┌─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───┐
chapter seventeen!
UP IN FLAMES
└─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───┘

( visionary, pt. i )

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

DEREK LEAVES TOWN that night. Vera doesn't find out until he's already gone. She's lying in bed, curled into a fetal position with a purring Hades curled into her side, her glassy eyes locked on her wall as the moonlight streams through her curtains, when her phone vibrates. Hades' head jerks up as the buzzing disturbs his dozing. Vera is snapped out of her daydream and sluggishly turns her phone so the screen is facing her. Her sister's name flashes across it.

As soon as she accepts the call, Cora's voice reports, "Derek left."

It takes a moment to process. Vera's voice is hoarse from lack of use when she creases her brow and asks, "What?"

"He packed up and drove away. Didn't even say anything. I think he's trying to protect us."

Derek always is. Everything he does — everything he's been doing since his return to Beacon Hills that January — is to protect someone. Her, Dominic, Scott, Cora, Isaac. The loss they'd suffered tonight... he wants to make sure nobody else has to die. The Alphas can't force him to kill another one of his Betas if he isn't in town.

Vera can't tell what part of her feels the loss of Boyd and what part still aches from being manhandled by Aiden. Her entire right side thrums with pain after hitting the cement so hard. There are small puncture wounds on her biceps from his claws. She'd bandaged those up but had refused Dom's suggestions to take pain medication before bed. Boyd's death will make her hurt regardless. No amount of pills can ease the ache in her heart.

Two pack members gone in less than three months. She's starting to feel like she'll never be whole again.

"Did he say when he'll be back?" Vera questions as Hades stands with a stretch, walks in a circle, and then tucks himself back into her once more. She lifts her free hand to scratch at the nape of his neck, wincing at the fresh throb of agony the action brings.

"No," Cora answers. "Liability."

Right. The same reason why Vera never asks her mother where she goes on her business trips.

Vera continues the conversation with another inquiry. "Do you want to sleep here? I can come and get you— you're not alone anymore."

Cora hesitates. Vera is almost certain she's going to reject the offer, claiming she's better off by herself, only to surprise her by muttering in a voice so quiet she can hardly hear it through her phone's speaker, "Yeah."

Hades releases a meow of discontent when she rolls over and climbs out of bed, suppressing a grunt of pain. "Okay. Hang tight and I'll leave in a few."

That's how Cora ends up inside the Pérez household for the first time in six years. The youngest Hale sibling trails her gaze over the brightly-colored decorations and the way the mostly-empty home seems to hold its breath as she looks around. Her expression is unreadable, brown eyes clouded with something Vera can't place.

"It looks the same," Cora says, staring at the two photos against the closest wall. One is a young Vera and Daniel on the morning of her First Holy Communion. Vera, aged seven, is missing her two front teeth. The other is from her quinceañera. She poses in a dazzling red dress with her abuela, who looks so overjoyed to see her granddaughter after so much time apart; they are only able to visit the Dominican Republic every few years.

"Yeah," Vera replies. "That was my mom's plan."

Hardly a single renovation has been made since Vera's father's passing. Not a vase out of place, not a coaster missing from the side tables in the living room. It's like her mother is waiting for him to come back and wants the house to look exactly as it had when he'd left. Even the closet still holds most of his clothes. When Vera had suggested they donate them two years ago, her mother nearly had a meltdown— and Vera has rarely seen her mother lose her composure. She stopped mentioning her father's belongings after that.

Rather than trying to fit in Vera's room, the girls decide to camp out in the living room. Cora easily adjusts the coffee table and chairs to fit a large air mattress that Vera inflates. They pile as many blankets and pillows as they can find onto the mattress, then they somehow end up constructing a fort using some of the sofa cushions. By the time they're finished, Vera's arm muscles ache almost as badly as the rest of her body. She collapses onto the air mattress and mountain of blankets with an exhausted sigh.

Hades trots inside, poking his nose into everything and pawing at the pillows. Cora watches him warily, but the cat doesn't skitter away from her even though she's technically part dog. He merely sniffs her and then rams his head into her leg affectionately, leaving a tuft of orange fur on her sweatpants.

