#1) at the funeral hera keeps asking how it will make things 'better' which feels relevant | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

stillgeekingout · 7 years

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amazing news! it’s time for another chapter of everyone’s favorite, the ultimate aaron milverton crossover fic, now with extra crossover!

once again it’s longer than any of the other chapters... why do I keep doing this... but it’ll make sense when you read it

tw: a lot of mentions of death (again... it’ll make sense when you read it)

previous chapters as usual: 1 here, 2 here, 3 here, 4 here, 5 here, 6 here, 7 here, 8 here

------

“How do you think it’s going?”

“Alex, you don’t have to whisper, they won’t hear you from the car,” Blair said.

“Oh, right.”

It had been about five minutes since Blair had returned to the van and there was still no sign of Aaron or Chad. Zoe hadn’t really thought this plan through-- would she just leave Aaron there if he didn’t come outside soon? She couldn’t exactly send anyone in after him. If Aaron was making a move, she didn’t want to interrupt. She leaned back in her seat, resigned to waiting it out.

“So, Hera--”

“I’m sorry,” Blair interrupted, “I can’t keep calling her Hera, it’s just too odd for me.” She twisted around to look back at Hera. “Don’t you have an alexname or something?”

“An alexname?”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Zoe. “She means a nickname. But you don’t have to change your name for her sake. She’ll get over it.” She shot Blair a look.

“Actually…” Hera said, then stopped. Zoe glanced at her in the rear view mirror. Her eyes were closed in concentration. She opened them, seeming to decide something. “My real name is Rachel. You can just call me that.”

------

Rachel Yorick was not having a great life. For starters, pretty much everyone she cared about outside of her family had been murdered. Then there was the fact that the person she was in love with had been one of the ones doing the killing (...and the being killed). And to top it off, she was stuck living with her parents and working part-time as a cashier at some touristy froyo place. Who knew her dead-end theatre career would be the least of her problems.

Not that she had really tried to pursue acting after her world had totally fallen apart about a year and a half before. She had taken the rest of the semester off, postponing her graduation yet again. Eventually, she finished her degree online without much fanfare. She couldn’t bear the thought of physically going back to Wittenberg. Too many memories. Too many ghosts. (Perhaps literally.)

Speaking of ghosts, she had waited the better part of a year for Hamlet’s to show back up, but to no avail. She couldn’t help but feel hurt all over again. Why had Hamlet visited Ford and not her? Why had she put up the videos so they couldn’t be removed and then disappeared without another trace?

Rachel hadn’t talked to Ford since all the funerals. God, there had been so many funerals. She had thought Hamlet’s would be the hardest, but almost no one was there (she tried not to think about the fact that there would have been more people if they hadn’t all died). No, it turned out facing Marci’s family was much worse. Rachel and Marci had been inseparable since high school; it was like parting with a sister. She felt so numb she could barely muster the energy to cry.

So after the funerals and a few other legal things (Laura’s court case, for example), Rachel hadn’t kept track of Ford’s whereabouts. She assumed he was busy running Elsinore Castle, whether he claimed he wanted to or not. For all she knew, Hamlet’s ghost was still visiting him every day. She hated that the thought almost made her jealous. How sick was it to wish to be haunted by your dead best friend?

And she was haunted, in a way. By the nightmares. Her friends lying on the floor, covered in blood. Hospital rooms. Gunshots. It was all too much.

So she had moved back in with her parents, gotten a therapist, and started working at the froyo shop to get her mind off of things. It was a decent drive from her house but even in her current state, she couldn’t stand the thought of spending all her time at the middle-of-nowhere edge of Kissimmee. And the time passed, and she learned to survive. To push through another day if it meant one day farther from the worst thing that could have ever happened. One day closer to living some semblance of a normal life.

A chime went off above the door. Rachel blinked a few times to clear her head. She was at work, zoning out again. She tended to do that a lot these days. Three people walked in: two strangers followed by someone she had never expected to see again.

Laura O’Ness.

It couldn’t be. Could it?

Rachel craned her head, trying to get a better look.

Laura was in prison. Laura would be in prison for probably 25 years. She wouldn’t be here with some random strangers, sporting a new haircut and casually loading up a giant cup of froyo. Would she?

Rachel was so preoccupied by Laura(???) that she accidentally dropped the froyo she was trying to hand back to the poor girl in front of her.

