FOR HER ENTIRE life, Ellie has felt everything.

It was a flaw when she was younger.  Every emotion would hit in a wave crashing over her head, soaking her from head to toe in whatever hurt or joy she'd encountered that minute.  Sadness was a pillow over her face, a weight on her chest that simply won't lift.  Joy is a buzzing in her body that leaves her jumping up and down,  this giggling mess of a girl that people find endearing.  Love is warmth, it's entirety, it's what courses through her veins every waking moment and builds strength in her bones to better support those she loves most.  Rage is a quiet, burning thing that she's found decimates before she can put it out, ending in ashes she's left to inhale for however long she lives.  Her existence has been experienced solely in extremes.   Ellie knows her emotions,  knows her heart,  knows what to display and what to hide until the shower is willing enough to blend tears with the steady stream.

Ellie knows her emotions.  She's felt it all before now,  she thought.

This is entirely new.

Grief was always going to be the twin of love.  It was always going to be what lingered in the curves of every smile.  Love burns in unison with funeral home candles,  a reminder of everything that was once had.  One cannot grieve without loving; one cannot love without grieving.  Ellie believes she was born mourning.  Perhaps that is what fuels her love.

In another world, a worse world where she lost her father and auntie in that hallway last year, she would know much more about this.  She would know how to handle what is settling in her stomach like a rock sinking to the bottom of the ocean,  would know how to look beyond the void and reconnect with reality as she would eventually be forced to do.  Supposing she could survive a world like that, a world where she cannot call Dad or Abi at three in the morning because she needed to hear their voices after a nightmare, there would have been a haze she knew.

Then again,  Ellie-Marie doesn't know how long she could survive in a world without the people who taught her to breathe.

It's something that's been difficult to do for an hour and a half now, breathing.  Each breath she draws in reminds Ellie of how Anika sounded beside her in Quinn's room, each inhale coming with a rattle that may have taken her if the ladder did not.  Each exhale is a ghost of Anika's last breath,  the one she used to scream until she hit the dumpster and collided into the cold, unforgiving pavement.  No one has stopped touching her since Danny's apartment door was practically thrown open.  It's been Buffy wrapped around her, Dad tucking her under his arm like she's a little girl hiding from monsters again, Abi holding her face between her hands,  Rory pulling her in for a hug that still managed to catch Ellie off guard.

(Her face was damp when it pressed into her sweater, Ellie noticed.  She hasn't spoken a word about such.

Even as Rory held Mindy in her arms in a way that suggests she was built to do so, her eyes lingered on Ellie more than once.)

Tara has almost been as hands-on as her family.  Her first hug was given to Sam, weeping, collapsing into her sister's arms while Ellie finally relented to the same fate in the safety her father's presence brings.  Her second was a good few minutes with Buffy,  the third a silent embrace shared with Mindy.

It was only when her eyes landed on Ellie that Dad stepped back the first time.  Tara threw herself on her, clutched her like the lifeline Ellie had treated her as all these times before.  The weight on Ellie's shoulders could soothe with Tara holding her upright,  and for a few seconds in time,  everything almost felt like it might have the potential of being okay.

So yes, now that she's on the road in front of the apartment, now that her ankle is wrapped and she's been cleared of a concussion, Ellie knows that she should somehow be optimistic.  She's got her people  (sans Mom and Lou,  which burns in a new way she cannot bring herself to acknowledge now),  she's not dead.  She's going to fight another day.

Anika won't.

That's the problem.

Her eyes feel dry.  The cool October  air brushes across her face in a breeze that should feel nice,  though her face is still sticky with the tears that she eventually ran out of.  All she knows is it's early.  Seven fifteen,  last she heard.  Too early to be staring down the blanketed corpse of one of her closest friends,  yet here Ellie sits regardless.

People have passed.  People have sat by her.  The paramedics spoke when they wrapped her ankle, one passed her a packet of tissues upon realizing she simply couldn't stop crying until her body finally ran dry.  Her fingers shake as they grip her patients’ blanket.  The world around her is a blur of noise.

