“I DIDN'T NEED you to propose a pity lunch,  Ellie.”

It's not surprising that Mom waits for Dad,  Abi,  and Lou to find the group seating before she speaks up.  Ellie-Marie knew it wouldn't go unspoken,  knew it from the moment Mom graciously accepted her offer with a barely perceptible hesitation.  She's never taken kindly to interference,  even well intentioned.  It's why Ellie asked the other members of their little group to find a place to sit while she and Gale ordered.  It's also why Abi cut her a soft look of reprimanding over her shoulder.

Ellie-Marie loves her mother.  That doesn't mean mildly upsetting her isn't the same thing as wearing a belt of salmon and running away from a group of starving bears.

“It isn't a pity lunch,”  she says, keeping her focus on the menu ahead.  Chicken alfredo sounds really good right now- or maybe she's just hungry.  She hasn't eaten in…

Yeah,  no,  she's starving.  A side of garlic bread sounds good,  too.

“Really?”   Mom doesn't seem to be as occupied as Ellie is currently forcing herself to be,  her stare baring into the side of her head.   “So offering right when that glee club zygote shot me down was just poor timing?”

“You caught me.  How does a blackened chicken po’boy sound?  You love those.”

Mom makes a noise of what Ellie believes to be surprise.  “You remember that.”

“Duh.  You’re my mom,  of course I know your favorite lunch.”

“Funny, considering we never get it together.”

The sheer audacity of it all is like a hand guiding Ellie's chin until she's facing her mother,  biting her tongue between her molars.  Mom does this when she's agitated, takes it out on whoever she knows won't take it harshly because she doesn't mean it harshly.  That doesn't mean it doesn't sting a little.  “I've asked before.  You're busy,  remember?”

“I’m-”

“You're busy,”  she repeats.  Her voice is soft as ever yet there's no way to tell if it's from exhaustion or from suppressed irritance, shoulders squaring out as though preparing to defend herself.  “I know that.  Look, can you tell me what's actually bothering you?  Because I know it's not me asking to go to lunch together,  despite how I’m probably cutting into some quality writing time right now,  and I don't wanna bicker with you when I could be dead tomorrow.”

The line moves up.  Ellie takes a step forward with it,  folding her hands together so pastel colored nails can dig into the outside of her knuckles.  She loves her mother,  she does,  and she knows Gale loves her.  She always has.

It's showing it that she has problems with.

It's been their problem since Ellie was eleven.  Dad left and took a piece of Mom with him, the penthouse of a happy family now holding a little girl and a workaholic in place of the woman who used to fall asleep with Ellie on the couch while they waited for Dad to get home.  She's never been overly affectionate,  not like Ellie is,  but she never used to be outright distant.  A switch flipped overnight.  Where her arms were once open for Ellie is a space filled with papers and plans for a future she's not sure she's in, paper cuts replacing the warmth until the days her dye would fade and the following nights Mom would spend sitting on the edge of the bathtub, combing her fingers through brightly colored hair like their closeness resembled that of two peas in a pod rather than two strangers in the kitchen.

But she'll get better.  Ellie has to believe that.  She does believe that.  It's why she's already opening her mouth to apologize when Gale's hand is placed on her shoulder,  turning around with the words already on her tongue.   “I’m sorry, I don't know why I said that.”

“You were proving a point,”  Mom states.  “Believe me,  it's taken.  However,”

There's always a however.

“You said what the problem is.”

“What?”  Ellie can't help how her face contorts as though emphasizing the question,  nose scrunching with the force of it.  “Mom- oh. I’m cutting into writing time?” 

That's always been one of Gale's biggest pet peeves.  When she was younger and still being read to at night Mom would use it as an excuse to write little short stories,  works of fiction that Ellie still prefers to these reports she's become infamous for.

Guilty as she feels about it,  this entire situation has been a good break from that distance.  If Mom's worried about her then there's no question that she still cares.

Then again,  her job is her life.

For her part Gale looks more confused than Ellie does,  her frown sharp as a knife.  “What?”

“Your writing time.  You're gonna write about this,  right?”

“Oh, my God.  Ellie…”  from how annoyed she seems to be at the question Ellie presumes it's an affirmative,  barely resisting the disappointment that ebbs it's way closer to her heart.  Of course it's writing.  She's not upset.  Mom's a writer,  a reporter at that.  Of course she's putting her work ahead of lunch.

