Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first thing she’s aware of is the taste of iron rotting in her mouth. Addy blinks, the sky blurry, her glasses long gone, and she has exactly two and a half seconds before it hits her - before the pain rolls over her body and she doesn’t even have the strength left to scream. 

It hurts, everything hurts, there’s so much pain that it stops being pain and blurs the line of complete and utter agony. What - What happened? What - The storm, the howling winds, the rain soaking into her bones, looking back and Praveen was gone, Kate’s outstretched hands, the concrete wet and cracking beneath her, something slamming into her side, painpainpainpain and then nothing. 

Oh shit. 

Addy opened her eyes, even that hurt her a little bit, and she breathed. They got caught in a tornado, an EF4 or EF5, Praveen was gone, and last she saw Kate and Jeb were underneath an underpass, one that wouldn’t be able to withstand those winds. She was alive, and she had to get up and get help. 

Okay, okay, she had to do this, there was no other choice, not for her, not for Praveen or Kate or Jeb, not for Javi who could be getting help or just as screwed as the rest of them. She pressed her hands flat against the ground, all too aware of the cuts and scrapes on her palms and arms, the bruises that felt like they were covering her entire body, and the distinct lack of feeling beneath her knees. Deep breath in and - 

She let out a strangled scream as she shoved herself up, pain ricocheted up her body, and she almost blacked out. But Addy hung on, her fingers digging into the muddy dirt beneath her, sinking in and gripping the tattered remains of roots with everything she had. She blinked, dried blood clinging to her eyelashes. She was sitting up, that was step one. 

Now - She pressed a hand to her mouth, barely feeling the pain of the movement as she stared down at her legs, or rather the wreckage of them. Her right was about as torn up as she expected, with blackened skin and fresh bruises crawling across almost every inch of skin, only broken by scratches and bloody streaks. But her left? 

Addy turned her head, what little she had left in her stomach tearing up and out of her throat. Stomach acid burned at her scream torn throat, her cracking lips stinging as she wiped them off. Her left leg was damn near in pieces, the white of bone sticking out in the mess of torn muscles and sinew, the blood-stained skin and blackened bruises that covered what little remained together. 

Her first-year college roommate was studying to be a doctor, and one night Addy, hyped up on Red Bull and shots, decided to take a look at what she was going over that week. She promptly spent the next hour throwing up in the bathroom because Elena happened to be studying crush injuries that week. 

She never quite forgot the wreckage of human skin, or how familiar it was, how growing up in a place that knew more tornadoes than peace caused her to be quite familiar with blood and guts. 

Which is why, broken in the muddy grass near what was a road a few hours ago, Addy recognized that there was little chance to save her leg. She also knew that if she tried to stand up, it might actually tear off. Fuck.

Her breath came in heavy pants, bordering on hyperventilating. The only reason she was even conscious was because of shock, or whatever reason she hadn’t quite registered the agony of her legs. (She prayed it wasn’t paralysis, but Addy couldn’t bring herself to check, to try and wiggle her toes.) 

She needed help, she needed a doctor and a hospital, she needed Kate, she wanted her mom. God, what was she going to do? What - She couldn’t - Her leg - 

Addy didn’t believe in God, but for her mother she prayed, then and there in the wreckage of the storm that she’d soon learn killed two of her best friends. For herself, she peeled off her belt with shaking, trembling fingers, two of them broken, and tied a tourniquet on her left leg. Then she dragged herself by her broken, bloody fingernails closer to the road and, after a horrific fifteen minutes of staring at the way her ankle was only holding on by sinew, she waved down a police chaser. 

And promptly blacked out. 

They would never find Praveen and Jeb's bodies, and they would be buried in empty graves. As their parents received the news, Kate was unconscious in a hospital bed, Javi was having a panic attack in a half-empty storage closet, and the surgeon was removing her left leg just below the knee. None of them really survived that night, it wasn't the sort of thing you could walk away from. 

(In five years she'd horrify her family with the constant leg jokes, in five years Addy would breathe in and out and it wouldn't hurt. In five years, that is.)

Chapter Text

She woke to a steady beeping. Addy blinked, everything slow and off, due to whatever drugs were being pumped into her, and she was met with the startlingly bright lights of a hospital. She took a slow breath in and out, in and out, and looked down as much as she could and - 

She was right, her leg was gone. 

Her fingers clenched around the stiff hospital bed sheets. Her leg was gone, cut off just below the knee, and she could feel the various lengths of stitching on her body, pulling the skin together. Her leg was gone, she was cut and bruised to hell, but she was alive. Addy could work with that. 

Try number two, her body barely twitched as she tried to sit up. Whatever strength she had when she crawled towards the cracking road was long gone, adrenaline replaced by a drug-induced numbness. Addy blinked, and shit, she was going to have to replace her glasses soon. Okay, she got this, she just had to, “Mom?”

Her voice was torn to hell, barely above a croak, but it worked. Her mother, knitting something in the chair beside her bed, flinched. She dropped the - sweater, or maybe it was a scarf - with a cry. “Addy? Addy!” 

Someone went running out of the room, one of her cousins she was guessing, and her mother’s face came into view. It seemed like in the span of days, maybe? she had gained a dozen more wrinkles, worry lines carving a path into her face as her hands hovered over Addy’s face. “Oh, Addy, Adaline, my sweet, sweet girl.” 

And now she was sobbing, her entire body shaking as she just pressed her hands to the side of Addy’s face. “My girl, my beautiful girl, my girl.” 

She had to do something, she had to speak, this - another child in a hospital bed, another pale corpse with her hair and her husband's eyes - this might actually break her. Addy wet her lips, thanking whatever doctor out there that they had pumped her with enough drugs that she didn’t feel the agony in her body, in her leg. “Mom, mom, mom,” Her mother stopped her mumbling and stared at her, “I’m okay, I’m alive, I’m okay.” 

Her mother took a deep breath, in and out, but the look in her eyes had Addy freezing. She had always been able to read people, it’s what she was good at when she tried, and she could see it in her mother’s eyes - the painful edge of grief and pain, a you almost died, and worse, something like relief followed by guilt. She was alive but someone wasn’t, and her mother was awfully guilty that she wasn’t the screaming parent in the hospital waiting room looking for an empty bed. 

Her hands twitched against the bed, and she fought the urge to look down at her leg, to try and move the limb that was no longer there. “Who?” Steps in the hall, she didn’t have enough time, she needed to know. Addy lashed out, grabbing her mother’s hand, finger pressing against the golden band she never took off, “Who’s dead?”

Her mother’s face was pinched with grief, with an echo of sorrow. She swallowed, “Sweetheart, Praveen and Jeb they, they haven’t been found yet.” And Addy heard the unsaid, and we all know they won’t be found ever. 

“Kate? What about Kate?” Because Kate was there, at the underpass, her hand reaching out just as Addy was hit. Because Kate was there, and Kate had to live, because Kate was Kate and she couldn’t be dead because that wasn’t right, it just wasn’t.

Her mother sighed, “She just got out of surgery, I heard. She’s okay, she’s alive,” Her mother corrected, “She’s alive but you gotta worry about you, love, you -”

Her mother started sobbing again and Addy just - she just watched her. She watched as her mother sobbed, as a doctor entered the room, someone already checking her stats. It was odd, she thought, her finger still pressed against the warm metal of her mother’s wedding band, that she seemed to be grieving them more than Addy was. 

It’s not - Jeb was dead, Praveen was dead, Kate was barely alive, Addy didn’t have a leg, and she had no clue where Javi was. Everything was gone, everything was falling apart, the world was ending and she was - she was still breathing.

Nothing made sense, none of it was right, but it was. 

The railings of the bed dug into her bruised ribs that were somehow not shattered in the storm. Her fingertips brushed against the edge of a bottle of water, perspiration dripping down the sides, almost taunting her because she just couldn’t reach it and Addy would be damned if she called the nurse. Not surprisingly losing your leg and being beaten to hell and back meant you needed help with everything, and it got old real quick. 

She was almost there, just a little more, just a little bit - “Do you need help?”

Shit, she lost her balance, the edge of the railing digging painfully into her ribs. Addy let out a muffled cry and someone rushed towards her. Familiar arms braced her, and Javi carefully helped her back up into the bed. She let out a painful groan, her fingers digging into his arm as she settled back against the same stiff sheets. 

She took a few heavy breaths as her body settled, old and new aches making themselves known. Javi hovered over her, looking like he hadn’t slept in days. She tried for a smile, and probably failed, “You look like hell.” 

He laughed, or maybe it was a choked sob, she couldn’t really tell. “You - did you - Hi, Addy.” He pulled over a chair, the sound of the metal dragging causing both of them to wince. Javi sat down, running a hand over his face, “Hi.” 

What else do you say when two of your best friends were dead and the other is damn near comatose in the other room? (The Doctors said it was shock, Addy had been unconscious for most of the storm but Kate was awake for everything. The storm took something from them both, her leg and Kate’s sanity.) “Hey, Javi.”

He wordlessly passed her the water bottle after loosening the top. Addy drank her fill, the cool water soothing the hell that was her throat. When she had drained half, she carefully placed the top on, or tried to, her fingers trembling too hard to actually do it. After a painful beat, Javi gently took it from her hand, tightening the cap and setting the bottle on the nearby side table. 

The two of them stared for a long moment, before she managed, “You seen Kate?”  

Javi stared down at his hands, “Yeah, her mom let me in a few times but she’s - uh, she’s still out of it.” Addy hummed, staring at Javi staring at his hands. 

Silence echoed between them, heavy with everything they had survived, heavy with Jeb and Praveen and Kate’s hollow eyes. What did you say to one of the few people who knew your grief intimately, who knew the agony of surviving?

Addy didn’t know, so instead she said, “Help me move over.” Javi stared for a minute, before he broke under her eyes. Nobody ever lasted long against her when she actually used her puppy dog eyes. 

He looked at the door, looked back at her, and sighed. Javi helped her scoot over, still giving the door worried eyes like some nurse was going to stop and tear him away from her. He carefully shifted her over to the left side of the bed, readjusting the pillow so her leg was still elevated. Without a word, and still utterly careful for the wreckage of her body, Javi crawled into the bed next to her. 

Addy, still hooked up to more wires than she knew what to do with, laid her head on his shoulder, his arm automatically wrapping around her. The two of them had ended up here more often than she could remember, curled together around some fire while Kate went on and on about something new, Praveen chiming in as Jeb watched both of them with soft eyes. Javi was - 

If she managed to believe in God like her mother wanted, she would have said he gave her Javi as a way of making good on old debts. But Addy didn’t believe in God, and she barely believed in fate, so she liked to think Javi was just the sort of person who clicked with her. 

He held her close, and Addy could hear the rattling of his breathing. She curled her hand around his own, her other still splinted so her fingers didn’t heal at a crooked angle. Then, for the first time since she actually knew they were dead, she started crying. 

Javi didn’t say anything, they never had to talk when it was just them. He just pulled her closer, tucking her under his chin and just holding her. 

Addy sobbed, Jeb and Praveen were dead, Kate was broken, Javi was breaking. The world was breaking and breaking and breaking and - 

Javi just kept holding her, even as she felt tears falling onto her hair, even as he broke above her. 

By the time the hospital sent her home, two weeks and three days later, Jeb and Praveen had already been buried. Or rather their grieving parents and siblings and grandparents had stood over the empty graves, mourning their sons who had driven right into a EF5 and paid the price. Addy stared out the car window, ignoring the concerned looks her parents kept throwing at her. 

She stared at the trees and fields as they passed them, the blur of nature a far better sight than the bandages still wrapped around her leg, against the still healing tissue held together by stitches. Her ribs still ached slightly, her fingers no longer twitched in pain and Addy found herself more annoyed at the splint than the actual broken bones. She was alive, her friends were dead, and she didn’t have a leg. 

Addy had to be honest, life fucking sucked.

She stared up at her bedroom ceiling, at the decade old glow in the dark stars on her ceiling, a semi-accurate stretch of constellations. It had been years since Addy had actually slept in this room, she hadn’t exactly come back once she left for college. Hell, she had chosen to sleep in the back of Kate’s car over coming back home. 

There was a gentle knock on the door, which meant it wasn’t her parents because they didn’t knock. Addy didn’t look up as the door opened and shut, or as someone slipped into the bed next to her. She turned her head to see her little sister, her face paler than usual, and in that moment the two of them had never quite looked so alike - haunted, half-dead, breaking.

“Hey, bug.” Gracie tried for smile, curling into her side like they were ten and four again, kids without a clue about how bad life could get. She was in a heavy sweater, despite the heat, the sort that swamped her hands and body, her little sister had always preferred shrinking into herself, hiding. 

That’s what happens when you grow up with parents who are constantly seeing ghosts in the corner of their eyes, who only know how to love with grief attached to it, it’s echo. 

Without a word, Gracie burrowed against her. Addy wrapped an arm around her, holding back the wince as her bony arms and elbows dug into the still-healing bruises and stitching. A little pain was worth being able to hold her sister close, to reassure herself that Gracie was alive, that they both were. 

Kate hadn’t been able to look her in the eyes since that day, Javi kept having panic attacks, Jeb and Praveen were dead. Her family, not by blood but Addy had never given it that much weight, was gone or breaking. She needed a little comfort, she needed to hold her little sister. 

She breathed in the smell of Gracie’s shampoo, some fancy French thing she specifically bought with her allowance. After a slow, slow moment, she whispered, “You almost died, I was so scared.” And then Gracie started to cry, she let out a gritted, choked sound, like she was desperately trying to hold back her sobbing and failing. 

Her sister always hated breaking in front of anyone, she preferred to sob in the shower when the water could hide her tears, when it could turn her skin red from the heat, where she could shatter without anyone to see her pain. 

Addy took a breath in and out, and carefully stroked her hair. She didn’t say anything, she didn’t try for reassurances that would only fail her. She just held her sister, like she wanted to be held as she shattered, and the world passed them on.

She hit her floor with a thunk. Addy fought the urge to scream, or curse out every god in existence. Her hands dug into her soft carpet, she was alive, she was alive and that was a good thing. She was alive and that was a good thing, she was alive and -

She couldn’t put on her fucking pants because she kept expecting her left leg to be there and it wasn’t. So now, Addy was on her floor in a set of underwear and a ratty old t-shirt about to lose her goddamn mind. She knew, she knew that there would be consequences to losing a leg, she knew that you don’t just walk away from something like this. But god dammit she hated this, she hated everything about this. 

She wanted back, she wanted back, she wanted back, she wanted - 

“Addy, love, do you need help?” Her mother again, for the hundredth time. Addy loved her, she loved her with all she’s got, but God she might actually lose her mind if she kept being babied, being the poor innocent girl who lost her legs and her friends.

It was true, but she couldn’t take any more of those pity-filled eyes, the sorrow people seemed to wear around her. She couldn’t take it, she couldn’t take any of this which meant she had to get the fuck back up and figure this out. 

“I’m fine.” She shouted back, gripping the edge of her bed and pulling herself up. Pants, she could do pants. 

Her crutches clicked on the wooden floor as she made her way to the kitchen. Her ribs still tinged but it was older aches, manageable ones. Just like the grief that still burned in her gut when she saw a picture on the wall, all five of them tucked together, a storm burning in the background, not the storm, just a storm. Addy was learning to survive this, and somehow even that felt like a betrayal, like some sort of blasphemy her mother liked to preach about.

She grabbed a warm muffin, the chocolate melting on her tongue as she leaned against the corner. Addy tilted her head, “What’s that?” She nodded towards a bundle of books wrapped in brown paper on the counter.

“Oh!” Her mother came running over, practically tripping over herself to help Addy - A good thing, she reminded herself, a nice, good thing. “Your friend Kate, the one who survived that awful thing,” That’s the only thing her mother used to refer to the tornado, another thing Addy hated with a passion, “She’s a real shy thing, you know, barely said a word, just limped over, dropped those things off for you and left. Didn’t even stay for my muffins, my muffins!” 

Her mother kept bustling around the kitchen, doing one thing or another, watching out of the corner of her eye as Addy untied the bundle of books. She pulled back the brown wrapping paper, and, leaning on her crutches, she read the title Fundamentals of Amputation Care and Prosthetics by Douglas Murphy. 

Oh, she thought, fucking Kate. 

She put the book to the side to find another on Amputation care, caring for injuries and prosthetics, managing the emotional trauma of losing a limb. Book after book, all the sort Addy could and would read, all the sort Addy used to pour over before, although they were typically about the mechanics of storms, not the human body. 

