smile toys at her lips, her cheek nestled against holly’s shoulder as she giggles at the mere idea of it. how much work it would be is the only reason her brain doesn’t start thinking about how to make it happen - the never ending shifts to make fairvale work were daunting enough - though it’s a pipe dream that she’s sure she’ll think on forever now. 

she notices holly picking at her lunch - another reason merrick had brought her away from the clinic, knowing how little her sister had been eating in general. even less than merrick, who was wasting away to nothing because of her own lack of hunger - but she makes no comment, not now, not today. there’s nothing that will take away from one happy day they can have together. 

It’s a gift from the heart. Fletcher holds the CD case carefully and looks over the song list, her handwriting and smiles something fierce at the note about him being her ‘knight in shining armor’. Anything creative is a gift that will always be appreciated. To express herself and her gratitude and all the platonic love between them in such a way Fletch thinks is a special thing. Art in any form is vulnerable, and a CD mix falls under the general scope of creativity and self-expression.

“This is really sweet, Mere. Thank you so much.” Merrick never half-asses anything so he’s sure that every song on it was carefully cherry picked to suit him. He’s probably shared his iPod enough times to give her a hint of his taste in music which is all over the map. Aside from his 'rig playlist’ which was purposely all things obscene and obnoxious for the sake of annoying his squad en route to any calls (never to the hospital because no patient would appreciate that). Makes for an easy task. He is positive it’s more than just a mash-up and there is more thought behind the track list.

Fletch laughs softly as the first track begins to play and turns to look at her with a happy squint to his eyes. “I’ve been here for almost nine months, you should know I’m all for anything cheesy at this point. Bring on all the cheddar you have. Every bock, slice and shred.” But they can find something. He can go bother Jules down at inventory - it’s been a minute since he’s seen the guy, and Fletch is overdue for a check in with him as well as many others. God, has he been slacking in the over-attentive mother hen friend department.

“Art is something we should all hold onto. Whether we create or consume. Music counts, obviously, so I agree. Everyone deserves music.” Old and maybe one day new, if they can collect more musicians in town. “This means a lot to me.

Merrick’s grateful that he understands how much of herself she was giving to him, that he truly sees it for the gesture it is. She smiles more, pressing a soft kiss to his cheek before wrapping her arms around one of his, curling up with him on his bed. 

It’s nice, like this, Fletcher giving her the positive attention she needs and craves without her own selfish desires getting in their way. It isn’t often she’s found this kind of dynamic - more often than not, she’s sabotaged it with lust, with her own rash decisions ruining anything that can come close to true intimacy. But with Fletcher, she feels safe. Warm. 

Like home. 

She hopes she can provide those things for him, too - she knows his family is Madison and Logan, has watched the way the three of them interact with one another, but hopes he can count her as well. Knows that while she may have ( more ) than her fair share of blood relations around, he’s her family too. That she’d do anything for him - to help him stay safe, to protect him, to make him smile. 

“I remember the first time I found my mom’s old discman,” she says, thumb scratching against the comforter beneath them, “it had a Matchbox Twenty CD in it. And I listened to it for like, a week straight. I was probably like, eight, and definitely didn’t resonate with the lyrics yet, but there was something different about being able to hold it like that - Holly had an iPod and we had headphones but it was different. I could only listen to so much of it, I could control what I had in my  hands. And then she taught me how to make new CDs out of music on the computer - how to choose songs, how to make sure it fit. She gave me my first mix CD, you know.” Bringing up Whitney is a strange feeling - she’s been so quiet about their actual family outside of Fairvale, haven’t even mentioned their father and how they found them. 

But Whitney - well, she’s safe. Presumably. Looking for her daughters. And Merrick realizes, with a tug in her chest that threatens to overwhelm her again, that she’s missed her mom more than anyone else. 

“Holly and everyone laugh because of how much I love ‘Iris’, but our mom was the first one to play it for me. We were in the car going to softball practice in third grade, and she went ‘I love this song’ and turned it up at full blast and sang along. She never did that. She was always too busy to appreciate the music in the background. But whenever Iris came on - she’d always stop and listen and sing, and unlike me, she could actually sing.” 

