The air coming off of the pool was pleasantly cool for the five friends that sat in Brooke’s back yard together.
“Thank you all for coming over here. It just… feels wrong to have this place empty all the time.” Brooke smiled, bittersweet. The loss of her dad was still fresh, and sadly not one member of the group could say that they didn’t understand how long it took to get over losing someone like she had.
Stavo leaned over to wrap an arm around her shoulders, and Brooke leaned into him. Emma set down her glass and scooted forward on her pool chair.
“Hey, it’s no problem. Twist my arm to come out and have a pool party, am I right?” She smiled, trying to brighten the mood. It seemed to work, because Brooke laughed finally.
“Yeah, this is great for the occasion.” Audrey agreed, moving onto the free space on Emma’s pool chair to get closer to the conversation. “I mean, who would have guessed we’d actually all manage to get accepted to the same place that’s far, far away from here? Goodbye Murderville, U.S.A.”
Now Noah laughed, grinning broadly at his best friend.
“You know, technically Alaska won that title in 2015.” He noted.
“Welp, we’re not going there either. And of course you would know that.” Audrey teased. “But anyway- comparing a state to a town is like comparing a fish to a shark. I wanna know if they’ve ever seen anything quite like… well.” She paused, unsure of how to continue, and Emma picked up for her.
“I’m going to guess no one has ever seen anything quite like this- not outside of movies anyway.” She offered. “And let’s hope no one ever has to again.”
“Agreed.” Stavo chimed in, “Although admittedly it’s going to be hard to write a story as good as real life after this.”
“You’re supposed to be creative.” Brooke waved her hand. “You’ll figure it out- without anyone else having to die, please.”
“Right-o.” Stavo agreed, earning another smile from the small blonde.
“So have you all thought about my suggestion?” Brooke asked.
“My mom liked it. We looked at the cost comparison for on campus housing and for a few houses for rent in the area and it made way more sense. We just couldn’t get anything too extravagant.” Emma noted.
“Yeah my parents and I came to the same conclusion when we looked. They said they’d be cool with that, I just have to send them pictures when we’re looking.” Noah agreed.
“My Dad’s cool with it. He wasn’t at first ‘cause he thinks I’m gonna get into trouble, but I think you might have sold him on it with the cost comparison that you put together.” Stavo smiled at Brooke, and Brooke smiled back.
“I also told him I’d keep an eye on you.” She grinned.
“Better keep both on me. I’m a lot.” He teased, earning him a peck on the cheek.
“What about you, Audrey?” Brooke asked when she realized Audrey hadn’t answered yet, and when she glanced over she noticed Audrey had been staring at her feet, probably ignoring the question.
“It sounds great. It really does. I just… don’t know if I could fund that, you know? I’m already there almost entirely on scholarship. And my Dad’s definitely not helping me after that fight unless I go to a different school, and like hell that’s happening…” Audrey answered. “I guess my answer depends entirely on if I can find a job out there, because then I guess it would be nice to be able to take out fewer loans.”
“I can help you find a job there. And maybe we could share a room or something- that could bring things down a little.” Emma offered, reaching a hand over to squeeze Audrey’s.
Audrey finally looked back up to meet Emma’s eyes and smiled.
“I know you’re good at that stuff. And yeah, sharing a room would probably bring the price down a little for everyone. It could be fun, too. Get the quintessential college roommate experience without all the surprises… but again, that depends on if I can get a job out there before the first payment is due.” She sighed.
“You know, in the long run off-campus housing actually winds up cheaper.” Noah commented. “It would help a lot really. Especially since there are people who want to board college kids and offer rates that are way better than what the school can offer.”
“And wouldn’t it be nice to get to live together like normal friends who aren’t being hunted and stalked by a killer? To just have a good time and all that?” Brooke chimed in.
“It does. And it would be.” Audrey agreed with both of them. “I just… I don’t think any loan I could take out would cover my rent for a room in a house month to month; they would probably want me on campus housing. They like to gut you for the more expensive stuff, you know.”
“… You know what, I’m making an executive decision.” Brooke decided. “I’m gonna cover your share for a while. If I do that, then will you come with us?”
Audrey audibly gasped.
“Brooke, that is so sweet but I don’t want you to have to do that, and isn’t that money supposed to go towards your tuition first—.”
“I know I don’t have to, I’m choosing to. And there will be plenty left for tuition. Renting some rooms in a house is like nothing in the big scheme of what my dad left me. Hell, I could probably cover the whole thing if I really needed to. But anyway, I’m choosing to do this for you because you're one of my best friends. And… you guys are kind of all I have left now, anyway.” Brooke commented, glancing down a little. “So it would just be nice if we didn’t have to split up, too.”