Of course, she thought, of course, Kate couldn’t talk to her but she could find every book in existence to help Addy. Of course, Kate couldn't talk to her, out of guilt, or pain, or too much grief to bear, but she could drop off books and say without saying anything I’m here for you, I love you and perhaps the best, or worst thing, I know you, and I know you can drag your ass out of hell. 

Okay, we’ll survive this, one way or another, we’ll survive. 

She was such a goddamn idiot. Addy was going to kill the always-smiling Terra, “You’re doing a good job, Addy!”

She had managed to walk about five feet with her prosthetic leg before almost tripping and falling right onto her walker, that was such a great job. She took a heavy breath in and out, staring at her leg, at the glint of the light on the metal. It was an incredible thing, one that a lifetime ago she would have loved to dissect, hunched over it with Praveen at her side, telling her to be careful because machines were such delicate things.

But this wasn’t a lifetime ago, and the metal leg was attached to the stump of her left leg and she was one moment away from yanking out her hair. Addy had been at this for so damn long she was a moment away from shattering from the shear physical strain of having to relearn how to walk and step and fucking live again after that, after - 

The worst part was the storms. When she was little she would sneak out of her room and onto the roof, her feet pressed against the shingles as she stared at the clouds, the grays tripping into beautiful, violent greens, the wind brushing against her hair, gently kissing her skin like it was welcoming her home. Addy found that the closest to peace she had ever come was to a storm on the horizon, that she felt alive in the heart of it all. 

But now, now she kept flinching when the rain grew a little too hard, when the wind cracked a branch, when a tree came toppling down. The tornado had taken her leg and it took her love of storms, but not the storm howling in her bones. So, she was split between that desperate longing and urge to dive into a storm, and the utter terror at going into the same thing that killed her friends, that almost broke her. 

She was a mess of contradictions and right now she was going to murder Terra and her preppy smile and her damn energetic way of talking. 

She tried to stand up, her leg giving out as she did. “Fuck. Fuck me.” Addy tugged at the end of her braid, fighting the urge to yank out her hair. It had only just grown long enough for a proper braid, with most of it being chopped off by Gracie when she found her in the hospital bathroom, half-conscious and yanking at the tangled bird's nest of her hair. 

“Come on, Addy.” Terra crouched down next to her, “You’re almost there for today, I know you can do it.” She sounded genuine, and the worst part is that she was.

Terra really gave a shit about everyone, she cared, she believed in better, hell, for some reason she even believed in Addy. But she just couldn’t do it, she couldn’t handle it, she couldn't handle any of this and Terra was the easiest target. 

“Can you just give me a minute, I swear.” Terra leaned closer but Addy almost snarled, “Five fucking minutes, Terra!” 

Terra stepped back, her eyes flashing not with hurt, but something worse, true and utter sorrow, like Addy’s hurting hurt her, and maybe it did. “Okay, I’ll give you a second.” She stood up with her two whole legs and walked towards the door of the small training room, which, for once, was empty. The door clicked shut, and a silence fell over her. 

Her heavy breathing was the only sound in the room. Addy groaned, pitching forward, grabbing her one good leg and folding it up against her chest. She needed to calm down, she needed to breathe, she needed - She needed her leg back, she needed Praveen’s careful warnings and Jeb’s steady presence, she needed a Kate who could talk without flinching, she needed - 

The door clicked open. 

“Terra I told you to give me five fucking minutes!” Addy couldn’t stop the way the words tore at her throat, her fingernails digging into her one good leg as she stared at her left leg like it personally betrayed her. 

“Well, I’m not Terra, so -” Her head snapped towards the door where Javi was standing, his hair slightly shorter, looking more alive than he had the last time she saw him. 

“Javi? What the hell are you doing here? I thought you went back home to your family.” He smiled at her, wearing his typical easy grin that she had almost forgotten how much she could love. 

Without a second glance at her leg, he slipped down to the ground beside her, “I did, but my mom got pretty sick of me quick enough, figured I should come see you.” He nudged her slightly, “Biggest pain in my ass.” 

Addy smiled, a real smile because Javi was Javi, “Right back at you.” His eyes went gentle as the two of them took one look at each other before laughing, real, sweet laughter. 

The world had ended, and yet here they stood, laughing. What a fucking miracle.

“How you doing, Addy?” Any other person's concern would cause her to bristle, to riot and run, but Javi was Javi. He was family, like how Kate was family, like how they weren’t blood but that had never mattered and now they were all that was left, now they shared the same scars and trauma and burden. He was family in a way that her parents weren’t. 

She closed her eyes, trying to take a steadying breath and failing a little, “I can’t fucking walk. This goddamn leg.” She kicked lightly, the metal making a hollow sign as it hit the floor, “I know, I know I’m lucky to have a good prosthetic, I know I’m lucky to have so few complications and a relatively easy path forward. But God - I hate this, I hate all of it.”

Addy swallowed hard, “I fucking hate this, I hate myself. I keep - I keep stumbling and falling and my leg won’t work.” She bit back a sob or a scream or a howl, “I’m broken, it broke me, the storm broke me and I have no idea how to piece myself back together again. I don’t, I should’ve died in that storm.”

“No.” His response was immediate, “Don’t ever say that. You’re alive, Addy, it doesn’t have to be for a fucking reason. You’re alive.” There was an echo of grief in his voice, a pain so sharp she could physically feel it. Shit, this must be his worst fear, being the person left alive, being the one standing. 

“Sorry, I didn’t - I’m a mess.” Because she was, because Addy was breaking into a thousand pieces but she couldn't stand hurting Javi in the process. She couldn’t take hurting the last family she had left.

Javi pressed their shoulders together, a wordless thing of forgiveness before he said, “It’s only been a few months, you’re allowed to struggle, hell, Addy no one would blame you if you ran away and joined some underground cult to cope.”

She stared at him like he was higher than god, but Javi’s plan worked, her anger and grief and just fucking pain had dulled a little, her breathing had evened out. “You’re crazy, you know that right?”

He just smiled back at her, if his eyes were a little haunted, well, no one just walked away from something like that - All storms carved their mark on this world, Addy knew that personally. “I love you, you're my best friend.” 

Addy smiled for a moment, going to say something before he interrupted her, “Now get your ass up, we’re gonna do this here and now, and then I’m gonna take you for a well-deserved ice cream, or two.” 

“What?” Javi pushed himself off the ground, brushing off his pants and offering his hand out to her, his gaze insistent. He had learned from the best, the only way to get any of them to do something was to be stubborn, to be pushy because all of them had a storm in their bones and they were stubborn as hell.

“You’re gonna get up, and you’re gonna walk and do all the exercises Terra wants for you, and I’m gonna be right here, cheering you on for every single step. You’re gonna get up and we’re gonna survive this, okay? Because you - you, Addy Morris, have come too damn far to die here and now feeling sorry for yourself.” He waved his hand insistently, “Come on.”

She could say no, she could scream in his face, tell him to leave and Javi would but - She didn’t want to die here, she didn’t want to break here, and God knows how the her of Before would be screaming her ass off because Addy was many things, but she wasn’t the sort of person who moped and cried about how unfair life was. 

Addy survived, Addy weathered the storm and she crawled her way out of hell by her broken fingernails. Addy endured, and she would keep enduring, but first - 

“I hate you.” Javi just grinned as she grabbed his hands, letting him pull her up, steadying her as she tentatively put pressure on her leg. 

“Me and you?” She loved him, she loved him so damn much even when he was a pain in her ass. 

Addy tried and failed to hide her smile, “Me and you.”

Kate looked like a ghost standing there by Jeb’s grave, her hair pulled back in a braid, the longest she had let it get for a while. “Hey, Katie Kat, it’s been a while.” She immediately tensed at the nickname, the only one she had because nobody could say no to Addy’s puppy dog eyes when she really put her effort into them. 

“I thought you were in PT today.” Of course, she planned her graveyard trip around Addy’s schedule, she was avoiding Javi too then seeing as he, more often than not, was her therapy buddy. 

Addy shrugged, shifting her weight, grateful that her leg was the sort that required shoes because otherwise, it would have sunken clean into the mud. It was warm, humid, wet, like it always was after a storm. “I took today off, heard you were heading to New York.” At Kate’s look, still tense, a hand digging into her thigh, into the freshly healed scar there, “Your Mom talks a lot.” 

She nodded, then said, her face pinched and uncomfortable, “I wasn’t, I - I wasn’t avoiding you.” Addy gave her another look, that was the pain of knowing another person so well, you could read them easily. “Okay, I was, but I just -” 

Kate stared down at the nearly pristine grave, dirt just beginning to collect in the lines of his name, in the horrific numbers that represented his entire life. “I’m sorry.” Addy almost flinched when she spoke suddenly, her voice cracking. “I’m sorry I was so stupid, confident, I led us there. I’m so fucking sorry, Addy.” 

Oh, oh shit. This made sense. She knew Kate was avoiding them because of the storm, but she thought it was the trauma, she thought it was surviving the storm and watching them all disappear one by one. She thought it was the breaking of her mind. Not - 

She should have known. Addy knew all of them down to their worst faults. And Kate had always carried the world on her shoulders like it was meant to rest there. Kate had always been their shield, their heart, Kate was Kate and they all loved her for that. But she had forgotten the downside to it. 

She couldn’t have stopped herself if she tried. Addy lunged forward, grabbing Kate in a hug so tight and sudden the two of them crumpled to the ground. Kate’s hands hovered around her, hesitant and so unsure, so unlike her that Addy almost wanted to cry. Instead, she buried her face in Kate’s neck and said, “It’s not your fault and I have never blamed you, not once, not for this. You hear me? This is not your fault.”

Maybe if she said it enough, firmly enough, then Kate would believe her. 

The words kept pouring out of her mouth, her hands digging into Kate’s shoulders, holding this girl who wasn’t her sister by blood as tightly as she could. It’s not your fault, It’s not your fault, I don’t blame you, It’s not your fault.  

Arms slowly wrapped around her, hands shaking as they pressed against her back, against a scar from the branch that hit her. Tears soaked her shoulder as Kate shook, as she cried, not wept, not broke, just shook from the force of her silent tears. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

It kept going on a loop, a terrible cycle between the two girls who survived the same storm, who carried the same scars and horror. Back and forth, back and forth, a cycle of blame and forgiveness. I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. 

Over and over and over and over again they broke and pieced each other together again and then broke and on and on and on. 

Kate’s the first of them to leave, and Addy doesn’t blame her for that. Maybe she should, but she can’t. Kate’s family, and she knows that if they’re going to survive this then - 

They have to go, one way or another they have to leave to survive and she can’t blame Kate for that, she couldn’t even try. Kate leaves and Addy watches her go. 

Time passes, slow and steady, and Addy learns to survive the worst thing that ever happened to her. It somehow hurts, realizing she hasn’t thought about Jeb or Praveen in days, realizing that her first instinct in the morning after checking her phone and the weather is to slip on her compression sleeve and grab her leg, realizing that the world had ended and she just - moved on. 

Time passes and Addy lives in her childhood bedroom and she eats dinner with her parents and she goes to PT and meets up with Javi, and she texts Kate and gets a response about half the time. The months creep on, and Addy breathes in and out, and one day she realizes that the storm in her bones is howling again. 

She keeps staring at the sky outside, she keeps opening her weather app and her heart beats faster at the orange and red swirls in the sky. She can feel it, the longing to run, to go chasing, to breathe in the heavy air, and feel the storm coming. She wants it back, she wants it all. 

The storm, the tornado took her leg and it cracked her mind but maybe, just maybe, it didn’t break her. Maybe there was something left in Addy, something that needed to run, to chase to survive - to live again. It’s been months of peace, of rest and ease, she’s had her lifetime of easy. 

She wants the storm back.

Javi has a guilty look on his face, and she already knows why. It’s been ten months since the storm, he’s been getting stir-crazy, desperate. Addy knew because she felt it too, the storm in her bones, the longing for it all, despite what they had survived. Going back was never an option for people like them. 

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” He shoved his hand into his pocket, not quite looking her in the eye. 

Addy sighed, leaning back against the cushions in the back of Javi’s truck. The stars shined above them, perhaps the only consistent thing she knew besides the howl of a tornado as it cleaved the world in two. “Javi.” 

He gave in easily, “The army, I got a spot.” He swallowed, finally looking over to her, “I’m taking it.” 

That’s not how she thought it would go for Javi, but, whatever it took to ease the pain they felt, the call in their blood. Addy shoved herself up, her leg propped up on the side of the truck, her scar bared to the world. Javi was Javi, he had never flinched from her before, he wouldn’t now. 

Javi’s eyes flicked to her, to the blankets and cushions beneath them, to the stars. He was more nervous than she had ever seen him. He wasn’t - After everything, he couldn’t take it, rejection, hate from one of the few people he called family. 

But he was an idiot. Addy could never hate him, never spurn him, never leave her family, her chosen family. 

She reached over, grabbing his hand, “If you gotta go, then you gotta go.” Addy squeezed his hand, wondering if he could feel too, everything she didn’t say, the I’m going to, wait for me? 

Javi took one look at her, and he probably could see it, because he shifted over, tucking her against his side, the two of them cushioned by blankets and staring at the stars - utterly alive despite it all. “You’re my family, Addy, always will be.” He looked over at her, “You need me, all you have to do is call and I’ll be there, I’ll find a way.”

She wouldn’t call, because Javi needed to run and she needed to learn to stand on her own, to breathe through the pain without the few others who shared it. Addy wouldn’t call, and Javi knew it, but they also knew he was telling the truth - If she ever needed anything, he’d be there. 

“Likewise.” Addy smiled, “Me and you?” 

“Me and you.”

“No.” Her father stood up, dishes clattering on the table, “You are not going out chasing those goddamn storms again! No, that’s not happening.”

Addy stared at him, her knuckles going white from her grip on the cutlery. “I don’t know if you noticed, Dad, but I’m twenty-two, I don’t need your permission. I just wanted to tell you, to let you know where I’d be.” 

Her mother was clutching her necklace, an old silver cross, “Adaline, sweetheart, why would you ever want to go back to those storms, after - after you -” She stopped her sentence, it was almost funny how her mother seemed to struggle more with the storm than Addy did. 

Gracie was pointedly looking at her food, Addy had wanted this to go easy, she hadn’t wanted a fight but she knew she would get one. But she had survived worse, she had held her own against far fucking worse than her father. “I want to go chasing again, I want to study storms, I want to see it all and I want to go back.” She gritted her teeth, placing down her knife and fork, “That tornado doesn’t get to take this from me, I won’t let it.”

Her father, his face bright red, shook his head, “You - After the grief you put me and your mother through, you want to go back?!” He staggered back, almost seething with his anger. She should have expected it, he had been on edge for months, it had been bound to explode at some point. “No, that’s not happening!” 

“Dad -” He slammed his hand down on the table, and for the first time in months, Addy flinched. 

“If you leave this house to go fucking storm chasing, you won’t be coming back.” His words weren’t a yell or a scream, and that was somehow worse. Her father was almost quiet, a deathly sort of silence. It’s how she knew he meant it. 

Addy stared at him, blinking, unbelieving, before turning to her mother. “Mom?” 

Her mother, gray hairs lining her bun, her hand still clutching her cross, just shook her head, “We can get you a job at the university, you can still look at storms. Sweetheart, just stay put, with us.” 

But that was the issue, Addy couldn’t stay, not here, not with them, not in the house that was surrounded by ghosts and the echo of the tragedy she endured. She couldn’t stay here, not when a storm was clawing at her bones, not when she felt it more and more every day. Addy had to go, she had to get out and never look back. She had to leave, staying wasn’t an option. 

She looked between her parents, the people who loved her, and spent their entire lives protecting her and crossing every line in the process. She looked at her parents, who had spent the majority of her life grieving her despite the fact that she was alive, that she was thriving. She looked at her parents and she saw the only thing she had left of her brother.

She looked at her parents, and she loved them, and she hated them a little. 

“I’m done.” Addy stood up and walked away from the table. 

She checked her bags for the thousandth time, she had everything she needed, Kate’s books, her clothes, everything she needed to care for her leg on the road. Addy was always the one packing things for the group, she was methodical in a way that Kate, with her head lost in the clouds, and Praveen, too worried about missing things that he missed other things, were never. 

She had everything she needed, especially if her father held true to his word and didn’t let her back. Which, given what she knew of him, and of her mother and her tendency to give in to him, was likely. It should be harder, leaving her childhood home, leaving her parents but - 

Addy had survived an EF5 tornado, she had survived losing her leg and her best friends, this was nothing.

