Archive of Our Own

The typewriter sat on the wicker table, its keys gleaming in the glow of the single hurricane lamp Wednesday had deigned to turn on. Outside, the Pacific continued its waves against the shore, each exhale carrying the scent of brine and dying seaweed into the small beach house at San Francisco Bay that the Sinclairs had claimed as their summer refuge for three generations.

Wednesday Addams had been staring at the same half-finished sentence for forty-seven minutes.

The words refused to cooperate. They sat on the page like dead things themselves, lifeless and uninteresting, lacking the sharpness that Wednesday demanded of her prose. She pressed her fingertips to her temples, feeling the thrum of a headache building behind her eyes. The heat was unbearable as a wet humid blanket settled over the West Coast and refused to lift, even now at nearly midnight.

August in California was a cruelty she didn't anticipate when Enid extended the invitation.

"We'll have the whole place to ourselves," Enid had said, her eyes bright with earnest enthusiasm. "My mom's giving me a few weeks before I have to, you know, officially take over everything. It's like a vacation, but also kind of a... trial run? She keeps sending me stuff about pack logistics and territorial disputes, and I'm supposed to have answers ready by September."

Wednesday agreed to come for reasons she still hadn't fully articulated to herself. Perhaps it was the way Enid's voice trembled slightly on the phrase take over everything. Perhaps it was the knowledge that this summer would be their last—the final, fraying thread of a connection that had begun in the gothic halls of Nevermore Academy and somehow survived werewolf transformations, murder investigations, and the chaos that seemed to follow Wednesday like a loyal shadow.

Or perhaps she simply didn't know how to say no to Enid Sinclair anymore.

The small beach house was atmospheric in the way that Wednesday appreciated. It had weathered shingles, salt-crusted windows, and a porch that groaned underfoot after decades of Sinclair summers. Enid's mother had decorated it in what she clearly considered "coastal chic": driftwood sculptures, seashell collections in glass jars, and an unfortunate number of throw pillows embroidered with motivational sayings about the sea. Wednesday strategically relocated most of these to the closet on her first day.

But the heat had no such mercy.

She shed her usual layers hours ago, resorting to a simple black tank top and loose linen trousers. Her hair was pulled back in her two braids that did nothing to alleviate the dampness clinging to her neck.

Outside, the darkness was absolute except for the sliver of moon that occasionally emerged from behind the clouds. Wednesday could hear Enid's music drifting from somewhere down the beach—something soft and acoustic. That melancholy indie folk Enid pretended to find embarrassing but played constantly when she thought Wednesday wasn't listening.

The typewriter mocked her.

Wednesday pushed back from the table, the wicker legs scraping against the worn wooden floor. She had been trying to write for three days now, and the results were pathetic—fragments of sentences, half-formed ideas, and characters who refused to come to life on the page. The heat was a convenient excuse, but the truth was more complicated.

Her mind kept drifting to September.

To the airport.

To the moment when she would board to a plane with destination to New Jersey, and the distance between them would become something more than just miles.

It was a thought she had been carefully avoiding, packing it away in the same mental compartment where she stored her feelings about her mother's attempts at emotional bonding and her father's insistence to enjoy more things in life besides her novels. But the compartment had a crack, and the thought kept seeping through, poisoning her concentration.

The music on the beach shifted into something more mournful now, a woman's voice singing about leaving and longing and the ache of things unfinished.

Wednesday found herself moving towards the screen door, her feet carrying her across the porch and down the wooden steps that led to the sand. The beach was empty except for a single figure silhouetted against the moonlit water, phone held in one hand, the soft glow of the screen illuminating a familiar profile.

Enid sat with her back against a palm tree that had somehow survived the last hurricane, her legs stretched out in front of her, barefoot on the sand. She was wearing shorts and one of those oversized tees she favored even in the heat—a pale pink thing that Wednesday privately thought looked like it had been mauled by a very pastel bear. The sleeves falling down to her biceps, revealing the delicate bones of her wrists and the faint silver scars that crisscrossed her forearms—remnants of battles fought and won during their years at Nevermore.

She didn't turn as Wednesday approached, though the wolf's ears picked up her footsteps easily. Instead, she simply tilted her head slightly, a silent acknowledgment that she knew Wednesday was there. The movement caused a cascade of her now dirty-blonde hair that's slowly growing into its natural color, to slide across her shoulder.