It's like they're kids again. The Hale house had been huge— perfect for pillow fort construction. Once, the girls had transformed an entire hallway into one huge tunnel. Laura had been annoyed because it blocked the kids' bedrooms, but Derek had merely crawled through it to reach his room, thus obeying the laws of the pillow fort town. Vera had tried to make forts herself after the fire, but without her sister, it wasn't the same. She'd found herself missing when Derek would trample their creations underfoot and they'd attack him with pillows in retaliation.

Hades nestles himself between the two girls once they're both settled on the mattress. Vera wriggles around to get comfortable, but the claw marks on her arm still pulse with pain, and her wince doesn't get past Cora's keen eyesight.

"You're in pain," she observes.

"M'fine," Vera mumbles, closing her eyes in hopes that her sister will drop the subject.

It doesn't work. Vera can feel Cora's disbelieving glare even though her eyes are shut, and within seconds, she's placing her hand on Vera's shoulder. The thrumming pain slowly fades away as she takes the hurt. It allows her to linger in a peaceful void of darkness for a few precious seconds before Cora pulls her hand back.

"Don't lie to me," Cora says. "I can hear it. And I don't like knowing you're hurting."

"Yeah, unfortunately, Derek's chomp on my arm didn't grant me supernatural healing powers," Vera jokes, her heart constricting with love for her sister, as exasperating as she may be sometimes. "Kind of selfish of him, if you ask me."

Cora huffs a laugh. The living room is quiet for a few moments. Vera continues lying on her side, facing Cora, and Hades between them. Though she still feels the pulsing agony of Boyd's death like knives in her heart, she can admit that having someone here to share her grief helps. It reminds her that she's not alone.

They fall asleep like that as if they were children, not rising until the sunlight filters through the blanket canopy above them.

— ✯✯✯ —

Monday's school day is agonizing. The principal announces Boyd's death as a brutal animal attack. Though he hadn't been very well-known around school, his locker quickly becomes decorated with memorabilia and flowers. Vera's legs feel like lead when she does it, and it ultimately takes Cora going with her to make her reach his locker, but she eventually sticks a photo she'd taken of Boyd and Erica at the ice rink Boyd had worked at from March. Seeing their smiling faces sends a punch to her gut. She knows that the two of them had shared a special bond. She hopes that Erica had been there to greet him as he'd crossed to the other side, lips stretched with that dazzling smile.

Vera goes through the day in a daze. It ends up costing her when she realizes she has no idea how to do her homework. Normally, she would go over Dom's house so they could work on homework together, but his family is gone because his brother Grayson has a football game and Dominic promised to work on his science experiment for him while he was gone.

"My mom's mad at him," Dom had explained when she'd called. "He should have started two weeks ago, but he put it off until the night before it's due and he can't work on it because of football. But the poor kid's scared because of the disappearances, so I'm doing it for him. I just have to build one of those little volcanoes and make it explode."

Vera appreciates the amount of love that Dominic has for his siblings. Though they fight, they're still close at the end of the day. Plus, she's sure that Grayson will have to owe Dom for this favor anyway.

She ends up at Lydia's house instead. Lydia perches at her desk while Vera is sprawled out on her bed, receiving occasional glances from her friend to make sure she stays on track. Vera had been spaced out for the entire lecture, so she has to read through her notes several times in order to complete each problem. She can tell her slow work is mildly bothersome to Lydia, a practical genius, but the strawberry blonde keeps her mouth shut... for the most part.

"No," Lydia says as soon as Vera starts drawing her graph. "There's a two in front of the quadratic, so the shape is narrow, not wide."

Vera groans. "But there's a negative!"

"That's just to tell you if the parabola faces up or down. It's not relevant to the actual shape."

Mumbling some choice words about where she'd like to shove her pencil into whoever created the concept of parabolas, Vera erases the graph and starts over again.

This is one of the worst parts of grief. The world never stops moving. Even though eerie sacrifices are still happening thanks to the Darach, the threat of the Alphas is constantly looming over them, and Vera is struggling to adjust to the losses of Erica and Boyd, the universe doesn't pause and wait for her to recoup.

The desire to just give up and drop out of high school becomes more inviting by the day.

Vera is starting to work on the next problem when she notices that Lydia hasn't moved. Looking up from her paper, she notices the girl with her head tilted to the side and nose wrinkled in disgust.

"What's up?" Vera asks. When Lydia doesn't respond, she snaps her fingers. "Lyds?"

Lydia jolts as if being knocked out of a trance. "Is something burning?"

Vera's eyebrows crease. "What?"

"I smell smoke."