She went over her bags one more time, living out of her car would be a pain in the ass but Addy had dealt with worse, (Try living with four other people in two vans, both mostly filled with tech and research, it wasn’t fun.) She could do this, she had to do this otherwise she was going to suffocate and drown in her own blood. And that wasn’t an option, she had come too damn far to die here. 

She checked to make sure her boots were tied tightly, her leg secured and ready for an hours-long drive. Then, with one last look at the glow-in-the-dark stars on her ceiling, the blue bed sheets dotted with cumulonimbus clouds, the pictures on her nightstand, the scratches from Daniel when it was his, Addy shut the door and crept down the stairs. 

She had long memorized which boards creaked and where not to step. It was easy, horrifically, terribly easy to leave. Addy shifted the bags on her shoulder, careful to make sure her leg, now heavier and less forgiving, didn’t accidentally set something off. 

She walked past the dining table, a broken plate still on the floor. She should clean it, do one last thing for her mother, she should - 

“You’re really going?” Addy froze at the sound of Gracie’s voice, the painful edge to it. Her sister was at the foot of the stairs, her blonde hair curling messily around her shoulders. She looked so painfully young. 

Addy swallowed, “I have to go, I have to, Gracie.” 

Gracie rocked back and forth on her feet, “Why do you have to go? We can go talk to Mom and Dad, get you some job at a nearby university or some weather station. You can still look at storms, you can still stay. ” Her voice broke on the last word and it was almost enough to make Addy unpack her bags, almost. 

Her leg still ached faintly as rain began to pour outside, the sound both soothing and enough to set her on edge. That did it, that broke her, or rather it made her steel. She had to go. Addy took three steps forward so she could reach out and brush back Gracie’s hair, “I can’t, bug. I can’t stay. It’ll kill me.” 

She wiped back a tear from Gracie’s face, and marveled at how much her sister looked like her, how young she looked, how unbroken even now. “If I give up storms, it’ll kill whatever part of me managed to crawl out of that tornado. I won’t -” Addy shook her head, this was the only truth she knew now, “I can’t survive giving this up, having it taken from me. I gotta go, and you have to let me.” 

Because here was another truth, if Gracie asked her to stay, and she meant it with everything she had, then - Then Addy would go back upstairs and unpack her bag, she would settle in this suffocating house, and find a job, forcing herself to be content looking at swirling colors on a screen and ignoring the howling, thrashing thing in her bones, the storm in her blood and marrow. If Gracie asked her to stay, she would. 

But, for better or for worse, her sister was more like her than she should be. Gracie swallowed, her lip trembling for a moment before she stiffened it, before the tears stopped falling. “Go.” She swallowed a sob or a scream, “Don’t look back, just - Call me, every so often so I don’t forget your sorry face.” 

It was odd how she had almost forgotten how much she loved her little sister. Addy smiled, leaning forward and oh, they were the same height now, pressing their heads together. “Course I’ll call. You couldn't forget me if you tried.” 

Their eyes slipped shut, and for a brief moment, it was just the two of them holding each other. It was months and months of grief and terror and the hollow of her leg and the empty graves and the accusing stares and Kate’s absence and Javi leaving and leaving and leaving. It was the months of the two of them surviving some of the worst days of their lives. 

It was the two of them - sisters, the one thing she had always been, would always be. 

Addy pulled back, her leg aching only slightly, “You take care of yourself, okay? And if you need anything, and I mean anything, you call me and I’ll figure something out, I’ll be there.” Because she would, because come hell or high water, she’d be there for her sister. 

Gracie sniffled, blinking and stubbornly refusing to show any signs of grief or pain. Addy loved her for that. “Where are you even gonna go? To some city like Kate? Because I have to say I might disown you if you actually join the army like Javi.”

Addy shifted the bag on her shoulder, thinking about the various maps on her phone, about the instinct she had to run, or rather chase something. “I’ll stay close, but I figured it was about time I saw Arkansas in all her glory.” Gracie raised her eyebrow, “I’ll do fine, leave me alone.” 

Her little sister just laughed, it was a mess but still laughter. “I love you, always will Ada, no matter how far you go.” 

God, she had almost forgotten that despite how young Gracie was, she was also growing old, growing up. Addy smiled, “I love you too, always and forever.” 

Gracie smiled at her, before darting forward for one last hug. The two of them held onto each other with all they had, nails digging into skin, the last few tears pressed against scarred skin, breaking and breaking and whole. Then, Gracie pulled back, like if she didn’t she might never let go. “Bye bye, Ada.” 

“Bye bye, bug.”

She couldn’t help it, the way she settled down onto the old wooden porch she had grown up hanging on. Addy could still remember spilling paint on the left banister, she could remember Daniel always jumping so he skipped the last two steps, she could remember kissing Lana Darling on the last step right after prom. She remembered growing up here, living here, loving here.

But, despite the memories and all their long, long history, it wasn’t home. Not anymore, and it hadn’t been in a while. Sometimes, Addy wasn’t sure she really did come out of that storm. 

“We’ll put your stuff in the storage container, 3B near the edge of town, they’ll let you get anything you want if you need it.” She damn near jumped off the steps, turning to see her mother in the doorway, wearing her usual robe and frown. 

“Mom.” She wasn’t sure what she was saying, what she should be trying to say. All Addy could force out was, “Mom.”

Her mother wrapped her robe tighter around her, staring at Addy and the sky like they were both her greatest torment. Addy didn’t quite flinch, but it was a near thing. “We tried, you know, to love you two like before but -” She pressed her lips into a fine line, “We failed, we failed you, so I guess this is our fault truly. Shoulda known better.” 

“Mommy,” Later Addy would revolt at how weak her voice sounded, but for now, she was a child begging for her mother’s love. 

Her mother remained unbroken, watching her with the same steel gray eyes Gracie had, “I wanted to name you after a storm you know, but your father insisted it would bring bad luck.” She let out a huff of laughter, “He said the storm would take you back, and I called him an idiot, but he was right, wasn’t he?”

She took a few steps forward, brushing back a strand of hair that had fallen out of her ponytail, “You, love, you have more than one birthright, and we were fools for ever thinking we could have kept you from it.” Addy leaned into her mother’s hand, unable to stop the tears streaming down her cheeks, unable to shake the feeling that her mother was tearing out her last name and home in the same breath. “I’ve buried one child, Adaline, and I’ll love you to your grave. But I will not watch you get there.” 

Then, without another word, without something to soften the blow of her words, her mother let go of her, turned on her heels, and walked back into her house. Oh, Addy thought, this is what the end of the world feels like. 

The sun was just peaking through the clouds as she passed the Welcome to Arkansas sign. Addy tightened her grip on the wheel as she stared at the sprawling land around her. This, she thought, this was a place she could make home. 

One way or another.

Chapter Text

Her first impression of Tyler Owens doesn’t involve him at all. Instead, it involves his bright red truck, and his less-than-adequate undercarriage and connecting anchors. (A rather fitting metaphor and all that.) 

Addy tied her hair into a loose ponytail, sweat clung to the back of her neck, and her shoulders, and her back. Sometimes she forgot why exactly she hated summer, only made slightly more tolerable by the storms it brought. Even if she still couldn’t drive into a storm, or close to one like she had years ago. 

That, she thought, glaring at the ground that seemed determined to trap her foot, was an issue for another time. Addy was fine, completely and utterly fine - or at least, she was dealing with it. 

She looked around, taking stock of the chasers currently at the rest station she stopped at. There were the usual vans and heavy-duty cars, the sort of people who were like them, not heavy chasers but rather observers. And then there were the people she had caught Gracie watching once or twice, Wranglers, they called themselves, in their weathered trucks and a camper. 

She should walk away, she should totally walk away but - Addy didn’t walk away from things, even when she should, even when she definitely should. She tilted her head, the buzz and echo of slightly tipsy, adrenaline-high storm chasers fading as she eyed the various gears and mechanics of the large, red truck that belonged to Tyler Oliver, Oak, Ocean? She didn’t know, it didn’t matter, not when in comparison to the heavily worked-on truck that her fingers itched to tear apart and rebuild it better. 

Addy crouched beside the truck, readjusting her balance awkwardly to avoid digging the edges of her prosthetic right into the twisted edge of her scar. She fought the urge to slip under the truck and work, to get oil and grease pressed into the lines of her palm, and under her nails, and anywhere and everywhere, and Jesus Addy, how did you even get dirt there?? 

Praveen’s voice was a sharp echo, and yet - She was already starting to forget what he sounded like. Addy swallowed, barely aware of her surroundings, what was the exact shade of Jeb’s eyes? What - 

“You planning on stealing my truck or just staring at it?” Oh shit - She hit the ground with a thunk, feeling the cool dampness of mud getting all over her jeans, and her ass. Her leg dug right into the edge of her scar for a brief second, and after letting out a sharp inhale, she glared up at the person who scared her. 

He was tall, and blonde, and wearing a cowboy hat and a smug smile. Addy looked at him, glared at him, and then she noticed the easy way he was leaning against the truck, because it was his truck. He was, “You’re Tyler Oceans?” Oceans seemed like the sort of last name a YouTube Wrangler would have, right? 

He raised his eyebrows, staring down at her with an incredulous look, “Oceans? You look like you want to dissect my truck but you don’t know my name?” Despite the amused-slightly-annoyed tone, he took a step forward, offering out his hand.

Addy wanted the world to swallow her whole, she wanted Tyler whatever the fuck his last name was to be covered in mud, but her leg was also killing her and maybe it wasn’t the best idea to struggle to stand up. She held back her glare, taking his hand and letting him pull her up. Addy groaned as she brushed off her pants, only smearing the mud and dirt on her jeans. 

After a moment of amused eyes on her, she grudgingly smiled, although it was more of a grimace, “Your truck is going to get you killed.” 

He blinked, and blinked, and blinked before Tyler something threw back his head with a startled laugh, “You just - You’re something else, stranger. My name’s Tyler Owens, and my truck is perfectly fine.” Unlike some others, his tone wasn’t threatening, it wasn’t the sort of tone that said you better back up and apologize before I break your jaw. No, it was just amused and almost playful. 

Oh, she thought, readjusting everything she thought she knew of Owens. He may be an asshole, that’s still up for debate, but he didn’t mind some competition. Addy could work with that, Addy could take that and run with it. 

She skeptically looked down at the under bed of the truck, “Those anchors of yours, they’re sure as hell not secured enough, and even if, let’s say, they were, they’re not long enough. You think a foot and a half in the soft, muddy, freshly overturned earth is gonna keep you anchored in the face of an EF2, EF3?”

Tyler Owens, an oddly normal name for this batshit crazy man, stared at her like she had grown two heads and started flying. Oh, Addy thought, a little too smugly for all of this, you haven’t had an actual challenge in a while. Good, anything was better than depressing thoughts and spiraling. 

“You work with trucks, storm chaser trucks?” It wasn’t - Addy was used to the sort of condescending, a little girl like you tone, but this wasn’t that. It was a genuine question as Tyler actually crouched down a little, looking at his anchors tucked away near the wheel and hidden in the frame of the truck. 

“Yeah, have for a few years now.” It was the truth, or at least a half-truth. Addy worked on storm chaser trucks, her own, her teams, or at least she did before the world ended a few times in a row. “And I don’t think your watchers would enjoy seeing your head being bashed around and splattered across those nice seats.” 

Okay, maybe that was a bit too much but she had had a shitty twenty-four hours, and week, and year. Addy was entitled to a little bite. “And what would you do?” Another genuine question, another i actually care about your opinion question. 

Her fingers itched to tear about the truck, everything in her body ached for a storm but if she couldn’t step in one, then she’d get as close as she could. Addy tilted her head, eyeing the frame and the screw-shaped anchors, they’d have to be heavy-duty, especially with the added weight of the reinforcements meant to protect its cargo, as well as the speakers? Of course, there are speakers, of course, the Tornado Wrangler had speakers. “Well, steel’s the obvious choice, it isn’t the heaviest but it’ll work the best with your frame. And you’ll get the added weight if you lengthen the anchors, and widen them too. You’ll have to alter its outer shell to account for the changes but it’s nothing major, nothing too impactful as long as you're cautious and rebalance everything.” 

Addy paused, already making calculations and trying to remember who exactly she knew who could get them the right gear. There were a few old friends in Oklahoma but most hadn’t talked to her beyond the now quite familiar i’m sorry for your loss, or the worse option, why the hell are you the one still alive? But Owens on the other hand had to know someone, she had to admit other than a few things his truck was beautiful. 

Oh, Owens. 

She got too lost in her head, almost forgetting that she wasn’t home and surrounded by people well used to her spiraling and rants, to the way Addy could lose herself in some new machines or invention if she was really interested, (it was always specific, something new, something old, something fixable rather than Javi’s passion towards anything with a hint tech.) She looked over at Tyler, still crouching down near his truck, smiling over at her. Oh crap.

Even as her cheeks flushed she didn’t apologize, he asked and Addy had never been in the habit of gentling herself for people who hadn’t earned it. “You asked.” 

“That I did.” Tyler stood up, brushing off his hands and holding it out, “Can I have the name of the woman who is rather hell-bent on insulting, then fixing my truck?”

Another genuine question that left her staring. Addy had a feeling that Tyler Owens wasn’t the sort of person you walked away from, that he was a lot like Kate, that he was the sun and you couldn’t help but orbit him if you let yourself get close enough. Kate was the sun, and Kate was gone, and Addy was floating through the dark abyss of space, and she was so cold. 

She could walk away, here and now, and he’d let her go. She should definitely run away from the man who had the same glint in his eyes that they all did before they died before the damn storm killed them all in one way or another. Addy should go, but she never did learn how to survive on her own, how to be self-sustainable, and weather the storm by herself. 

It would probably come around and bite her in the ass later, but until then -

She inexplicably thought about her mother, her blonde hair pulled back in a bun, her fingers tracing over her rosary, a conversation that was almost a decade old, You know I wanted to name you Isabel, you were born into that storm, you survived it. But your father said no, so you became my lovely Adaline. 

Addy thought about her ghosts, about her past, about Kate in New York and Javi in the army, about the graves with empty coffins. She thought about everything she was running from, or rather very calmly walking away from. 

She finally took his hand, “You, Owens, can call me Isabel.” Tyler smiled at her as he shook her hands.

The wind picked up around them, and Addy could feel it in her bones, the storm coming. “I have a feeling,” Tyler said, “We’re going to be good friends.”

It was extremely annoying how right he would be. 

It felt right, having grease and oil and dirt pressed into every line of her palm. God, she had missed this, all of this. “You’re telling me this was your first stop in Arkansas, and you decided that dissecting my truck was the best thing to do?” 

Addy smiled, wiping her hands on her pants, careful to keep her leg tucked beneath the fabric. She didn’t exactly think Tyler would act negatively, but she wasn’t sure she could handle another look of pity, poor you right now. “I like shiny things, and you don’t seem to mind. It took you about an hour to let me dig around in here.” 

He shrugged, “You have supervision,” At her raised eyebrows he just smiled in response, “I don’t know why you’re looking at me like that, Isabel, I’m perfectly responsible and logical.”

Those were not the words she would use to describe Tyler Owens who had a theme song and built-in speakers on his truck, but she wasn’t going to complain. Not when this was the most fun Addy had had in months, not when something was slowly and carefully relaxing in her, the constant storm shrieking in her head dulled just a little. 

She grabbed a nearby rag, eyeing the exposed anchors they had just replaced, they were decent but she was right, not long enough. Addy wiped off her hands, Tyler whistling as he surveyed the new and improved anchors. After about a week, in which she had the pleasure of meeting the other batshit crazy wranglers except for two of them, Dexter and Lily, who were out of state for some emergency, they finally found everything they would need to improve the truck. 

Or rather she had nagged at Tyler, pointed out what was wrong and was proven right, and finally managed to sway him over to her side, let me fix this, i’ll do it for free, i’m just twitching to work on something and you know that i’m right. (Neither of them touched on the way Addy almost clocked him when he pushed too hard on her past that first night, or how Tyler kept giving her these little tests, do you know what you’re talking about, how do you react to anyone that isn’t white or straight, why don’t you chase if you know so much?)

(You didn’t grow up in tornado alley, in the wake of constant tragedy after tragedy without gaining a little trust issues in the process.)

“These are -” He stopped short, but Addy didn’t take offense. She just pressed the rag under her nails, trying to get the worst of the dirt and muck out, it felt a little too much like blood for her liking. 

