✓ DYING MOURNINGS, original

five : revelations

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𝐅𝐈𝐕𝐄 : 𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒

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The car ride back to the cabin was filled with pointless chatter that I could hardly remember. I was too focused on the way my skin stuck to my new clothes and the little flakes of dried blood were peeling and crusting on my hands. There was also the fact that I was now facing my own mortality, something I thought I wouldn't have to do once getting shot and nearly bleeding out across town.

I didn't need to think about things like that. Wasn't I just a kid? I was just nineteen, still a teenager, still a kid. I didn't need to be worrying about death and dying and demons and the devil but here I was, stuck in the backseat of an expensive car holding my bloody clothes in a trash bag to my chest.

There were things worse than fate but I wasn't so sure about that now. My fate was beginning to look more and more crappy as the days went on. And, if Cage was right, which I was praying he wasn't, there was a good chance I'd bring Crow to the grave with me. We would die together, or one after the other, an act of sacrifice.

He could already be dead.

I had to mentally slap myself not to think that way. We were going to bring him home tonight. He would be alive and home and warm and him. He'd finally be back here with me.

With us.

The car slowed to a stop outside the cabin and I turned my head, a small gasp leaving my lips. I opened the car door and was out before it was put in park. I threw my hands to my head and yelled, pointing to the accident before me.

"My car!" I cried, bunching my fingers in my hair. "Look what you've done to my car!" I looked up to the sky, seething out, "Pandora, you better find me money to get this repaired or I swear to god–!"

"Pandora did that much damage?" breathed Blondie with a chuckle as she came up to stand beside me. "We found it like this when we got here and, well, when you weren't inside...thought you had gone off into the woods or something."

"She wrapped my car around a goddamn tree," I whispered, shaking my head. The front of the car was totaled, the hood scrunched up and the windshield shattered. The front two tires were flat and there was definitely something leaking from underneath the ruined hood. "If she wasn't already dead, I'd kill her."

"I think maybe she did you a favor," Winker said to me as he approached the mess. He had both hands in his pockets and he was smiling. "She's giving you the perfect excuse just to drive lover boy's car around."

I pursed my lips. He wasn't wrong. Crow's car was significantly better than mine and I wouldn't have to worry about any mechanical failures anytime soon. Changing the subject to stop the pain from losing my car, hopefully just for the time being, I asked, "Did you have any trouble getting what we needed?"

Blondie shook her head. "We got everything inside, grab your things and we can get this show on the road!"

I headed to my car, trying the passenger side door. I gave it a few hard pulls, the door refusing to budge. Winker came to my side, wrapping a hand around the handle to help me pull and the metal with one loud grinding groan finally eased open. The door was scratched all down the side, like a monster had dug its claws in to keep from escaping. Climbing inside the car, I grabbed my bag, checking for the bone I collected and feeling at ease that it was safe.