"I'm dying. All these secrets and lies are slowly suffocating me."
Grace Hart is suddenly torn away from her old fairytale life, stranded on a deserted island with nine other girls. She expected nothing but wellness and luxury, yet the "Dawn of Eve"...
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------ twenty ------
No one came for them. 22 days. They had been stranded on the island for 22 days. Six days had passed since the plane flew over. Two days without food. The girls had wasted their resources. There was nothing left. There weren't even tears left to cry. Fear had vanished and was replaced with an unbearable hunger. By that time, they had accepted their fate.
Death by starvation, that wasn't on her bucket list, but like the rest Grace learned to live with it. She was going crazy. If it hadn't been for Toni, her fuse would have blown long ago. Most of her days, Grace spent with her and Martha. Occasionally, she kept Shelby company.
"I let us eat all of the food. Such a fucking idiot." Hunger took out the best of them. Dot had been consumed by guilt for the past six days. The last two were the worst for her. Guilt filled the void in her stomach.
"Hey. Don't talk about my friend like that, all right? You keep being nasty to her and I'll have to take you." Shelby, on the other hand, was her old self again. No mental breakdowns. Some people blossomed in a crisis. Grace wasn't one of them.
When the blond looked up, she saw Shelby taking out her dentures. "Bar fight, 2015. You should have seen the other guy," she joked, hoping for a smile that she didn't receive.
Whilst the Texan found her light, Leah went back into the dark. She kept to herself, always sitting a few feet away from the group. Conspiracy theories raced through her head. "Maybe he's in on it," she stated.
"Who?" Grace failed to follow her.
"The fucking pilot." Her voice cracked. She wanted to cry, but she couldn't. "What kind of a person sees an island full of lost girls and doesn't send help?"
"Leah, what would he be in on?" Shelby was just as confused as Grace. Leah always seemed miles in front of them. Her theories seemed wild. But at the end of the day, the crazy girl was the first to figure it all out.
"I don't know."
Shelby sat down beside her, resting her hand on the brunette's shoulder to comfort her. Giving someone comfort in a situation like that, was nearly impossible. Yet Shelby had given it her best. "Take it easy, all right? We're gonna be okay."
Grace wasn't so sure of it anymore. Meanwhile Martha remained blinded by faith. For her, giving up wasn't an option. Maybe, that was why the cheerleader kept so close to her during those days of hunger.
"There's no way that he didn't call it in. People love to help out, you know?" She offered Leah a smile. "It's probably just taking a minute." A long minute. Time passed differently out there. Days were longer. Nights were shorter. Their lives had stopped, while the world went on running.
------ flashback ------
Tragedy brings people closer together. It brought Maria and Grace Hart closer together. Before her father's death they hardly ever spoke, but now they bonded over their loss. Maria hadn't spent half as much time with her daughter beforehand. To be fair she was all the woman had left in this world. She had left her old friend group when they headed for bankruptcy. She was too embarrassed to face them.