"I thought you were writing," Enid said gently, easily audible over the waves. It was a low, comfortable sound, the voice that whispered secrets to Wednesday in the dark hours of the night when the rest of Nevermore had been sleeping.

"I was failing to write."

"Ah." Enid let out a soft, familiar laugh. "The muse isn't cooperating?"

"The muse is an invention of romantics who can't accept that creativity requires discipline. I don't need a muse. I need air conditioning."

Enid laughed again, the sound louder now. Wednesday took it and stored it away in the same careful mental archive where she kept the memory of Enid's first full transformation, the way her fur caught the moonlight, the pride in her wolf's eyes when she finally mastered control.

"Come sit," Enid said, patting the sand beside her with a hand that still bore faint traces of chipped nail polish—a pale lavender that was already flaking away. "It's actually nice once you get used to it. The breeze is starting to pick up."

Wednesday hesitated for a moment, her legs sinking slightly into the cool, damp sand. The ground was still warm from the day's heat, but the breeze Enid mentioned was indeed beginning to stir with the scent of salt and something that made Wednesday's nostrils flare.

"What is that?" she asked, her voice carefully neutral.

Enid's cheeks flushed, the color visible even in the dim light filtering through the clouds. "What is what?"

"That smell." Wednesday gestured vaguely with one hand, her fingers tracing the air. "It's... botanical, earthy. Slightly acrid."

"Oh." Enid's hand moved, and Wednesday noticed for the first time the thin paper rolled between her fingers, the end smoldering with a small ember that glowed orange in the darkness. "It's... well. It's..."

"You're smoking marijuana." Wednesday deadpanned.

"I'm—" Enid's blush deepened, spreading down her neck in a way that Wednesday found unexpectedly endearing. "Okay, yes. Look, I bought it from this guy a few days ago, and I wasn't planning to actually use it, but my brain wouldn't shut up and I thought maybe it would help, and—"

She was rambling, a tell that Wednesday had long since learned to recognize. The words came faster when Enid was nervous, tumbling over each other in self-conscious explanation that only seemed to increase her embarrassment the longer she continued.

"I'm not judging you," Wednesday said, surprised to find that she meant it. "I simply didn't know you had a... predilection."

"I don't! I've never even tried it before. But Lucille—my cousin who got sent in that werewolf conversion camp on the Balkan countryside—said it helps with anxiety, and with everything coming up, I just thought..." Enid trailed off, gesturing vaguely with the joint. "I don't know. I was going to throw it away, but then tonight I came out here and the music was playing and the stars were out and I just—"

She took a quick, shallow drag, then immediately dissolved into a coughing fit that seemed to embarrass her even further. Her free hand flew to her chest, and she doubled over slightly, the joint dangling dangerously close to the sand.

"I'm terrible at this," she gasped, waving away the smoke with a frantic motion. "I'm literally the worst person to ever attempt to—"

"Enid."

"What?"

"Breathe."

The command was simple, delivered in Wednesday's usual flat tone, and yet Enid's shoulders dropped slightly. She took a steadying breath, then another, and when she exhaled, some of the tension seemed to leave her frame. Her fingers loosened their death grip on the joint, and she leaned back against the palm tree with a sigh that seemed to release some of the weight she'd been carrying.

"Sorry," she said. "I'm being weird."

"You're always weird. It's one of your more tolerable qualities."

Enid snorted, a distinctly ungraceful sound that somehow made Wednesday's chest feel lighter. "Wednesday Addams, was that almost a compliment?"

"It was a statement of fact. Don't let it go to your head."

But Wednesday could see the small smile playing at the corners of Enid's mouth, the way her eyes crinkled with genuine amusement. Something in her chest eased slightly, the tight knot of anxiety that had been building all evening loosening its grip. This was familiar ground, the careful dance they'd perfected over four years at Nevermore, the way they could needle each other and still find comfort in the rhythm of their exchanges.

Enid took another drag of the joint, more carefully this time, holding the smoke in her lungs before releasing it in a thin stream that was quickly evaporated away by the ocean breeze. Some of the tension in her shoulders relaxed, and she tilted her head back against the palm tree, her throat exposed to the moonlight in a gesture of lupine vulnerability.

