Chapter Text
Connor wakes up on the morning of September 7th with the knowledge that it’s the last time he ever will.
He lights a joint, like any rational person bearing knowledge of this size would, and smokes it until the pit in his stomach is only roughly the size of a tennis ball. There's a pounding at his door.
"Connor, get up, you have school," Larry calls, with the loving, parental croon that Connor has gotten so used to. Jokes on you because I'm going to kill myself later, but, y'know.
“I’m not going to school,” he yells back, except his nest of sheets has gotten kind of sweaty so he climbs out of it anyway. His body gets dressed and he shuffles it downstairs in search of cereal.
"Zoe, get off your phone and eat, I don’t want you to be late for-- oh, Connor!” Cynthia grins tiredly. “Come and have breakfast. You look so nice, are you ready for your first day of--”
“I’m not going,” he cuts her off, briskly, ruffling through boxes along the counter in search of Bran Flakes. Cynthia's smile fades.
“What do you mean you’re not going?” she asks, with a sort of worn exasperation that says she knows exactly what he means. They are out of cereal. Connor grabs a bag of Chex Mix, because Chex Mix involves cereal, he's pretty sure.
Connor rolls his eyes and sits down with his Chex Mix. “What does it sound like? I’m tired. I’ll go tomorrow.”
“It’s your senior year, Connor, you are not missing the--”
The phone begins to ring loudly, with impressive timing, cutting off her argument. Cynthia sighs heavily.
“Larry, please talk to him,” she orders, grabbing the phone. “Hello...? Oh, Birdie.”
Without looking up from his computer, Larry grumbles something along the lines of, “You have to go to school, Connor.” Connor ignores him with practiced ease. There is a loose thread by the zipper of his jacket-- he pulls it until it's taught, then wraps it around his finger and yanks it out. He's gonna die, later.
“Hm?” Cynthia says puzzledly into the phone, and Connor watches her frown. She has her face scrunched up a little like she's thinking hard about something. “No, I…” She pauses, covering the phone and turning to her daughter, who is sitting across from Connor, bored and tired and picking apart her off-brand Pop-tart. “Zoe, Alana didn’t sleep over last night, did she?”
“What? No. She left when you told her to,” Zoe responds, sparing Cynthia a glance of narrow curiosity. Connor digs around for a properly seasoned Chex, only partly focusing on the conversation.
“No, she left around ten o’clock last night,” Cynthia relays back into the phone. “Why? Didn’t she come home?”
Zoe sits up, suddenly alarmed. “What? Mom, what?”
Cynthia ignores her, listening. “Right. Gosh, I hope so, that’s just so unlike her…”
Zoe is making frantic gestures in the back. Cynthia holds up a finger, turning away from her rudely. “Absolutely. Please, let us know if there’s any way we can help, alright? I mean it. Anything you need.”
A pause.
“Alright. I’ll give you a call the second I know anything.”
Another pause. Cynthia is nodding.
“Alright, bye-bye.” Cynthia hangs up.
Zoe immediately launches into a frenzy. “Alana didn’t make it home last night? What?”
“Oh, sweetheart, I wouldn’t worry,” Cynthia says, shaking her head and smiling unreassuringly. “I'm sure it's absolutely nothing."
Larry is still looking at her questioningly, and she shoots him a pointed look-- universal for shut up, we’ll talk later. Zoe doesn’t miss it.
“Wait, are you kidding me? Is my best friend missing or not?” she demands. Connor steals her orange juice, and she doesn't notice. Or care.
Cynthia clicks her tongue. “She is not missing, Zoe, she just-- oh, Connor, be careful of where you put that, you don’t want it to spill on your father’s laptop--”
Zoe lets out some purely teenage noise between a scoff and a groan. Larry frowns at her.
“Zoe, don’t be childish,” he says waspishly. “You’re giving your brother a ride to school today, by the way. I don’t like him driving when he’s high.”
“What?” Zoe and Cynthia both say. Zoe branches off to, “You can’t be serious.” While Cynthia says, “He is not high!”
“Connor said he’s not going to school,” Zoe argues.
“He’s going.” Cynthia frowns. “Connor, are you high?”
Connor, who is high, shrugs.
“Oh, my god.”
Zoe looks like she’s ready to explode. “Why is no one talking about the fact that Alana is missing?”