“Ohhh my god I’m sorry,” she said. She handed the girl some napkins, still distracted. The girl who couldn’t be Laura looked over at her and showed no signs of recognition, just a look of disdain at being stared at by a stranger. Rachel blinked, wondering if she was imagining things. She looked at the girl on whom she had spilled the froyo, realizing she was being a terrible employee.

“Seriously, I’m really sorry about that. I was just, uh.” Distracted by the doppelganger of the girl who killed my best friend? “Startled, I guess.”

“Startled?”

“Well, you know,” she started, realizing ‘startled’ had been the wrong word, “sometimes I see a pretty girl and I make a fool of myself.” Saved by the gay. The girl’s face changed, and Rachel realized maybe that had come across as flirting. Which, to be fair, the girl was very pretty, but Rachel wasn’t exactly in a good place to date anyone.

“Blair has that effect on people sometimes,” the girl said.

“Blair?” So she definitely wasn't Laura. Or she was Laura in disguise. (Why would Laura be in disguise?)

“My friend. I’m Zoe.” Oh no, she was introducing herself. It must’ve seemed like flirting. “I’d shake your hand, but…” Zoe looked down at her skirt, still covered in froyo.

“Hera,” said Rachel. It was a name she had started using with strangers, because her real name was connected to those awful videos that she still couldn’t figure out how to take down and didn’t want anyone to find. It was sort of an anagram of her name, with some letters missing, which made her English-nerd heart happy. Plus, she liked Greek mythology, and the original Hera took no shit from anyone (something Rachel needed to get better at).

Zoe seemed to find the name funny. “What?” Rachel asked.

“Nothing,” said Zoe. “That’s Blair’s mom’s name.” So again, she couldn’t be Laura. Laura’s mom’s name was Laura, and also Laura’s mom was dead. Not really something to laugh about.

Zoe was still talking. “I mean, not that that’s… I haven’t met her mom. I don’t know why I laughed. It’s a pretty name.” She trailed off, looking embarrassed. It was pretty endearing, Rachel had to admit.

“Thanks,” she said, and Zoe went back to her futile skirt-cleaning attempts.

“Is your bathroom back there?” Zoe asked.

“Yeah,” said Rachel. She had been so distracted by Blair-not-Laura that she had almost forgotten about the froyo. As Zoe turned to go, she felt like she should probably do something better to make up for her mistake than pointing to the bathroom. “Hey,” she said, “let me buy you a new dress. I feel badly that yours is so cute and I ruined it.” Then she kicked herself for sounding like she was flirting again.

“Oh, no, it’s fine, I’m sure it’ll wash out,” said Zoe. Phew. But Rachel still wanted to help.

“Please,” she said, “I’ll feel better. At least let me give you some money for it.” She started to reach for her wallet.

“Only if you come with me to pick it out,” Zoe said. Crap. That was definitely flirting. Rachel ran through a mental list of ways to politely turn her down. She had tried going on a few dates over the past year in an attempt to get Hamlet out of her head, but none of them helped and she felt badly for leading those girls on. And Zoe seemed nice; she deserved better.

But she was pretty. And one date wasn’t a commitment, especially when it wasn’t explicitly a date. And it was an excuse to go to Goodwill, which Rachel always loved. Maybe it would cheer her up, help her stop thinking about not-Laura. She took a breath.

“I get off in an hour,” she said. Zoe smiled. Please don’t let me regret this, Rachel thought. From the corner of her eye, she watched not-Laura stand up to get more froyo.

-----

“This is… a really big Goodwill,” Zoe said, her eyes wide.

“Isn’t it great? I get the best stuff here.” Rachel couldn’t help being a little bit bubbly. There was something about ridiculous clothing that still brought her joy even when other things couldn’t. She bounced back to the dresses and grabbed the first thing that popped out at her. “Oh my god, this is hilarious, you have to try it on,” she said, giving it to Zoe.

“There’s no way that will fit me,” said Zoe, “But I guess I’ll try it on.” She glanced skeptically at Rachel before going into the dressing room. (Marci used to give her a similar look. Rachel felt a sudden pang of sadness.)

“Yeah, this definitely doesn’t fit,” Zoe called through the door, snapping Rachel out of her haze.

“That’s fine,” she called back, “I’ll find something else.” She returned to rifling through dresses.

The second dress Zoe tried on was obnoxious in the best way. She didn’t seem to see the appeal, however. “Are you sure about this?” She looked down at the skirt, pulling at it.

“The thing about terrible clothes is that’s what makes them great,” Rachel said. “Trust me, it’s a lifestyle choice.”