“Hey, little dove.”

Except for Abi.

Ellie's eyes cannot pull from the alley while she tries to find her voice.  She's been alone for all of half a minute,  left for Dad to go press some answers from the cops on the scene,  yet it feels like she's been in this emptiness forever.  Tara is only twelve feet away in the back of the opposite ambulance,  her arms looped around Sam,  her head on her sister's shoulder.  Uncle Randy is holding Jules and Buffy still,  with Juno seemingly having joined forces with Dad to go force answers out.  Chad and Rory flank where Mindy sits,  her face barren of everything but soul-crushing devastation.  All of these people and Ellie still feels like an outsider frozen behind glass,  pressing a hand against the one-way mirror in a desperate attempt to alter what cannot be fixed.

“Ellie,”  Abi repeats.

Right. She needs to speak.

“Hi,”  she tries,  voice hoarse,  raw,  perhaps bled dry.  “I'm sorry,  I-”

“You're not apologizing to me right now.”  Taking a seat beside her Abi wraps an arm around Ellie's blanketed shoulders, the offering of a pillar needed now more than it has been in over a year.  Her shoulder is a place to find a safe haven, a landing platform for the exhaustion swirling with grief and pain in Ellie's head, and it's taken with a gratefulness meant to remain without words.   “I know you're not. I forbid it, sunny.”

Ellie tries to crack a smile at what she knows isn't a joke.  “Guessing I can't apologize for that either, then.”

“Nope.”  Abi presses a kiss to Ellie's head.  “No apologies for you. You're a guilt-happy little dove, you don't need to internalize that more than you already have.”

“I'm not guilt-happy.”  A lie.  Ellie is a fixer by nature and guilty by birthright, two traits everyone has seen on display.  Even if she was a decent conwoman Ellie knows she couldn't pull this lie off.

“You are,”  her aunt corrects gently.  “You always have been.  Just like your old man, you take that all in.”   

Typically similarities between her and her father make Ellie-Marie glow with pride.  From their smiles to how soft Ellie's heart is, there's not a person who knows them both that hasn't pointed something out.

For once,  though,  Ellie can't be pleased with the comparison.  All she can think about is how it felt to be bawling long after Anika lost that ability,  after half of her face was beat into a pulp by both the concrete and the undignified hit that the dumpster lid got, after the only thing she could think was you didn't reach her.

In more ways than one,  this is a repeat of what seems to be the story of Ellie's life.  How many people will she fail to protect?  Maddie was the first to die, then Tara was a target.  Rory died once before the paramedics brought her back.  Dad and Abi are forever marred because of the shot Ellie didn't take.  She couldn't reach Quinn in time,  she let Anika fall.  Her track record is written in the blood of people she'd let down time and time again.  Every single thing she touches has started to wilt.  With all she has to long for,  perhaps she should examine what she has earned. 

What her loved ones should not have paid for.

“I almost had her.”  Ellie says,  because she has to say something but listing out reasons that would get her laughed out of a courtroom seems like the wrong move,  even to her worn down mind.   “Anika.  When she was able to move that last time, I almost had her.”

“Sunny…”

“No,”  the interruption,  while uncommon between the two,  isn't unkind.  She's forcing herself to breathe steadily regardless of how badly she wants to give into a collapse of tears once again,  tightening her jaw and waiting until that ache of tears in her throat disappears.  “I was right there.  I was right there and I saw,  I saw her face when she realized- I saw her when- she knew,  she knew she was gonna die and she knew I was right there and she knew that I-”

“Ellie-Marie.”  Abi cuts her off with a gentle lift of Ellie's head from where it rests comfortably on her shoulder,  tired eyes wearing into Ellie's soul.  “She knew you were trying to save her.”