“It’ll keep you alive if you can’t stop yourself from driving right into the worst of Mother Nature.” It wouldn’t have saved them, not against an EF5 but - Addy pressed her lips together, the Wranglers, she had noted after spending one too many nights binge-watching their past videos in her crusty motel bed, never went into anything worse than an EF3. They stopped short at the risk of something worse even as they played it off with laughter and adrenaline-high words. They were careful, and she really didn’t want another them, so Addy improved his anchors and was a slight bitch in the process but that was nothing really. 

As she admired the truck, already thinking about anything she could improve or change to fit the storms, she felt eyes on her. Addy didn't flinch or buckle underneath it, she was used to stares, although they were mostly pity-poor-you stares. "You gonna say something or just stare? We have about thirty minutes before Boone comes running in to see our progress and tell you the stupid thing so and so did, and how y'all should totally do it too." 

It was easy, it was so damn easy to know them, to learn them - Addy almost wanted to run screaming in the other direction, or carve out the cracking thing the storm made. 

"You're something else, I don't know what but you are it." Tyler tilted his head a little, "Still not gonna tell me what the point of all of this is, Isabel?" 

The name wasn't - it fit, like an old, worn sweater, like something that wasn't hers but once was, but could have been in a slightly different world just to the left. It should have been jarring, just as jarring as his question, as the knowing glint in his eyes and words, and how Tyler Owens was surprisingly not as terrible as she thought he'd be. And yet. 

And yet. 

"I'm just making sure you don't get yourself killed, Owens." Before he could say anything else she gave up on trying to clean off her hands, tucking the rag in her pocket and putting her hands on her hips, "Now, why don't we go find Boone and tell him the good news?" 

Tyler, still with a glint in his eyes, didn't mention her obvious attempt at avoiding the conversation. Instead, he just smiled, "Now that's a great idea." 

Boone practically ran her over as he headed towards the nearest grocery store, if you could call the tiny, barely lit building a grocery store. Addy, biting back a groan as the movement caused her leg to press against her scar. It hurt on and off these days, something about inflammation and her skin tightening as the natural healing process took its hold. She just called it a pain in her ass. "I'm sorry, didn't see you there Bel."

(It took him about two hours, and a few snarky comebacks for him to give her a nickname.)

Addy brushed back a loose strand of hair, she was going to have to cut it soon, "You're okay, Boone, but why are you in such a rush? What did you do?" It was so very easy to begin to know them, it was so easy to care. (She wasn't sure if she hated that or not.) 

He smiled at her, almost giddy, "I didn't do anything, for once, Lily and Dexter are back." Boone was almost bouncing on his feet, "And she finally fixed her drone, Cairo's up and at 'em." He had a look in his eyes that Addy recognized, one she had worn, one that Kate had worn right before - 

Nope, she wasn't going to go there. "You're gonna go crazy, aren't you?" 

"Yep, but I gotta get their favorite snacks first." Boone tapped the side of his head, "Hangry storm chasing ain't a good idea." Then he was off, rushing towards the grocery store with the same stupid, real smile. 

She watched him go, staring and refusing to let herself get lost in the storm of memories. New people, new people was always a good option at ignoring her issues. 

"Owens! You gonna chase a big one today? And do not make a joke or I will -" Addy stopped short when her eyes met a new face, a woman around her age with brown skin and dyed dark blue, almost black locs pulled back. She had goggles hanging around her neck, and heavy-duty gloves on as she stood over the drove, Cairo. 

She was - beautiful was a far too simple word. 

Oh shit. Addy blinked, her threat dying in her throat as she stared at the stranger, Lily, it must be Lily. Somebody cleared their throat, and she turned to see Tyler coming out of a nearby trailer, staring at her with a knowing, and exceptionally smug look. 

"You were saying?" She was going to kill him. She was going to kill him, "Lily, come meet Isabel, the girl I told you about, the one who insulted my baby and then asked to fix her." Addy never should have come to Arkansas, why exactly had she thought this was a good idea? 

Lily looked up, a smile already spreading across her face as she stepped around her drone, "Oh my god, I have been waiting to meet to you. Tyler was moping the entire first night because Oceans, Tyler Oceans, am I that forgettable?" Lily laughed, and it was a delightful sound and Addy had forgotten how idiotic she got around pretty girls. 

She stuck out her hand, "I'm Lily, Lily Lane because my parents liked alliteration and all that." 

Addy had three seconds of staring, open-mouthed and red in the face, before she firmly reminded herself she had survived worse, she could talk to a pretty girl. She took her hand, ignoring how inexplicably right the leather of her gloves felt against her callouses and the jagged scar that cut across her palm. "A - Isabel, my name's Isabel so we have a proper introduction."

The corner of Lily's eyes wrinkled a little as she smiled, her left front tooth was just a little bit chipped. Addy was so screwed, she was so screwed. 

"I'm fine, I swear. I've been doing nothing but working on trucks, not a single storm, not even an EF0." Addy leaned her head back against the motel wall, Gracie's voice rolling through her head. She loved her sister to hell and back, but God, she had their mother's protective streak. "Yes, Gracie, I'll be careful. Yeah, yeah, love you too." 

The call ended with a click and Addy had about two seconds of peace before - "That your girl?" The shriek she let out was completely and utterly rational, really. Lily was standing a few feet to her right, her hands held out like she was calming some sort of injured, cornered animal. "Sorry, sorry, I thought you heard me coming." She smiled, "I've been told I'm not exactly the best at subtly."

She took a few calming breaths, not so casually moving so her left leg was partially hidden. Addy was like eighty percent sure they wouldn't care or look at her differently but - she didn't have the energy to take that risk now, she just didn't want to, so she didn't. She slipped her phone into her pocket, face twisting as she registered Lily's initial question, "God no, that was my sister, Gracie. She's back in Oklahoma, a senior in high school meaning she can't up and leave. So, she's mother henning to cope."

Lily hummed, and Addy couldn't tell what the look on her face meant, "That's nice, I don't have any siblings so I'm just stuck with Tyler and Dexter being overly cautious." 

She snorted, slapping a hand over her mouth as Lily just looked at her in amusement, "I'm sorry, it's just - Tyler's the worried one?" It didn't quite fit with what she thought of when she looked at Tyler. He was a self-proclaimed Wrangler, almost too unafraid, and a borderline adrenaline junkie. Sure, she had seen some glints of what lay beneath the persona but -

Lily just shrugged, taking a few steps closer and Addy would be able to grab her hand if she just reached out. She did not. "People always think he's the worst of us, and sure, Tyler's as crazy as we all are but," She shook her head, tilting her head as she looked Addy over. It wasn't a flirty look, more like she was trying to see her down to her bones, to see what Addy was made of. "He cares about everyone, he cares so damn deeply it shouldn't be possible, but it is." 

Addy swallowed, not managing to look Lily in the eyes. The way she talked about him, the way you could feel it, her bone-deep faith in Tyler, the sort of faith that wasn't freely given, that was earned and more precious than gold. It reminded her, like most things, of them, of the once unshakeable belief she had in her team, in her faith. The faith that was, like everything these days, cracking and tattered, barely hanging on against the world's relentless winds. 

If she was smart she would pack up in the middle of the night and drive until she hit a new state. They, The Wranglers were too familiar, too good, too caring and so much like them that the lines kept blurring and - It might kill her if she stayed, or break whatever wasn't shattered from the storm. If she was smart Addy would run screaming in the other direction, and survive another year desperately searching for a reprieve from her constant breaking. If she was smart, that is.

She leaned a little closer to Lily, not touching but closer, "Yeah, I'm starting to get that." There was something a little too raw in her voice, a little too soft and cracking, but Lily didn't comment on it. She just smiled that lovelybeautifulgolden smile. 

"You should stick around, Isabel. I got a feeling you'd make one hell of a Wrangler." And she meant it. Addy didn't stand a chance. 

She pressed her hand against her leg, fingertip brushing against the fabric that concealed the metal of her leg. She had had a family once, and now here she stood. Addy wasn't sure what to do with any of that, but she did know what she was going to say to Lily Lane. "I'm not going anywhere, at least not yet."

It was almost odd, how easy it was to fall into place with the Wranglers. Addy worked on the trucks and RV, helping Dani or Tyler repair the worst of the damage from whatever storm she had watched them chase from the safety of her motel room. When she wasn't knee-deep in oil, rust, and grease, she was writing articles for various companies, all directed towards people who wanted to know storms but didn't want to actually get close to them. (If you had pointed out that she was now one of them, Addy would have kindly hit you over the head with her computer.) 

She sat with the Wranglers around a hastily made campfire, or drank some concoction Dani had made that was potent enough to kill a horse. She laughed and played and watched them dive into storm after storm. And yet - 

Addy had always been able to read people, not nearly as well as Jeb but she could read people, and when she knew them she knew them. So, she could see it, the questions on the tip of their tongues, the glint in their eyes as she let one thing slip and they added another thing to the mess of facts for Isabel (Still no last name.)

It was equally as frustrating as it was nice, the way they cared, the way they were genuinely worried when they rolled back into town and caught her on the tail end of a panic attack because one of their cameras went out and Boone wasn't responding on the radio and all she could see was Praveen behind her one second and gone the next. The Wranglers, they had called themselves tornado tamers and really we aren't that different, despite how much of a mess she was, seemed to genuinely care about her and Addy - She didn't know what to do with that, with any of this. 

So, she didn't do anything, she kept marching on, kept breathing in and out in some warped version of survival.  

Her first actual conversation with Dexter involves more t-shirts than any person could ever use and a rather unsettling observation. She's wandering the camp when she hears a low curse, and the sound of someone stumbling through the dusty Arkansas ground. Addy turns a corner to find Dexter near one of the open compartments of the RV, struggling with a box of t-shirts? 

"Need a hand?" He makes a sound that vaguely resembles a yes, or maybe, please help before I fall and break my back. She walked over, ignoring the slight drag of her left leg in the dust, and took the right side of the box, helping Dexter carefully lower it to the ground. She  looks down as she brushes off her hands, and - "Is that Tyler's face?" 

Addy couldn't have helped her incredulous tone if she tried. Dexter, a hand pressed to his back, mid-way through mumbling something about being too old for this crap, (Which is also bullshit because he regularly dives into storms for the hell of it,) smiles at her, "Yep!" 

She stares at him, and then at the t-shirts, and then at the several boxes of t-shirts still tucked away in the open compartment. Then, she laughs, she laughs, and looks down at Tyler's stupidly large head and she laughs harder. Almost bending in half because what the fuck but also it is so so fitting, it is so Tyler Owens. "Not my first tornado? That's what he settled on?" 

Dexter, with the same amusement in his eyes, just shrugs, "You know people, it'll sell. Besides, Tyler's big head is gonna give us money to fund helping towns that have been hit. A worthy cause, I say."

Her laughter dies quickly, oh, oh. Every time she thought she knew exactly who Tyler Owens was, he just had to prove her wrong. Something about this just stung, "You okay?" Addy blinked, unaware if seconds or minutes had passed, Dexter was pointedly looking at her hand, or rather the way she was rubbing her side, just over her ribs. Her ribs and the scattered scars that the piece of debris gave her when it tore her away from Kate's outstretched hand. 

It didn't hurt much these days, not like her leg, but sometimes Addy thought she could feel the blood drying on her skin, could feel the wood and metal and muck digging in and in and in and - She shook her head, nodding towards the boxes of t-shirts, "I'm fine, let's get the rest of these out." 

Dexter hummed but he didn't say anything as the two of them worked to carefully remove the boxes without dumping the t-shirts onto the dusty ground or buckle under the weight of the box. Addy found it was easy to just slip away from everything, to just let the world shrink until it was only here and now, and why the hell was a bunch of t-shirts so damn heavy?

She rolled her neck from side to side, trying to ease the muscles as the wind picked up a little around them. Her fingers twitched again, and without looking she knew that somewhere in the lot Tyler and Boone were readying his truck, she knew that Lily was prepping Cairo and Dani was bartering with some other chasers for something the RV needed. It would be so easy to just go with them, to drive and drive into a lovely storm. It would be so easy if Addy could get near one without all her desperate want giving way to a rather rational utter and absolute terror. 

Dexter knew, somehow he knew because he cleared his throat, "You can go off with them if you want. I can get the rest of the supplies, and I know Lily wouldn't mind the company." Despite the gentle tease in his voice, Addy couldn't help but notice the underlying I know something's off, why? 

She shook her head, "I'm good, I'm just - just a half-decent mechanic." And wasn't that the biggest lie she'd ever told? Addy was many things, so many terrible things, but she wasn't just a mechanic. She barely qualified, because as much as she loved fixing things, nothing could ever compare to storms, to figuring out how they tick, to seeing them in all their wonderous, terrifying glory. 

For a moment, she thought he'd let it drop. But no, she should never have assumed a Wrangler would run. Dexter's voice was quiet but sure, his eyes staring into her soul, "You've been chasing before, haven't you? Tyler, he does think you're just some mechanic, more focused on tech and gears than the actual storm, but he doesn't see it." 

Addy didn't look over at him, she didn't let herself, "See what?" 

"The look in your eyes every time we go out, every time you see a storm in the distance. It's the same look he gets, the want, the urge." Dexter shook his head slightly, "You look at the storm like it's in your bones, like it's killing you not to be in the center of it. And yet, you don't chase." 

It was almost terrifying, how right he was, how spot on he was. Addy fought the urge to dig her nails into her scar, just to prove that she is alive. She fought the urge to roll up her pant leg and say, scream, this, this is why I don't chase. She fought the urge to tell him that she loved storms with everything she had but they killed her family and they killed her and ADDY DID NOT SURVIVE THAT STORM. 

Instead, she smiled, bright and sharp like the world hadn't ended over a year ago, like it still wasn't ending, "I'm just a mechanic, Dex." And then she grabbed another box. 

Chapter Text

In her worst dreams, she’s back there, in the center of the storm, the wind taking her. Lightning flashes, or maybe it’s the blood rushing to her head, or the white-hot agony spreading through every part of her body. She takes a breath in and she’s choking, on rainwater and mud and blood, thick and hot and iron is rotting in her mouth. 

Addy breathes and it hurts, it all hurts and she turns her head and - 

Praveen’s eyes are dark and unforgiving, or worse, hollow, empty. There’s blood clinging to his temple, so dark it’s almost black. His hand is outstretched, his fingers twisted and shattered at the wrong angles. His chest isn’t rising and falling, and the rain-soaked ground is swelling around them. It’s rising and she can’t move, she can’t move. 

She can’t feel her legs, she can’t feel anything. Praveen’s head shifts, the mud dragging their limbs down, and his tongue lulls out of his mouth, swollen and twisted and wrong. Addy opens her mouth to scream, but a sound doesn’t escape, the mud closes around her throat.

It’s cold and harsh and blood rushes down the back of her throat, hot and thick, and the mud rises and rises and she’s choking on warm earth and it tastes like death and grave dirt. It fills her lungs and she can’t breathe and she’s suffocating, she’s drowning, and Praveen’s eyes are still hollow and she can’t - she can’t - 

Addy wakes up with a strangled scream, her fingers clawing at the shitty Motel sheets. Sweat sticks her ratty shirt to her back, to the warped twisted scars that curve around her sides. She isn’t, she can’t breathe, she has to get out. She has to go h o m e. 

She yanks off the blankets, swinging her legs over the bed, and - 

The unforgiving Motel floor sends a dull pain up her side. Addy blinks, cheek pressed to the too-damn colorful carpet. What? She pushes herself up, her arms trembling slightly, and looks down and oh, oh. There’s nothing but empty space where her left leg should be. She flexes her ankle, or what should be her ankle, and the muscles on her thigh contract. Terra would be proud, somewhat. 

She shoves herself up, skin dragging against the carpet, and presses her trembling hand to the stump of her leg. Addy digs her fingers into the smooth, pulled tight skin, and the curved line of her scar. She closes her eyes, her nightmare lost for a minute in the shock of losing her leg all over again, and reaches a hand past her kneecap. 

Her hand traces the line of her shin, fingers grazing over nothing as her nails scrape over the scar she got when she fell off a tree playing with Daniel a week before the first end of the world. Addy shivered, all too aware of everything, the rough carpet beneath her, the faint smell of burnt hair from god knows what, the worn-by-time softness of her shirt. And the faint sensations from a limb that the hospital disposed of over a year ago. 

All it is is phantom limb syndrome, her mind remembering what her body has already lost and buried. She knows this but - Addy presses her fingers against her inner ankle, and there, just below the rounded edge of a bone is a tiny four-leaf clover, the same one she got with all the other Tamers a year before the world ended. 

Addy opens her eyes, tears slipping down her face, and her hand hovers over empty air. 