“Hmmm,” said Zoe, but she let Rachel hand her a third option without complaint.

“So are you from here?” Rachel asked, while Zoe was changing. She wanted to know if she’d be able to get out of a commitment easily. Maybe Zoe was just a tourist. Most people in that part of Orlando were.

“Currently, no,” Zoe said. “I’m Floridian but I moved to DC a couple years ago. My friends and I just came down for a convention.” Rachel breathed a sigh of relief.

“Wait, which one?” she asked, feeling safe to have a conversation now that she knew Zoe wouldn’t be expecting anything from her beyond that evening. “I didn’t know there was a con this weekend-- Oh, I love that.” Zoe looked very cute in dresses, Rachel had to hand her that. But Zoe still didn’t seem satisfied, so Rachel handed her another option to try.

“So are you from Orlando then?” Zoe asked through the door once she had closed it again.

“Yeah,” Rachel said. “Pretty much been here my whole life. I went to Wittenberg for school but Winter Park might as well be Orlando. Same with Kissimmee, which is technically where I live now.”

“Oh ok, I don’t know this area super well,” Zoe said. “We basically just come down here for Disney. And I went to Wizarding World once.”

“Nice, have you seen Diagon Alley yet?” Small talk was good. Small talk was safe.

“No, I’ve been meaning to! Is it good?”

“It’s so good. Hogsmeade is great, but it still feels like a theme park, you know? Diagon Alley makes you feel like you’re really there.”

“Yeah, I’ll have to go one of these days.”

Rachel wasn’t sure what to say next. She didn’t really want to ask anything personal. Light conversation was one thing, but she didn’t want to lead Zoe on (even if she was leaving town). Luckily, she didn’t have to come up with anything because Zoe opened the door again, looking unfortunately adorable.

“Seriously, this is the one,” Rachel said. “It looks amazing on you.” Careful, she told herself.

“I don’t know…” said Zoe.

“Now you’re just fishing for compliments!”

“I am not!” Zoe protested. “You just have very… interesting taste.”

“Come on, you have to admit you are rocking that dress.” She was. In fact, it annoyed Rachel how good Zoe looked when she was trying her best not to get attached.

“I rock a lot of dresses,” Zoe said, grinning. “I just don’t know if this is one of them.”

“Fine! Fine! I’ll find something else!” Rachel threw her hands up in mock exasperation.

After several more tries, Zoe finally agreed to one of Rachel’s suggestions. Rachel had the suspicion that she had worn her down. They moved on to looking at jackets-- Rachel’s weakness. The gaudier the better.

She hit the jackpot right away, pulling out matching pink Grease jackets with hand-written logos which she eventually convinced Zoe to buy (though Zoe put back the dress). Rachel pulled the jacket on for the second time as they walked through the parking lot.

“Tell me more, tell me more,” she sang at Zoe, twirling around and fanning out the jacket.

“I told you, I hate Grease!” Zoe said, laughing again. But she put hers on too.

“Me too,” admitted Rachel. “It’s super white and has terrible morals and Rizzo should’ve ended up with Frenchy. But it’s a catchy song.”

Zoe shrugged, then jokingly grabbed Rachel’s arm. “Summer dreams, ripped at the seams…”

Rachel was surprised by how nice Zoe’s singing voice was. “Bu-hut, oh,” she said in her best terrible John Travolta impression, whipping her head around to face Zoe.

“Those su-ummer niiiiiiiights,” they both sang, then laughed.

“I would like the movie better if it was about Steph and Lisa,” Zoe said, gesturing to the name on the front of her jacket.

“Oh, definitely,” Rachel said. “Well, this is my car.” She stopped. She wasn’t sure where Zoe had parked. Zoe looked at her, then looked away, then looked at her again.

“Hey, do you… do you want to get some dinner?”

“Um,” Rachel said. It would be so easy to leave. She could say she had to work early, or she had somewhere to be… or she could be honest and say she wanted to because Zoe was cute and nice but she was still sort of getting over her dead best friend. Maybe without the dead part.

“You don’t have to,” Zoe said, and Rachel realized she had paused too long again.

“I probably shouldn’t,” Rachel said, not giving a reason. “But this has been nice.”

“Yeah!” Zoe said, clearly disappointed but pretty good at faking nonchalance. “Thanks for spilling froyo on me.”

“Any time,” Rachel said. “You know where to find me.”

“Mmhmm,” Zoe said. “Nice meeting you, Hera.” Rachel had already forgotten she told Zoe that name. But she nodded.