"Thank you," Enid said quietly. "For coming here. I know you hate the heat."

"I don't hate the heat. I find it... disagreeable."

Enid chuckled. "Disagreeable... right. That's the Wednesday word for 'I would rather be anywhere else.'"

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to. I can read you, remember?"

And that was the truth, wasn't it? Enid had always been able to read her, from the very first day, when Wednesday had been dumped in that room in Nevermore and Enid hurried over with those bright eyes and that huge smile, greeting and immediately attempting to hug her. Wednesday might rejected the hug back then, but she felt something shift in her chest.

She spent years cultivating a reputation for inscrutability, for the kind of stillness that made people uncomfortable. She perfected the art of the cold stare, the cutting remark, the impenetrable wall of aloofness that kept everyone at a safe distance. And then Enid Sinclair had walked into her life with her colored hair, her wolfish grin and her insistence on matching snoods, and she simply... refused to be intimidated.

Now, sitting on the sand with the ocean whispering in the darkness and Enid's shoulder warm against hers, Wednesday found that she didn't want to be inscrutable tonight, not with Enid.

"Are you going to try it?" Enid asked, offering the joint. Her fingers were steady now, no longer trembling, and the ember glowed a soft orange in the darkness.

"I don't generally partake in recreational substances."

"I know. I'm just... offering." Enid's voice was gentle, without the pushiness that would have made Wednesday bristle. "It's okay if you don't want to. It's okay if you want to. There's no right answer."

The words were simple, but they had a weight that Wednesday felt in her bones. There's no right answer. It was what Enid always offered her—a space free from the pressure to be anything other than what she was. No expectations, no demands, no judgment. Just the simple gift of acceptance.

Wednesday reached out, her fingers brushing against Enid's as she took the joint. The contact was brief, but it sent something electric up her arm, a current she quickly suppressed. Enid's skin was warm, warmer than the ambient temperature could account for. The werewolf's natural heat that Wednesday had grown accustomed to over the years. It was a warmth that had seeped into her bones during countless nights spent studying together, when Enid would fall asleep on her shoulder and Wednesday would find herself unable to move.

She brought the joint to her lips, took a small drag, and managed to hold the smoke for three seconds before coughing. The smoke burned her throat and filled her lungs with an acrid taste that made her eyes water.

"I hate it," she said, handing it back with a grimace.

"You tried. That's what matters."

"It tastes like burning grass."

"It's supposed to... I think. I don't know, I'm not an expert." Enid took the joint carefully, her fingers brushing against Wednesday's again. "I'm not sure there is an expert, really. I think everyone's just making it up as they go along and pretend this thing calms you."

"A comforting thought."

"That's kind of my thing. Comforting thoughts." Enid's smile softened, and she looked at Wednesday with something that made the air between them feel charged. "You're a hard person to comfort, you know. Most people would take that as a challenge. I just... I just try to be here."

"You're very good at being here," Wednesday admitted, the words slipping out before she could stop them.

Enid's eyes widened slightly, and Wednesday could see the surprise flickering in their depths. "Was that another compliment?"

"It was an observation."

"You know, for someone who claims to hate compliments, you're pretty good at giving them."

Wednesday opened her mouth to protest, but the words died in her throat. Because Enid was right again, always right. Wednesday built walls around herself, but Enid had a way of finding the cracks, of slipping through the defenses and leaving warmth in her wake.

They sat in comfortable silence for a while, the waves providing a steady rhythm that seemed to synchronize with the beating of Wednesday's heart. The joint burned slowly in Enid's fingers, and Wednesday watched the ember trace patterns in the darkness as Enid gestured, her hands moving through the air like she was painting with the smoke.

"I've been thinking about September," Enid said finally, there was a note in her voice that Wednesday was trying to ignore. It was the same note that had crept into their conversations for weeks now, a quiet undertone of sorrow that neither of them had fully acknowledged.

"Yes." Wednesday's voice was flat, carefully controlled. She had become expert at hiding the sharp edges of her feelings, at smoothing them down until they were nothing more than manageable aches.

"You know, you could come with me. With my pack..." Enid's words came out in a rush, as if she'd been holding them in for a long time. "Not forever, obviously, but... for a while. My mom said there's a warehouse in the pack house that can be been converted into a room. It's not your aesthetic, but you could make it work. You could make anything work."

