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“We’ve passed that hitchhiker five times already.”
“Are you sure? I think it was only four.”
“Jasper.”
Jasper takes his eyes off the road to meet Monty’s incredulous gaze, swerving when the car runs off the road and into the dirt. “What?”
“You know what.”
Jasper lets out an obnoxious sigh, staring at a road blanketed in shadows. Light spills onto the street in front of them, the double yellow line illuminated by the harsh glow of the headlights. “So we made a wrong turn. Or five. Big deal.”
“Jasper, we haven’t made any turns.” Jasper doesn’t have to look at Monty to hear the annoyance in his voice. “You know this isn’t just going to go away.”
“You’re right.” Jasper presses on the gas more firmly and the car roars as it speeds down the empty street. The mountains are silhouettes against the night, tall and ominous, and the cold, late October air cuts through the car with the windows down. “It won’t. Which is why I need a drink.”
Jasper wishes the wind or even a drink would drown out the truth, but it’s never worked before.
“You really think Jaha’s gonna take you back like this?” Monty’s hair sweeps across his forehead from where he sits. The passenger’s seat is starting to look like a high horse to Jasper. “Afraid of who you are? Drinking yourself into a stupor every night?”
“I’m fine,” Jasper shoots back, and Monty rolls his eyes. “Besides, is Jaha really one to judge?”
Monty barely waits for Jasper to finish before he responds, “You’re an idiot.”
“Yeah, well, at least I’m not dead.”
“That’s low even for you.”
Jasper turns up the radio loud enough to drown out Monty’s voice, a Violent Femmes song blaring through the speakers. Jasper hums along with it, and for a second, it’s almost as if Monty’s gone and Jasper’s alone. He can’t remember the last time he was alone. Maybe once when he was high on mushrooms. He thinks maybe he should try that again.
They’ve been driving for hours, all night, and they don’t have much longer to go until they reach the academy - Camp Jaha. He still doesn’t know how Jaha found him or why he got a letter in the mail requesting he return “home.” None of them have seen each other in over a decade. What made now so important?
Jasper might have ignored the invitation if he had anywhere else to go.
He’d run out of options a long time ago.
“I hope we’re not the only ones who show up,” he says over the music, and Monty ignores him, leaning forward to stare through the windshield.
“Look, there’s the hitchhiker again.”
Only this time the person isn’t standing on the side of the road; they are standing in the middle of it.
Jasper slams his foot on the brake, and both boys lurch forward in their seats as the car screeches to a halt. The child in the middle of the street is unfazed as she blinks at them, squinting in the headlights. Music spills out from cracked windows, and Jasper doesn’t think to turn it down, his face white as he stares at the girl.
“Was it always a little girl?” Jasper can’t remember details about the silhouettes they’d passed for the last several miles, but he doesn’t remember there being a blonde child with a brace around her neck. “What happened to her neck?”
Monty sits back in his seat, forcing his gaze away from the child and to Jasper when Jasper puts the car in reverse. “You’re not seriously leaving.”
Jasper doesn’t respond, only turns off the radio and places his hand on the back of the passenger’s seat, craning his neck to check the road behind them.
“Jasper, you can’t run from this.” Monty’s voice is serious, and he sighs when Jasper backs the car away from the child. “She’s just gonna come back. Again.” Jasper puts the car into drive once they are far enough back. Monty adds, “She’s just a kid.”
“Don’t you think I can see that?” Jasper snaps, stopping the car again, and this time only Monty lurches forward in his seat. “Yeah, she’s a kid. She’s also dead. There’s no telling what she wants.”
“I’ll go out on a limb and guess that maybe she wants a ride?”
“Okay? Not my fault she’s lost and dead.” Jasper sounds exasperated, and Monty stares at him, his expression stern. After a long moment, Jasper sighs in defeat. “Fine. She wants a ride.” He motions for the child to get in. “Clearly I’m never getting rid of either of you,” he mumbles, knuckles white on the steering wheel as the kid comes around the car and opens the door behind Monty.
Jasper doesn’t say anything at first. He only stares at her through the rearview mirror. Her eyes are wide, empty, as she stares back at him, expression blank, and he doesn’t realize they’re still sitting there until Monty elbows him. “Uh, where to?” he finally manages.