“You too,” she said, and smiled. “Bye, Steph.”

“Bye, Lisa.”

There was an awkward moment where Rachel wasn’t sure if they should hug or shake hands or something. Eventually she just waved and got in the car, shutting the door on what might’ve been a great opportunity if Rachel’s life wasn’t such a mess. When she was sure Zoe had walked away, she rested her head on the steering wheel and sighed.

------

The next time Rachel saw her therapist, she mentioned that she was finally ready to talk about her relationship with Hamlet.

Up until that point, she had mostly avoided the subject, choosing instead to focus on all the other trauma that came along with the events of the previous year. She had been telling herself that it was fine, that she needed to work through all of that, but meeting Zoe made her realize she was delaying the inevitable. The truth was, she didn’t want to confront her relationship with Hamlet because she knew it had been unhealthy and a part of her still wasn’t ready to let go.

“Your precious Hamlet.” Ford’s words echoed in her mind every time she thought about it, and she pushed them away. Because, really, how was she supposed to accept that her best friend, the person she was in love with, was “an abusive murderer”? Even after all this time, Rachel couldn’t put Hamlet at fault. She had been put under so much pressure that she cracked. It was Claude to blame, Claude and his manipulation.

But Hamlet had still killed Paul, and Rosa, and Gil, and even Claude, though Rachel couldn’t help but think the last one was deserved. She had still belittled Alex, outed him, and then broadcasted it all online against his will. She had been terrible to him; Rachel could see that even through her jealousy. Why had Hamlet dated him in the first place? Who dates their kid friend? If she had just dated Rachel instead--

And that was where she always ended up. “If Hamlet had just dated me instead, none of this would have happened. Because I would have been there for her. I could have helped her.” As unhealthy as she knew it was, as much as she hated herself for doing it, she still held onto this ideal in which no one died and she and Hamlet lived happily forever. “Your precious Hamlet.”

It was an ideal that she knew would fall apart as soon as she confronted it, which is why she had thus far been unwilling to do so. Better to keep at least one shred of something positive in her mind, even a pointless hypothetical that would never change anything. She had been fully prepared to cling onto it forever.

But then she met Zoe.

Zoe was the first person who made her feel normal again, even for just a few minutes. Because for a moment there, she had pushed her awful life to the side of her brain and let herself just sing in a parking lot with a pretty stranger. There was something freeing about it. Her family was supportive, but it always felt like they were walking on eggshells around her. Zoe had just treated Rachel like anyone else, something she hadn’t really experienced since acquiring a tragic backstory.

Turning her down had been the right thing to do at the time, but it made Rachel realize that she wanted that again. That sense of talking to someone who knew nothing about her life, who only judged her as the girl from the froyo store who loved Goodwill and not someone to be tiptoed around, a fragile spineless bystander who watched the people she loved kill each other and didn’t manage to save them.

And if chasing that feeling meant risking tarnishing her memories of Hamlet, so be it. She was done living in the past.

------

A few months later, Rachel took a day trip to St. Augustine. She needed a breather from her family. Several of her cousins were in town for Thanksgiving and they were all being overly nice to her, which was well-meant but exhausting. So she had taken the day to visit one of her favorite places. It made her inner history nerd happy and it was somewhere she had never been with Hamlet or Marci, so it felt untainted.

In that regard, though, she was doing slightly better. Therapy was helping, as was her resolve to make a tangible effort to move on. Obviously everything wasn’t magically fixed, but she was almost to the point where she might be ready to find some new friends.

All right universe, you gonna send me some new friends? she thought, then laughed to herself a little. Right, because browsing gift shops alone was a great way to make friends. One of these days she would have to actually try being social. But until then, she had plenty of tourists to keep her company.

“You know, I have a pink jacket that would look great with that shirt.”

Rachel turned, sure she had misheard the voice. But no, it really was Zoe standing next to her. She blinked several times, processing. Not what I expected, universe, she thought. But I’ll take it.

If Zoe wasn’t going to act surprised, neither was she. “Is that right? Funny, so do I!”

“What a weird coincidence.” An understatement if she’d ever heard one.

“Yeah,” she said, thinking quickly, “my friend and I have matching ones.” Maybe if she pretended she and Zoe were already friends, Zoe would go along with it and forget that Rachel had rejected her once before. “She wasn’t sold on the idea at first, but I talked her into it.”

“I’m sure she’s glad you did,” Zoe said, and Rachel smiled at the shirt rack she was thumbing through. Success. “It probably reminds her of a fun experience.”