The offer hung in the air between them, fragile and hopeful. Wednesday had considered it, of course. She spent too many sleepless nights in this stifling heat, staring at the ceiling, imagining what it would be like to stay with Enid in San Francisco, to carve out a space for herself in Enid's world. Now she pictured herself in that converted werehouse that could be her personal room, surrounded by the chaos of pack life, trying to focus while the sounds of Enid's new life filtered through the walls.

And always, she reached the same conclusion.

"Your pack wouldn't accept me," she said, her voice steady. "I'm psychic, an outsider. I would be a liability."

Enid's jaw tightened, the muscles in her neck tensing. "You're not a liability. You're—" She stopped herself, and Wednesday could feel the weight of unspoken words pressing against her skin. "My mother would get used to you. She'd have to. I'm the Alpha. She can't—"

"Enid."

The name was a soft rebuke, and Enid fell silent. Wednesday could see the frustration in her posture, the way her shoulders had drawn up and her fingers were curling into the sand.

"I know you think your position gives you power," Wednesday continued. "But power in a pack is different than power in the high school world. It's built on bonds, on relationships. A new Alpha can't afford to appear weak. She can't afford to make choices that might be seen as... indulgent."

"I'm not being indulgent. I'm asking you to—"

"You're asking me to make a choice that would make your life more difficult." Wednesday's voice was steady, even as something inside her twisted. "And I refuse to be that for you."

Enid was quiet for a long moment. When she spoke again, her voice was smaller, the words coming out in a whisper that was almost lost to the sound of the waves. "What if I want you to be that for me? What if I don't care about what the pack thinks?"

"You would care, eventually. When the challenges came, when the territorial disputes escalated, when your authority was questioned. You would care, and you would resent me for it." Wednesday could feel the truth of her own words like stones in her chest.

"I could never resent you." Enid said, giving emphasis on never. She couldn't never think of a world where she would ever resent Wednesday.

"Not consciously or immediately. But the resentment would grow, like rot beneath a floorboard, and one day you would wake up and realize that you'd sacrificed everything for a girl who has no place in your world."

The words were bitter on Wednesday's tongue, but they were also true. She was used to anticipate the worst outcomes, to protect herself from hope that could only lead to disappointment. This was simply an extension of that practice—a necessary cruelty meant to preserve something vital.

Enid's hand found hers in the darkness. The touch was soft and tentative, as if Enid expected her to pull away. Wednesday could feel the calluses on Enid's fingers, the rough patches from all the years being the leader of Poe Cup tournaments and transformation practice, the roughness of her skin pressed against Wednesday's softer one.

"I hate that you think that," Enid said, those words were hurting her. "I hate that you've already decided what's going to happen. I hate that you won't even—"

She stopped, and Wednesday could hear the tears in her voice, the effort it took to keep them from spilling over. The sound cut through Wednesday's constructed defenses like a blade, leaving her vulnerable and exposed.

"I'm sorry," Wednesday said. It was the first time she'd ever apologized for something she wasn't sorry for. "I don't mean to—"

"You don't mean to hurt me, but you do it anyway. You push me away because you're scared of what might happen if you don't." Enid's grip on her hand tightened, almost painfully. "I'm not going to pretend I understand everything about you, Wednesday. But I know that. I know you're scared."

The accusation landed like a blow, because it was another truth. Wednesday could feel her walls trembling, the foundations cracking under the weight of Enid's honesty.

"Fear is a reasonable response to the circumstances," she said stiffly, the words feeling hollow even as they left her mouth.

"Is it? Or is it just easier than trying?"

Wednesday opened her mouth to respond, but nothing came out. It was easier indeed. It was always easier to retreat into her isolated world than to risk the vulnerability of wanting something and failing to keep it.

She looked up at the stars, at the pinpricks of light scattered across the velvet sky, and tried to find the words that would make this easier. The constellations were unfamiliar here, different from the ones she memorized over the gothic spires of Nevermore, different from the ones she studied in the cold New Jersey nights of her childhood. Everything was unfamiliar.

"I'm going to miss you," she said finally. "When I leave... when we go our separate ways."

Enid's breath caught, a sharp intake of air that seemed to echo in the darkness. "Wednesday..."