“Anywhere.”
It’s one word, three syllables, but Jasper feels the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Is it just him or has she not blinked once since she got into the car? He glances at Monty and takes his foot off the brake, the car moving deeper into the night. “So… what’s your name?”
He doesn’t like this. He never has. There's a reason he self medicates with booze and drugs: It’s to stop seeing people like her - dead people.
Okay, Monty is dead, but he’s different. He’s less ghost and more brother. More comfort. Always there no matter how wasted Jasper gets.
Jaha used to say this made Jasper special. All it really did was make Jasper crazy.
“Charlotte,” the girl responds, staring out the window now.
“Cool.” Jasper's voice lacks the confidence it had before. “I’m Jasper. This is Monty.”
Monty turns and offers a friendly wave that the girl doesn’t return.
“You thirsty?” Jasper asks, well aware she can’t drink anything, but at this point he wants to fill the gap of silence extending between them. “We have…” He glances over his shoulder at the seat next to Charlotte. “Liquor. Or… liquor. You look old enough to drink.” Charlotte doesn’t crack a smile at his joke, so Jasper tries again, “How old are you, about twenty-five?”
Charlotte is staring at him through the mirror again. She still hasn’t blinked. “Twelve.”
Jasper’s gaze slides over to Monty’s. There’s a dead, creepy twelve year old in the backseat, he wants to say, but before he can even consider it, he hears the sound of velcro pulling apart in the backseat.
“Hey, no- Don’t do tha-”
He’s too late.
He almost steers the car off the road when Charlotte takes the brace off, her neck bent at an awkward angle that makes Jasper want to vomit.
“What the fuck-” The color has drained from his face again. He can feel it in the way his heart pounds into his throat. He forces his gaze away from the girl and to the road. “Don’t look now, but the creepy kid just took off the brace.”
“I’m not creepy.” There’s a sliver of emotion in the child’s voice this time, but Jasper can’t bring himself to look back at her again. “I broke my neck.”
“I can see that.” Jasper’s voice sounds foreign to his own ears. “How’d- uh, how’d that happen?”
“Jasper,” Monty scolds. “You can’t just ask people how they died.”
Jasper can’t believe his own ears. “Yes, I can. I have a right to know-”
“I had to slay my demons,” Charlotte interrupts, her voice void of emotion again, and Jasper feels his mouth go dry. “I couldn’t get away from them, so I had to slay them.”
Dead leaves scatter into the air and back onto the pavement as the car races past a familiar white sign: Now entering Arkadia.
Jasper feels his stomach turn again.
“Okay.” He isn’t sure what else to say. He doesn’t want to know more, but he knows she isn’t going anywhere yet. “Did you? Slay your demons.”
He isn’t sure which is more crooked when he glances at her: her smile or her neck. “Yes.” It sounds like relief he hears in the word, and he scans the road ahead for any sign of that old gas station he’d stopped at on his way out of town ten years ago.
Charlotte’s smile disappears in an instant. “But bad things happened. I wasn’t the only one who had to face my demons.” She glances down at the liquor bottles next to her and then turns so she can stare out the window again. “Do you have demons, Jasper?”
His heart slips from his throat to his stomach at her words and the use of his name. He thinks about Camp Jaha - everything from Jaha to Dr. Tsing to the rest of them. Bellamy and Clarke, always fighting to be the leader until there was nothing left to lead; Murphy, ignored and eventually pushed out when he needed them most; Octavia, the best-kept family secret; and Raven, the look on her face the day Jasper left.
He feels chills climbing his arms, sharp claws of emotion gripping his throat.
He needs a drink.
“We all have demons, Charlotte,” Monty interjects when Jasper doesn’t respond. Up ahead, a sign for the gas station is glowing neon green. “The trick is facing them.” He glances at Jasper, whose eyes are locked on the road ahead. “Right?”
Jasper doesn’t respond.
When he glances in the rearview mirror, Charlotte is gone.
The lump in his throat remains.
“We’re almost home, Monty,” he chokes out, but Monty is already gone, too.