The Garden of Heathen

Demons run

Aussie's eyes practically bugged out of her head when Hedy stepped out of the tent. Even Gally himself reeled back a few steps to Aussie's surprise. She had no idea what was going on or why she thought she'd heard her name, maybe- probably this was none of her business, but she decided to stay just to make sure they were both ok. At least that's how she justified her morbid curiosity.

She was behind Gally and saw the rapid rise and fall of his broad shoulders. His hands went to his head, running over his hair, before his arms went out wide.

"Wha- what are you doing?" He asked her quietly but his tone and body language was quite frenetic.

Hedy stood there in shorts so short Aussie assumed she'd find some cut off shorts legs somewhere in the garden one day, and a button up shirt that was not buttoned up. She shuffled nervously, not her usual confident self.

"I just- I wanted you," she admitted softly.

His hands landed heavily on his hips as he shook his head.
"So this is what you do?!" He paced in a small circle before facing her again, his posture just exuding anger. "In my sleep?!"

"I thought you'd wake up and... be pleasantly surprised and just go with it," she muttered.

"Really? After I told you I had no interest in being your friend, you thought I'd just go with it?"

"We don't have to be friends to-"

"Shut up."

Hedy's head ducked just a bit at his low, angry tone. Somehow it felt scarier than if he had yelled. If she hadn't done something so immoral Aussie would have felt bad for her.

"Have you done this before?" He asked her.

She shook her head, avoiding his gaze.

"Have you done this before?" He asked again taking one quick step toward her.

"No!" She said as she flinched backward, almost tripping back into the tent.

Gally covered his face with his hands and stood there in silence for a moment.

"What are you going to do?" Her voice had a nervous edge to it. "Are you going to tell Aussie and the others?"

He looked up and saw the fear glimmering in her eyes and he almost felt bad.

"Please, please don't tell. I don't want to get banished! Please, I'll do anything!" She begged and pleaded.

Gally seemed to be mulling it over for a moment and Aussie was curious to see what he would do.

"If you leave me alone- and by that I mean don't speak to me or even come near me if at all possible, I won't tell," he bargained. "But only for as long as you stay away from me. There's none of this 3 strikes thing, it's one strike. You got it?"

She nodded fervently.

"Get out of here," he jerked his chin toward the camp the girls slept in and she immediately bolted off before he could change his mind.

Aussie bit her lips, wondering if she should come out and try to comfort him, or come out and act is if she hadn't witnessed the whole thing, or just leave it be and go back to bed. Most of those options were taken off the table when Gally suddenly spun on his heel and started marching toward her little house.

She quickly darted behind the tree further so he wouldn't catch her eavesdropping, and watched him falter for a second at the bottom of her stairs, his hand gripping the rail so tightly she could tell his knuckles were white even in the dark. Finally he charged up the stairs as well and softly knocked on her door, shifting nervously as his hands wouldn't keep still. He bit his thumbnail, ran his hands over his hair and his face and crossed his arms in the span of like, 4 seconds. Finally Aussie came to her senses and realized that she nor anyone else was inside to answer him, and he seemed to be getting more agitated as he knocked again and softly called her name.