That admittedly was a feeling that Brooke knew more intimately than any of the others, and Audrey got up off of the pool chair and pulled her into a hug.
“Alright. Sounds fun. Then they can’t tell us we can’t have candles or dumb shit like that.” She finally agreed, and Brooke and the others beamed.
“Alright, Lakewood five leaving Lakewood for a college adventure- all together now!” Noah exclaimed “Oh man- I gotta tell The Morgue about this. I haven’t updated it in forever because we’ve had space to breathe. I guess this would be a good place to leave it off, though. At least until I start studying forensics.” Noah chuckled.
“Just don’t jinx anything.” Audrey cautioned, and Noah nodded.
“Hey like you said, we’re leaving this place behind for quite a while. We’re going to be fine. It’s going to be great.” He smiled, and Audrey smiled back.
“It will.” She agreed, moving next to Emma’s pool chair.
“I think I’m going to take another dip again.” She announced, and Emma stood up with her.
“Me too. And then I guess we should start looking at rental properties.”
“I’m too cold for the water so I’ll look.” Brooke volunteered. “I’m warning you though, I have a wish-list already.”
“Oh man.” Stavo whistled. “Are we going to get a slideshow presentation of this or something?”
“That’s a great idea!” Noah exclaimed with a grin. “It’ll be a good way to condense the information. Okay Brooke, send me the links. Let’s get this going.”
“I think I’m going to…” Stavo started, and he was intending to say steal Audrey’s idea and join the others in the pool, but when he noticed Audrey and Emma sitting together on the steps, smiling at each other and talking quietly, he wondered if it was really the best idea. It looked like they could be having a moment, and although he didn’t know them as well as he knew Brooke and Noah he did know an intimate conversation when he saw one. “…take a dip in the hot tub. I’m still sore from that work out earlier.”
“In this heat?” Noah asked.
“It’s a little chilly. Besides, heat is good for sore muscles.” Stavo shrugged. He glanced back at the other two, now laughing at something that only they were privy too, and remembered being on the other side of this scene with an old friend.
With that, he started walking to the hot tub as he thought. Maybe he’d have to draw him again, soon. Maybe his next story could be about him. He wished he could tell him about Brooke, about how much he would have liked her, too, and how Stavo thought maybe he could be in love again finally— although, for both their hearts, it was probably best that he wasn’t able to share that. Maybe that would be too close to saying goodbye for good. Maybe it would sound too much like I don’t feel that way about you anymore for either of them. Especially for Stavo. The wounds were still too fresh. His heart still held way too much for that boy that, the longer he thought about it, the less sure he was that he had really moved on. He wondered if Brooke ever felt the same way. He wished he could be as brave as Noah to try and talk about it, one day.
But not tonight.
He made a one hundred and eighty degree turn away from the hot tub, opting to go and find his tablet instead to record this moment. It would make a good epilogue in his story. Although, admittedly, maybe it was just that he wanted to blink the tears out of his eyes and distract himself with the people he had around him more than he wanted to write an epilogue.
It was difficult to really commit to anything site unseen, and so with school right around the corner someone had to go and check out the properties before they sold to someone else who committed faster. They wanted to believe the few renters they were deciding between were honest, but without really, really seeing the space it would be hard to tell.
Brooke didn’t particularly want to go alone- despite Kieran being locked up, something in her felt like should she step out that far into the world alone, some sort of other indeterminate threat would be looming (even if only creeps at interstate gas stations). Miguel was reluctant to let Stavo go because, despite the fact that he would soon have no choice, letting his son go on what was such an ardous trip one way and then back seemed to be just a little too much for a boy just out of high school.
Walking through the mall with Brooke and Emma (mostly to help Brooke pick out clothes), Audrey had a thought.
“If I go, do I get first pick of the rooms?” Audrey asked.
“I mean, sure- are you sure you would want to, though? It’s like a crazy amount of driving.”
“I mean someone has to.” Audrey shrugged. “And I have an iPod for some entertainment.”
“Wait, you don’t mean you’re going and going alone?” Emma stopped her, and Audrey shrugged again.
“I mean, I don’t think anyone else plans on joining me. Even Noah’s folks are having a hard time letting him go because they’re gonna miss him enough already when he’s at school.”