It was pretty clear from Merrick’s declarations that she very much did care but she just simply wasn’t going to dwell on it anymore. At least for that particular moment anyway. Oliver remembered how she told him about both of them, about everyone in her group of friends, and the pain that laced every word. She tried to sound flippant, or at least neutral but Merrick was never neutral. And everything she felt was always so big, he couldn’t blame her for wanting to stop those feelings from completely taking over. So she retreated into herself, into making herself focus on anything but what was currently tearing at her heart.

In a way, he recognized the coping mechanism; after all, it was similar to his own.

“I wouldn’t say I’m lucky,” he shrugged, his shoulders shifting the grass underneath and it tickled his neck. “I’ve had my fair share of… this.”

Merrick only barely moved, turning her face towards him with an expectant eyebrow raised. Maybe it was too hot to exist, it seemed to be saying, but she was listening. Interested.

“I probably could have told you before,” he said, staring up at the clouds instead, “but then it might have seemed like I was trying to one up you or something. But yeah, I have - had? - this one ex that was just… not good. But I loved them and I let them convince me that all of our problems were my fault because I’m asexual and they’re not but-”

Oliver stopped, his throat a little tight at the way that core and central fact about himself had slipped out. It wasn’t something he hid exactly but it wasn’t something he just volunteered to just anyone.

“Anyway,” he said, clearing his throat, “I did a lot of things for them that I wasn’t always comfortable doing. And it’s not bad, not like I was forced or anything, but I wanted to keep them and I guess I made myself try to be someone I’m not so they’d be happy. Even if they never were.

“Eventually I just used the excuse that I was dropping out of college to more or less ghost them,” he finished. “We didn’t so much break up as I stopped trying and decided a broken heart was just the better option.”

Flashes of smiles filled his head, soft touches on his hand, little casual moments that meant the world to him in a lot of ways. Things that he could almost remember and convince himself there had been a time when it was right.

“It was never right,” he whispered sadly, “but… I wanted it to be. I loved them, you know? And it took me a long time to be okay with that, I guess. That I can love someone but it wasn’t enough.”

He chanced a look back at Merrick, who was still staring at him.

“I guess I got the gene too?”

Merrick listens - she’s always been a good listener, despite what people presume. They think because she’s loud, and brash, and argumentative that she won’t take the time to hear the stories of those around her. She knows her own life isn’t the most important - that it isn’t even anything more than a blip in the grand reality of things - even if her emotional depths say otherwise. And getting to have these conversations with Oliver - well, it makes him feel more real. 

( There’s a part of her, sometimes, that worries all of this is the result of a mental break. That she’s actually locked up in a hospital in Boston somewhere, that her brain finally broke completely and in an effort to make her fix herself, people like Oliver and Fletcher are mere figments of her imagination to put her back together. But then she remembers the very real heartache she felt when she saw Logan and Holly interacting upon his return, and the happiness she felt when she and Colette managed to throw perfect bullseyes during target practice, and everything else. Her imagination is good, but it’s not quite that good. ) 

“I think we all got the gene,” she hummed in agreement. She knows he just dropped two bombs on her - the story of his own love life, the history and backstory he hadn’t shared with many others, she assumes - and his sexuality. But neither really phase her that deeply - she does kind of wonder how his crush on Fletcher works out like that, but it’s not her business until he wants to share. 

she let’s mere take the lead, weaving through streets in town holly was aware existed but had never had the time or inclination to venture to, already uncomfortable enough living in the areas that had been opened to them, too inclined to concentrate on the lives of the people that had lived their lives within those streets before her.

holly wonders briefly what it must be like for madison and the rest of the towns people that had called fairvale home before it was known as fairvale, the natives of prescott - she wonders how they must feel to see strangers take over places and lives that didn’t rightfully belong to them.

she’s not sure she’d be able to be half as gracious as they had seemingly been if she were in their place, if this was riverside being overrun with the unfamiliar.

merrick keeps up a stream of one-sided conversation as they walk, hands clasped together, and holly is struck by such a strong wave of familiarity that her lips quirk up into a small soft smile she can’t’ seem to shake off her face the more her sister throws herself into her explanation.

it’s almost, almost like it used to be. holly tired but attentive, merrick full of energy and bursting with adventures to share – the two of them and their own private little world.

