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the woman on the beach
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. ✧ ・゜. +・o ✧
Alina Fairgrieves-Byers really wanted out of this. Her throat was raw with screams, and every so often a cough rattled out of her mouth. The crashed car, the monster, all of the images she'd seen were burned under her eyelids, pulsing there in case she decided to close her eyes. It would be so easy to whip off her blindfold right now, let El finish everything. Because even though the beach seemed so safe, Alina knew it wasn't. It would be so easy to walk away.
But that wasn't what she did. She'd always been brave—which didn't mean she had no fear, rather that she kept going in the face of it. And there had been many reasons in her life before now to be afraid, even before she'd been introduced to the Upside Down. So she kept her blindfold on. Kept her real arms by her sides. Took a deep breath of this salty air and wiggled her toes under the sand, preparing herself.
And that was when Mike spoke, his voice echoed and distorted through the sandy environment. "El. Al. Are you two okay? Are you okay?"
El took a deep breath. She was standing ankle-deep in the water, her face wet with saltwater and tears. She looked to Alina. "I'm okay."
"Me too." Alina blinked through the haze of sunlight, investigating the area. She'd never been to a beach before. When Linda left, her dad had been more focused on his work to let them go anywhere—although he had promised that in a couple years he'd take her on the best vacation of all time. Linda, on the other hand, actually had taken Alina on vacation, but not to a place where children would actually have fun. No, instead they went to various European countries to look at teacups and fancy china in museums.
Teacups and fancy china. Those were, apparently, the only things Europe offered.
"What's going on?" Mike asked.
"We're... on a beach," El explained. She moved towards Alina, taking her hand. Alina held it gratefully. It was a raft in the middle of a raging ocean during a thunderstorm.