“But you can’t go alone.” Emma blurted out, grabbing one of Audrey’s hands in both of her own. “It’s…”
It’s not safe, she wanted to say, it’s not safe for me to let you go alone, look what happened the last time I sent you somewhere alone I almost got you killed I can’t let you get killed you can’t die you can’t go—
“Emma?” Audrey asked softly, squeezing her hands gingerly, and Brooke chewed her lip a little. She remembered this glazed over look from Emma’s first day back at Lakewood before the second round of murders, and she knew it didn’t mean pleasant things for the other blonde.
“…You shouldn’t be traveling alone on the open road…” Emma tried to collect herself. “I’ll go with you.”
“Really?” Audrey asked, still holding Emma’s hands. “Do you want to?”
“Yeah. It’ll be fun. We can make some magic mix for the road and make up for the summer road trips we didn’t get the chance to go on.”
The thought was bittersweet- it made Audrey think of being in eighth grade, right before they “drifted”, as Emma had once so callously put it, and talking together about all of the cool places they would go together once they could drive. My god. In all of the commotion that followed that first letter to Piper Audrey had never really given herself the chance to just feel sadness over what they had together and what they’d lost.
Audrey tried to shake off the thought the best she could, figuring it did no good now since they were reunited again and going to give the aforementioned road trips a swing, finally.
“Are you sure your mom will be okay with that?” Audrey started again, and Emma nodded.
“I’ll find a way. She’ll probably be a little concerned at first but I think I can convince her.” Emma nodded, trying to smile.
“Alright. If you can’t, though, I’ll probably just have to go ahead myself anyway—”
“But that’s not going to happen because I’m going to find a way.” Emma abruptly cut her off.
The… something between the two girls was so thick that Brooke could cut it with a knife. Instead, though, she set her hands on their shoulders and spoke up.
“I think we need to get some food before we can keep shopping or talk to Emma’s mom.” She suggested, and the other two nodded.
“That’s a good idea. I’m starving.” Audrey announced, dropping her hands to her side to start walking. She hadn’t let go of Emma’s hand, though, and Emma didn’t seem to be making any move to let go either. Instead the strawberry blonde just squeezed, tightly, and held on as they started walking.
She wasn’t sure if food would be enough to calm her nerves, but it wasn’t a bad idea at any rate. She’d make sure to grab the seat next to Audrey, though, that way in case anything happened she could keep Audrey safe and with her—
“Emma?” Brooke asked this time.
“Um, yes.” Emma smiled, and then dropped it once she realized maybe that wasn’t an appropriate answer to whatever she’d been asked.
“I asked where you wanted to get food. The downstairs food court kind of sucks right now because they took out the Chinese food bar so I figured we could go to the upstairs one.”
“Oh, yeah that was definitely the best part of that one. Not really worth going if it’s not there.” Emma smiled. “Let’s just go see what they have in the upstairs one. Audrey, did you want anything specific?”
“I’m easy. We can go wherever you want to go.” Audrey shrugged and smiled back, and Emma wasn’t sure why there were butterflies gathering in her stomach after the declaration. Maybe it was because she was just glad to see Audrey was okay, not dead on the floor of an abandoned orphanage, and walking with her to get food. Somehow, though, she felt like that wasn’t really the reason for what she was feeling. She just couldn’t quite identify what was right then.
Maybe some food would help her think it over.
After a long conversation between Maggie and Emma (and a shorter one between Maggie and Audrey, where she had Audrey promise to call her if Emma was having an episode), the two girls sat in Emma’s room while they finished packing Emma’s weekend bag.
“It’s funny,” Audrey started, “that taking a break from packing for college ended up being packing to look at rental houses for college”.
Emma laughed a full, ringing laugh.
“Yeah, I guess that’s not much a break is it? This trip will be, though.” She smiled. “God can you imagine? We used to talk about doing something like this all the time.”
“Yeah.” Audrey agreed, feeling the bittersweet feeling creeping up on her again. ‘Yeah’ ended up being all she was able to get out.
This time, Emma noticed.
“Is everything okay?” She asked, and Audrey mustered a smile.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything’s good. I think we’ll just have to put the popcorn in a bag before we go so it doesn’t get on everything.”
“Yeah, of course. But really, is everything okay?” Emma tried again, and Audrey’s face fell.
“Things are fine, Emma.” She tried a little more firmly, and Emma moved from tucking some socks into her bag to go sit on the bed next to Audrey.
