Me, Myself, and Her

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Chapter Fifty-Nine: You're On Your Own, Kid

At first, Steve had wanted to protest to Annie's next (and last) stop. He was too worried they'd be too far out of range for Nance and Robin to reach them if they found anything out.

But he never shared his concerns, because the second she asked to go to the cemetery, he knew who she wanted to see next. Dustin and Lucas were a bit confused, but they figured it out, too.

Max guessed this would also be a stop for Annie today. All this end of life planning, it's something Max would've done if she were in Annie's shoes.

Despite the fact that the brunette still held onto Max's hand, the girl didn't look over or confide in her at all. It was obvious Annie wanted someone there, that she needed someone there, but didn't know how to go about it. Max wouldn't be too surprised if Annie didn't know how to process all of this information at once.

Unbeknownst to the redhead, Annie had so much more going on in her mind. The first was the hallucination she had witnessed in her bedroom. It was even more intense, and if everything tracked, that meant the next one was the one.

She also couldn't get the conversation- well, argument with her mom out of her head. Annie had been mentally begging for Vecna to show up again, so Annie could see maybe her mother wasn't such a terrible person. But, she had no such luck. Those being her last words to her mom though? Annie didn't care to change that.

There was also the thought of how she was going to do this stop. As they had gotten closer, Annie pulled out the two envelopes she needed, deciding to leave her backpack. It would just be in the way.

Steve pulled up and parked right below the hill Annie wanted to visit. "I'll be back in like, three minutes, tops," she said, unbuckling and starting to open the door.

When she was fully out of the car, Max went ahead and slid out, too. "Annie, wait," Max said, taking some jogging steps over to Annie. The girl in question stopped and turned to her. "You don't have to be alone, you know."

Annie gave her a small smile. The best she could manage. "I know. I just... need to do this by myself, okay?" Max went to protest, but Annie cut her off. "I'm fine. I promise."

Max wasn't one to push too hard, so she nodded and turned to go back to the car. Annie turned back to her path and went up to the graves.

The Lopez family and the James family decided to bury the girls next to each other. Neither family had any plots or generational gravesites, something Annie's parents did have, so they put the girls together.

Together in death, always. Annie hoped it was nice.

She sat down in front of them, the sun being behind her a bit so it wasn't completely blinding. The headstones weren't as weathered as the others in the cemetery were. There was some dirt on Holly's, though, so she reached forward to wipe it off.

Once it was gone, she retracted her hand and took a deep breath. "Hi," she whispered. Of course, there was no reply. Annie cleared her throat and held the envelopes up. "I... I made these. I have no idea why, but maybe there's some off chance the afterlife does work like the Egyptians thought and you guys can use these somehow."

Carefully, Annie placed each envelope by each girl's headstone. She did it in a way so that their names faced out. Once those were settled, she took another deep breath and looked to her fidgeting hands.

"I... I wanted to write something. But I didn't know what to write. The drawing came a lot easier. That was a good day, and it's something I'd want to hold onto in the afterlife. If there is one. I don't even know if you can hear any of this," Annie said, letting out a sigh as she did.