DISCONTINUED / NO LONGER WRITING
❛ and its new, the shape of your
body, its blue the feelin' i got and
it's ooh, whoa-oh. it's a cruel summer.
and it's cool, that's what i tell 'em. no
rules in breakable heaven, but ooh,
whoa-oh. it's a cruel summer...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
𝐂𝐑𝐔𝐄𝐋 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐄𝐑 / 𝖼𝗁𝖺𝗉𝗍𝖾𝗋 𝖿𝗈𝗋𝗍𝗒-𝗍𝗁𝗋𝖾𝖾 ❛ it's best to not say you've hit rock bottom. you can always go lower. ❜
THEY SAY THERE ARE five stages of grief. Five stages and five different emotions a person goes through when they experienced the grieving loss of losing a loved one. Stella Routledge had only made it through four.
The first stage is denial. Stella denied that her brother was gone for days. He isn't dead, she repeated in her head for multiple days after the storm. She cried like she'd never cried after hearing the fatal news, and she shouted and yelled at the police officers for giving up on looking for them. She couldn't believe John B was gone—she didn't want to believe it.
The second stage was anger. Stella trashed the Château after she got home. When she saw John B's face in the pictures around her house, she grew angry. She tossed it across the room and watched it shatter before moving onto the next one. JJ had to force her to calm down, caging her to him and fighting her until she broke down into sobs in his arms.
The third was bargaining. She bargained a lot. She stayed in this stage for a lot longer than the rest. She still sometimes did it, even weeks after the accident. What if she had gone with him? She should've gone with him. It should've been her, not him. He should've turned back when Ward told him too. Maybe then he would still be here with her.
Then there was depression. Stella still resided in this stage. Even weeks after the storm, Stella remained bed ridden. JJ stayed at the Château with her, helicoptering. He didn't need to. She only ever left the comfort of her bed to go to the bathroom. She didn't eat and she didn't drink. She was a zombie.
They say the next stage is acceptance, but Stella can't seem to imagine herself ever accepting her brother's death.
She was in John B's sweatshirt, hood tugged over her head to hide her tousled, uncombed hair. Mascara smudged under her eyes from the crying and blanket pulled to her chin.
The power was back on the island and it seemed everything went back to normal. The world still spun while it stopped for Stella. For Stella Routledge, the sun didn't rise. She was trapped in a dark night filled and littered with the monsters that kept her up. The ground cracked and she fell through, watching as everything she loved disappeared.
DCS was back on her ass like nothing had changed. There was an eviction notice on the outside of her house. She hadn't payed the bills in over a month. She hadn't worked in over a month. She hadn't even left her home.
Everything changed when John B died. No one was the same. JJ tried to hide his heartbreak and be there for his girlfriend, but it became so hard. They were both hurting and they were both broken but he needed to be strong. He needed to be strong for her.