Ellie shakes her head, feels her hands clench.  It’s exhausting for others to see her guilt, she knows.  It's why she keeps it under wraps where she can.  “She knew she was gonna die.”

“She knew she had a best friend who would have sacrificed it all to save her.”  The correction is gentle enough to soothe the little storm that currently feels like it's raging inside,  her auntie's hand shifting from Ellie's chin to her hair.  This is a move from when nightmares plague her,  from when she wakes up screaming and has to crawl in bed beside Abi like a child.  Even now Ellie leans into her palm,  chasing comfort like bait.  “I saw her, sweetness.  You couldn't have grabbed her from that distance,  and moving out any further would have…you would have been right there.  You would have gone with her.  That wasn't what she wanted, and it wouldn't have saved her.”

It could have.  That is what Ellie-Marie longs to say now,  trembling in a way she would prefer to attribute to the early onset of winter’s chill than the pain digging in her chest.  It could have.  Even if it had killed her,  there was no way Anika was doomed in every universe.  Some force took her in this one and Ellie can feel the blame staining her hands much like how the tears stain her cheeks.  Like how Anika's shirt is forever stained with blood.  Like how her best friend,  one of her sisters,  is staining a white sheet with crimson even now.

That's the funny thing about the world.  Ellie-Marie will never know an alternate reality.  In another life,  maybe this had a different ending.

In this one,  Anika is gone.

She's never going to meet her sister later on.  She won't get to see what becomes of her and Mindy.  She won't get to see Anika achieve her dream of becoming a veterinarian.  She won't get the horribly cheesy Christmas cards,  won't wake up to more selfies in outfits that Anika would throw together for a laugh.  She won't get the fierce protection that was Anika swooping in when people began recognizing Ellie from Woodsboro.  She won't get Anika,  because the world decided her life could be cut short after a mere two decades. 

The tears are back.  Ellie feels them flow down her face despite hardly realizing they were forming to begin with,  feels how Abi shifts her hold to wipe the strays away.  Abi understands.  Even now,  when Ellie cannot force a word out,  Abi understands.

Her auntie's arms unfold in full,  a safe haven in the worst of wars.  Ellie-Marie collapses in them with a sob heaved from the depths of her chest.

She doesn't need words now.

HER EYES BLINK open without Ellie realizing they'd closed long enough to need it.

She hasn't been out long,  she realizes.  Everything's still the same.  Anika is still dead,  Dad is still talking to officers.  Abi is still at her side,  Buffy is still with uncle Randy.   Rory is still with Mindy.  The world is still moving,  remarkably enough.

Ellie-Marie envies how easy it's making that seem.

“You got five minutes,”  Abi says without her asking.  It feels odd,  their little routine of Ellie  ‘not falling asleep’   being used here,  but it's a comforting sort of odd.   “I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that's the most you've had?”

“Mhm.”

“I figured as much.”  The comment is said without judgment or ridicule,  not even paired with a side dish of take care of yourself.  Her auntie knows how impossible things like self-care or sleep become during times like these.  Ellie-Marie couldn't sleep if she tried.  It's only made more evident now,  as her overly alert mind forces her to rouse,  that her body is the one thing keeping score.

“I can't sleep,”   she says anyway,  needing an excuse to talk about something other than the events of the last few hours.   “I haven't tried, I mean, but it seems kinda useless anyway.  Who wants to sleep when some maniac is after them?”

Abi scoffs out a chuckle,  blonde locks shifting over Ellie's face.  The feeling tickles and leaves her nose wrinkling,  leaning up to both get away before she sneezes and to clear her mind.  The arm that remains around her is a background comfort to the chaos unfolding now,  a cacophony of noise that elicits a resentment Ellie-Marie didn't even realize she contained.  There's all this movement,  all this talk,  all this fear with Anika's body in the center.  It's like the world can't even have the decency to respect what it snatched without a care to spare.  Police grimace around her corpse,  Dad pointedly gestures to where they've left one twisted foot uncovered,  Juno hasn't even been able to look at the scene for too long.  This is personal, even more than 2011 was, because it isn't just her.