“Zoe, please, you know as much as I do.” Cynthia glances at the clock, clearly begging the world for an escape. She looks relieved when she reads the bright green 7:51. “I promise we can talk more later, but the two of you are going to be late.”
Zoe sends one last helpless, angry glance around the table-- even to Connor, who raises a questioning eyebrow, because what does she expect him to do? She rolls her eyes and stands up, shrugging on her stuff and marching to the door.
“She’s not going to wait for you, Connor,” Larry mutters, taking a bite of toast. “And I’m not going to tell you again.”
Connor wants to flip him off, but he's not even looking, so the effect is sort of dead. He does it anyway. Connor shoulders his bag and heads off to follow his sister.
“Have an amazing first day, I love you both!” Cynthia calls, though her tone is narrower when she adds, “And Connor, I am not happy that you were smoking again before school.”
“I’m not going to school,” he calls over his shoulder, walking out the front door. Zoe doesn't say anything.
The short ride over to the high school is filled to the brim with tension, of course, although Connor isn’t very bothered by it. He stares out the window, eyes hopping between road signs as Zoe glares holes into the the windshield. Her fingers keep tapping the wheel, which is fucking annoying, but-- well, but nothing. It's just annoying.
“You didn’t-- this is such a stupid question, but you didn’t see anything, right?” she pipes up suddenly. Connor slowly turns to look at her.
“...What?”
“With Alana. You didn’t-- you weren’t out, were you? You didn’t see her after she left?” Zoe has this look like she knows she’s dropping a match into a puddle of gasoline. Connor rolls his eyes.
“Obviously fucking not,” he retorts, “I was in my room the whole time, so unless she’s hiding out in there--”
“Okay, okay, jesus, I said it was dumb, forget it.” Zoe huffs. She’s simultaneously cursing herself and looking like she wants to punch something. “Go back to sulking."
Uncharacteristically, Connor has no response to this. He turns back to the window.
“Calm down,” he murmurs. “She probably had a hookup, or something. She’s not dead.”
Zoe’s anger intensifies, if possible. “She wouldn’t-- Connor, you know me and her-- even if we weren’t-- actually, no, you know what?” Zoe jerks her head, forcedly trying to collect herself. “I don’t need to explain anything to you. Fuck you.”
“Hm," Connor agrees.
The rest of the car ride is silent.
School happens. School is. Through most of it, Connor sits in the back contemplating his impending doom and staring at people’s screens as they text one another or watch Netflix. And while he’s sort of curious about the whole Alana situation, that’s not really where his mind is at, considering what he’s planning to do, later. She definitely isn’t there, and it’s noticeable-- Alana is a presence, at school. However, the topic of why she’s absent only comes up once-- when a couple of cops walk into his biology and ask to speak with him.
Connor’s first thought is, oh, good, we love a good Connor-Murphy-got-arrested-finally rumor, and his second thought is thank god I can leave this class early. What the fuck doesn't occur before third. He stands up and quietly shoves his handout into the growing cacophony of papers inside his bag.
“Nothing to worry about, just come with us, please,” one of cops says. Connor nods awkwardly. They head down to the office, through empty, yellow corridors, Connor itching the entire way, wondering if he’s about to be searched. It’s not the worst thing that could happen, considering, like-- y'know. But still, why does all this drama have to pop up today? It’ll be significantly more difficult to sneak off with his parents watching him like hawks, and he’d rather not delay the plan.
When they open the door and step inside the office, he’s confused to find that Zoe and some asshole kid Connor recognizes from a couple of his classes (and what probably qualifies as catcalling in the hallway, ex. “Nice to see that beautiful smile,” and “Wow, skinny jeans or leg corsets?”) are already sitting there, waiting.
“Have a seat,” one of the policemen says. Warily, Connor does.
“Now, no one is in any trouble,” the same one begins. “My name is Officer Bay. This is Officer Cabello. We’d like to ask you all a few questions regarding a classmate of yours, Alana Beck.”
“I knew it,” Zoe whispers, at the same time Connor is like, oh. She sniffles loudly.
“Supposedly, your house is the last place she was seen,” Cabello says to Zoe and Connor. “Are you already aware of this?”
Connor nods. “Her mom called,” Zoe explains, “but our parents won’t tell us anything.”
“Why is he here?” Connor asks bluntly, pointing at Asshole Kid (Jason? Jason.), who’s yet to say a word. Actually, he’s just been sort of… glaring? At nothing, which is. Weird. Definitely weird. Noticing that he’s been acknowledged, his frown deepens.