(she’ll keep this, she’ll dig her nails in and grasp it to her so that nothing can tear it away - no matter what. she’d promised - merrick’s first night in boston, late at night and both drunk on cheap wine and the pure giddiness of being back in each others hearts – she’d promised that nothing would ever pull them apart again and holly always tried to keep her promises)

when they stop their journey they’re standing outside a house, not at all unlike every house within fairvale, but unkempt and long abandoned – the kind of house that would have been a sight to behold in its prime now another casualty of the world around them, the broken swing seat on the porch and the once lemon colored shutters hanging off their hinges a reminder that everything beautiful eventually falls.

now isn’t the time to concentrate on what can be torn away though.

“i’ve seen several different horror movies that start with this exact scenario.” she runs her hand lightly over the sign near the gate, the writing too faded to make out. but the house in front of them reminds her of the small hidden away antique stores she’d dragged mere to all around boston when they’d both had the free time to explore together – unwanted and unvisited by all but a few but filled with so much history that the sisters had spent hours getting lost within the walls, searching for beauty amongst the dusty and forgotten.

“two reasonably attractive people with a vast and complicated history between them.” She grins a little part self-deprecation, part tease as she bumps her hip against mere’s playfully and part of her thinks she probably shouldn’t bring it up not even jokingly, but she want’s to show mere that despite the fact they’re both not currently confronting their issues it doesn’t mean that holly is shying away from them either. there’d be no running away this time like holly had done in the past. “a mysteriously abandoned house perfect to explore, horrors unimaginable awaiting all that choose to venture inside – you should write me a little something when you have the time, i miss having the stuffing scared out of me the regular way.”

“lead on, i’m sure i’m going to love whatever it is we find in there.”

“reasonably attractive,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes with a grin, “try two major babes, and you’re closer to the truth.” still, she opens the gate surrounding the home and leads her sister in, glad she’d opened the windows the last time she’d been in so the house - while stuffy and dusty - doesn’t smell quite as bad as it could have. the summer breeze that’s drifting through the open windows ruffles her hair, but she let’s go of holly enough to let her sister start exploring - she hadn’t gone to the second floor when she’d been there before, nervous about the stairs if she was alone, but she leaves them be to explore the bookshelves that surround the walls, the old antique desk that’s full of old letters - some dated back centuries before - before wandering out to the courtyard, spreading the blanket out on the patio for some comfort while holly pokes. 

there’s a couple of glasses in there that she fills with apple juice - harvested from the farm, she knows, and not nearly as sugary as the synthetic garbage they’d grown up with for years, but healthier in a way holly will appreciate, sandwiches wrapped in paper to keep them intact as she lays out their small feast. it doesn’t take holly long to find her - she’ll explore when they’re done eating, merrick’s sure - and she pats the ground until her sister joins her, the clouds barely hiding the sun but making the summer heat mildly bearable for the moment. 

“to us,” she offers, tilting her glass towards holly, “and everything we’ve managed to build in the past eight years.” a slight reminder that they weren’t always like this - that at their worst, each sister would have sold the other out just for a chance at their own happiness, while simultaneously sabotaging themselves for the others. but they’d rebuilt themselves, come back together, and now - 

now, there isn’t anything more important than this. than seeing the relaxed look on her sister’s face, a shimmer of true happiness in her eyes that merrick hasn’t seen....ever, if she’s being truly honest with herself. 

“it’s not exactly tea at the plaza,” she jokes, offering some cookies she’d baked specifically for this, “but i figured you’ll never take an afternoon off if i don’t make you. and, for the record, i’ve already looked at everything on the first floor - i’ve been too nervous to check the basement or second floor, in case the stairs cave in, but everything here looks safe. and from what madison’s said, no one’s really come here in years. so i like to think that it can be yours, now - that you can love it more than anyone else would. and if it turns out that the house is safe, maybe it’s a place you - we, if you want - can make a home out of, in time.” 

Ray bounced between customers with a practiced ease. He wasn’t rushed or frantic, but he moved back and forth, filling up drinks, taking tokens, keeping an eye on Merrick’s water, making small talk, and performing small party tricks for those sober or new enough to appreciate it. Ray liked the familiarity of flipping shot glasses to stack on top of each other and the perfect slide down the wooden bar. It was small, little things like that that reminded him of life before the outbreak and made him lose track of time at work. 

One of his regulars, a guy old enough to be his grandfather that refused to drink anything but super cheap vodka, snickered when he saw the black ink across Ray’s hand. Ray had heard the man make multiple inappropriate comments in the past and he fixed him with one of his sternest looks. “Not a word from you Harold,” Ray warned, fighting the flush he knew was on the tips of his ears. He was ninety percent sure that Harold muttered something into his vodka, but Ray was too far away from the man to hear it by the time his lips started moving.