“I hope it does. I know it does for me.”

“Sounds like you two get along well,” Zoe said. How is this happening? Rachel thought.

“Yeah, I don’t get to see her often. She lives in DC, and I live in Orlando, so that’s not really conducive to hanging out.” She was beginning to see Zoe’s long distance status as a positive thing. She could practice normal human interaction for however long Zoe was in town, and she wouldn’t feel too much pressure because it didn’t have to turn into anything long term. “Now that I say that, though, I remember her saying she was Floridian, so it wouldn’t be out of the question for her to visit again. I could even potentially run into her on a day trip to St. Augustine.”

“I’m guessing she grew up right near here and she’s visiting her mom for Thanksgiving,” Zoe said. “I bet she doesn’t know you’re in town. You should ask her out to lunch or something, while you’re here.” She had to admire Zoe’s willingness to forgive her for the strange way she had left things after the Goodwill trip.

Rachel took a deep breath. “Do you think she’d want to do something right now?”

“I think she would love to,” Zoe said. Maybe she also had reason to want a fun day with no strings attached. Rachel didn’t care. All she knew was there was a nice girl with no knowledge of her past who wanted to spend the day with her, and she wasn’t going to waste it.

“I’m sure if you grew up here you’ve seen all the historical sites already, but that’s my favorite thing if you’re willing to see some of them again.” It seemed like a fine time to drop the banter. “If you don’t mind going with an obnoxious history nerd, that is.”

“Honestly, I haven’t been inside the castle since the 4th grade field trip,” Zoe said. “And I’m sure obnoxious history nerds make great tour guides.”

So they went to the Castillo, and Rachel almost didn’t notice her guard slipping. Zoe listened to all of her fun facts and genuinely seemed interested. “I’m sure they told us that in school, but it’s much better when you tell it. You’re my new second-favorite history storyteller.”

“Who’s the first?”

“Lin-Manuel Miranda.”

“Of course.”

They talked about their jobs (Zoe’s PR work in DC put Rachel’s frozen yogurt career to shame), the midterm elections that had just happened, their families, and other safe topics. Rachel made sure not to bring up college or her friends. It was fine, though, Zoe didn’t really talk much about her friends either. Maybe she’s got some kind of dark secret too, Rachel joked to herself. Can’t possibly be as weird as mine.

When they left the castle, they stood around for a while, just talking. It was surprisingly easy to talk to Zoe, now that she was allowing herself to. She knew at some point they’d have to end their little date (was it a date?) but she wasn’t ready for that yet. That would mean returning to her real life. She was just contemplating asking Zoe to dinner when someone she didn’t recognize ran up to them, shouting.

“Zoe! We did a bad thing!”

The following conversation (including another boy who ran up behind Zoe’s friend) made absolutely no sense to Rachel. She tried to follow along in Zoe’s attempts to calm down her friend, but there were too many references to events she didn’t know about. She hoped whatever this situation was wouldn’t cut their date(?) short.

She was almost maybe starting to catch up to speed when not-Laura showed up. Great. She had somehow forgotten about Zoe’s friend Blair and her uncanny familiarity. She also didn’t realize they were good enough friends that she would come with her on Thanksgiving vacation. Maybe this hadn’t been a good idea after all. How could she continue to act normally with this girl standing right there?

“I should maybe… go…” she cut in, as Zoe and her friends continued their confusing conversation.

“No!” Zoe said forcefully. Good, maybe she would shoo everyone off and Rachel could ask her to dinner after all. “I mean, I can explain. Please don’t go.” She gave Rachel a pleading look. Rachel didn’t want an explanation, she wanted to hang out with Zoe alone. But Zoe was already introducing everyone. “Um, you’ve met Aaron, and these are my friends Blair and Alex.”

“I remember you,” she told Blair. Or Laura, if it really was her in disguise. (She hadn’t totally ruled it out.) “Nice to meet you, Alex.”

Zoe coughed, and Rachel realized for the first time that maybe she was jealous. After all, Rachel had explained away staring at Blair by saying she was attracted to her. But there was no way to explain the truth to Zoe, so she kept quiet. “Anyway, so…” Zoe said, clearly intent on explaining the situation. “Blair started a charity organization a few years ago and Aaron is one of the members.” Wow, if only Laura was so nice. Clearly Rachel was being unfair projecting her dislike of Laura onto this girl. But how could she not?

“Religion,” Blair said. “And I didn’t start it, Chad did.” And just like that, Rachel lost track of the conversation again.