“I’m her neighbor, dickwad. And her friend. Why are you here?”
Connor leans forward, an incredulous eyebrow raised. He’s about to retort, but Cabello cuts in.
“Hey, let’s keep this professional,” she says loudly. “You guys are old enough to do that, right?” The way she asks this implies that she does not, in fact, think they are old enough. On the other hand, Connor is not about to get into an argument with the police-- not today, at least, and so he settles back down reluctantly.
“Now,” Bay breaks in, “can you tell us how your friend was planning to get home? Was she walking, driving, biking--”
“Walking,” Zoe answers stiffly.
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Alright.” Cabello writes it down in this little notebook. “You’re sure she was planning to head home?” she asks, and the question must be directed at Zoe, but Connor swears that she’s glaring at him.
“Yes? Where else would she be going?” Zoe frowns. Bay and Cabello exchange a look.
“Well, was she acting nervous or suspiciously before leaving your house, does she have a history of behaving rebelliously--” Bay elaborates.
Connor snickers. Alana Beck, the rebel. The legend.
“No!” Zoe cries, clearly not finding the image as funny as Connor does. “She never sneaks around, this isn’t-- she didn’t run away on purpose, if that’s what you’re implying.”
“You, can you confirm?” Cabello points her pen at Jason, who looks up.
“What?” he utters stupidly.
“They’re asking if Alana is a rebel, ” Zoe mutters, spitting the word “rebel” like it’s blasphemy.
“Oh, um.” He blinks a few times, and then the world’s axis must shift, because he actually cracks a smile. “Lana? No way.”
Cabello purses her lips and hums, a little disapprovingly, like that wasn’t the answer she was looking for. Still, she scribbles it down.
“Jared, is it?” Bay speaks up. Jared, right, Jared Kleinman. Jared Kleinman the asshole. “Would you mind telling us a little about Alana’s home life? How is her relationship with her family?”
Jared blinks, looking sort of taken aback. "What, you want to know if her parents beat her?"
Zoe, seeming slightly offended, jumps in before either officer can. “I already told you, there’s no reason Alana would’ve run away. That’s not what this is. She’s really close with both of her moms.” She speaks almost defiantly, arms crossed, head down in this stubborn way she’s had since childhood. The officers look annoyed. They more or less try to ignore her, still waiting for Jared’s response. It takes him a moment to realize.
“Oh, me?” He sits up, smiling like he’d just been told a penis joke. His brow furrows briefly. “No, her parents are fine. They’re great, it’s all one big party in the Beck household. Yeah. No need to call, like, child services or anything."
The cops seem exasperated, but they aren’t going to push it. “Alright,” Bay sighs, and Cabello writes some more. “I’ll-- I’ll accept that. So, in the case that something really did happen to her on the way home--”
Zoe opens her mouth, ready to interject, but Bay raises his voice over hers.
“-- how long would that walk have taken? Ah!” He raises a silencing hand when Zoe is about to speak, and then points at Connor, who is the quiet angel, or something. “I want you to answer.”
Connor blinks, and frowns. “Me? I don’t fucking know, I don’t go over there. Zoe’s the one--”
Bay interrupts frustratedly. His final hope for a normal, easy answer has crumbled, but it’s not Connor’s fault that he doesn’t know anything. Also, fuck the police, kinda. “Fine, alright. You, go ahead, then.”
“She’s a little less than half a mile away from our place,” Zoe says, quick and simple. She’s looking at the floor. “It’s a ten minute walk. Maybe fifteen.”
Cabello writes it down.
“And do you know what route she takes?”
Zoe purses her lips, focusing. “...Um, yeah,” she says slowly, chipping at her nail polish. “She goes down our street-- Myrtle-- and then she goes right, onto Buttonwood, and goes straight for a while until Linden-- I’m not going too fast, am I?”
Cabello waves her on without looking up from the notepad.
“Okay. She goes left onto Linden, and then keeps going straight, and then her house is on Lawrence.”
“Myrtle, Buttonwood, Linden, Lawrence,” Cabello recites. “Is that correct?”
“Yeah, that’s it,” Zoe answers, leg bouncing nervously. It takes a surprising amount of self-restraint for Connor not to reach over and hold it still.
Cabello and Bay look at one another, and Bay nods. Cabello flips the notebook shut.
