Chapter Text
They say that light travels faster than sound. Something about mediums and vacuums, Chrissy remembers vaguely as her consciousness flickers to life.
It’s an odd detail to remember. And yet, she’s pretty sure. Eighth-grade physics. Reckons she’ll be able to find that textbook somewhere in her basement - just to make sure she’s not got it all wrong. Yeah. She’ll get round to checking that at some point in the near future, anyway - if she can will her aching limbs to move. Her eyes to open.
Except they are. And sure, okay, light most definitely travels faster than sound, but she can’t see much of anything at all. And Chrissy, this is for you and the frantic, hypnotic guitar chords that had plucked her from an endless darkness and hopelessness are still ringing in her ears, grounding her, filling her lungs with air. Making her stomach swoop low at the sensation of falling and flying - and suddenly she’s landing on something lumpy and soft - a mattress? And various people are shouting holy fucking shit, but mainly-
-mainly, what she registers is the hot, solid pressure of a sticky hand on her cheek; clumsy, calloused fingertips brushing the shell of her ear.
‘Chrissy.’ A heaving sob. Familiar. Chrissy, this is for you. ‘C’mon, sweet girl.’
The fog lifts, and Eddie Munson’s face swims into view; barely recognizable, tear-streaked and covered in snot and blood. She blinks rapidly, trying to speed up the clearing of her vision. Other people are in the room, but they’re drifting in and out of focus, and she keeps her eyes locked onto Eddie, her hand reaching up to cover his own. To say she is confused would be the understatement of the fucking century, and yet, the only thing she can think to say is-
‘…did you just call me ‘sweet girl’?’
He lets out a shaky laugh, relief flooding his features as he grins so widely it warms her insides, but the red trickles between his teeth at an alarming rate.
Hey, she attempts to twist around and call out to the others - whoever they are. ‘He’s bleeding,’ she gasps out, propping herself up on her elbow.
The jolt of pain in her shoulder knocks the breath out of her and she crumples in a heap back onto the mattress, curling in on herself as the world falls out from underneath her again. The others' voices seem more familiar now, their hushed murmurs growing more and more distant with the ebb and flow of her consciousness - but they'd heard her. They’d help him.
She is still cradling his hand in hers. Keeping it at her cheek, the metal of his rings no doubt leaving indentations on her skin.
And yeah, she thinks as she succumbs to a new wave of exhaustion, everything going black. Maybe, in the physics books, light does travel faster than sound.
Chrissy, this is for you.
But that hadn’t been her experience at all.