Of course what Ellie's been hoping for means nothing.

She tries to make this as far from personal as she possibly can.  It's what she had to do several months ago, right after Mom acted like her promise to not write about what happened in Woodsboro meant absolutely nothing,  because it didn't.  Not to Mom.  Not where her job was involved.  She's a career woman,  always has been,  always will be.   Ellie understands that.  Respects it,  even.

Another step up in the line.  She knows what Dad wants,  too.  She's got her family's orders memorized,  enough so that she doesn't need Mom waiting to assist any longer.  She didn't need it to begin with.  Wanting it,  though,  is a different story.

It's funny that she stayed here to talk to Gale.  It's funny that she thought they could connect however briefly in a lunch line.  It's funny that,  when she turns around after an extension of silence, Mom is gone.

It's funny that,  when Ellie places the orders,  she pretends her voice isn't thick.

“LET HER SIT before you start bombarding her with theories.”

Lou's instructions are always delivered with no room for negotiation.   Ellie-Marie admires it most of the time,  wonders if there's a way to blend sternness with gentleness when she's trying her best to ward people away from her friends rather than her pipeline from sweetness to outright feral behavior.  Effective as it is, she's not too sure about its status of respectability.

“It’s not bombarding if I’m helping keep her alive,”  Mom shoots back.   “Believe it or not,  I don't plan to see my daughter on the evening news.”

“You’re saying there's something you don't want to report?  That's a shocker.”

“Lou, don't start with me.  I've done this dance before. I know how badly this fucker wants me dead. But believe it or not, I'm not the only one on that list. You're right there with me.  So is Ellie,  which means she's got every right to be warned.”

She's hardly gotten the chance to take her seat between her father and aunt before she's roped into this Weathers-on-Weathers argument.   It's never a place anyone wants to be,  especially when Mom's already seeming more than a little agitated today and Ellie-Marie feels like she's used the majority of her energy on reliving the past.  She raises her glass to her lips in an attempt to avoid the conversation, shooting a side-eye Dewey's way.  He always knows how to keep Mom from going off more than she already has.

Because her father is either a saint or equally as eager to get this pushed aside,  he complies.

“So,”  he says, pushing through the tension with an awkward effort to clear his throat.   “Els,  have you eaten since everything started?”

Of course he chooses the most parent route of changing the topic.  Out of the corner of her eye she notices Abi grin, the same fond look she gets when Dad behaves- in her words- like a natural born caretaker.  Nevertheless Ellie plays into it,  not bothering to lie.

“You mean since Jason and Greg died?  No.”  

A furrow appears between Dad's eyebrows the same way it always does when Ellie admits to not taking care of herself (like she had the time to do so) though he does as she hoped and shifts the attention back to Mom and Lou.  “She hasn't eaten-”

“We heard.”

“-so save the…death, conversation,”  he very carefully doesn't look her way as he speaks.  “Until she's actually got the energy to listen to it.  Now's not the time,  Gale.”

Mom's mouth parts partially before she leans back in her chair,  nothing short of a scowl playing at her lips.  She won't argue with Dad in front of people,  Ellie knows.  She respects him more than she respects anyone else.

There are times she envies such a luxury.

Silence hangs over them like a blanket of tension as she takes another sip of lemonade.  There's gotta be a quicker way around this besides annoyed chewing and the sound of ice clattering to the bottom of the cup.

“Has anyone checked on Juliette?”  Abi asks.  Her voice breaks the collective bated breath of the table and prompts Ellie to raise her head, unable to keep it from tilting in the way that always makes her adults smile.  Or,  in Lou’s case, come close to it.

“What happened to aunt Julie?”

“The Loomis girl’s memorial,”  Lou supplies, voice emptied of the prior irritation.  “I believe your mother told me they were close.”

“Like sisters,”  Dad corrects.  “Like Els and Buffy.  They were practically sewn together,  you know,  and when Jules saw that mannequin,  all the photos,  she left.  I know Randy's with her.  That's about it, though.”