“Okay, kids,” Cabello sighs, “is there anything else you think we should know?”
The question might as well be rhetorical. She and Bay are already standing up.
“We’ll be in touch with your parents, so you can always let us know--”
“I’m sorry,” Zoe stands up, “but when are you going to start the actual search?” Her tone conveys something cold, hard and unapologetic. Apparently, Zoe has decided that today is Be Fucking Touchy With The Cops Day, Seriously, You’re Toeing The Line Here, Zo.
“We aren’t answering any questions. Sorry.” Cabello doesn’t look very sorry. Zoe looks even less sorry, and Connor pinches the bridge of his nose, exasperated and kind of embarrassed, fighting the instinct to grab his sister’s arm and pull her back down from her fuming cloud. Some feeling, like eerie deja-vu, stirs in his gut. He can't imagine why.
“You’re not gonna tell us anything?” Zoe’s brows knit.
“We’ll be releasing information as soon as we have it,” Bay sighs. “For now, ask your parents.”
“But I’m not asking for that kind of information, I just wanna know when--”
Bay steps forward. “Do you really want to stand here and argue with me?” he questions, and Zoe’s eyes widen by a fraction. “Ask your parents. That’s all I’m gonna say. You guys are dismissed.” He stares at Zoe until she moves to get her bag. She’s pissed. That’s what you get, Connor doesn’t quite say.
“Thanks for your time,” Bay grunts as they file out. It’s left at that.
“Hey, Zoe Murphy, right?” Jared smiles, holding the door open.
Zoe glances at him as she steps through. “Yeah. We’ve met, Jared,” she says, not exactly dismissively, but her voice contains a sore lack of enthusiasm.
Jared shrugs. “Yeah, like, once.” He lets go of the door just in time for it to swing in Connor’s face. Connor flails unattractively to catch it, and murdering Jared is officially on his bucket list.
“Alana talks about you all the time, though,” he says. “Seriously, she’s borderline obsessed. You would think the two of you were secretly getting it on, or something.” He laughs.
There’s a silent pause.
“Well anyway,” Jared says loudly. He spiels off into some other shit about Alana, and studying with Alana, and his project that Alana saved his grade on for some class last year, and Connor can see Zoe slowly unraveling and actually listening and even laughing with Jared, to his surprise and what must be her own. Now, Connor doesn’t really know Alana minus glances at the dinner table and failed (though persistent) attempts at conversation on her part, but as Jared goes on, Connor is able to picture it less and less. Alana Beck, in all of her poised glory, hanging out with Jared Kleinman, a bitch. It doesn’t match up. Clearly, Connor is missing some puzzle piece, here.
Kleinman glances at Connor momentarily, as if to say why are you still standing there? and Connor remembers that he doesn’t even like puzzles, anyway. He averts his eyes and heads off, making it around the hall too late to miss Jared exchanging numbers with his sister. For a moment, there’s this sinking feeling as he considers the possibility of Jared coming over to his house to hang out with his sister, but the feeling turns floaty and weird when the realization hits Connor that he won’t be around to care.
Yes, because nothing actually matters anymore. He forgot.
Connor’s phone buzzes in his pocket, and for a weird fucking second when he pulls it out, he expects to see a text from Jared. Which makes no sense because Jared doesn’t even have his number. He sees that his mom has created a group chat between herself, Connor and Zoe, telling both siblings to come home directly and immediately after school, plus an xo and a heart emoji. Zoe responds pretty quickly with a, We will. Connor clicks his phone off.
That night at dinner, everyone is incredibly tense, except for Connor, who is high. Zoe, defiant, hasn’t even added any food to her plate, rather she’s been slumping down and crossing her arms like she thinks she’s making some statement by not eating. Cynthia and Larry are ignoring this fact, picking at their chicken and watching their plates with a certain fascination that only comes with the avoidance of breaching an awkward, though inevitable, topic.
“Pass the green beans,” Larry grumbles. He’s like an angry bridge troll, today. Cynthia smiles tightly and hands him the bowl.
“So honey, how was work today?” she asks, now that the silence has already been broken. She knows that she can’t stray away from the Alana conversation forever, but damn her if she won’t try.
Zoe raises an eyebrow. Red flag. Larry doesn’t answer fast enough.
“Seriously?” she utters. “Are we not going to address the fact that my-- my best friend is missing?”