Vera takes a long inhale through her nose. All she smells is the fresh, airy scent of Lydia's bedsheets and the remnants of the perfume she'd put on that morning. "I don't smell anything. It's fine."

She tries to act nonchalant and go back to doing her algebra, but finds her eyes unable to move past the first number. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see that Lydia still hasn't budged. The perplexity in her wide, green eyes is making something gruesome gnaw at Vera's gut. This is how she was acting at the motel. And every time she heard something that nobody else could...

Vera is yanked from her thoughts when her phone buzzes from the blankets beside her. There's a moment where her heart stops and she gasps in fright, only to resume a steady beat once she notices the name lighting up her screen— Grayson. It's early evening, meaning he should be finishing his game right now, but maybe they had already won.

She answers it, putting the phone to her ear. "Sup? How'd your game go?"

There's no reply.

Vera removes the phone from her ear and checks the screen to make sure he didn't hang up. When it says the call is still ongoing, she tucks it back against her shoulder and asks, "Grayson? You there, bud?"

The first thing she hears is a sort of stuttering breath. Then a sniffle, and the thirteen-year-old boy's trembling voice filters through the speaker, sounding like he's on the verge of breaking down. "Where are you?"

"I'm at a friend's. Why? What's wrong?"

"Is my brother with you?"

"No, the last time I heard from him, he was working on your experiment." Vera sits up, dread filling her veins at Grayson's cryptic words and choked tone. Something isn't right about this.

Grayson makes a frail noise that may be a sob. "Please come over."

Vera is already moving, slamming her math textbook closed and shoving all of her papers into her backpack. Even though her heart thumps erratically against her ribcage, she keeps her voice steady and level for him. "Okay, okay, don't cry. I'll be there as quickly as I can. I promise. Do you need me to stay on the phone?"

There's the piercing wail of a siren in the background of the call. "No, it's fine. Just please get here."

He hangs up. Vera doesn't bother to organize her things or put anything in its proper place as she shoves them into her bag. Her pencils and calculator are thrown inside, her books crumpling the papers. The end result is her having to force the zipper to close, partly because everything is so stuffed and partly because of her trembling hands.

"What's wrong?" Lydia asks, more lucid than before now that Vera has cracked into motion.

"That was Dom's brother," Vera replies. Her voice shakes with fear now that she doesn't have to fake being calm for Grayson, the terrible sensation trickling down to her fingers and making them numb with cold. "He told me to come over — it sounded like he was crying—"

"I'll drive you," Lydia says. When Vera opens her mouth to protest, Lydia shoots her a knowing look and swipes her car keys from her bedside table. "You'll crash your motorcycle driving in that state."

Vera ultimately concedes, and by the time they're in Lydia's small vehicle, she's glad that she isn't in control. Her mind whirls with possibilities. Was there an accident? Is everyone okay? Why was Grayson so upset? He's never been one to shove down his emotions like most young boys are taught to, but it's been a long time since she'd seen him cry.

She bites her nails anxiously for the entire ten minute trip to her street. As soon as they make a right, Vera's heart drops into her stomach and Lydia gasps. It's packed with police cars and fire trucks, and through the tips of the maple trees in nearly every front yard, she can see smoke pouring into the air against the night sky. The street is so packed that it would be impossible to drive all the way down it to her house, so Lydia finds the nearest spot against the curb and rolls to a stop.

As soon as she can, Vera opens the door and throws herself onto the grass. Lydia scrambles to follow, but Vera doesn't pay her any mind before sprinting down the street, dodging some of her neighbors who are standing on their front lawns and sidewalks. Her feet are a thunderous slam against the concrete. She nearly trips over a little kid and fights to regain her balance, arms cartwheeling, her breath shallow in her lungs and vision nearly swaying.

As soon as she reaches her house, a Beacon County deputy holds a hand out to stop her. "I'm sorry, Miss, but this is a restrict—"

"Let her through!" the panicked voice of Mrs. Shire calls.

The officer steps aside, allowing Vera to see the family huddled on the sidewalk in front of their home. The acrid stench of smoke is stronger here than it had been by Lydia's car. Grayson stands out in his blue-and-black football jersey, wringing his hands and his brunet hair disheveled on his head. Maeve, the youngest at eight, clings to her father with her face buried in his side. As Vera sprints closer to them, Mrs. Shire opens her arms and pulls her into a hug.