The Motel has even shittier lights lining the hall, half of which are cracked and broken, and the other half are constantly flickering on and off over and over again. It’s the perfect horror movie, all it needs is a psycho murderer with an ax hitched over their shoulder. Addy walks towards the only working vending machine, her left foot click clicking on the ground in a way that refuses to let her forget that she doesn’t fucking have one. 

Her eye twitches a little as she stares at the selection of snacks available - years old chips and granola bars and - Addy doesn’t even want to guess what that is. “What did the vending machine do to you?” 

She holds back the shriek as Boone suddenly appears at her shoulder, staring blearily at the dull light of the vending machine. He barely reacted as she looked over at him, eyes wide, her fists clenched because why did none of the Wranglers ever announce their presence? He blinked, before turning to look at her, “You good, Bel?”

It was too much for all of this. She ran a hand over her face, thanking all the Gods she didn’t believe in that she had the good fortune to put on some soft flannel pants before coming out. Instead of protecting her from grabby assholes, it protected her from the Wranglers figuring out too much about her. “Hi, Boone, hi.” 

He smiled for a second before turning back to the vending machine, pulling out a crumpled dollar bill, and pressing the flickering red lights at random. Addy watched him like he was an upside-down tornado, a freak of nature, Boone up before noon on a non-chasing day. Boone muttered something as he opened the bag of trail mix. Taking a handful and throwing it into his mouth before holding it to her, “Want some?”

Fuck it, it’s not like any of this could get weirder. “Sure, why not.” She took a handful of notes, and a few chocolate chips, and swallowed them. It was - edible, at least. Addy held back a yawn, fighting the urge to just tilt forward and hit the terrible vending machine with her head. 

“You sure you’re good? Because I’ve been told I’m a good listener, granted I may forget half the conversation by tomorrow, but -” Boone smiled at her, a real, genuine thing despite the sleep clinging to him. 

She had the inexplicable thought then, that he and Praveen would have gotten on so well together, that they would have clicked and the world would be far more chaotic for it. His broken, twisted fingers flashed before her eyes and she couldn’t quite hold back her wince, shifting on her feet, fighting the instinctive urge to runrunrun. 

Boone reached out with his free hand, hovering over her shoulder like he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to touch her or not. “Is your ankle bothering you? I can go get Dani, she’s the best with medical stuff out of all of us and I promise she won’t be upset at being woken up. Or Tyler, if that’s better? He’s picked up some stuff, we all have. I mean, in this line of work you kinda have to know.” His sentence slowly died out as Addy stared at him, stuck on his first sentence.

“My ankle? Why would my ankle be bothering me?” Do you know, she didn’t scream, do you know the broken pieces of me? Do you know that I outlived them? Do you know that I shouldn’t have? 

His smile was halfway to a wince, like he had revealed something he shouldn’t have, “I mean - you’re not exactly subtle, Isabel. We all kinda notice you have a limp, and that your left ankle is a little off?” Boone, who had never hesitated before, seemed like he was ready to flee the country with every word, “I mean, not like in a you’re broken way, just -” He sighed, giving up on explanations, “It hurts you, we want to help, we care, we notice.” 

Oh, oh. 

Addy had thought she was better at hiding it, she thought that nobody cared enough to look too closely. She thought that she could lose herself in Arkansas, be nobody and nothing in the storm-ridden fields. She should have known better. She should have run the second she met Tyler Owens' eyes and recognized a bit of Kate in him. 

She didn’t let herself look down at her leg, or fall to her knees and fall apart because Praveen’s eyes still flashed in her head and she hadn’t talked to Javi or Kate in weeks because they were all surviving and running but God she missed them with everything she had left. Addy just pressed her lips together, letting out a sharp exhale before saying, “I’m fine, Boone, really I just - I had a nightmare, that’s all.” 

He didn’t say anything for a long moment, staring at her with too damn knowing eyes. Then, Boone smiled, soft and gentle, “Okay, it’s just - We’re here, if you ever want to talk. I’m here.” 

And that was the issue, Addy didn’t say. They were here, they were still here and she was on the verge of falling apart because she lost one family and the next in the same breath, and Addy couldn’t do this again. They were here, and she didn’t know if she wanted to run or fall apart in their arms. 

Her smile was tight, and she knew it didn’t look right, “I know. Goodnight, Boone.” Then she walked away, trying desperately not to limp and failing. 

She doesn’t even realize, the first time it happens. 

They’re at a local bar, crushed into a booth that definitely isn’t meant to hold six people. (Addy couldn’t tell you when it had gotten easier, when they started to include her.) Someone’s elbow is digging into a scar or two but in the dim light of the bar, with the buzz of whiskey on her tongue, it doesn’t hurt.

For once nothing does. 

Her fingers are tap-tapping against her glass and she’s fully engrossed in a conversation with Dexter about classic horror movies of all things, and someone’s foot keeps brushing against her right and she doesn’t even bother to pull her left back. Tyler is laughing and everything is so loud and alive. It’s lovely, it’s a desperate, sharp relief. 

And so the words slip off her tongue, and she doesn’t even flinch as she says it, “God, you and Jeb would get along so damn well.” Addy’s smiling as she says this, as she tilts back her glass and lets the whiskey and some spice warm her from the inside out. 

She wakes up with a hangover and no memory of this conversation, or the three before that. 

The next time it happens she’s staring at Lily, looking up at Cairo and laughing - the sort of laughter that happens when you throw your head back, like you can’t help the way it escapes you, like you’re this close to flying. It’s beautiful, she’s beautiful and last week Addy tripped face-first into a ditch in front of her. 

She groans, putting her face into her hands because How the hell was she so bad at this? Literally, how was this possible? She’s been a practicing lesbian for ten fucking years, since Angie Laws in seventh grade and oh my god, she had more charm as a twelve-year-old than - 

“You know you could just talk to her.” Addy glares into her hands at the sound of Tyler’s voice, a touch too smug but also gentle. The asshole. Tyler was standing next to her, leaning against her workbench, fingers hooked into his belt. At her look he raised his hands in mock surrender, “I’m just saying, Lily’s a lot of things, but a mind reader ain’t one of them.” 

Addy answered that with a mature response, she groaned and leaned her head against a nearby shelf, curling her knees against her chest. Her fingers dug into her cargo pants, a knife in a pocket, and the line where metal met skin. “Lily’s just -” 

Lily was a lot of things that Addy wasn’t. She shook her head, “I’m not good at this, any of this.” She never had been, but at least before, she had some confidence, she had something there - innocence, hope, faith - but now, now she had her scars and her metal leg and ghosts constantly howling in her head. 

Addy was broken goods, and that was just the bitter fucking truth.

“Kate would definitely -” She stopped short, eyes snapping away from Tyler to the sharp blue sky behind them, Lily’s laughter a faint echo. Kate would definitely be better at this than me. That’s what she was going to say, like Kate was here, like Kate hadn’t left, like there wasn’t a reason she was gone. She hadn’t - Addy hadn’t slipped in a long time, she hadn’t let herself get lost in the past, in them, in her family except they were dead and gone and she was still standing and god why was she still alive - 

Someone blocked her view of the sky, Tyler, his eyes worried as he leaned a little closer, hesitating like he wasn’t sure if that would help or not. “Who’s Kate?” And she knew that he wasn’t just asking about Kate, he was asking about why the mention of her name had sent Addy spiraling, had sent her flailing. He was asking a lot of things, and Addy didn’t have one good answer for him.

She gritted her teeth, pushing herself off the ground and pretending not to notice how Tyler reached out, how his eyes darted to her leg and why were they seeing so damn much?! “Kate’s no one,” Except that couldn’t be the furthest thing from the truth so it was a good thing Addy had made herself into a liar, “I’m just being stupid.”

She wiped her hands off on her pants, something creaking within her, something in her coming dangerously close to breaking. “I gotta go look for some wires, I’ll be back soon.” Addy didn’t bother to wait for Tyler, having made it very clear that she was leaving, that she needed to go and get out and run. She tried to steady her breathing, and failed miserably as she walked off, Lily’s laughter pressing over the buzz of Cairo flying above them. 

The third time it happens she has a panic attack outside another shitty bar. It’s not - nothing happens, nothing truly horrific, it’s just - It’s a bad day, and Addy has been surviving for one year and five months and she’s just barely gotten the hang of it. 

Her fingers are wet from the perspiration of a beer bottle, and her left leg feels particularly heavy, particularly cruel. She’s alone at the bar top, and she didn’t even remember why exactly, why she was here, why no one else was. (Her first lesson in surviving was this: Do not be alone with your thoughts. It’s not the first time she’s failed at that.) 

Addy takes another sip, and wonders idly if she’s imagining it, the drip-drip-drip of rain, the ache in her bones that screamed a storm was coming. She wondered if she had more beer than she could handle, she wondered a lot of things then. So lost was she in her head that she almost didn’t notice the man beside her, almost. 

“What’s a pretty little thing like you doing in a place like this?” She debated on how much force it would take to shatter her bottle and drive a jagged edge into her carotid artery.  

Instead of cracking her beer against the edge of the bar top, Addy took another long sip of her horrible-tasting beer. “Not interested.” She would usually be calm, be kind, be gentle and cautious and safe. But Addy didn’t have much left in her for that right now, Addy was one moment away from drowning, or burning alive. It might actually kill her, smiling and sucking it up. 

“Oh come on, don’t be like that.” At the exact moment he touched her shoulder a BANG of thunder cracked in the distance and Addy flinched, hard. 

It was too much, it was all too much. She had a knuckle-white grip on her beer bottle, breathing picking up as she stared at the man, a completely mundane-looking guy. He was saying something, his hand hovering over her shoulder, and the rain was picking up and Addy wondered if somewhere in the middle of nowhere Oklahoma her blood had mixed with the thick mud.

Another crack, another bang, and she could feel the wind tearing apart her hair, her skin, she could feel a wall cracking against her spine. She could feel her tibia breaking, spiderweb cracks crawling up the bone, blood and sinew and tissue swirling and tearing and HE WAS STILL LOOKING AT HER. 

Addy stood up so violently she almost upended her stool, her knees buckled and for a moment she almost collapsed forward. But then someone wrapped an arm around her waist, holding her up and tucking her behind them in the same move. He was a line of warmth against her, the thunder rattling the windows, and Tyler, because it was Tyler, was saying something. 

She couldn’t make out the words but she could hear the sharp edge to his words, could see the tenseness in his shoulders, could practically feel the danger. She should be spiraling, falling off the end of the world and drowning in her grief and the agony of survival, but instead her breathing was slowing, instead, the world was slowly coming back to her and Tyler’s hand was still on her waist, still holding her up and shielding her from the world. 

For the first time in months Addy felt safe, she had almost forgotten the feeling. 

In some ways that was almost as painful as the thunder, as the echo of her leg shattering into about a hundred different pieces. She didn’t - She didn’t deserve peace, she didn’t deserve safety because Addy was still breathing and Jeb and Praveen were long gone and nothing felt right, it hadn’t in a long time. She couldn’t - She had to - 

Addy barely felt Tyler’s hand leaving her waist as she violently tore herself away from him, away from the dim light of the bar, away from the buzz of drunken idiots who were all just trying to get by. Her vision was spotted with black dots, with swirling wind, and the violent echo of the world ending over and over again. Someone said something, a slurred yell as she brushed past them but Addy couldn’t have told you what. She had to get out, she had to run, she had to get out. 

Rainwater pressed against her skin, her clothes sticking to her skin, to her bones, to her scars. Her left leg ached, everything ached and Addy was choking, she was dying like she hadn’t over a year ago. Her hand dragged along the bar’s wall, rough wooden slates scraping against her palm as she stumbled blindly, running towards something, towards nothing. 

She hit the ground with a choked scream, and there was a crack of lightning somewhere and they hadn’t found Praveen’s body. Addy tried to claw her way up but her hand slipped, and it was red with blood, and she didn’t know if it was real or not. She didn’t know if any of this was real, she didn’t know if she lived past twenty-one. 

Someone crouched in front of her, but Addy couldn’t see anything - she could only reach out, clawing at his arms, at his hands and wrists because she wasn’t sure what was real, but if she felt it then it had to be. Words were falling from her lips, or maybe it was a tangled scream, i can’t breathe, i can’t breathe, i don’t know what’s real, i don’t, help me. 

A calloused hand blocked the howling wind, the biting rain as her head was pressed against Javi’s chest. She could feel the slight rumble of his chest, his words lost on her as he held Addy close, and for once she didn’t pull away from his touch, from crossing the lines she had drawn sometime after she lost one family. Hands covered her ears, damn near cradling her and Addy took one shuddering breath after the other, and maybe she was screaming, maybe she was drowning. 

She heard a whisper of something, We gotta go, and something was being wrapped around her shoulders, someone was carefully pulling her up, still keeping her close, still keeping her shielded. Addy was moving, the ground dragging beneath her feet, beneath her leg, beneath her scars and her guilt. A hand was stroking her hair, and Javi was talking, he was talking and she wasn’t screaming, just gasping, just shaking. 

And then there was the smell of leather and dirt, and then the rain and wind was gone and she heard the click of a door as she shuddered. Her hands dug into the rough material of the jacket wrapped around her, water slipping down her face as she leaned forward, pressing her head against the hard plastic of the truck’s console. 

There was another click, and a hand was pressed against her back. It didn’t move, it just rested there, fingers brushing against a scar that she couldn’t remember getting, and Addy s o b b e d. She howled, she wept, she collapsed in on herself, digging her nails into her skin until even that pain faded away. She collapsed and broke, she broke and broke until Addy was empty, until there was nothing left for her to shatter over. 

Then she just took a breath, in and out, in and out while the storm raged outside but - it couldn’t touch them, not here, not now. She didn’t know if that was a relief or not, if that was a good thing or not, if she was alive or not. 

Like a static TV suddenly coming into focus, Addy heard it, “-we’re okay, we’re okay, we’re okay. I got you, I got you.” Oh, she kept her closed, suddenly exhausted, the sort of tiredness you could feel in your bones. It wasn’t Javi holding her together, it wasn’t Javi keeping her alive, it was Tyler. Because Javi was gone, because they all were.

Addy blinked, and very slowly she forced herself to sit up, taking one shaky breath after another. The two of them were in Tyler’s truck, rain pouring down on the glass, the bar’s dim light flickering in the distance. He was in the driver’s seat, looking at her like he wanted to fight the world for her, like somehow Addy’s pain was his own. 

She had forgotten what that felt like, she had forgotten what this was like. 

She looked at him for one trembling moment, and then before she could stop herself, before she could regret all of this and run back into the howling storm, Addy practically threw herself forward and into his arms. He barely skipped a beat, wrapping his arms around her, cradling her head like he had before. It was awkward, the stick shift digging into her ribs, plastic cutting into her skin, but it - 

It was the safest she had felt in a long time.

Chapter Text

“I had a brother, you know. His name was Daniel.” There’s rainwater soaking her down to her bones and her leg was screaming and gone and -

It had been sixteen years since they had buried him. Seventeen actually, Addy almost laughed, or screamed, seventeen years because she had been twenty-three for two weeks and neither of her parents had bothered to call. 

Her fingers twitched for a blunt despite the fact that she hadn’t smoked since freshman year when Praveen almost had an asthma attack and for about twenty seconds she thought she had killed her best friend. It was one of the few things she had picked up from the therapist she was forced to see: when in doubt humans fall back to what they know. It’s human nature to seek the familiar. 

Tyler hummed, a hint of confusion mixed with concern. Addy figured it was warranted, she just had a sobbing, wailing breakdown in his arms out of nowhere for seemingly no reason, and led with this. But she wasn’t interested in logic right now, she could barely collect her thoughts beyond the slow trickle of how the hell did i get here.  

She laughed a little, barely an exhale really, “He was older than me by four years and so annoying, I mean, God, he knew how to push my buttons when he felt like it. But he was - he was my brother, you know? He was, he was my brother.” 

Some of her first memories were of him, Daniel, and the glint of mischief in his eyes as he leaned over her bed, a toy clutched in his hands. Daniel, his laughter echoing through the house as he ran, bare feet pitter-pattering across the oak floors. Daniel shoving down Alex Dumas when he would not stop teasing her about her missing front teeth. 

daniel daniel daniel daniel 

There was a gentle hand on her shoulder, warm and pressing right against a set of scars that were years old. For once, Addy didn’t flinch away, she just looked over at Tyler, and the gentle-worried- love in his eyes. She had been running for months, from the past, from the dead, from the ghosts, from them, the slightest sign that people could care about her - despite the blood on her hands, despite the death that followed her, despite it all. 

She was just so tired. 