“Are they?” Emma asked softly, searching Audrey’s eyes. Audrey had really pretty eyes, Emma noticed, and she could see how people could fall in love with them, Noah, that poor girl from the video—
They were full of hurt right now, though, and despite the years they spent apart Emma could still recognize that look. It was the same look she saw the first time she took another friend to see the Lord of the Rings movie they had showing and forgot to invite Audrey.
She didn’t even remember who that friend was, now. All she remembered was the way Audrey looked when she heard about it the next day.
“Are they?” Emma tried again, this time almost whispering, and Audrey sighed. Their faces were only inches away now, and it was hard to lie from this distance.
“… It’s stupid, Emma. Just let it go.” Audrey mumbled, and this time Emma set a hand on her shoulder.
“Your feelings aren’t stupid.” She assured her, and her voice sounded so syrupy sweet that it made it even harder for Audrey to even consider saying what she was thinking about. It also reminded her of when they were looking for Noah, and how they’d never really addressed that moment, and oh no this was quickly spiraling out of control in Audrey’s head—
She decided to just try and focus on the road trips again.
“No, but what caused them is. Just— do you really want to know? Do you really want to do this before we spend like ten hours in a car together?” She exhaled shakily.
“Yes.” Emma urged gently, and Audrey huffed.
“Why is this so important to you?” The brunette asked, and the blonde traced her hand over Audrey’s arm.
“I don’t want you to feel like you have to keep things from me anymore.” She explained, and Audrey’s eyes flashed the way they did the first time Emma walked up to her after that video—
“What, because you still don’t trust me to not fuck up your life again by inviting another serial killer to town—” Audrey started furiously, and Emma grabbed both of her shoulders now to try and steady her.
“Audrey, no! That’s- that’s not what I meant, at all, all of that wasn’t your fault anyway. But I do know why you wrote the letters, now. I was being really unfair about it, because I made it about me but it was really about you being hurt. You were hurt. Really, really hurt. And I did that; I hurt you. And I see that now. And that’s what I was trying to get at, you know, was that you were hurting and I hurt you and I didn’t even let you talk about it. And I should have asked you what was up. I shouldn't have been so distant or so something that you felt like you had to keep things from me when it hurt you.” Emma explained, her voice softening at the end as she pulled the brunette into a firm embrace.
“So I’m asking you not to keep things from me now because I don’t want to hurt you like that anymore.” The strawberry blonde mumbled into the brunette’s ear, earning a slight shiver. If Emma weren’t so focused on holding the other she would have noticed Audrey’s fists clutching onto the bed sheets, desperately. “Talk to me, Audrey. I’m here for you.”
The feeling of Emma’s breath on her ear and Emma’s arms around her made Audrey’s heart hammer in her chest and made her body feel warm and tense in uncomfortably comfortable ways. She had been trying, hard, to bury her feelings for the blonde on the bed next to her, but she supposed she hadn’t even set them in the hole- or even dug one in the first place.
Frantically, she tried to steer her mind away from the warmth growing inside of her by finally answering Emma’s question.
“… I’m… We couldn’t help the past few years. Shit was hard, there wasn’t time for normal teenager things like road trips. But… goddammit Emma. When you talk about things like that all I can see is you in that stupid bitch’s car with that stupid ex-boyfriend next to you and it reminds me we missed out those first few years not because this shit set in yet, it was just because you just threw me away to go have some fucking time with the fucking lot of them. And was it worth it, Emma? Was it?” Audrey’s voice cracked, and she’d forgotten how much this upset her.
Emma tucked her chin over Audrey’s shoulder and squeezed, taking a deep breath before speaking.
“No. No, it wasn’t worth it, it wasn’t worth it at all. I don’t think I ever felt good about hanging out with Nina, and I wish I hadn’t let her make me second guess asking you to come hang out. She was just so… intimidating. You couldn’t say no to her, or yes to anyone else. I know that doesn’t make it better, though.” Emma sighed, a lump in her throat as she really thought about it, and then she continued.
“And of course Will… ended up being just as awful as you probably would have warned me he was. I kind of unpacked that while I was… away, you know all the stuff about the bet and the video and the blackmail and… just how generally not good for me it was. Anyway, I know I never talked to you about it and I didn’t want to upset Brooke but… I’ve learned I can feel awful that he died and recognize that he wasn’t good for me and I needed to not be with him anymore all at the same time. I guess I would have missed Brooke if we never met but… still. That- the not talking to you thing- wasn’t worth it.” Emma tried to assure the brunette, and Audrey nodded a little, finally returning the hug tightly.
“Did that help anything?” Emma asked, hopefully.
