#bsideheart

Can I come in?

Grief was something strange. It gnawed at her heart, even now, even two hundred years later. Even though, arguably, she hadn’t known Avid that long—

They hadn’t even been able to bury him. The headstone was just a cenotaph. 

Drift still mourned Avid. Her roommate. Her friend.

It really was something. She remembered hundreds of years ago, back when she was still human, back when her heart had a steady beat that drummed on in her chest no matter what happened to her, when she was too afraid to act and ran away from everything—

I feel like I’ve known you, in another life.

— That time was to heal all wounds. Drift wasn’t sure who had told her that, perhaps the older woman who looked at her knowingly when Drift confided that she was terrified of the orchid killer, perhaps it was the farmer with a steady hand and steadier eyes, perhaps she’d just read it in a book. But Drift disagreed. They knew nothing about time. 

Drift had all the time in the world, and no matter how much of it passed, Avid’s headstone was still there. Merp Manor was still cold, empty and abandoned. No matter how many times she went over to Scott and Shelby’s, and they laughed until their stomachs hurt, she still found herself having to suppress the instinctive turn to Avid. To her best friend.

And it was… stupid, really, perhaps sort of childish. She knew Shelby still suffered all these years after Avid’s death, but Shelby was her sire, and the childe/sire bond was one forged from steel, and one incredibly painful to break. Drift always thought Shelby was so brave, for that. Drift didn’t have any fledglings herself, and Scott was her sire, and they’d all somehow survived. But Shelby had lost her fledgling and her sire, and it weighed on her. Drift didn’t think she had the right to be upset when she looked at Shelby.

Scott… well, Scott had never really gotten over Avid. Scott never spoke about it often, but Drift had the sinking suspicion that in all of his hundreds (perhaps thousands) of years, Scott had never been as close to anyone as he had to them. And while it was… good, Avid had been different. Avid had unconditionally cared for him in a… way that Drift couldn’t. She saw it in the boys Scott bought home, late at night, boys with short messy hair and loud laughs. None of them lasted. 

So Drift didn’t feel as if she really had the right to mourn. No matter the fact that when she went back and finally solved the orchid killer case, all she had wanted in the world was for Avid to have seen it. To have been proud of her. Avid had always been so brave, and Drift…

She blinked away tears, wiping her face. Oh, she thought, somewhat distantly. My hands are shaking.

Drift should have known. Drift could have stopped it, Drift had experience with murders, if she had just listened to her instincts, if she had seen the pure unadulterated hatred in Owen’s eyes, the sneer in Pyro’s lips, she could have stopped it, could have saved him, but—

Avid had died. Just another orchid with withering flowers in her ledger. 

She took a deep breath. She didn’t need to breathe, not anymore, but— it helped. It soothed her. Maybe that was childish, too.

She hadn’t even known Avid for that long. But she felt like she had known him her entire life when they crossed paths, stumbling across Oakhurst like idiots, startling at every noise and screaming as they ran from Owen, and—

And she still had things she wanted to show Avid. She had picked up scrapbooking, somewhere along the way. Her and Shelby traveled, still, even— even without him. She thought he would have really loved certain places. She thought of the redwood trees on the West Coast, how tall and ancient they were, scattered by mist. 

She thought of the huge, sprawling cities that she’d been in and out of, like distant stars in a bird’s eyes, flying away. She imagined Avid among the people traveling there. What would he look like? How would he dress? What music would he like? 

… she didn’t even know his favorite color. Was it purple? Like his eyes? 

Her grip around her mug tightened. She had been making… well, heating up blood made it taste better. It was cold now. It didn’t matter. There was a whole world of people out there, and Avid would never see it.

I want to laugh at your jokes. I want you to see how far I’ve come. I want you to see the world, how much it’s changed. I want to show you my favorite TV shows. I want to talk to you about Shelby, get your opinion on whether or not she actually likes me. I wish I had photos of you. I don’t remember what you looked like anymore. It’s been so long I can’t hear your voice anymore. I don’t want to get married without you at my wedding. Do you know I go back for you every year? Would you do the same for me? I’m not afraid anymore. I’m not afraid anymore. I’m not—

Drift poured her blood down the drain of her sink, hands shaking. So stupid. She barely even knew him at all.

You cannot save them.