After a few minutes, Zoe came to the conclusion that the only way to solve whatever the heck was going on was to take a group road trip to Miami, right then. Well, that was unexpected. But then, everything so far with Zoe had been unexpected.

“Sorry about this,” Zoe said to her, as they walked towards her car. “I wish we could keep hanging out.” This was the moment for Rachel to leave, she knew. But she didn’t want to go back to her family, and she didn’t want to stop talking to Zoe. Besides, she was kind of intrigued by the whole quest. Zoe had made the first move three times now. It was her turn to be adventurous, even if she would regret it later.

“I mean, I’m down for a road trip,” she said. Zoe turned towards her, surprised. She had gone too far. What kind of person asks to go on a several hour road trip with a girl they barely know and her friends? “If you don’t mind, of course.”

But Zoe surprised her again. “Not at all,” she said, and kept walking towards her car as if nothing was off. Rachel wondered if she had these kinds of adventures often. She was starting to get excited, when--

She stopped in her tracks. “This is your car?” Zoe’s minivan was identical to Marci’s. Of course it was. What was it with this girl? She was the one person who could distract Rachel from her past, and yet she was surrounded by things that brought it back up again.

Zoe started trying to defend herself, which made Rachel realize she was being rude again. It must have seemed like she was judging Zoe for her choice of car.

“No, no, I like it,” she said. She was intent on having this adventure, damn it, and she wasn’t going to let Laura’s secret twin or Marci’s car duplicate stop her. She would get over it, help some nice people commit an act of matchmaking or whatever they were doing, and most importantly, not put a stop to what had been her first truly relaxing day in recent memory.

She had been planning on using the time to talk to Zoe, but it wasn’t meant to be. Not-Laura (Blair, she had to start thinking of her as Blair) insisted on shotgun. That’s ok, she told herself through her disappointment. I said I wanted more friends. These other people seem nice too, I’ll just talk to them.

Most of the trip was spent listening to music. Zoe sang along to everything, and her voice was amazing. She shared Rachel’s love of Hamilton and Halsey, though she liked Taylor Swift a little too much for Rachel’s taste. Then she started on Disney soundtracks, and Rachel was nervous she would have to ask her not to play The Lion King. Luckily, though, it didn’t come up. Alex sang every song, loudly and not very well. Blair was mostly quiet, but got very enthusiastic about Hercules. Just seeing the back of her head, Rachel could almost forget about the whole Laura thing.

At one point, while Zoe and her friends were caught up in singing, Rachel had a conversation with Aaron in the backseat. “So, if I’m understanding this situation,” she said, feeling sure she wasn’t, “you like this guy but he thinks he can’t date you because of your religion?”

“Kind of, yeah,” said Aaron. “Honestly, I don’t even know if he likes me. We might get all the way there and figure out he didn’t want to date me even if he was allowed to. I don’t even know for sure that he’s not straight.” He seemed distraught, and Rachel could tell this wasn’t the sort of crush he would get over easily.

“That’s rough, buddy,” she said, and he laughed.

“I mean either way it’s better than my last relationship. At least I know he likes me as a friend. My ex didn’t even like me, she was just using me for information.”

“Yikes,” Rachel said. “What kind of information?”

“Something to do with a case. She was a detective or something, and my cousin was into blackmail. Well, I guess she’s probably still a detective.”

“And your cousin?”

“Dead,” he said matter-of-factly. She could tell by how he talked that he hadn’t liked his cousin, so she decided not to offer sympathy. From experience, she figured he had probably gotten enough of that already.

“Well, I hope this boy likes you. You seem pretty cool to me.”

“Thanks, Hera,” he said sincerely, and she cringed. In the scheme of life, she thought, a cross-state road trip with people who didn’t know her real name probably wasn’t the best idea. What if something happened and they needed to identify her? But she didn’t know how to bring it up, and besides, there was still the matter of the videos. These were her new, no-backstory-required friends. They existed in some kind of magical bubble where her old life couldn’t get to her. So she said nothing.

She tried to tell herself again that it wasn’t worth getting attached to these people who would only leave her once the trip was over. But Aaron lived in Orlando. And Zoe might just be the type of person who was worth staying in touch with long distance.

For the past year and a half, Rachel’s life had felt pretty pointless. Why put work into anything when everything could just fall apart in a moment? But looking around the car at this weird little group, she realized she had finally found something that felt worth the effort again.

#surprise!#this has been the plan all along!#blairgp #tajwash #barely #hamdam #mine

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