“…Yeah.” Audrey admitted, her nose brushing against locks of blonde, loosely curled hair. “Yeah… it did. And I think Brooke was probably in a similar position to you. She’s too nice for all of that shit, really.”
“Yeah. You’re right, she was. Maybe we all would have found each other again someday, anyway. And it’s not much but… if it makes you feel any better, I never actually managed to go on a road trip with any of them. The one time I asked my mom she told me no way, because she didn’t trust any of them, and well… she had good reasons.”
“Well she wasn’t wrong.” Audrey grinned a little, and Emma laughed again finally. She finally moved from the embrace, ruffling Audrey’s hair a little before standing up again.
“I think we need some magic mix after that.”
“Yeah.” Audrey agreed. “Emma?”
“Yes?”
“Thanks.” Audrey said softly, and Emma leaned over to hug her again. Admittedly, although she didn’t feel totally absolved of guilt, it helped Emma feel a little better, too. There was probably still so much that they still needed to talk about before Audrey could really feel comfortable opening up to her without so much prompting- things that she hadn’t even known she’d done to hurt her, and of course that time in the barn- but this was a start. Maybe one day Audrey could trust her again. She missed that. She missed the way they used to spend all their time together, the way that Audrey used to be able to tell her (almost) anything, the way Audrey had… loved me, Emma supposed.
As Emma broke from that embrace and moved down the stairs to get the magic mix, she wondered if she was a terrible person for wanting that from Audrey again. She wondered why she would even want that if she knew it had hurt the brunette so, so terribly the last time.
This time could be different Emma thought idly. Even she wasn’t entirely sure what she meant by that. Maybe she was just trying to make herself feel less guilty about wanting something that had taken so, so much out of Audrey- and with no pay off. And how would she even go about giving that pay off if she kept working towards getting that kind of emotional investment from Audrey again?
Or worse- would Audrey even want anything Emma could possibly give, especially when they were about to be surrounded by many more new, enticing, and possibly also queer women? Would Emma even compare to anything they could give? And why did she care so much anyway-
A chill ran up her spine and her stomach churned as she thought about Audrey, canceling dates with her in favor of some new girl gang full of pretty, eligible lesbians that wouldn't have near as long a history of doing Audrey wrong as she did, and only then did she realize what kind of excruciating pain Audrey must have been in when they fell out of touch.
After staring at the popcorn for a good two minutes, Emma decided she could at least mix it with the candy while she ruminated over the aforementioned possibility. It shouldn’t matter, right? Audrey could make new friends but Emma would just make sure that she would still be Audrey’s best friend, she'd put in the effort this time, and then if one of those other friends ended up being Audrey's girlfriend then so what? Audrey had the courtesy to do that for her, right? Once they’d started talking again she said nothing about when Emma got caught up with Kieran. She didn’t try to sabotage that relationship, she just tried to keep theirs going. If anything, Kieran tried to sabotage her relationship with Audrey after that audio recording, trying to point out all her bad angles to Emma.
Maybe she was afraid someone who Audrey met would do that with her, somehow. Or maybe she was afraid Audrey would make the same mistakes that she did, like leaving her for another group of friends, or believing a douchey girlfriend's smear campaign about her best friend. And while Emma was sure that she would deserve as much she just couldn’t bring herself let that happen—
“Did you get lost?” A voice came from behind her, and she turned around to see Audrey.
“Oh- yeah, I just spaced out.” Emma only half lied. “We can just eat out of the bucket for now, right?”
“Yeah. Hey are you done packing? We can see if anything’s on T.V.” Audrey offered.
“Just about. Let’s do that.” Emma smiled, leading Audrey to the couch and letting her sit first. She leaned against the brunette once she was settled, setting the popcorn between her thigh and Audrey’s. She wasn’t sure why she needed the closeness so desperately in that moment, but she did need it. Sharing some magic mix was as fine an excuse as any.
She tried to push the train of thought she’d been having in the kitchen to the back of her mind as Audrey took the remote and started to flick through channels. They were about to have a whole few days all to themselves. Maybe that would help her feel a little better and think about her feelings and the possibilities a little more clearly.
Looking up at Audrey’s face with the light from the T.V. spilling across it she made up her mind that she wasn’t going to lose her to anyone. If she’d managed to save her from a killer, she could save their relationship from a few bitchy college girls or a jealous significant other. Audrey had done as much for her with Piper and Kieran, respectively.
Yes, I’ve survived two killers, Emma reminded herself. We survived two killers, together. We can get through anything together.
She just hoped that this somehow wasn’t harder to get through.