Dark Places

42 | what would you do if i wasn't here?

—I HAD to use an I Know What You Did Last Summer gif for this chapter. ABSOLUTE TRASH MOVIE. 💀

❝they call them rogues.
they travel fast and alone.
one hundred foot faces
of god's good ocean gone wrong.❞

☽

V. ROUGH WATERS

THE ART OF DUMPING A BODY.

I've never wished I was sober more in my entire life. It feels like the shitty flashback intro from I Know What You Did Last Summer, in which I stand in a salty mist at the edge of a deserted pier and watch myself watch her body fall into a starving, gnashing ocean, and I swear to take this to the grave, and I wonder how the fuck I ended up... here.

Except I didn't kill her.

Sophany was already dead. I knew that.

Regardless, I stomp forward, frantic footfalls fumbling to close the space between us. "Did you run her over?" I sputter, shooting him an incredulous look. He blinks. "Drake!"

"Oh, don't give me that look." Drake groans, heaving an exasperated sigh as I gawk at him in disbelief. His eyes flash in annoyance. "What?" He tosses a hand up, gesturing to the disfigured, decaying corpse in front of us. This can't be happening. No. No. "She was already dead!"

"I am tired, Drake. I am really, really, really tired of finding dead bodies with you."

"It's only been two."

"That's two too many!" I stomp a foot childishly. "I don't want to find body parts in your stupid Volvo or be looking over my shoulder for rotting bodies, or— or— I just don't want to do this!" I swallow a thick sob, blink past a flood of frustrated tears, and whip around to slam a palm against his trunk as I choke on a bitter laugh. "What even is this? The Italian Mafia? Sure, Medina, I'm going to find Sophany's head in my bed next, huh?"

Inhaling deeply, I try to calm my frayed nerves. But Sophany is dead, here, and I don't understand why they're terrorizing us, taunting us, and I'm shivering, shaking, spiraling into hiccuping cries, slumping in paralyzing panic. "I'm not smart enough to survive this, Drake! I'm going to fucking die, and I—" I can't do this. "I'm going to die, me voy a morir, Medina, voy a morir—"

"Ay, Melo, calm the fuck down." Drake slaps my ass sharply, and I whip around, only for him to catch my arms and wrangle me to a dead standstill against his chest, tightly wound into a confusing cocktail of fear and rage. His gaze zeroes in on my trembling bottom lip. He softens, cupping my jaw to sweep his thumbs across my damp cheeks. "Tranquila, Luz, you're losing it, and I need you to stay with me." He nods, refusing to let go. He just... holds me. "You're not going to die, ¿entiendes?"

Sniffling, I nod. "Okay. Okay, yeah. No. I'm... I'm not going to die."

Drake hesitates, gauging my expression, before letting his grip loosen ever so slightly. It catches up to me quickly, so fucking quickly, and I blow out an exhausted breath as I untangle myself, averting my gaze meekly. Fuck, it had been years since I cried in front of him, begging for misplaced comfort in all the wrong places, in the wrong... person.

I shake my head when Drake tries to reach for me again. It's supposed to be different. I don't need it.

"¿Bien?" He nods curtly, acknowledging it, and shifts his body to stare down at Sophany. "Okay, just help me get her in the trunk, Melo."