Cynthia and Larry exchange a look.
“Well,” Larry begins, “the police are doing what they can, sweetheart--”
“Oh, are they?” Zoe sits up, now, and ignores her mother’s quiet “Don’t interrupt your father, Zoe.”
“You two haven’t been part of any search parties,” Zoe points out.
Cynthia shoots her husband a warning look. He misses it by a mile. “They can’t actually begin the search until 24 hours after a victim goes missing,” he says, and Cynthia lets out a noise of defeat, covering her eyes and leaning over the table.
“Wait, are you kidding me? They haven’t even started looking, yet?”
“Oh, but honey,” Cynthia’s smile looks more like a grimace. “They’ve been gathering information all day, technically they’ve been working on it-- didn’t they come and talk to you kids at school, already?”
“They came to school and tried to make us convince them that she ran away,” Zoe scoffs.
“That’s not true,” Connor pipes, and Cynthia looks grateful for a moment before he adds, “they also patronized the absolute shit out of us.”
“Language,” Larry mumbles, cutting a piece of chicken.
Cynthia gapes. “Is that all you have to say right now?”
As Larry responds with some tired comment, Connor catches Zoe watching him with something resembling (resembling, that’s very important) respect. Is she surprised that he took her side? Because that’s not what he was doing, he was just siding against their parents, like he always does, and she must know that. It’s just happened to coincide with her stance this time.
“What?” he demands. Zoe blinks, and the moment is gone.
“Nothing. Jesus.” She scowls and turns back to the argument. Connor, unwilling to take part more than he already has, distracts himself by playing Candy Crush under the table.
“No phones at dinner, Connor,” Larry chastises. Connor ignores him.
“Larry, your daughter is upset, can we please focus?” Cynthia cries.
“This isn’t about me being upset, it’s about Alana, and no one is doing anything--”
“Sweetheart, they’re doing plenty,” Cynthia sighs. “I’m sure the police will be out searching first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Tomorrow morning isn’t soon enough!” Zoe exclaims. “She could be dying, mom, she could be--”
“That’s enough, Zoe,” Larry warns, eyes narrow. “And Connor, I’ll take that thing away from you. Put it away.”
Connor scoffs, without looking up. Larry can have it. This is the last time it’ll ever actually be useful to him.
“What about Alana’s parents?” Zoe demands, ignoring her father.
“Well, what about them?” Cynthia sighs.
“Have you even spoken to them since this morning? Have you spoken to Sara at all?”
“I’m sure they’ve been busy--”
“So that’s a no.”
Fucking christ, the noise.
“Zoe, please don’t be difficult--”
Connor clicks the phone off. Something to feel instead.
“Connor, we have a rule, give me the--”
Clicks it on.
“Larry, stop worrying about--”
Clicks it off.
“Mom, listen, I’m not--”
Clicks it on.
“That is enough,” Larry bursts. The arguing dies down, surprisingly. “You’re arguing like children,” he says, as if he’s not included in that narrative. “Zoe, there’s nothing we can do right now. Connor, I want that phone right now.”
Connor silently debates. There’s no point in keeping the phone, at this point, other than to spite Larry one last time. A final hurrah. Is it worth it?
No, he doesn’t want to make any more trouble. Not tonight. Tonight needs to go smoothly-- or, well. Maybe they’re already beyond that.
As smoothly as it can go under the current circumstances, then.
Connor tosses his phone at Larry, who blinks in surprise. Clearly he was expecting a fight. Wordlessly, Connor gets up and starts to walk off. So does Zoe.
“Speaking of this,” Larry speaks up, waving for them to pause. Hesitantly, they do. “Except for school, I don’t want you going out without me or your mom until all of this is cleared up. That goes for both of you. Understood?”
No one says anything.
“Understood?”
In perfect unison, Connor and Zoe mutter “Whatever.” They share a quick glance (kind of a glare, really) and then both head up the stairs.
Two bedroom doors slam at once.
Yeah, so, obviously Connor sneaks out.
He’s waited until the rest of the house has been in bed for at least an hour. It’s midnight and he’s on the other side of his bedroom window, equipped with a nearly-full bottle of his mom’s sleeping pills and the rest of his weed, which actually isn’t much? He’s smoked off an impressive amount. Not that he plans to finish all of what he has, he’d kind of like to get this over with, but. Well. It seems like a good thing to have? Maybe he can leave it as a fucking weird sort of apology to whoever finds him.