"I know I'm not good at... this. At saying what I feel. I've never had to be, because I've never had anyone I wanted to say it to." The words came out rough, pulled from somewhere deep in her chest where she'd buried them years ago. "But I've spent the last three days trying to write, and all I can think about is that this is it. This is the end of something I didn't realize I was building."

Enid shifted closer, her shoulder pressing against Wednesday's. The contact was solid, a physical anchor in the shifting uncertainty of the night.

"We could keep building," Enid said hopefully. "It doesn't have to end."

"Everything ends, that's the nature of things. We're rational people. We can acknowledge that without—"

Without breaking, she meant. Without losing ourselves in the inevitable grief of parting. Without falling apart in a way that would leave us nothing but scattered pieces.

"No," Enid said, and there was something fierce in her voice now, the same fierceness that had transformed her into a wolf and made her stand against everything that threatened her and Wednesday, even the most monstrous creatures. "No, I refuse to accept that. I refuse to pretend that this is just some... some neat conclusion we can both walk away from."

"Enid—"

"Please. Just—" Enid released her hand to gesture, the joint burning forgotten. "Can you just hear me out? Can you just listen for one minute without deciding what I'm going to say before I say it?"

Wednesday nodded, too surprised to do anything else. Enid's eyes were bright in the moonlight, and Wednesday found herself caught in their intensity.

"Every day since I met you, I've been terrified," Enid tried to put her thoughts into logical order. "Not of you—well, yes, initially you were terrifying, but not in the way you think. I was terrified that I would wake up one day and you'd be gone. That you'd decide I wasn't worth the trouble. That I'd do something to push you away, and you'd just... leave."

Her voice cracked, and she took a shuddering breath. The tears were falling freely now, tracking silver paths down her cheeks in the moonlight.

"But you never did. Even when I was too much, even when I was annoying, even when I couldn't stop talking or I made everything pink and glittery. You stayed. You stayed, and I realized that maybe—maybe you weren't staying because you had to. Maybe you were staying because you wanted to."

Wednesday's throat felt tight, a sensation she attributed to the heat and not to the words that were burrowing into her chest like small, sharp knives. Her vision blurred, and she blinked rapidly, refusing to acknowledge the wetness on her cheeks.

"And now you're telling me that it's going to end," Enid continued. "That we're both just going to walk away because it's the rational thing to do. But Wednesday, what about what I want? What about what you want? Because I'm pretty sure you don't want this either."

The accusation hung in the air, and Wednesday found that she couldn't deny it. She couldn't look away from Enid's eyes, couldn't retreat behind her walls, couldn't do anything but sit there and confront everything she'd been trying to ignore.

"I don't want to lose you," Wednesday said, the words forced out like confession. "I don't want to go back to New Jersey and pretend that you don't exist, that you were just some... temporary part of my life. But I also don't want to be the thing that holds you back. The Alpha of a pack can't afford attachment to someone who doesn't belong there. It's a liability, and you know it."

"Then let me decide what's a liability," Enid's voice cracked. "Let me make that choice. I'm not some naive girl who can't wolf-out anymore, Wednesday. I've—" She gestured at the ocean, at the night, at everything. "I've led people. I've made hard choices. I've hurt people who deserved it, and I've forgiven people who didn't. I can decide what's important to me."

"And what is important to you?"

The question was blunt, but Wednesday needed to hear it. She needed to hear Enid say the words, needed to know if she was just projecting her own hopes onto the shifting sand of their relationship. She needed to understand what she was risking, what she was potentially losing, what she might be throwing away with her constructed defenses.

Enid turned to face her fully, the moon illuminating the vulnerability in her eyes. Wednesday could see every detail of her face—the freckles scattered across her nose, the slight chapping of her lips, the healed scars at the side of her right cheek that will probably never fade away completely, the faint lines of worry that had appeared around her eyes in the last few months. She looked older than she had at Nevermore, more burdened, but also more certain.

"You," Enid said absolutely certain. "You've always been important to me. From the moment you walked into that room, looking like you'd rather be anywhere else in the world, I knew you were going to change everything. And you did. You made me braver. You made me stronger. You made me—"

She stopped, and Wednesday could see the tears glistening on her cheeks, the way her throat worked as she swallowed.

"Made you what?" Wednesday asked.