Aunt Rebekah.  She's another ghost Ellie has found herself dreaming of, glimpses of chestnut hair matted and brilliantly bright hazel eyes empty in nightmares.  There's no way to ask about her without pushing a domino in the line of grief,  her story one that breaks barriers of morality.  Dad has nightmares about her sometimes, she knows.  He was one of the first ones at the scene despite not being with that particular force.  He's not the only one cradling her memory, either; Buffy said that uncle Randy once gave her a lecture on going through boxes in their attic because that's where the rest of Rebekah's things remained,  clothes tucked away and kept by Juliette.  The sister who survived.

Ellie doesn't know what she would do without Buffy.  Losing Anika feels like she's swallowed a knife made of flames already, a loss she can't think about longer than a few seconds lest she burst into tears, but Buffy?

Some things aren't ever to be spoken of.  Ellie can't ever imagine losing her twin,  her best friend.  She can't imagine losing such an essential piece of herself yet three people in her direct family have,  from Julie to Rory to Dad.  None of them need the weight of another loss.

The thought pulls her attention back to her father.  Aunt Tatum had a section in the shrine,  she knows.  It stood next to the rainbow pajamas and drawings of the mutilated Maddie Reed like it was daring Ellie to confront her entire past.

Like a coward, she avoided it.

Dad's nowhere near as careful.

“Are you okay?”  She questions.  There's no need to elaborate.  There's a mutual understanding of what she's saying despite how Lou never crossed paths with Tatum,  this bone-deep grief coming from equal parts sympathy and the unity between them that somehow hasn't broken.  By some miracle of miracles their family shares a beating heart that aches when one of them aches,  breaks when another breaks,  loves and bleeds in the same hopeless way Ellie's always has,  and that's how she knows without his answer what the truth really is.

“Dad,”  she says, voice barely above a whisper.  “Can I have a hug?”

Once again she doesn't need an answer.  Without regard for their awkwardly shaped booth Ellie leans into her father's side,  pressing against his jacket until both arms are comfortably wrapped around him.  Abi and Lou have started their own conversation on her other side,  stories of death coming in a flow of whispers Ellie doesn't want to decipher at the moment.  As far as she's concerned,  there's only one way to make sure neither Dad nor Juliette loses more than they already have.

It's a conversation Ellie isn't looking forward to.  For now she presses closer to Dewey,  finds comfort in the way he holds her the same way he held her as a little girl,  and waits for a piece of normalcy.

“I’M WHO HE wants.”

Abi's barely finished her final bite before Ellie is saying what they all already know.  She'd done what Dad had politely requested of Mom and Lou- for her sake, no less- and waited until lunch was over before bringing up the elephant none of them have addressed,  desperately trying to ignore how her aunt nearly chokes at the words.

“Sunny-”

“It's me, Fifi, and Sam,”  Ellie continues,  reaching one hand down to grab for Abi's own.  Dad's not speaking beside her,  she's no longer sure he will.  Lou's keeping a carefully controlled expression,  her eyes practically steel daggers as she stares across the table.  Mom looks stiff.  Abi feels twitchy.

Ellie feels sick.

“I don't plan on dying,”  she starts, squeezing her aunt's hand like that's a reassurance of any sort.  None of the others ever planned on dying.  Not Tatum.  Not Rebekah.  Not Wes.  Not Luke.

Not Anika.

None of them ever planned on it yet they still found themselves on a lineup of memories to play back at the theater of those loved and lost.  None of them ever planned on it yet they still left people to mourn them.  None of them ever planned on it,  that's not what matters.

What matters is that they're still gone.  What matters is that Ellie could easily join them.  What matters is that her family could be next,  and she can't let that happen.

Her heart rises at a breakneck speed as she looks down at the table,  smoothing one thumb over her aunt's knuckles.  “I don't plan on it.  It won't be a - a sacrifice or something,  but I can't drag everyone down with me when you guys could finally be in the clear.”

“We're never in the clear.”  Lou states this without a beat spared to think, her lips pressed into a thin line.  “Ever.  While we may play the roles of collateral now,  they don't lose anything by killing us where the others failed.”

“They don't gain anything,  either,”  Ellie points out.  “If you guys can be kept out of the way-”

“And let you be what, bait?”

The sharpness of Mom's tone throws her for a loop.  It's easy to cut her thoughts short at how tense her mother sounds despite their prior conversation,  a small part of her feeling like a scolded little girl at Gale's reaction.

