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Diana was somewhat used to the dark dingy building she called a therapy space. Same schedule every Saturday: 10:30am restlessly pace around the house, waiting for your 1:00pm appointment. 12:30pm, leave house to go to therapy appointment, reach the place later than 1:00pm, usually 1:15pm or so. Wait an additional 15 minutes for your best friend, Corbett to finally arrive. Go upstairs and wait a few more minutes for Daniel and Brent to arrive. At that point, it would be around 1:40pm.
But today was different. Diana was the last one to arrive in the small room.
"Diana, take a seat." Dr Jane pointed to her usual spot next to Corbett.
Diana pulled up the chair, glancing at Brent who gave a wary but welcoming smile and Daniel who looked constantly pissed. She draped her jacket over the chair, waiting for the silent scare to dissipate.
"As I was saying, I think I have a good idea for all of you to bond over."
"Jigsaw trying to kill us?" Daniel offered.
"I'm not bonding with murderers." Corbett whispered to Diana.
"She's not bonding with murderers." Diana echoed.
"I had a reason." Daniel sighed angrily.
"So did I." Brent glared at him.
"Kids!" Dr Jane got up in fear. "I mean, let's all calm down. I was suggesting, and all of your parents-" She paused to look at Corbett, "your guardians, have signed permission slips."
Daniel leaned forward in his seat, giving a hard stare towards the doctor trying to do her best.
"We have decided that maybe a day out, with each other, would serve you all some good."
Immediate outburst. Overlaps of protest, Diana screaming for the noise to stop, Daniel telling her to suck it up, Corbett somehow managing to escape the room once a shouting match erupted between the two. The walls were dark in the hallways, no better than the small, claustrophobic, suffocating-
Corbett could feel the breath catch in her throat. Why wasn't she breathing? She could do this, she had all this air around her. She paused for a second and let herself breathe in and breathe out. Slowly, surely, there was no time to waste, no timer on anything.
Brent stalked down her hall slowly, finding Corbett's light head of hair in no time. She was leaning against the wall, catching her breath.
"Dr Jane said we're all going to go out on the town together." He stuffed his hands into his pockets. "You have to come."
"Where's Di?"
"Downstairs with Daniel." He noticed her puzzled expression. "We won't have anyone to hold our hands when we get older."
She nodded and followed him, where she could quickly hear the now quietened grumbling between the two D's. They were grumbling about the same thing, about the little field trip they had to take and how would this even affect them.
"Let's get this done and over with." Daniel immediately started walking once he saw the two descend.
Corbett grabbed onto Diana's arm. She was dragged along as the older kept walking towards the rows of shops that outlined the therapy building, as they all lovingly called it. It gave off roughly the same vibes as the aforementioned building with their run-down walls and rotting signs with the wary shopkeepers eyeing them. Everyone in this area knew who they were by now. It was hard not to recognise them, considering how many news articles were written about them, how many had tried speaking with them.
"Anyone have money?" Diana pulled out her pockets, signifying that she was broke.
"I have some, not a lot." Corbett mumbled.
"We could just steal." Brent suggested.
"Last time I stole, I got trapped in a poison gas house." Daniel retorted.
"Weren't you trapped in there cause of your dad?" Corbett frowned.
"Weren't all of us trapped because of our dads?" Diana pointed out.
Brent tried to stop it but for some reason, a small chuckle erupted out of his mouth. It was a weird coincidence for all of them. The child always paid for the sins of the father, didn't they? And occasionally their mother. Soon, everyone was doing different degrees of laughing. Odd. It made them almost seem human. Not the sacrificial sheep they were raised to think they were. It was odd to think that these were not a bunch of rascals just hanging out. That this was reluctant. That just a few moments before they were all grumbling against this.
"Okay, all the "fun" things are across the road, so we might as well go there instead." Brent gestured, after the fits of laughter ended.
Corbett immediately grasped Diana and Daniel's hands tightly. It had been drilled into her head since she was young, always look where you're going and always hold someone's hand. In an ironic twist of fate, this lesson was said less after her brother's death. It was weird, as if that was a lesson in of itself. Like that death was supposed to teach her family anything. It did in the end, but not until nearly all of them had died. Corbett was the only one left alive to learn it. Why?
They walked across the empty street slowly, Diana keeping an eye on the younger girl. Daniel gripped Corbett's hands, suddenly feeling a rush of sympathy for the girl. He didn't like his parents but no matter what that family did to him, they neglected her. Daniel sort of felt like a bond was forming between the four of them, a weird trauma bond. He grinned over at Brent, the only other boy and the closest in age to him.
Brent took this grin the wrong way and sprinted away, yelling behind him, "Slowpokes!"
Diana ran behind him as he pushed himself into the arcade.
"Weirdos." The two blondes muttered to themselves. They glanced at each other, staring at each other's eyes for a second before realising maybe they should try and make sure their brunettes didn't cause any chaos.
As they watched Daniel Matthews' coffin be lowered into the grave, all three thought of this exact moment. The moment where they realised they had been destined to bond together. To have a sense of camaraderie. The graveyard was barren, no one there except for them and everyone who was working. It was closed, obviously but they all thought back to him. That very moment where they all found a look of understanding and knowing, a similar outlook on life. When all their eyes met in a pool of nothingness and death. No one said anything in that moment, not quite letting his death seep in. It would occur to them only a few days later, as they were packing up Daniel's belongings that he was truly dead.
"Have any of you listened to the recordings he sent?" Brent looked up, packing his clothes into a box.
"No, haven't had time really." Corbett sat on the steps.
As she opened her phone, readying herself to hear Daniel's final words to her, they both heard a yell, coming from Diana's area.
"What the actual fuck is this tunnel system?"