Anika didn't ask for this.

The familiar clicking of heels is all that pulls Ellie from her thoughts,  head turning in unison with her shift forward.  There's only one person who commands any space with only her shoes,  and despite how an ember of heartache still burns with the original absence of her mother,  Ellie can't remember if she's ever been happier to see her.

Even better: it's Mom without a camera crew.  She came,  Ellie knows in her gut,  because she was worried.

Abi doesn't loosen her grip even when she also notices Mom,  still keeping Ellie tucked close to her side.  While she knows they both need it,  it's impossible to not wonder if it's because she looks more and more like a flight risk by the second.

“Gale!”  Auntie calls,  her voice raising above the growing crowd in unison with how she waves Mom over.  Another part of Ellie-Marie,  one that she wishes would shut up and perhaps focus on her dead best friend,  finds solace in how her mother looks like she could collapse with relief.

Mom never runs outside of the gym.  She won't expect her to now,  but the speed-walk she kicks herself into is almost the same effect.

“Ellie!”

The instant she's close enough to become audible Ellie hears the relief in her voice.  She barely has the chance to lift her head before Mom is pulling both her and Abi into her arms, a rare show of affection Ellie-Marie wishes she could bask in guiltlessly.  Every move she makes now feels like spitting on Anika's memory, flaunting what she can experience in the face of a dead girl. My mom can still hug me.  Yours?

It's the worst she's felt during a hug.

When Gale pulls back she keeps one arm around Ellie,  holding her in a way she hasn't in years.   “I came as soon as I heard.  I'm so glad you're okay.”

Once again the unfamiliarity of the comment makes Ellie wish she could take it in stride,  tuck it close to her chest and lock it inside her heart right next to the hope that things will get better for them.  Little moments like this help prove that Mom cares about her, even though she doesn't show it often.  This is what Ellie wants to cling to.

But she can't.

Instead she shifts up further,  allowing both Mom and Abi to maintain their hands along her arms while she glances around their surroundings once more.  The day has just begun.  There's no way to hide from it now,  no shelter to take or grave to bury herself in.  She's facing this.  She has no other choice but to face this.

“I'm sorry,”  Mom starts,  seemingly not realizing how distant Ellie is from their one-sided conversation.   “I’m sorry about Anika, Ellie.  I know you two were close.”

They weren't.  They weren't close;  they were sisters.  They were confidants.  They were each other's home base for four years.  They were best friends.  They weren't just close-  that's underselling everything they've been through.  That's not a difference that matters to most people,  though,  and Ellie knows better than to argue it.  She doesn't have the energy for that now.

When Tara happens to look over and catch sight of the three together,  she seems to recognize that.

“Gale,”   Tara acknowledges the moment she draws close enough.  “You didn't come for a story,  did you?   ‘Cause she's not in the mood.  None of us are.”

“I came here for my daughter.”  Mom's quip back is lined with more than an undertone of annoyance,  a scowl daring to form on her lips.  “I'm not a monster,  Tara.  Regardless of whatever you want to believe.”

“Coulda’  fooled me.”

There's no denying that Tara has a right to be pissed at Gale.  Ellie-Marie is equally as aware of it as Abi seems to be, lips pressing into a line of warning seemingly directed Mom's way.  Neither Ellie nor Buffy or Rory would take kindly to one of them being called born evil in an internationally published book,  that much is for certain,  and while Mom and Abi have resolved their differences from two decades ago,  Ellie doubts Abi would be too pleased about it herself.  Especially if it was said about Sidney.

Before Mom has a chance to quip back, however, her phone begins to ring.

The sound makes Ellie's blood run cold.  Auntie’s grip around her shoulders grows a little tighter,  Tara scoots in a little closer.  A flash of alarm hits Mom's face yet she still reaches to her pocket,  pulling out her phone and checking the caller ID.