He’ll probably do that.
Anyway.
He walks to that park bordering the woods, with the playground and the baseball diamond and that hill he used to roll down. He walks because to drive would be a risk beyond what he’s willing. Too noisy. Too noticeable. Plus, it… God, Connor really isn’t one for sentimental bullshit, but it feels sort of right? To walk to his final destination. A simple kind of closure...
No, that’s stupid, nevermind. He’s walking to lessen the risk factor.
He walks in the middle of the street, because it’s a quiet neighborhood and there are few cars, even when it isn’t as late as it is. He’s always kind of liked that? Walking in the road as opposed to on the sidewalk. His parents were always keeping a close eye on him when he was little to make sure that he wasn't hit by a car. Maybe it’s the openness that he likes so much. He isn’t sure. He wonders if this is something that people will remember about him.
The park is empty when he arrives, naturally. He finds a bench-- the bench, the preselected one, the one he’s been eyeing for months, because he’s already scoped this place out and planned everything accordingly, of course. Sitting down is like meeting a friend for the first time. Or maybe it’s like sitting on a bench, Connor doesn’t know, he’s tired, fuck. Whatever.
He takes a joint from the box in his pocket and his lighter. He’ll probably only smoke one. Once again, he doesn’t want this to take too much time, and it’s cold out here. Connor lights the joint and takes a long, slow hit.
He leans his head back and looks up at the sky, at the handful of stars not obscured by light pollution or clouds. Surprisingly, he does not come up with some deep bullshit about heaven and the afterlife, about joining those stars (and even if he believed in an afterlife, he knows he’d be heading miles down in the other direction). No, he just sort of… stares. There’s no “what a beautiful world it is” moment, no melancholy. He thinks for a second about constellations, and how weird they are, and how he’s never actually been able to pull them out from the messy sky. Except for, like, the big dipper. Grownups used to point them out to him, but he was never able to make one out. He still can’t. Granted, he isn’t looking very closely.
He squints. Blinks. Smokes. Oh, and yes, before he forgets-- he takes the box with the rest of the weed out of his pocket and leaves it on the grass in front of the bench. Sorry, it says, hope you weren’t traumatized by the dead kid. If you were, maybe this’ll help.
That’s stupid. No one’s gonna take the weed.
He leaves it anyway.
Some time passes. Some, he doesn’t know how much. About one joint’s worth? Yeah, it’s almost finished. Does he want another one? Is he stalling? Why would he be stalling? Fuck, it’s cold. One hand, the one not holding the joint, goes into his pocket. He closes his eyes.
Until there’s a fucking flashlight in his face, and oh fuck, oh shit, oh fuck fuck fuck, how did he not notice someone coming? Connor jerks up.
“What the fuck are you doing?” someone asks, someone, Zoe? Is that Zoe’s voice? She lowers the flashlight, and after a spell of temporary blindness, Connor sees that yes, apparently his sister is here. Panic turns to frustration.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he retorts.
Zoe crosses her arms, frowning defensively. “I’m trying to find Alana.”
Wow. Connor-- wow. Connor is actually pretty speechless at that. He knew Zoe was naive, but since when is she that fucking stupid?
“You-- you’re trying to find Alana. Alone. In the middle of the night.” Holy shit, Connor wants to tell himself that he doesn’t care, but holy shit. “Are you fucking insane?”
“No one else is doing anything!” she cries. “I’m not gonna watch everyone else just stand there while she’s out there, somewhere, in trouble! That’s not fair!”
“Yeah, well, congratulations on giving them another missing persons case to deal with, oh my god.”
“Well, you’re out here too? Smoking?” Zoe argues. “Like you could literally do that at home.”
Connor doesn’t know how to argue that he actually came here to kill himself without bringing up the point that he came here to kill himself.
“Yeah,” he says instead, shrugging. Zoe waves her arms at him, as if she’s saying to some invisible audience, look how impossible my brother is.
He wishes she would just leave. That way, they could both be on their merry ways; Connor to die, and Zoe to get abducted, probably. “Are you just gonna fucking stand there?” he asks. Zoe opens her mouth to respond, but then she pauses. She holds a hand out.
“What?” Connor prompts.
“Is it raining?” she asks.
Who fucking cares, Connor begins to say, but a few droplets of water drabble onto his face, then. He sighs. Fucking wonderful.