“Is that right?” Ray answered, tapping a finger on his chin as he pretended to look over her work. Merrick had written so much even Ray’s fingers felt cramped, but he drew it out for just a minute longer before giving her a nod of approval. 

“Looks like you’ve met your publishin’ deadline darlin’.” Ray’s hands move for the tall Collins glass as he talked. They had freshly squeezed juice, straight from the farm, that Ray had been keeping under the bar and away from sticky fingers. “Drinks will be on me tonight. What kind of gentleman would I be if I let you pay, hm?” Some ice goes into the base of the tall, narrow glass. In his mixer he deftly added, some juice, and a mix of vodka and light rum measured by eye - both watered down of course - and a small spritz of sweet and sour mixer. That stuff will never go bad, it seemed, apocalypse be damned. The drink comes out looking light and fruity, exactly what Ray was looking for, and he slid it over with an expectant look on his face.

Merrick practically claps her hands in excitement - a real drink, something she hasn’t had in months, if not years. She’d never been a big drinker under the better circumstances once high school and college were done - a drink at a bar here or there - but when things started falling apart, she had really cut most of it out. Self preservation - one too many, and she’d probably be on a deep end closer to where Yale lived. Always craving another drink, always desperate for another shot. 

She had missed it, though. The fruity taste, the careful mix made specifically for her - it warmed her heart, made her smile wide at Ray. They didn’t always get a chance to talk a lot - he was busy working, while Merrick was writing - but there was a comfortable familiarity between them now. Something Merrick was craving more than normal these days. Even if she wasn’t outwardly pouting and sobbing about the state of her heart these days, it was always there - just under her skin, an undercurrent of emotions she was trying so hard to push down. 

“Now I can see how you might have made a good bartender,” she teased, sipping her drink slowly to preserve it for as long as possible. A special drink, just for her. The kindness is almost enough to tug at her tear ducts, but she blinks away the threatening overwhelming emotions. “It’s a shame I wasn’t of drinking age until I was up north - maybe I could have been a regular at your bar if I’d moved back closer to home after college.” There was a lot of things that could have gone differently had she not gone to the metropolitan areas after high school - a whole different Merrick that would have existed. “That’s what I wanted to do originally, you know. I was gonna stay home, get myself a husband, start popping out kids by the time I was twenty.” A laugh escapes her as she shakes her head. “My mom wanted me to have so much more so much that she pushed me to New York. I only even applied to college there to be close to Holly,” she takes another sip, letting the alcohol warm her body inside and out. “Isn’t it weird how things work out like that?”

it had been a month since they appeared back into their lives. a month that merrick had let him mostly waste away, suffering from his own brand of PTSD - she still didn’t know what happened, but wasted their time by telling him stories about her life in boston, about what had happened since they’d come to fairvale. she never really knew if he was listening or not - his eyes would be open, and sometimes she’d swear he was actually looking at her - but the void that seemed to swallow him, to keep him in a near comatose setting, it was overwhelming and if she didn’t do something soon, he might never recover from it. 

in truth, she’d gone to the event at the bar for appearances - for holly, who’d want to know she was really doing ‘better’ ( whatever that fucking meant ), for ray, who was rapidly becoming a good friend and she’d hate to disappoint him by not showing up. but she slipped out at the earliest convenience - she was trying, so hard, but the weight of everyone else’s expectations on her shoulders constantly felt like a burden she didn’t want to carry for much longer, something she knew ethan would have related to - if he’d been a real person anymore. 

she slipped into the house unnoticed, climbing into the room she’d once shared with colette, but now mostly hid her and ethan away. she suspected he’d be asleep - she’d made him eat with her before she left for the bar, but there wasn’t much else he did if she didn’t force him into it. normally, she didn’t slide into her own bed these days - giving ethan and herself some space - but the exhaustion was wearing on her, and for once, she was going to be selfish enough to take the grain of comfort she could gain from being close to him. 

“hey,” she whispered, tucking herself into the bed with him, hoping she wasn’t waking him up, even as he stirred. “you didn’t miss much,” she lied, seeing an eye pop open in her direction, “though one day you’re going to have to come and meet other people. i think you’d even like some of them.” she burrowed herself closer to him, wrapping her arms around him and resting her cheek against his chest. “just as long as you still like me best. i miss being number one.”