“False alarm,”   she states,  sounding nearly as relieved as Ellie feels.   “Ellie,  it's your dad.  Let me take this.”

Raising one hand in a silent affirmative Ellie-Marie waves for her mother to go ahead, hardly aware as she walks away.

When Abi removes her arm from Ellie's shoulder,  though,  she glances over.   “Are you going?”

“Not far,”  she says,  always knowing exactly what Ellie needs to hear without it ever needing to be said.   “Kirby just got here.   I’m gonna go talk to her,  okay?   Then I’ll be right back.”

God. She should feel like a child for needing this reassurance, her nod barely perceptible enough for her auntie to notice.

For once she doesn't even notice Tara has remained.  Not until she's standing right in front of her,  eyes softened with a sorrowed understanding that Ellie wishes she didn't need.

"It isn't your fault."

It's so easy to say.  Four words that Ellie-Marie hears on a practically daily basis, from either her therapist or the mantras she's forced to repeat in the mirror.  They don't mean anything anymore.  Not now.

She feels vacant as the world seems to bustle around her,  paramedics and officers swarming the area.  Mom and Dad are talking by someone's car.  Buffy is weeping in Ethan's arms.  Ellie can't even remember when he got here.  Mindy is shaking.

She's vacant.  Her attention has gone back to Anika's body,  replaying those final moments like a horrible movie scene.  The tears in her eyes,  the scream from Anika,  the blood,  the sound of her body hitting the pavement.  The sickening silence that followed,  Mindy's scream following soon thereafter.  Everything was still when the world fell apart.  Even the rubble froze in place.

Tara isn't taking her silence for an acceptable answer.  The only thing Ellie can feel is two gentle hands cupping her cheeks,  turning her head until they're face to face.  Against herself and all her hurt Ellie lets out a sigh of relief,  finding comfort in the face she's come to love so much.

"Ellie,"  Tara says,  voice firm.  "It's not your fault."

She wishes that were true.

“She was right there.”

“And you were already across.  That's not your fault.”   Tara sounds more stern than Ellie-Marie has ever heard her, expression that of laser focus as she locks their eyes.  “Would I lie to you?”

“No.”  Ellie doesn't even have to think about the answer.  Tara would never lie to her.  Even if she was being instructed to,  even if she was planning to,  she wouldn't.  She never has,  she never will.  It's that simple.

Tara nods, seemingly relieved.  In a better mindset Ellie would shake her head at the obvious shock,  maybe add in a comment about how she could trust Tara in a life or death situation  (her timing is excellent,  she knows),  but in this one she can only arch her brows the same way Mom does when she's questioning a response.

Tara notices.  Of course she does.

Her hands drop from Ellie's face to her sides then,  expression shifting into that of exhaustion that cannot be hidden any longer.  "I can't lose you,  Li-Li.  You're the only thing making this hellhole worth it."

It's a sentiment that Ellie-Marie can't help smiling at.   The circumstances couldn't be worse timing for her heart,  her dumb,  stupidly soft heart that's devoted itself wholly to Tara like the idea of romance isn't a secret fear in itself,  to skip several beats when the two of them lock eyes.  The world couldn't be fighting it more.  Even so, it's like Tara has become a magnet that Ellie can't help but attach herself to.   

One bloodied hand,  the only thing left that the paramedics hadn't cleaned off,  reaches down to take Tara's hand in hers,  finding immediate comfort in how they slot like puzzle pieces.  There are some promises you simply can't keep,  but for Tara,  she has to try.

"You won't."

She has to try.

IT'S ONLY WHEN Mom texts her to get in front of the apartment building now that Ellie-Marie can move from her spot.  Tara has stayed by her side like Ellie hoped she would,  lingering in front of her almost protectively while the chaos continued to unfold around them, and she stays by her side when she finally tries to stand on shaky legs.

Her ankle is apparently choosing to be a little dick about this,  it seems.