She leaned into his hands, and a part of her wondered if Daniel would have grown up to be that kind, “What happened?” Addy let her eyes slip shut, the rain beating against the truck a constant, comforting reassurance. Maybe it should scare her, hell, thirty minutes ago it had. But now, now it was just a familiar ache, like her leg, like Daniel, like Praveen. 

“He was like me, Daniel, or maybe I should say I’m like him. He was a daredevil, a thrill seeker, he just loved the world, all of it, every crack and crevice, all of it.” She pressed her hand to her thigh, fingers inching towards her knee, toward the edge of her compression sleeve. “One day, he, uh, he wanted to go check out this river that was right next to our land. He just - He just wanted to check out the rocks. He just wanted to check out the rocks.” 

Addy took a shuddering breath, her nails digging into her leg, desperately wanting to see blood, to see some proof that - that she was alive? that the world wasn’t ending despite every reason it should? 

The hand on her shoulder was gone, and there was a gentle pressure on her hand, forcing her fingers to let go. Tyler smoothed out her hand, intertwining their fingers together, and Addy barely held back a cry. It was gentle, his touch, his words, everything was gentle. It took all she had not to flinch away from that. 

“The river, it - There was a flash flood, caused by drainage or something, I don’t even remember now. But he was just - He was gone, he was gone before we even knew he had left the property. He was just - Daniel was good, and then he was just gone.” Addy couldn’t have stopped the tears that slipped down her face even if she tried, “He was ten. He was ten and I’m,” She laughed, and it grated at her throat, it hurt. Tyler’s hand tensed around her own, “I’m thirteen years older than my older brother, do you know how fucked up that is? How wrong?” 

“Oh Isabel, I -” Tyler paused, staring at her like she was killing him a little, like she was family. “There’s nothing I can say that’ll change what happened, that’ll ease your pain. But,” He shrugged, “I’m here, I’m right here and I’m not leaving.” 

She took a trembling breath, in and out, Daniel was dead. Her brother had been dead for thirteen years and it never stopped hurting. But - Addy had learned how to bear it a long time ago, she had learned how to shoulder the grief alone, because her parents hadn’t spoken his name in over a decade and the only reason Gracie knew she had a brother was because she stumbled upon an old box of photos. Daniel was dead, and Addy was six the first time she learned how to survive on her own. 

She was eighteen when she met Kate Carter and learned that just because you can survive on your own, doesn’t mean you have to. 

“I know, I know.” And Tyler held her hand, and she held his, and Addy wasn’t alone. She wasn’t alone.

Before the storm, she hadn’t paid attention to how little disability accommodations motel rooms had. Now, now Addy noticed, and Jesus Christ, it was bad. The shower didn't have a seat, or a ledge, or literally anything to grip. Which was all fine and dandy until you were shaking from the aftermath of a breakdown, oh, and missing your left leg. 

Her nails scraped against the cracking tiles on the wall. Addy always took showers, she needed to feel clean to sleep. (It had nothing to do with the hours she spent soaked in mud and blood and dirt after her body was tossed around like a rag doll in an EF5, nothing to do with that.) But right now, she was about to lose her mind.

She washed the last of the conditioner out of her hair, only swaying a little to the side. Okay, this was okay, this was fine. Addy blindly fumbled for the towel she had hung up next to the shower and - Her fingers grasped the end of it right as her left hand slipped from its place on the wall, and her weight shifted, lurching forward. 

Addy hit the bathroom floor with a pained yelp, instinctively curling in on herself, flinching from the cool linoleum floor pressed against her naked skin. "Isabel! Are you okay?!" She was rooming with Lily, she was rooming with Lily because the motel had almost been entirely bought out and what good reason did she have to say no? She was rooming with Lily and was currently a mess of broken pieces on the bathroom floor, and her leg fucking hurt. No, she wasn't okay, but she couldn't just say that.

"I'm fine." She pushed herself up a little and managed to keep her groan contained to just a slight pained exhale, "Just fell." 

"Are you sure? Do you need anything? I promise I don't mind helping?" Lily sounded so sincere that Addy didn't doubt she meant it. But right now, the thought of the girl she had a crush seeing her like this - naked, bruised, breaking - sounded a little like hell. 

"Yeah, I'm sure." There was a moment of hesitation and then the sound of footsteps and the creaking of a bed. Addy took a shaking breath in, fingers pressed against the stump of her left leg, and out. First things first, she had to get up, she had to get up and get her compression sleeve, and her leg, and the flannel pants Jeb had bought her years ago because no one knew about her leg, and honestly, she didn't even know why she was hiding at this point. 

She just had to get up. 

Except her hands were wet. Except her leg kept sending sharp, jagged spikes of pain up her body. Except every part of her ached from before, from her breakdown, from saying Daniel's name for the first time in almost a decade. Except it was two in the morning and her brother was dead and Gracie was a state away and her parents hadn't even called to tell her happy birthday. Except Addy was twenty-three and it's been a year since the storm died and she was still alive. 

Except Addy was so goddamn tired.

Despite the fact that she wanted to just curl up on the floor and fade into nothing, Addy tried to reach for the countertop. She lifted herself up about four inches before she instinctively went to put weight on both her feet to hoist herself up, except she didn't have a left foot so all it did was knock her off balance and send her right back to the ground. She stared blankly at the cracking wooden cabinet and - “Fuck!” 

Her leg was gone and her friends were dead and her parents hadn't talked to her in months and she was naked on a shitty motel floor and her leg wouldn't work. A sob escaped her, tears of frustration or grief or anger, or all of the above forcing their way down her face. 

“Hey, hey, what’s wrong? Isabel?” Even through the door, Lily sounded so worried, so genuine. It was like she cared, it was like she really cared. Addy sobbed harder, "Okay, okay, hey, tell me what's wrong, what can I do?"

She had two options, either she asked Lily for help or she died on the bathroom floor, and Addy had come too far to go out like this. “I can’t - I can’t get up. My leg,” Addy gritted her teeth to hold back a scream, “My leg it’s, I can’t." That was all she could manage, but somehow Lily understood it, her, she always did. 

"Okay, I can help with that, but I gotta come in. Is that okay?" Addy fumbled for the damned towel, staring down at her leg, at the prosthetic leaning against the cabinet, at the compression sock on the counter next to the liquid power that was about the only thing that kept her skin from chafing to death. Nothing about this was subtle, but - It was bound to come out sometime. And she really did have to get off the bathroom floor. 

"Yeah, you can," She swallowed, fingers knotting in the rough material of the towel, "You can come in."

The door opened up behind her with a soft creak, "Okay let's," Lily's words died off as Addy knew the exact moment she saw it, her leg, or rather the lack of it. There was a brief moment of silence, and she almost thought, against everything she knew, that Lily would turn around and run. Then, her voice came back, strong as it always was, "Okay, let's get you up." 

Lily crouched down next to her, eyes barely pausing as they drifted over the scars visible on her skin, the rough patches of skin on her shoulder, the long jagged marks that came from something in the storm, and the clinical ones brought on by the dozen or so surgeries she had in the following months. "Isabel," She waited until Addy looked her in the eye, until her breathing slowed down just a little, until their chests rose and fell in sync, "Hi, what do you need me to do?" 

If Lily knew about her leg then there was no point to putting her prosthetic on so - "Can you help me stand up and get dressed, I just, I'm not the most stable right now." Addy almost wanted to gag at the words, at the idea of having someone else help her to do something as basic as getting dressed but - what other choice did she have?

She pointedly ignored the echo of voices that sounded like Kate and Javi and Gracie, all whispering the same thing, It's human nature to ask for help, It's human nature to help. 

Lily nodded, and then she carefully wound her arm around Addy's waist. She was unbearably warm, and Addy fought the urge to sink into her, or to do something as stupid as kiss those lovely lips because maybe then they wouldn't talk about the several elephants in the room. Instead, she braced herself on Lily's surprisingly strong arm, and the two of them managed to stand her up without her towel slipping. 

Addy latched onto the sink's counter the second she could, the action closer to flinching away from Lily than she would have liked. She looked over at the pile of clothes near the edge of the counter, a loose shirt and the stupid flannel pants. She thought about it, slipping the clothes on and hopping around and praying that she didn't slip and fall again because for a split second her body forgot she lacked a left leg, because despite the year of relearning how to walk and live there were moments where her mind just would not catch up. After everything that had happened in the last few hours she just - she couldn't. 

Instead, she looked down at the orange stains in the motel sink, knuckles white from where they were pressed against the countertop, and, "Can you help me, please." It was close to pleading, begging, but Addy was too tired to care.

"Of course," Came Lily's immediate reply, and she meant it, barely pausing as she reached for the clothes. She meant it, all of this, she really meant it. 

"Why?" Lily paused from where she was unfolding the t-shirt, their eyes met in the mirror, Addy's hair coming in wet waves down her shoulders and Lily's hair was piled on the top of her head, covered in a light blue silk scarf. Their faces were bare of makeup and grime, and they looked so young, so vulnerable, so very human. 

Lily had a tattoo on her shoulder, in the same spot Addy had a scar. She wanted, for just a second, to trail her fingers over it.

"Why what?" Her eyes snapped back to Lily's in the mirror, not her shoulder, not the warm brown skin revealed in the tank top she was wearing, not the black lines and curves pressed into her skin. They were so close together in the already tiny bathroom that Addy could feel her body heat, this was the most intimate she had been with anyone since, since it happened. 

Maybe that's why her words were the truth, so lie meant to protect her heart from the worst of it, "Why do you care?" It was a breathless thing that she immediately wished she could take back. But the words were already out, and it was so easy to read between the lines, Why do you care about me? 

Lily stared at her reflection, and then she took a deep breath before raising the shirt and nodding towards her arms. Like this was practiced, like they had done this a thousand times before, Addy slipped her arms through the shirt and let fall down around her. "When I was young I didn't believe in much, not in God, not like my mother wanted at least, not in the government, not in anything really. I was young and black and in the middle of Alabama. It wasn't a good mix." 

Addy watched her, watched the slight pull of her lips, watched as she methodically smoothed out her shirt and reached for the next article of clothing, not once looking anywhere else. "But my mom, she was one of the most faithful people I knew, in God, in our family, in our community. She believed, down to her core, she believed. I never got it, until one day, Mrs. O'Leary, this incredibly Irish older woman, lost her husband. They'd been together for fifty years and lived in our neighborhood for twenty, and he was just gone." 

She kept a hand on Addy's waist, holding her up and giving her something to lean on as Addy slipped on her underwear. She couldn't shake the urge to lean her head back on Lily's shoulder, she couldn't shake the desperate need to be close and safe and held. "I woke up the next day to my mom in the kitchen, baking this traditional Irish Beef Stew. Now, my mom, she's got her fair share of Maori in her, she did not cook Irish food." Lily laughed a little, "But there she was, in the kitchen, at six in the morning making Irish Beef Stew for Mrs. O'Leary, because she was hurting, because we didn't know each other well but we were neighbors. She said to me, and I'll never forget it, Because I can help her, so why wouldn't I?" 

Lily finally met her eyes again in the mirror, keeping her up while they managed to get her pants on, "I can help you, I want to help you because I care about you, I care, so why wouldn't I?"

She said it like it was the undeniable truth, like it was something unshakeable. Lily Lane said it like it was the easiest thing in the world, I care, I want to help you. 

Addy looked down, away from Lily and her words, "If only everybody was like that." It was just an offhanded remark, but Lily didn't skip a beat before she responded. 

"You'll find that most are." There it was again, that unshakeable belief. Addy dug her hands into the countertop, and shifted her body around so she was leaning against the sink. It dug into her back, into one scar or the next, but she didn't give a damn. Lily was barely a foot away, the hand that had been on her waist now pressed against the ledge of the counter. If one of them moved they'd collide and never quite stop. 

"Bullshit." Somehow, instead of asking a million questions, Lily Lane had helped her get dressed without a word about her amputated leg and now she was smiling at Addy's half-snarl. Who the hell was this girl? 

"A cynic? I don't know if I should be surprised or not." Her tone was so light, so easy, and beneath the exhaustion in her bones, something sparked. Addy wanted to lean forward and dig her nails into the back of her neck, pull her forward, and kiss her until neither of them could breathe. 

She didn't do any of that, she just smiled, somehow, even if it was a little jagged, "Not a cynic, just realistic. People are, usually, for lack of better words, assholes." 

Lily's eyes darted over her face, "Blood drives with lines leading out the doors any time there's a nearby tragedy."

"Hostile architecture." 

"Charity, volunteer support groups, soup kitchens, public hospitals." 

"Capitalism, Men who catcall you as you walk down the street, people that kick stray dogs and dump kittens, need I go on, because I can." Lily tilted her head, an almost smile on her face as she examined Addy, like she was trying to see every little thing that made her tick. 

"Do you really believe that people aren't good?" There was an incredulous, breathless edge to her voice, like she couldn't comprehend not believing in goodness.

Addy swallowed, the question taking a bit of the heat out of the moment. She shrugged, "I don't know. I don't really know, I just -" She looked around the bathroom, anywhere but Lily and her genuine, always worried-caring eyes. "I've seen a lot of bad, sometimes I wonder if it's too much."

Lily made this soft wounded sound, and without thinking, she reached out, grabbing her hand. The two of them paused, staring down at their intertwined hands, and - Lily had callouses, Addy was surprised at that, but not at how warm she was, how unbelievably warm she was. Neither of them pulled away as they looked up. 

"You know the first time I met the Wranglers it was after a bad tornado, hit a town south of me, I was helping the wreckage when this shiny, red truck pulled up. I had watched before, I knew who he was, or at least who his show persona was. And for a moment, for a moment I thought these bastards are gonna make this tragedy his personal drama. Then, Boone and Tyler stumbled out, it was before Dexter and Dani came along, and there were no cameras or smiles or big acting. They just,” She shrugged, smiling a little, “They just helped. They dug through the mud and ash and they helped.” 

Of course, they did, was her first thought. Of course, Boone and Tyler helped, it was who they were, they were good. They were - Lily looked far too smug for her liking, "Gotcha." Then her face slipped into something more serious, "I know not everyone's good, or kind, believe me, I know but - You have to believe that most of humanity is good, that they're kind and they believe in something better, they believe in each other and they hope and they love. You have to believe in that because what's the point otherwise?"

Addy wanted to believe in that, for a desperate moment she really did want it. But her leg was still gone, and so were Jeb and Praveen and Daniel, and her parents loved her but they weren't good people. But the world was still a shitty place where bad things happened every day. But she didn't quite know how to believe anymore. 

Lily must have seen it on her face because she looked so incredibly heartbroken, for Addy, for the way this world can break a person and lead them to not believe in something as simple as good. But before she could pull away, Addy tightened her grip on Lily's hand, drawing her closer until their legs were pressed together, until, for once, she didn't feel unstable, or broken, she was just - there, with Lily. "Do you think you can have enough hope for me until I can catch up?" 

Wait for me, she didn't say, she didn't say a thousand things, Wait for me? 

Lily smiled, a soft gentle thing, "Yeah, I think I can manage that." 

Chapter Text

Lily was painting her nails when she broke the silence of the room, a deep green brushing over her perpetually grease-stained and cracking nails, “Do you want to talk about it?” 

“That’s a blunt way of asking who cut off my leg.” It wasn’t as sharp as it could’ve been, but still - Addy was trying to enjoy her peace and quiet, or as much quiet as she could get with these terrible thin walls and constantly fucking neighbors. 

She could feel Lily’s glare without looking over, “I meant all those breakdowns we pretend not to notice.” Oh, well now she felt like an asshole.

Maybe she was just prickly, it had been one hell of a day. Addy shifted around in the shitty motel bed, forcing herself not to cover up her leg. Lily already knew and Addy would sooner gnaw off her own hand than let the world make her flinch back. (Only she got to hate herself right and proper.)

“I -“ Her words died off because she didn’t know what exactly to say. I survived the storm that killed my best friends. I survived a tornado and dragged myself over mud and debris while my leg was hanging on by a goddamn string. I survived and I haven’t talked to my family, my real family in weeks and that’s killing me a little. I survived and some days I wish I didn’t.  

Addy cleared her throat, “Survived what should’ve killed me.” Then, because it was Lily, because it was the girl who had helped her get dressed without a singular word, she smiled, “I got a habit of not staying down, even when I probably should.”

Lily gave her a slightly crooked grin, her legs tucked against her chest, a book near her feet and Jesus this was all incredibly domestic, “I noticed.” For a long moment, minutes or hours or years, the room was silent, and then she said, “You know we’d help you, right? With anything, with everything.” She laughed a little at herself, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed Isabel, but we’re a little crazy. And we don’t judge.” 