But Enid couldn't bring herself to admit it out loud without breaking apart.

"Made you fall in love with me..." Wednesday finished for her, the words leaving her mouth like a confession of guilt. It wasn't a question—she'd known, on some level, for a long time. She just refused to acknowledge it.

Enid's eyes widened, her breath catching. "I... yes. That's what I was going to say. How did you—"

"I'm not as oblivious as I pretend to be," Wednesday said quietly. "I've known for... a while. I just didn't know what to do with it."

"Wednesday—"

"Don't." The word came out sharper than she intended, a blade meant to cut through the growing hope in Enid's voice. "Don't make this harder than it already is."

"Harder?" Enid laughed, but it wasn't her usual enthusiastic giggles, but a wet, broken sound. "Wednesday, you just told me you knew I was in love with you. That you've known for months. And you didn't—you didn't say anything. You just let me—"

"What was I supposed to do?" Wednesday's voice rose, fraying at the edges. "Tell you that I loved you too and watch you try to make it work? Watch you compromise yourself, your future, your pack, all for the sake of someone who doesn't belong in your world? I couldn't do that to you. I couldn't be the reason you failed."

The words hung in the air between them, heavy with all the things Wednesday had been too afraid to say. She watched Enid's face shift, confusion and hope and pain warring in her expression.

"You love me," Enid said slowly, as if she was testing the words. "You love me, and you've been pushing me away to protect me."

"I've been pushing you away to protect myself," Wednesday corrected, her voice brittle. "Because if I let myself want this, and it falls apart—and it will fall apart, Enid, it's the nature of things—then I'll have nothing left. I'll have given you everything, and you'll still have to leave, and I'll be alone with the memory of what I could have had."

She was shaking, she realized. Her hands were trembling against the sand, and she couldn't seem to make them stop. She pressed them flat against the ground, trying to steady herself, but the shaking continued, radiating up her arms and into her chest.

"Wednesday." Enid's voice was soft, so soft, and suddenly her hands were there, covering Wednesday's, pressing them into the sand. The touch was grounding and solid, an anchor in the storm that was raging inside Wednesday's chest. "Look at me."

Wednesday raised her eyes, and Enid was there, her face inches away, her breath warm against Wednesday's cheeks.

"You're not going to lose me," Enid said. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm right here, and I'm not leaving. Not tonight or ever. Do you understand?"

"You can't promise that," Wednesday said, but her voice was weaker now, the fight draining out of her. "You can't promise what's going to happen. No one can."

"Then let's promise what we can control." Enid's thumbs traced circles on the backs of Wednesday's hands. "I promise that I love you. I promise that I'm going to fight for you. I promise that I'm not going to let you push me away, no matter how hard you try. And I promise that we're going to figure this out together."

"Enid—"

"I love you, Wednesday." The words were firm and unwavering. She's tired of denying it for so long, it was finally the time when she could say it without fear. "I've loved you for years, and I'm going to keep loving you for as long as you'll let me. You can't scare me away with your walls and your darkness and your terrible taste in music. I'm not going anywhere."

Wednesday could feel the tears falling freely now, hot against her cheeks. She didn't try to stop them. For once, she allowed herself to feel everything—the fear, the hope, the desperate, overwhelming love that had been building in her chest for four years.

"You're infuriating," she said, and her voice cracked on the word. "You're the most infuriating, optimistically pink person I have ever met."

"Thank you?"

"You make me want things I never thought I wanted. You make me believe in things I never thought I could believe in. And I hate you for it."

"Okay. I deserve that."

"But I love you anyway."

Wednesday had never said these words before to anyone, not in any way that mattered. She'd been told she was incapable of love, that her heart was a dark, dead thing, that she was too cold to ever feel anything real.

She believed it herself, for a long time.

But sitting here, on the beach, with Enid's hands holding hers and the waves whispering in the darkness, Wednesday knew that she'd been wrong. She felt everything, she felt too much even. And it was terrifying.

Enid stared at her, her eyes wide, her lips parted. "Say it again," she whispered.

"I love you." The words came easier now, still strange on her tongue but somehow right. "I love you, Enid Sinclair, and it's the most inconvenient thing that has ever happened to me."

"I'm sorry," Enid said, and she was laughing and crying at the same time. "I'm sorry that my love is inconvenient for you, but I don't think I can change it and I don't think I want to."