“Not bait,”  she replies, desperately trying to keep her voice reassuring as she delivers a hopeful promise she knows she can't force into reality.  “Just more open.  If it's like what Detective Bailey said,  like what you said,  then they want the legacy kids.  They don't want you.  For the first time since all of this started,  they don't want you.”

“What they want and what they'll do are two entirely different things,”  Mom shoots back,  jaw tense.   “Dewey,  back me up here.”

At her side Dad takes a deep breath,  the first one she's heard since she unveiled this new plan.  “She's not wrong, Els.  You're not putting yourself on the line for the small chance that it'll keep us safe.  You won't.”

“Dad-”

“Ellie-Marie Riley,”  the usage of her full name seems to even catch Mom by surprise,  brows arching in unison with Ellie's as Dad cuts her off.  “No.  You’re not giving this fucker even half of what he wants.  I don't care if it gives me an all-clear from now until the end of time,  it's not happening.”

The shutdown is one Ellie should have expected.  It's not like she expected him to be okay with what she knows to be the solution anyway but it still makes her bite her lip,  shoulders slumping in a defeat she can't voice.  This is the only way she can keep her family safe.  This is the only way she can keep her friends safe.  This is the only way to begin fixing what all seems broken,  yet the risk of one more loss is always weighing on their shoulders despite how Ellie longs to move the pressure away.

“Anika's dead,”  she whispers, deciding to focus on her aunt's hand once more.  “Because I -we- couldn't pull her in quick enough.  Because we didn't give him or them or whoever what they wanted.  She's dead.”

Twirl the ring.  It's a tanzanite gem, a December birthstone, one Abi has had forever.  Ellie spins it now, turns it around her quiet aunt's finger again and again.

“I don't want you guys to be dead,  too.”

The confession feels broken.  They all knew it despite how she's not spoken a word of the possibilities,  the fear another silent quality they share.  Ellie can't do it,  can't lose the first home she's ever known,  can't even begin to fathom what a world is like without Mom's thoroughness or Lou's observations or Dad's laugh or Abi's singing.  She can't do it,  she doesn't want to try,  yet this is daring her to do so yet again.

Abi catches her hand when it moves to twirl the ring again.  Her eyes are soft with an understanding sadness when Ellie lifts her gaze to meet them,  a sorrow buried in mounds of love looking right back at her.

“Sunny,”  she begins,  her tone soothing in the way Ellie always finds it to be.   “Your dad and I are never going to be alone again,  you hear me?  We're gonna catch up with Tara and Sam when we leave.  We're gonna stick around in a group.  We're gonna be a unit,  all of us,  and that's safer than we've ever been.  It's as safe as we'll ever be.”

It's comforting.  It is,  but it's not enough.

Ellie glances over to where Mom and Lou sit,  almost silently pleading with them to say the same.  Mom works alone.  She always has,  she prefers it to trying to get along with an entire group.  It's just that her version of alone includes Lou,  which means…

“Please,”  Ellie forces out.  “Mom,  please.  Please just go with us.”

For once her mother looks apologetic.  Ellie has never hated an expression more.

“Lou and I are going back to the house.  We've got research to go through-”

“Research you can't do with us?”

“Research that Bailey will insist on reviewing,”  Gale corrects.   “I don't trust him enough to share this with.  We'll be safe,  alright?  We've got doormen for a reason.”

“They're just as human as we are,”  Ellie argues back.  She's doing it on autopilot now,  senses rearing into a hundred.  All heart and no common sense,  Anika once joked.

It's not seeming like much of a joke now.

“Ellie-”

“No,  Mom,”  turning back to Abi she clears her throat,  doing her best to pretend she's not afraid.   “You and Dad will be with everyone,  then.  You promise that?”

There's no convincing her away from this one.  Abi knows it as well as Ellie does- she was the one who helped enforce this stubborn streak,  after all-  yet it's easy to now see the regret from such work reflected in her auntie's expression.   “I swear it, little dove.”

“Then it's settled.  Mom,”  Ellie turns in her seat now,  shifting her body forward to better face her mother.  This is her decision.  Her life.  Her people.

She's gonna be there one way or another.

“I'm coming with you and Lou.”