The few droplets quickly turn into a monsoon and the Murphy siblings are being pelted with rain. Connor just needs an hour. Literally an hour why is that so difficult? Zoe pulls her hood up.
“Go home, Connor,” she speaks over the rain.
“No,” he says, while seriously considering doing so. He could just come back tomorrow? This isn’t exactly what he was anticipating-- being interrupted by his sister and also the weather. It seems like a shitty way to go, cold and wet from the rain, having to worry about Zoe coming back before the job is done. Maybe tomorrow would be better.
Just as he moves to stand up, a nasally, “What up, fucks,” rings from his left. The one and only Jared Kleinman emerges from the shadows, then, glasses screwed up by the rain, donning sneakers and a rain jacket and fucking shorts, what the fuck. Connor’s insides turn into something gross, something resembling Kleinman’s face, as he lifts an eyebrow at his sister because he knows that she has something to do with this.
“I invited him to help me look,” Zoe shrugs.
“I had nothing better to do,” Jared also shrugs.
Connor does not shrug. Connor narrows his eyes at both of them, because while Jared Kleinman is an idiot, yes, he’s not that type of idiot, and he should’ve known better to keep Connor’s sister out of trouble like this.
But no, he does not care. He doesn’t. Let them both get fucking kidnapped, Connor will. Not. Be. Around. To give a shit.
“Boy Murphy, what brings you here on this lovely evening?” Jared grins that heinous grin of his, the one that Connor would very much like to punch right off of his face. “Writing some edgy poetry? Mourning your innocence?”
“Sucking off your mom, Kleinman.”
“O ho, original.”
“Mature, guys.” Zoe rolls her eyes and frowns disapprovingly. “Jared, can we focus? Connor was just leaving.” She shoots Connor a pointed look. He flips her off, but he isn’t about to disagree. He stands up and begins shoving past them, ignoring Jared’s “Nice talking to you, Corpse Bride.”
He hardly makes it a few steps before something snaps in the woods.
The three of them freeze. It’s the type of sound none of them would really pay mind to, or even notice, had it not been preceded by a very quiet, very human-sounding yelp. They all turn slowly.
Maybe it’s his imagination taking the circumstance and running with it, but he swears he can see the outline of a person standing in the treeline.
Fear begins to crawl up Connor’s gut. Okay, yes, he came here to die in the first place, but there’s a big difference between overdosing on sleeping pills and being cut up and tortured to death by a psycho axe murderer.
“Alana…?” Zoe utters, way too quietly to even be heard by someone so far away.
“Jesus, calm down, it’s probably an animal,” Jared brushes off, acting like he isn’t just as scared as the rest of them. Just as he says this, some guy steps out of the treeline.
“Fuck,” Zoe swears loudly, proceeding to whip a goddamn knife out of the side of her bag. Jared and Connor look at her in disbelief.
“What the actual fuck, Zoe?” Connor utters.
She glances at him, eyebrows knitted. “Okay, despite what you might think, Connor, I’m not actually stupid. I wasn’t about to come out here without protection. What do you take me for?”
Connor stares. “Do you even know how to use--”
“Connor, please, can we…?” She interrupts, looking at him urgently and jerking her head towards the person watching them from the woods. Connor doesn’t really see any room to argue and turns his attention back to the guy, the kid, actually, who appears to be shivering and barefoot-- is he wearing a hospital gown? He is, Connor realizes with a jolt.
Well. If he wasn’t creeped out before.
“Who are you?” Zoe calls out, kind of-sort of giving Connor a heart attack. The kid doesn’t respond, doesn’t even move, he just. Keeps watching. Connor shudders.
“This is fucking creepy,” Jared mutters.
They all pause for a moment. What are they supposed to say? Should they run?
“He looks our age,” Zoe points out quietly. “And he’s wearing a hospital gown. He seems really defenseless, actually.”
Connor turns to her briefly in disbelief. “Well, put the fucking knife down, then?”
“Creepy kid in a hospital gown staring at us from the woods after someone goes missing. Zoe, have you seen any horror movie ever?” Jared pipes, bringing up a good point.
Zoe clicks her tongue. “Look, his hands are empty, and it’s not like he’s hiding a weapon on his hospital gown.”
“He has teeth.”
“Jared, stop.”
They spend another few seconds in silent limbo. Well, the kid hasn’t tried to kill them yet? Connor, seriously debating his own mental health, steps forward just a little bit because no one else is doing anything. Zoe protests a little, but he ignores her.