Once upon a time Addy had a family, and then they died, and then they broke into more pieces than you could fix, and then - “I know I just, I’m trying Lily, I swear.” 

Her eyes were incredibly soft and Addy had her laugh, the one that happens in the middle of a storm when she throws back her head and it practically tears out of her, memorized. “We all are, besides, I regularly drive into tornados, you ain’t that bad babe.”

Babe?!

She was so fucked.

“Hey, Lily, can I talk to you for a second.” Addy shifted a little on her feet, completely and utterly aware of how there was only a set of fabric between the rest of the Wranglers and her damn leg. “Alone.” 

Boone’s whistle was cut short by Dani’s elbow as Lily nodded, walking over to her and linking their arms together. Addy did not obsess over that simple touch, nope, not at all. She guided the two of them further and further until they were out of hearing range. (Which was far out because the Wranglers had an eavesdropping problem.) 

She untangled their arms, because Addy absolutely couldn’t focus if Lily was holding her arm and looking at her like - that. “What’s up?” She sounded so genuine, so nice and real and Addy’s only option was to drive off a cliff at this point. 

Addy winced slightly, “Could not, you know, mention last night to anyone.” Lily blinked at her in faint surprise and the pit in her stomach, the dark twisty thing that wasn’t a crush, grew. The words flew out of her, “Not that I don’t trust them, or you, I just - I don’t know how to do this and you’re the first person I’ve told and I know I should be more open, and I shouldn’t lie to all of you but I can’t - I’m just not ready and I know it’ll come out eventually because my leg isn’t growing back anytime soon but I don’t know how the hell I’m supposed to do that. And I’m just not ready, I’m sorry but I’m just -” 

“Isabel, Isabel, Isabel!” Her words only stopped when Lily physically grabbed her face, her eyes full of concern, “I’m not gonna tell anyone, and you don’t have to either. This is your choice, when you tell them, if you tell them. I ain’t gonna push you, and I’m not gonna fucking out you. You’re okay, I promise.” 

Her heart was racing and it was only half because of her panic, because of the dark twisted shame because her leg was gone but sometimes Addy forgot, sometimes Addy hated herself a little, sometimes she thought it would have been better if she - Lily’s calloused fingers were still framing her face, her thumb hovering a centimeter over a faint scar Jeb had given her in the Lab - we don’t talk about it ever - accident. 

If either of them leaned in just a little, Addy could have felt her breathing, Addy could have made out every single detail on Lily’s face, Addy could have kissed her. 

Instead, she took a step back, face hot-red with a mixture of embarrassment and shame and oh god pretty girl. “Thanks. Sorry I, sorry.” 

Lily’s eyes were fond, but there was still that lingering bout of concern, “You’re good, didn’t do anything wrong. I won’t tell anymore, and if anyone says anything about this I’ll kick their asses.” Her smile was wicked and real and Lily was so very alive, “I’d beat every single one of them, you know that.”

This was - this was nice and good and her leg was gone but Addy had survived, and she would keep surviving, and in the meantime, maybe she could have at least one good thing. “I wonder what Tyler thinks of that, his ego could certainly take a hit or two. We should ask him.” 

And then she turned on her good heel and started speed walking (running was out of the question) towards the pretending-not-to-be-staring-at them Wrangler. “Isa!” 

It felt good to laugh. 

Her phone buzzed in her pocket, the Wranglers cackling on the stream on her computer as they tore around the edge of an EF2. Addy leaned back into the seat of her truck, dropping the half-fixed radio into the passenger side. The user ID gave her pause, it had been - a long fucking time.

 “Javi? You get kicked out yet?” There was a beat of silence, and then a familiar raspy laughter that echoed in her bones. 

Her eyes slipped shut as she leaned her head against the headrest, the sound of the Wranglers low in the background. “Blunt as ever, Adds.”

Tyler swung the truck around, sending Boone crashing to the side, his delirious laughter matching the swirling gray wind crashing against the windows. “You know me, couldn’t be subtle to save my life.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” There was a pause, a comfortable one because even if time had passed Addy wasn’t sure she could unknow him if she tried. “How have you been? Actually?”

She shrugged, eyes on the stream cutting to Lily, a wicked smile on her face as she forgot about the cameras surrounding her. “Been better, been worse. My leg’s acting up a little, funny enough it’s so goddamn itchy even when it’s literally not there.” 

Phantom pain was a bitch, but phantom itching was hell on Earth. “What about you? They treating you well over there?” 

Javi clicked his tongue, “Sunburned to hell and back, but Addy, there’s something here that could - I think it could change everything. I mean, I’m not a hundred percent certain right now, but, if I work on it,” He stopped, something unsaid hovering over the line. 

It had been a while since Addy had heard Javi sound so, so alive, so like the boy she knew before two of their best friends died, she was mangled and Kate broke. One part of her was filled with a relief so strong she almost doubled over, and the other part of her was damn near seething with envy. Because Javi sounded okay, he sounded alive, he sounded like the sort of person who hadn’t gone through hell and back while she still couldn’t dive into tornados, or handle a bad storm, or fucking walk in a muddy field without her leg sinking and sinking and - 

She forced her fingers to relax, forced her body to untense as Javi’s words slowly filtered back in, “It’ll take some time, but I’m gonna try.” Addy had no clue what he was talking about, but even if she didn’t know a goddamn thing she believed in him. Even if some days the worst of her hated him just a little bit for being okay. 

“I know you will. We wouldn’t be here if we were the sort of people to give up easily, or to back down.” Addy stared down at her leg, the faint line of it just barely visible through her pants, the echo of pain and the absence of it so constant she couldn’t forget if she tried. She shook her head, running her hand through her hair, her elbow braced near the window of her truck, “You should come down to Arkansas when you get leave. It’s hot as fuck over here.” 

Javi had no sympathy towards her, the asshole, “And who chose to go there.” 

“Meh meh meh, says the dude in tactical gear in Florida, you burning alive yet?” 

“Actually it’s quite nice down here, got an ocean view too.” 

“Oh, I’m sure you do, you -” 

A knock on her window startled her enough that she dropped her phone, and the ranting Javi, to the floor near the breaks. Boone was outside the window, his hair absolutely demolished, tangled in a way that she knew would have Dex cursing every God in the world as he spent the evening trying to fix it all. She raised up a finger before leaning over, cursing a little at the pressure on her kneecap and scar, her fingers wrapping around her phone as she sat up. 

Javi was still going and dear God she hadn’t realized how much she had missed him, or how much she loved him. But, “Javi, Javiii, as nice as this is, I gotta go. I may be hiding in my truck like an antisocial loser.” 

“So like normal then.” Addy just rolled her eyes, actually, she didn’t miss him, not at all, “Okay, I’ll let you go so you can socialize like a normal human being.” There was a slight pause, something passing between them even though they were thousands of miles away. Some things don’t change at least, at least not the things that mattered, “Take care of yourself, Addy, remember, I’m just a call away.”

“I know, same goes for you but I’m being honest it might take a while for me to get this truck to Florida. Javi, stay safe.” She’d do it, in a heartbeat for Javi, but it would be a pain in her ass. 

“Yes, Ma’am.” Then the line clicked because they don’t say goodbyes, it’s one of the first lessons they learned chasing.  

Addy closed for a brief second, and for just a moment, she could feel them - Jeb and Praveen behind her, Kate in the passenger's seat with a bright smile and bleached hair. Except it was coming up on two years since, since the end. She’d probably grown it out, maybe let it go back to its dark brown that reminded Addy of the fall, or maybe she had snapped and dyed it pink. 

It killed her, just a little, that she didn’t know what Kate fucking Carter looked like anymore.

A muffled bout of cursing made her open her eyes. Nope, no time for depressing thoughts, her life was shit as it was. Addy sighed, shoving open the truck’s door and swinging her legs out. If she had to cling to the handle as her prosthetic landed on uneven ground and refused to buckle or bend, well that was no one’s business. Literally, “Don’t look at me like that. I meant to do that.” 

Boone let out a muffled laugh, muffled only because Dani physically put her hand over his mouth. She took stock of them, Boone and Dani closest to her, windswept and clearly high on adrenaline, Dexter leaning against the camper, fiddling with some tech thing in his hands, and Tyler and Lily hunched over her drone, caught up in some conversation Addy was sure she could only half follow. Lily was waving her hands as she talked, and even a blind man would’ve been able to see the fact that she was joy personified. Or light personified. 

Okay, even she knew that was super gay. But honestly, who could blame her? 

“Soooo,” He dragged the word out, looking like the cat that caught the canary. “Who’s Javi?” Boone waggled his eyebrows, barely held back by Dani. She almost laughed at the irony of Boone thinking she’d like a guy as he interrupted her horrendous, lesbian pining for the girl she had had several deep conversations with but didn’t actually know if she was gay too. 

Addy did laugh though, because the idea of her and Javi was extremely fucking laughable. “Boone, I’m a lesbian. Javi is just an old friend.” She shifted on her foot, and it would be so easy to just roll up her pant leg and deal with the fallout, “He’s family, you know?”

But she didn’t, because there was a crunch of gravel behind her. All of them turned to see Lily on the ground, Tyler standing beside her with a shit-eating grin, eyes darting between Addy and Lily like - No, nope, not gonna think about that. 

Instead, she walked over to Lily, who was still on the ground, not because she was hurt but because she had seemingly given up on getting up. “You alright down there?” Across from her Tyler was still smiling, and without thinking, she kicked him, with her left leg, her metal leg, oops. 

He grabbed at his shin with a slight groan, and Addy heard a snicker from below. Okay, almost revealing her, well lack of a leg, was somewhat worth it. She didn’t crouch to drag Lily up, that wasn’t exactly possible with her leg, or it was but it was extremely uncomfortable and stiff. Instead, she walked over to stand in front of Lily’s prone body, and reached down a hand as far as she could go, “Come on, I almost crashed getting out of my truck, we don’t judge here.” 

She shot Tyler a quick glare from where he was still holding his shin, the baby, “We don’t judge.” He raised his hand in mock surrender just as Lily finally looked up at her. Okay, she was definitely gone on this girl because Addy should not find her general existence cute.

Kate was right, lesbians are more of a mess than storm chasers. And Addy happened to be both, so really, she never stood a chance. 

Lily pushed herself up to her elbows, cheeks a bright red that meant she must have been blushing something fierce for it to be so visible on her skin. “I tripped over,” She looked around from something, except she and Tyler had been talking in the middle of a gravel lot, so, “The air?”

Addy laughed, and behind her she heard another slight groan that meant Boone was being an idiot and Dani was done with him. “It happens, come on, let’s get you up.” Lily reached up, grabbing her head, and somehow they managed to get her back on her feet. 

She brushed off her pants with her free hand, because Addy was still holding her other hand, because it was warm and calloused and every part of her ached to hold on.

Before the end, all of them would tangle together in the bed of someone's truck or van, blankets spread out, pillows covering half of the usable space, and their sharp, gangly bodies covering the rest. It wasn’t sexual or romantic, it just was - Kate spooning Addy, Javi curled up near their heads, Jeb’s hand-stretched over the mess of their bodies and somehow ending up on Praveen’s hip. They’d watch the stars, trace constellations that you only saw out in the countryside, away from all the light and people, away from the world. Or they’d have a movie projected onto the side of Kate’s barn, staying up and laughing at shitty horror movies and 90s romcoms. It was good, they were good.

It had been so long since Addy had been held. 

But Lily wasn’t Kate, or Javi. She didn’t have the same scars and the heavy weight of them. And she most certainly wasn’t Jeb or Praveen, she wasn’t a dead boy walking, she wasn’t. 

Addy pulled away sharply, her cheeks hot as she cleared her throat, “So, you get anything good today.” That did it, and suddenly she had an arm slung over her shoulders as Boone started rambling about the storm, about the beauty of it.  Let herself be pulled into the conversation, into the things she knew, into the things that would never change even if she did. And she did not let herself think about Lily and her beautiful eyes and her flushed cheeks, she didn’t.

Chapter Text

Tyler had gotten by in life by playing dumb, or rather being exactly what people expected of him. A wide smile with a loud attitude and people would let him get away with almost anything, because he was hot and an idiot, and hot idiots did whatever they wanted - It was practically required of them. 

But, contrary to popular belief, he wasn’t stupid. No, Tyler wasn’t an idiot, and Isabel No Last Name had more skeletons shoved into the bed of her truck than most. 

In the beginning, he had written her off as clever, clever enough to not want to dive head first into the worst of what Mother Nature had to offer. It certainly hadn’t helped that she was a smartass, just like him, and had one hell of a smile - you think you know me? you don’t know shit smile that all self-assured people wore. Tyler had done what so many did to him, he assumed he had her all figured out, and he almost, almost didn't look further. 

But then came the tiny pieces of the real her that shone through. The soft look in her eyes as she stared at Lily, the wrinkle in Lily’s brows as she said She’s like a ghost and refused to elaborate. The quiet mentions of her past that were always cut short, like she was desperate to leave it dead and buried. The hushed names, the howling, thrashing storm in her eyes the night outside the bar. The shadows under her eyes and how they all knew she wasn’t sleeping, how Boone swears he heard her screaming herself awake. The - 

There were so many things that didn’t fit who he thought she was, or rather the person Isabel wanted him to think she was.

Tyler knew he should let this drop, especially when it was clear that Isabel was running from something but - That was the thing, she was running. She was running and he had never been the sort to turn his back on a person who needed help. And he had never, ever turned away from his family, because that’s what she was.

He didn’t have a whole lot of people who gave a damn about him, who knew him and stayed anyway, and Tyler certainly wasn’t going to turn his back on the few who did. Even if he should, even if he knew, he knew he needed to let sleeping dogs lie. He couldn’t turn his back, he couldn’t run away, he couldn’t let Isabel drown alone like she was trying to.

Because they all knew she was drowning, because there were moments when she barely reacted to Boone’s jokes and presence, when she stared right through him, when she would get spacey-eyed and gone, when one of them would reach out and she’d flinch back like she had been shot. Because sometimes Isabel No Last Name looked at storms like she loved them with every fiber of her being and like they were her grave, like she was already dead and her body longed to go home, back to the earth. 

Isabel was his friend, his family, or at least something close to it, so he couldn’t walk away. And Tyler Owens always did what needed to be done, even if it was hard work, even if it broke him, always. So, he did something he knew he’d end up regretting, he opened his computer and typed in five words - Javi + Praveen + Jeb + Kate + Storm. 

He got over a dozen results, and two obituaries.

Chapter Text

Javi was surrounded by ghosts, constantly, every second of every day. He’d wake up with a start, folding back his bedsheets with Jeb behind him. He’d brush shoulders with Elise, the two of them patrolling the base, and Praveen’s bloody, broken, crumpled corpse would hover in his footsteps. He’d sit at the bar, eyes glued onto the latest natural disaster, and Jeb would laugh, his head only hanging on by sinew and white-red bone.

They followed him everywhere, from Oklahoma to Florida to Texas and back. He couldn’t breathe without seeing them - and half the time he wasn’t breathing when he did see them. 

Javi had lost count of the number of panic attacks he had, from the howling hurricane outside, from the patter of rain against his windshield, from a laugh that sounded too familiar, from a girl who looked like Kate, or Addy. It had gotten better as the months had passed, and then he had a bad week and suddenly he was back to step one - choking on nothing and driving through the rubble, desperately trying to find his best friends, trying to find them alive and covered in mud, then, as hours had passed, trying to find their bodies. 

Over and over and over again, Javi drowned, and resurfaced, and then a stronger wave came and knocked him right back down. The worst thing was, all of this grief, all of this pain was entirely deserved. He had led them into the storm, he had said the okay, and then he had watched from afar as the radio went first, then the tracker on the van, then Praveen, then Jeb, then Kate’s sanity and Addy’s leg.

And he - he was perfectly fine, not a scratch, not a bruise, not a goddamn thing except two coffins and a shattered dream. 

So, when the next wave came, when the ocean was louder and the winds even louder, when Jeb opened his mouth and blood poured out of it, when hands clawed at his throat and cracked open his chest, reaching for his, terribly, horrific, beating heart, when the wave came Javi let it pull him under.

He didn’t try to fight. 

Say what you will about bars on the edge of no-name towns but they never lacked life, somehow. Addy leaned back into the haphazardly sewed-up cushions of the booth and watched as Boone played some odd version of pool with a townie, Tyler at his side and betting against him. Dani was defeating Dex’s ass at darts, say that five times fast, and Lily was - 

Lily was knocking back some amber liquid at the bar, her dark blue locs fucking glowing in the light. She looked beautiful, she looked alive. 