“I got you,”  Tara says,  hands gently wrapping around Ellie's left arm.   “I got you, sunshine.  You crossed a ladder on this bitch,  you can do it.”

For the second time in the last thirty minutes Ellie finally finds another small smile,  ignoring how her nerves scream with pain as she puts more weight down.  She's got things to do,  and since this is basically a surface wound from hell,  she's going to do them.

And Tara is apparently going to be right beside her.

They still haven't talked about earlier.  Ellie-Marie feels a pang in her chest when she thinks about how she'll never get to tell Anika that she was right,  a pang that explodes over how her heart soars each time she thinks of how Tara came here for her.  She's choosing her,  even if they don't ever talk about it again.  She chose her.

It's enough mental euphoria for her to make it around the ambulance.  Dad is there,  always close to whether Ellie is,  and Mom stands now with Abi,  Kirby,  and Lou.

Lou loses some tension when she notices Ellie, it seems.  She could easily be imagining it, but her cousin is more than the hard exterior she puts up.  It's a comfort to finally have each of her people within eyesight,  including-

“Bella?”  

The redhead currently speaking to Buffy turns,  a relief crumpling her features as she launches forward.  Tara barely helps keep Ellie up as she stumbles back, but that's not the main issue now.

Bella was Quinn's second cousin.  Estranged,  Bella had explained.  Detective Bailey hadn't even been involved in Bella's life in years,  probably didn't even know she was in New York until the interrogation,  but the two girls had just started talking again when Bella moved here.  Now…

“Oh, Bee,”  Ellie murmurs,  her free hand moving to cup the other girl's head.  “I'm so sorry about Quinn.  I'm so sorry.”

Bella's silent for several beats.  Ellie can't blame her- she's not feeling too talkative herself for once-  and she's beginning to accept that condolences may be what they have to exchange silently before Bella speaks up.

“Thank you.  Thanks, Els, I just- fuck,  you know?”  Leaning back with a sniffle Bella glances from Ellie to Tara,  who has grown remarkably quiet since her appearance.   “I'm sorry about Anika.  Buffy told me what happened,  and- and that had to be awful.  I'm so sorry.”

Ellie-Marie nods.  It's all she can muster beyond basic acknowledgement of what's happened,  still using the hand that Tara isn't holding to squeeze Bella's shoulder.   “Thanks.  I'm here for you whenever you need me, okay?”

“Thanks,  but,  uh,  I think I'm gonna tag along with you guys today. I fed Sir Purrington,  don't worry,  but-”

“You’re going with us?”  Tara cuts in.   “Where are we going?”

“Gale hasn't told you?”

“No,”  Ellie starts,  raising her chin to meet her mother's eyes.  “Mom?”

“Yeah?”

“Where are we going?”

Mom's eyes dart over to Dad for the quickest of instances,  their silent communication that Ellie still can't decipher now succeeding in driving her crazy.  “Mom.”

Taking a deep breath  (and somehow successfully attracting everyone's attention with it,  the proud show woman she is)  Gale meets Ellie's stare, expression almost watered down to soften whatever blow is coming.

“We found the building,”  she starts.

“What building?”

“Jason and Greg's.”   This information still means nothing when Mom allows it to settle.  Yeah, they were hunting down the address for it, but was it really such a necessity?  They were nobodies,  Ghostface wannabes who probably didn't deserve to die but definitely deserved to be in prison.

And then it clicks.  Ghostface wannabes.

“The masks.”  Ellie murmurs, connecting the dots in the same way that always makes Dad mutter something about her mother's intelligence.   “You found them?”

Mom's solemn nod is all Ellie needs.  She sinks her hand lower to grip Tara's properly,  forcing herself to mentally distance from what's still unfolding behind her.  Detective Bailey is here,  his face soaked with tears.  Her parents,  her friends.  Her family.  Everyone here is in danger until every secret is uncovered.

That's all the encouragement Ellie needs, frankly.

“Take us there.”