“What’s wrong?” he calls out. “Are you lost?”
Silence. The kid just stares at him. Connor stares back. They stay locked in an intense staring contest for a while until suddenly, Connor turns around, exasperated, flailing his arms up.
“What the fuck, you guys, are we gonna do something about him or not?” he asks.
Zoe sucks her teeth. “Well… we shouldn’t do nothing…”
Connor turns back to the kid. “Hey, come over here.”
Nothing.
“We’re not gonna, like, hurt you or anything, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he says, as Zoe stands behind him brandishing a large knife.
A beat goes by. Connor has an idea, but it’s fucking crazy. He glances back at Zoe and Jared, who are doing absolutely nothing, apparently having decided that Connor will take the initiative on this one. Maybe he brought that on himself. Fuck.
He starts walking towards the kid. He’s fucking insane, oh god. The kid is pretty quick to step back into the treeline, hiding, Connor guesses, but Connor pauses and puts his hands up to show that he’s harmless. Slowly, he continues, and the kid doesn’t come back out, but he doesn’t back away any more, either. Zoe and Jared are protesting in the back, and Connor knows he should listen, but he doesn’t.
He makes it to a close enough distance that if he wanted to, the kid could probably run out and attack him with ease. But he doesn’t. He just watches, wide-eyed, peering out from behind a tree. His eyes are green. He really does look young. No older than nineteen; in fact, Connor doubts that he’s even eighteen yet. He’s significantly less terrifying up close.
Slowly, so slowly, Connor lowers his hands and slips his jacket off, not losing eye-contact with the kid. “Here,” he says, holding the jacket out. “You’re shivering.”
A few moments go by. When the kid doesn’t take it, Connor places it on the ground and steps back.
They wait. Connor is tempted to turn around and see how Zoe and Jared are reacting, but he doesn’t want to take his eyes off of the kid. Moments pass. More moments pass. The kid keeps glancing at the jacket, like he wants to take it but is too afraid of Connor to do so. Connor is kind of about to give up and just walk away, back to Zoe and Jared, when suddenly, the boy moves.
Connor watches, silently encouraging, as his shaking form slowly re emerges out from behind the tree. He takes the jacket, quickly bending down to pick it up and then snapping back up, like he expects Connor to have pulled a gun in the time he looked away. Connor tries to smile reassuringly, but it probably looks more like a grimace.
The kid wraps the jacket around his shivering frame. He isn’t exactly wearing it right, but Connor doesn’t think that he’ll be allowed close enough to correct it. The boy relaxes just a little bit and glances to the side, like he doesn’t know what to do with himself, now.
“Holy shit,” Jared says from the back.
The boy’s eyes dart back to Connor, who forces his own expression to soften. They just… watch each other for a moment? It isn’t weird or anything-- actually, that’s blatantly untrue, everything about this is incredibly weird. But it isn’t awkward. It isn’t scary, anymore.
...Well, it isn’t as scary as it was. They seem to have found just a sliver of mutual trust.
Gently, cautiously, Connor extends out a hand, palm up. Enough time goes by for his arm to get tired before the kid takes it. Connor leads him away from the woods and back to the others, who regard him with suspicion and disbelief.
“...Should we call the cops?” Jared suggests.
Connor shakes his head, still holding the boy’s hand. “No. We’re not even supposed to be out here. Let’s just… take him back to our place?” He raises an eyebrow at Zoe, looking for her input. She’s put the knife away, but it’s somewhere that she still has easy access to it.
She sighs. “I guess…? I don’t. This is so fucking weird, Connor.”
“Yeah, no shit.” Connor glances back at the trembling boy. His head is down.
“Let’s just. We should go, before we get sick. Yeah.” Zoe turns away and starts walking. She seems to be kind of in shock. Jared and Connor share a glance before following, the boy still trailing behind.
Thunder rumbles.
Behind them, a streetlamp flickers out.
Down, down, somewhere on the other side, a young girl walks through mold and wet darkness. She’s only wearing flats and a skirt and blue earrings to match her blouse, and her glasses keep fogging up, which is annoying and doesn’t even make any sense. For being stuck in a desolate wasteland, the outfit is not ideal.
Alana Beck is cold, but she keeps doing what she does best. She perseveres.
Something in the distance is waiting to prey.