"Neither do I," Wednesday admitted. "I don't want to change any of it. I just want to stop being afraid."

"Then let's be afraid together." Enid released one of Wednesday's hands, using her own to cup Wednesday's cheek. Her palm was warm against Wednesday's skin, her thumb brushing away the moisture from her tears. "Let's be terrified together, and let's figure out how to make it work anyway. I don't know how to do this—I've never done this before—but I know I want to try. I want to try with you."

It was such a simple offer, such a clean solution to a problem that had felt impossibly complex. Wednesday reached up, covering Enid's hand with her own, pressing it against her cheek.

"You were my best friend," she said. "You're the worst roommate I've ever had, and now you're going to be my lover... I believe I don't know how to be without you."

"Then don't be." Enid leaned closer, her forehead resting against Wednesday's. "Don't be without me. We'll figure it out together."

The joint had burned down to nothing, the ember dying forgotten in the sand. The breeze had picked up, cool and salt-tinged, Wednesday could feel it against her damp cheeks and bare arms. Enid leaned back against the palm tree, pulling Wednesday with her, and Wednesday let herself be drawn into the curve of Enid's body.

Enid shifted, adjusting her position, and Wednesday found herself nestled against Enid's side, her head resting on Enid's chest right above her heart, her legs curled beneath her. Enid's arms wrapped around her, one hand coming up to stroke Wednesday's hair, the other resting on her hip. The contact tethered Wednesday to the present moment.

"I don't know what comes next," Wednesday admitted, her voice muffled against Enid's tee. "I've never known what comes next. I've always just... moved forward, relentlessly and without looking back."

"That's because you're stubborn."

"That's because I'm terrified of what I'll see if I stop." Wednesday admitted without fear and passion.

Enid's arm tightened around her, and Wednesday could feel the steady rhythm of Enid's heartbeat against her cheek. The sound was comforting, the same heartbeat that had been her anchor through countless nights at Nevermore, when the weight of her visions had threatened to crush her. When she became conscious again at Enid's arms, finding Enid wiping away her black tears with a soft cloth.

"We don't have to figure it out tonight," Enid said softly. "We have a few more days. We can be afraid together, and we can figure out what we want, and then we can figure out how to make it work."

"And if we can't?"

"Then we'll figure that out too." Enid pressed a kiss to the top of her head, and Wednesday closed her eyes, savoring the gentleness of the gesture. "But I have a feeling we're going to be okay. I have a good feeling about us."

"You always have a good feeling about things."

"That's my secret weapon. I believe in things until they come true."

Wednesday could feel the vibrations of Enid's voice through her chest, the soft rumble of her words. She relaxed into the embrace, letting herself be held, letting herself feel Enid's body pressed against hers.

"I believe in you," she said. "I don't know if I believe in anything else. But I believe in you."

"Good." Enid's voice was soft and dreamy, as if she was already drifting into sleep. "That's enough. That's more than enough."

Wednesday's hand found Enid's as it rested on her hip, their fingers interlacing together. She traced the lines of Enid's palm, the veins and scars that became as familiar as her own. The waves hissed in the darkness, a soothing rhythm that seemed to sync with the beating of her heart.

"We should go inside," she murmured, though she made no move to get up. "It's getting late."

"Just a few more minutes," Enid said with low voice, her head leaned back against the palm tree in relaxation. "I want to watch the stars with you."

"The stars will still be there tomorrow."

"But it won't be same tomorrow. Not the same night, the same stars, and the waves, and everything." Enid's hand slowly caressed Wednesday's left braid, feeling the technique of the braided hair in her fingers.

Wednesday understood. She was also already committing the moment to memory. The solidness of Enid's body against hers, the sound of the waves, the salt-tinged breeze on her cheeks, the steady rhythm of Enid's heartbeat.

"Okay," she said. "A few more minutes."

She let herself sink deeper into Enid's embrace, let herself feel the warmth and the safety of being held by her. By someone she trusted so wholeheartedly to let her body rest against without breaking it.

As the stars wheeled overhead, ancient and constant, Wednesday allowed herself to hope.

This hope was frightening. It was sharp-edged and fragile, and it could break at any moment. But as she lay in Enid's arms, Wednesday thought that, maybe, it was worth the risk.