"What happened?" Vera asks, glancing at the house behind them. It seems fine, but the smoke is still pouring from around it.

"We don't know," Mrs. Shire replies thickly, releasing her and wiping her red-rimmed eyes. "Mrs. Johnson from next door called, said our backyard clubhouse — you know, the one Rick built when you were kids? — was burning up. The entire thing, just... engulfed in flames. By the time we got here, the firefighters were already putting it out."

Grayson's voice is small. "That's where Dom was doing my science project."

Vera's heart plummets further into her gut. As she looks at the dejected faces of the family she loves as much as her own, she feels a lump form in her throat. It hurts to speak around it when she reluctantly questions, "Did they..."

Mr. Shire shakes his head. "They didn't rescue anyone from inside."

Vera takes a step back, her head nodding in understanding without her permission. Everything fades out. Suddenly she's sitting on the grass but doesn't remember the movement it required, her vision going blurry. Not Dom. Not Dom. She can't lose someone else already, and especially not him.

She becomes aware of a voice speaking to her and someone putting a blanket around her shoulders. A paramedic comes in and out of focus. The fuzzy material is forced into her limp hands, drawing it closer to her like a hug. She's numb to everything else around her.

Her ears manage to detect Mr. Shire's words through their ringing. "Vera, he could be somewhere else? Okay? Maybe he escaped. If he was in there, they would have found him and brought him out."

But his voice carries a certain tone of doubt in it, almost as if he's trying to convince himself as well as her.

Vera turns her head and sees Lydia standing at the property line near the deputy, her posture rigid and worried gaze trailing around the scene. She hugs her bare arms against the chill of the night, her floral dress slightly blowing in the breeze. It looks like it's taking everything in her power to stay back. If there's one thing that's for sure, it's that Lydia Martin hates feeling helpless.

A small pair of arms wrap around her. Vera turns to see Maeve, who has been uncharacteristically silent this entire time. Her usually joyful face is pinched like she's trying extremely hard not to cry. Evidently, she had failed at some point— dried tear tracks stain her pale cheeks.

Vera finds herself able to move enough to shift and pull the young girl into her lap, resting her chin on top of Maeve's head. The girl's blond hair tickles her skin and her glittery pink barrettes are falling out, so Vera busies herself by fixing them.

What seems like hours later, a fireman approaches them with answers. "Well, we didn't find any human remains. However, we did find this." He holds up a charred, half-melted cell phone that Vera instantly recognizes as Dominic's. "If your son was in there, it's odd he would leave such a thing behind. Also, detectives haven't noticed any footprints leading away from the scene that would suggest he ran."

"So what does that mean?" Mrs. Shire asks, voice teetering dangerously on the edge of hysteria.

"Well, the short answer is, we don't know what happened to your son." The man looks apologetic as he glances at all of them in turn. "It's odd that there aren't any... remains" — he casts a worried look at Maeve, who nestles deeper into Vera's grip at the word  — "and even stranger that he isn't in the house or on any surrounding property. If he was in there, smoke inhalation would have made it difficult to breathe and should have hindered his ability to walk very far. My suggestion? Go to the station. File a report. Then the police can formally search the town while we examine the scene and try to figure out what started the fire."

Mr. Shire nods, wrapping his arm around his wife as she covers her mouth. "Thank you, sir."

Vera doesn't feel comforted by those words at all. Somehow, the words we don't know what happened to your son are worse than the possible news that he'd been found dead.

_________

a/n:

:) hehe i love Suffering™

for those of you who are curious, here is the official casting of the shire siblings (love that alliteration) to help you picture them, along with dom to serve as a comparison. vanessa wasn't in this chapter since she's a college gal,  but she'll be in the next one!
—taylor hickson as vanessa shire
—asher angel as grayson shire
—mckenna grace as maeve shire

i'm honestly super proud of this casting! i love my babies and i hope you will, too.

(does anyone have any suggestions for who could play their parents?)

i recently dropped a class which means i have a bit more time on my hands to write. i currently have four ongoing stories including this one, plus a tips book, so it's difficult to juggle them but i'll try my very hardest to update soon!

just out of curiosity, who would you like to see vera interact with more? i can try to see if i can fit your suggestions into the plans i already have for the book! or, alternately, which one of vera's dynamics with other characters is your favorite? i always love hearing your thoughts!

—kristyn

( word count: 3.6k )