DISCONTINUED
Alina Fairgrieves-Byers and Gabriel Burton have learned to expect the worst, but that doesn't make things less disappointing.
𝐄𝐗𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐃 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘 𝐈𝐍𝐒𝐈𝐃𝐄
( 𝐎𝐂 𝐗 𝐋𝐔𝐂𝐀𝐒 𝐒𝐈𝐍𝐂𝐋𝐀𝐈𝐑 )
( 𝐎𝐂 𝐗 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋 𝐁𝐘𝐄...
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wide awake
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. ✧ ・゜. +・o ✧
Alina scrubbed another dish, letting the soapy water rinse away the remnants of food from this evening's dinner. Tonight, it had been meatloaf with baked macaroni and cheese, a dish lovingly prepared by Dolores in honour of Alina's arrival. She'd spent hours moving around the house, chopping up ingredients and mixing them together and ensuring that everything cooked to just the right temperature. When she'd arrived back at the Burton household, Alina had offered to help, but Dolores had insisted that she would take care of it. Alina, fresh from Reefer Rick's boathouse, had been too exhausted to argue—everything Eddie had just told her had zapped all of her energy. So, instead of standing beside Dolores and helping her trembling hands shape the meatloaf together, she instead played with Nicole in the living room, brought a glass of water to George, and headed to Gabe's room to attempt to calm down.
It didn't feel like she'd learned about Chrissy's murder this morning. It didn't feel like she'd tried to call everyone she cared about to make sure they were okay this morning, either. Today, the hours had stretched out, some of them so long that they felt like days. Surely, it was an eternity ago that her flight landed in Indianapolis. Surely, it had been an infinity since Nicole had launched herself into her arms as a greeting.
She hadn't seen Lucas at all today. It was wrong, just like everything else was—twisted, contorted, upside down. She needed him. She needed her boyfriend to wrap her up in his arms and tell her everything would be all right, even if that couldn't be further from the truth. She needed to feel the sturdiness of his hand within hers and finally let herself breathe.
She didn't have any of that. Instead, she was drowning in her own mind, unwanted memories springing up.
Every single time this happened, Alina always thought, well, at least it's over, now. When El had vanquished the Demogorgon and disappeared in a clump of ash. When she'd woken up in the hospital in a sheen of sweat, the Mind Flayer's corpse expelled from her desperate lungs. When she'd watched Starcourt Mall burn.