Addy took another sip of her lukewarm beer, it was local and tasted the same as muddy dirt but she was smart enough to not complain. A band played in the corner, people laughed without hesitation, Boone lost horrifically at pool, Lily was beautiful and everyone was so very much alive. That was more than good enough for her.

She was warm and buzzing slightly by the time Lily fucking Lane finally finished up at the bar. She walked over, a beer in hand as she gracefully avoided wandering hands, drunken arguments, and an attempt at dancing. “You look lonely,” Lily said as she practically fell into the booth. 

“Thank you, Lils, real nice.” She slid the bottle across the table until it clicked against Addy’s empty one, beer spilled out, dripping onto the table and her fingers as Lily propped herself up on her elbows and stared. “What?”

Lily smiled at her, “Anyone ever tell you your eyes look like a dust storm, like the moment a tornado ends and all that kicked up dirt and debris lingers in the air and the sun shines through the clouds for a minute before it all comes crumbling down.” 

That was - There was so much to unpack there, and Addy was not drunk enough to do that. So, instead, she took another sip of her beer, and then said, “How much have you had to drink?”

She rolled her eyes, “Not enough to make me an idiot. But, enough to make me a bit more bold.” Lily scooted closer until there were only a few inches between them, “You said you were a lesbian.” 

Addy blinked, “I did.” 

“I’m pansexual, by the way, very, very into girls.” Her heart skipped a beat, because this was not where she saw tonight going. It was a nice, lively night, but this - this - was not on the schedule. 

“Oh,” Lily’s smile never wavered, but her eyes were sharp as they scanned over Addy. She was right at least, she wasn’t drunk enough to be an idiot, or regret this in the morning. In that case, she needed to say something, like right now, but the words just wouldn’t form. 

In the end, it must have been her flushed, bright red cheeks that did it, because Lily didn’t pull away. She moved closer until the sides of their legs were pressed together, until Addy could feel every heated inch of her. “If it wasn’t clear enough, this is me, flirting with you.” She leaned ever closer, until their shoulders were almost brushing, until their faces were close enough that Addy could make out the two moles just beneath her eye. “This is my attempt at seducing you, how am I doing?” 

Addy forced herself to take a deep breath, and to not notice how Lily’s eyes flickered to her lips, “You’re drunk,” She only grinned in response before sliding closer, closing the few inches between them.

Lily tapped her fingers against the very empty beer bottle on the table, “I’m as sober as you are.” Then, while making direct eye contact, she placed her hand on Addy’s leg, just above her knee. Her thumb gently moved back and forth on the sensitive skin of her inner thigh. 

Oh, fuck me.

She let out a sharp inhale at the hand on her thigh, at the warmth of it, at the fact that there was an extremely beautiful, and hot, woman propositioning her - Christ. Addy swallowed, and she very purposefully did not move away from Lily, instead, she leaned closer. They were so damn close that their noses could brush if they moved another inch, they were so close that she could smell the whiskey on her breath. "Are you doing something we're not gonna talk about in the morning?"

Lily's eyes softened from a heated desire to a warmth that was too close to something real for Addy to think about, "I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm not the most outgoing with people I don't know. I'm not Tyler, I don't flourish in the spotlight. And I don't do one-night stands, or flirting for the sake of it." 

Something clicked in her, a puzzle piece being gently stuck into place. The world had ended over two years ago, her leg was gone, her friends were gone, and - She had a place with the Wranglers in the middle of Arkansas of all places, she had friends, good people who she knew from experience could become more, and there was a pretty girl in front of her, offering something more for both of them. Addy could run, just like she had run all the way from Oklahoma, or she could stay, with her feet on the ground. 

It wasn't exactly a hard decision. 

However attempting to do this, whatever this was, with Lily certainly wasn't as easy as deciding to do it.

"I'm still not set on the whole goodness in humanity thing, and I'm not going into my leg, or the scars, or whatever all of you have picked up and talked about behind my back. And there are things I'm not gonna tell you, I'm just not ready to, and I might never be. You have to understand that, and if you can't, it's fine, we can be friends, or - I don't know, but I won't apologize for it," The words practically fell out of her in a rush of nervousness until Lily physically stopped her by grabbing her hand. 

The grip on her thigh would be missed, by holding hands definitely topped it, okay she really was extremely gone on this girl. "You don't have to apologize for that, for any of it, and certainly not for not wanting to share your traumatic backstory." Addy laughed a little at that, and Lily's eyes sparkled slightly, "I like you, and I mean like like you. You're smart, and focused, and a bitch when you wake up too early. You get blunt when you get comfortable with people, and when you laugh you scrunch the bridge of your nose and it's so fucking adorable."

Lily's voice was quiet, and yet it was still the only thing in the bar Addy could hear, "I like you, and I don't need to know everything. I just need to know if you like me back, and if," She flushed, and Addy desperately wanted to see exactly how different blushing looked on her, on every part of her, "If you and me want to figure something out, in between, you know, driving into tornados."

She was going to fall in love with the girl, wasn't she? Eh, love was a word for another time, she would deal with - that, when she was more sober, or dead. 

"You want to go back to the motel? I got a bottle of pity-wine I've yet to drink, and a somewhat nice bed."

Lily's grin turned a touch sharper, "After you."

Addy stared up at the cracking ceiling as a hand traced the outline of the scars on her torso. They wrapped around her sides and crept up her back, a few framing the muscles she had gained from increasingly relying on her upper body strength to do, well, almost anything. Lily's fingertips trailed over the junction where rough, tattered skin tissue met relatively smooth skin. "They're like roots."

She was going to blame that on the wine, and the sex, the really good, somewhat life-changing sex. Addy rolled over onto her side until she and Lily were face to face, their naked bodies tucked under a thin sheet and still bordering on unbearably warm. "What?"

Lily smiled as she rested her hand on the curve of Addy's waist, her fingers resting against the jut of her hipbone and a burn scar about a decade old. "The scars on your sides, they look like roots, like a willow tree's, crawling through the ground to keep the damn tree up." At Addy's look, she didn't even know what look it was, she playfully rolled her eyes, "I'm not asking about them, I'm just saying, roots."

She sighed before pushing herself up, Lily's hand slipping from her waist and onto the bed. Addy rolled her shoulders as she leaned against the headboard, completely aware of Lily's eyes on her breasts as the sheets pooled around her thighs. Sex was lovely and fine, but the second those warm brown eyes stared at her with a hand against her scars she - 

Well, she'd be completely screwed. 

"That was, nice." Lily laughed before she gave up on mapping Addy's body, pushing herself up and slipping off the bed. Addy stared at her as she walked towards her overflowing suitcase. Why a girl needed that many pairs of pants for chasing storms, she didn't know. But with this view, she was not going to complain. She had forgotten how fun sex was, how lovely it was to breathe another person's air. 

She also had forgotten what the after was like. Addy was quickly becoming familiar with wanting to claw her skin off, or run all the way to Florida at the warmth in Lily's eyes, the love -

"You want one?" She snapped out of that disastrous train of thought to see Lily, now wearing a worn, oversized t-shirt, and offering her a cigarette. Addy didn't smoke, but Isabel, Isabel could do whatever the fuck she wanted, Isabel never knew what it was like to die. 

She nodded, and Lily walked over to the bed, handing her the cigarette before falling into the pillows beside her with a sigh. She flicked open her lighter, an old silver thing with GOD SPEED carved into one side. The flames licked the tip of hers before she leaned over and lit Addy's, the reflection of the flames in her eyes was just as hot as the look in them as she came. Jesus, Addy was so incredibly fucked, in more than one way. 

She watched Lily press the cigarette to her lips, inhaling and holding the smoke for two breaths before exhaling. Smoke trailed from her bitten-red lips, and at Addy's somewhat confused look, she said, "These motels don't have working smoke detectors anywhere, and those walls are about a shade dark enough that I wouldn't recommend touching them. Nobody gives a shit about smoking."

Her mother would have broken a wooden spoon over her ass if she had caught her smoking indoors, with her very nice baby-blue wallpaper. But her mother also let her walk away, her mother also told her that she loved her, but she wasn't going to watch her walk into her grave so - 

Her coughing was so loud that every neighbor she had must have heard. When Addy could breathe without dying a little, she squeaked out, "Why the fuck does anybody do this?"

Lily laughed, before taking a drag of her cigarette while making direct eye contact as she very gracefully let out a cloud of smoke. "Prick." 

"What are you, British now?" Even as she laughed she reached out and took Addy's cigarette, resting it on her own ashtray - a welded, heart-shaped tray that was very distinctly Lily Lane. "Next time, don't inhale twice like I did, breathe in, and out, quickly. Do it enough and you'll get a buzz, without hacking out your lungs."

Addy shuddered at the thought, her mother may have been right on this, smoking was not for her. Besides, it probably wasn't best to push her luck with the whole cancer stick, especially given the already escaping certain death once thing. "I'm gonna have to pass you up on that, but you enjoy." 

There was a stillness that followed, not the sort that only exists in the aftermath of a storm, and not the sort that permeates funerals. It was the sort of quiet that only existed in the place somewhere between peace and death. Cigarette smoke slowly spread through the room, filling it with a hazy feeling and the distinct bitterness of burning tobacco. She felt her eyes slip shut as she listened to the murmur of Lily's subtle movements, the quiet only broken by a passing car or faraway laughter. It was lovely. 

It was unsettling.

Addy opened her eyes, counting her heartbeat as she looked at the wall of a shitty motel room in the middle of Nowhere, Arkansas. She wasn't supposed to end up here, in this town, in this state, in this body that was only half-hers. She wasn't supposed to be here, but an EF1 was an EF5, Praveen was the last one out of the van, she wore her favorite worn sneakers that had no traction, and Jeb shielded Kate, and Kate lost her faith, and Javi lost himself. She wasn't supposed to be here, and yet rough sheets were curled around her, and yet the flickering motel lights kept buzzing, and yet Lily had a cigarette between her fingers and lingering traces of Addy on her tongue.

She wasn't supposed to be here, and yet, here she was. 

"What's going on in that mind of yours, Isa?" Lily hadn't turned to look at her, instead, her eyes were on a painting in the corner of the room - a painting of something blue and green. 

Addy gave her the same courtesy, staring at the peeling wallpaper like the two of them hadn't fucked twenty minutes ago. "Just thinking about life, how I got here." 

Lily let out a small laugh, eyes slipping shut as she kept burning through her cigarette, "You never let yourself rest. Isn't it exhausting?" 

She imagined that most people's pillow talk was nothing like this, then again, they weren't like most people. "Eh, I'm used to it. I think I might go crazy if I chilled out." Addy shuddered at the thought of sitting in a normal office building, and typing on a computer, and the worst storm she ever faced was a rain storm that maybe, maybe messed up her hair. 

"I believe most people would call us adrenaline junkers, or idiots with a death wish." Addy let out a small hiss, fucking death wish, she hated that phrase. Lily sat up a little more, and she felt the full weight of those eyes on her. She tensed, preparing herself for the treaded question of what the fuck messed you up so badly? But that wasn't what came out of her mouth, instead - 

“You ain’t alone, you know.” The question, or rather the statement startled her enough that she turned to look at Lily. She took her breath away, although, she always did. The shitty lighting of the motel and the tiny ember burning in her cigarette lit up Lily’s face in a way that made her almost - Addy hadn’t believed in anything in a long, long time, but for just a moment, she came close. “You’re not the only one who has irrational fears, and a slightly broken mind.”

"I -" Addy pressed her lips together, hand twitching as she fought the urge to reach out and hold Lily while at the same time, every other part of her dreaded the thought of doing something so, intimate. "What are you talking about?" 

Lily leaned over before answering, tapping her cigarette on the ashtray before putting it out and brushing off her hand, "Sometimes I feel like the world is ending. Not for any concrete reason, not because of global warming or racism, just because - just because. And it sucks, I mean it always hits out of nowhere so I’m happy and okay, and then I’m failing to breathe because I just know, I know that something is terribly wrong.”

She let her head roll to the side, a glint in her eyes as she gave a small shrug, "Dani's had to talk me off the edge of doing something stupid before, not killing myself, but somewhere along the lines of having a mental breakdown and driving into an EF4." Lily had dimples when she smiled, even if it wasn't entirely happy, "Anxiety's a bitch, so is trauma." 

"I'm not traumatized." Her response was so quick that it almost gave her whiplash. Lily's eyes widened slightly at the, not quite outburst but close to it. Addy forced herself to breathe, in and out, in and out, she was fine, this was fine, everything was fine. "I mean I've gone through shit, you know that," She nodded her head toward where her legs were, the lack of her left shin and foot clear beneath the thin sheets. "But I'm not - traumatized or anything." 

Lily let out a huff of laughter, rougher than usual, "That's bullshit and you know it." She groaned, running a hand over her face, "We're not stupid, Isa, you've been through shit, you've survived something terrible even if none of us know exactly what. I don't know who or what taught you otherwise, but you can't heal if you never acknowledge the hurt. That's not how this goes." 

Addy wanted to scream, or run, but she was naked, still slightly drunk, and she was pretty sure her leg was in the corner of the room. So, instead of doing anything that would definitely hurt in the morning, she said, "This is the perfect pillow talk." 

"Okay, we can avoid it for now. But," Lily reached over and placed her hand right next to Addy's, her palm facing up, an offering, "There are some things you can't run from."

"I can't run from a lot of things." Lily let out a snort of laughter before slamming her free hand over her mouth. Addy grinned, despite literally everything that was happening, "It's my leg, I can make all the jokes I want." Then she very purposefully, and carefully reached down and intertwined her fingers with Lily's. She let herself think about the way their palms fit together perfectly for five seconds before she burned that thought to ash. "I'm running from a lot of things, but you're not one of them." 

It was the closest she'd ever get, at least for now, that she wasn't planning on leaving Lily, or the Tamers, or this tentative hope that had sprung up in the middle of Nowhere, Arkansas. Addy had run from her blood, from Daniel's grave and the wreckage of land that would forever hold what remained of Praveen and Jeb. Addy had run from the storm, and the girl who hadn't made it out of there. Addy had run from so many things, she was running from this still, but not from this. 

"Okay," It was barely a whisper. Then Lily squeezed her hand tightly before lifting it up and pressing her lips to Addy's knuckles, "Okay. Because if you do, I'm like legally required to chase after you now." 

"Oh really? Is this like a bounty hunter situation, are you gonna wear an all-black suit and carry around rope, because I gotta say that's definitely something we can discuss later on -" Lily shut her up with a kiss, and Addy let herself be dragged down, she let herself laugh against Lily's lips and breathe her air. 

Boone was smiling like the cat that caught the canary, and Addy knew he was only being held back from saying something by Dani's death grip on his shoulder. Good, it was way too early to deal with - all of that. She might actually punch someone if they said something about her and Lily, and the hickeys that covered her neck, and the even darker ones that peaked out from under Lily's shirt, and the whole you dumb idiots finally hooked up after months of pathetic flirting thank god. It was eight am, she hadn't even had an energy drink yet. 

Dex cleared his throat, pushing over a bowl of oatmeal topped with, you know what she wasn't even going to ask. It was hot and food and that was all that mattered. "You get Cairo up and running yet? I know you had some issues yesterday morning." 

Lily nodded, shifting her body towards him, (her foot still hooked around Addy's ankle), and diving headfirst in a longwinded rant that Addy only understood about half of - and she was a mechanic. But all of their education and experience was meaningless when it came to the intricate anatomy of a drone that had survived over fifty different storms ranging from heavy wind to an EF4. Yeah, she was not going to touch on any of that. 

Cinnamon, it was cinnamon and it was amazing and if anyone touched her oatmeal she'd fight them. Addy wasn't even joking, she had before. She was eighty percent sure Javi still had a scar on his leg from the whole barn-breakfast incident that they do not talk about. She may be short but that did not mean she - 

Tyler sat across from her, his eyes intense as he sat there and stared. It was too damn early for any of this. She let out a sigh, her spoon hovering mid-air, "What? What did you do? Did you break my baby?" That truck was hers at this point and she'd fight Tyler on that too. 

Instead of giving her a sheepish smile that meant he accidentally messed with the truck and she was the only mechanic he trusted to fix her, he pressed his lips together like he was debating on saying something, or anything. Her brows furrowed, something was actually wrong if Tyler wasn't making a joke or being way too energetic for eight in the morning. But before she said anything, he opened his mouth and tore a hole in her world with seven words.

"Why don't you ride with me today?" 

Addy's spoon clattered against her bowl as the table fell quiet, it was too fucking early for this.