a/n :  don't let the gif fool you,  this drabble is
set in 2014.  unfortunately i do not have the
willpower of taylor swift and felt myself
withering with every attempt to create a gif,
so.  here we are.  this isn't a happy drabble,
but!!  those will arrive eventually!!

'CAUSE TAIL BETWEEN YOUR LEGS,
YOU'RE LEAVING,  AND I STILL CAN'T
BELIEVE IT.  OLD HABITS DIE
SCREAMING.

SHE WAKES UP gasping for air.

It's sharp enough to hurt.  Ellie-Marie can feel it pierce the back of her throat like a dagger as she tries to resurface from the memories of a blade against her throat,  a scream trapping itself behind her teeth the way it always does these days,  even when she tries to force it out.

It's like her body remembers before she does,  that Dad's not here to keep the monsters away anymore.

Brown hair tangles between her fingers as Ellie drags her hands over her head,  eyes squeezing shut as she focuses on her breathing.  Dad would always rub her back, kiss her head and count each one with her.  In and out, Princess,  he'd coach.  One…two.  One…two.  One…two.  You're doing good, it's okay.  I'm here, babygirl.  I've got you.

If she squeezes her eyes shut hard enough,  grips her hair in an increasingly tightening hold,  she can almost make herself go back to those moments.  When her fear clutched her by the throat with a leather glove and blood soaked her little body up to her neck Dad was there to burst the door down, was there to drive her somewhere safe.  When the world felt like it was occupied by variations of cuts and bruises he was there,  crying with her and kissing each little wound before the bandaid was placed on.  When the nightmares would come she could scream out,  no matter how old she got,  and Dad would be at the door with a pistol at his hip.

She should be used to this,  though.  Opening her eyes to find her room empty except for her and the moonlight,  surrounded by stuffed animals that look on with what may be pity.  She should be used to this.  Her life has been full of when’s for the last six weeks.  

SHE WAKES UP with a smile.

It's how the good mornings start off.  The sunrise comes through at six in the morning and she wakes up for the first time,  checks the clock before rolling over and tucking her head under her pillow for another three or four hours.  Though they've only been in New York for two months,  Ellie thinks she's already got a system down that may actually work for her.

Today is no different.

Her feet pad against the cool wooden floor once she feels awake enough to stand,  barely passing a glance to the mirror at her bedside in favor of keeping her inside joke running with Dad.  He'll ruffle her tangled hair every morning and liken it to things Ellie doubts even exists,  like lions with frizz issues (everyone has frizz issues,  but lions?  Lions?)  or the world's first beautiful bird's nest  (Ellie thinks they're all beautiful.  Mom says she's sentimental.)  and she knows that,  if she sees it looking back at her,  she'll brush it all out.

What she chooses instead is opening her door and stepping into the hallway,  the smell of what can only be waffles hitting her senses immediately.

That's her first sign something's off.

This is his day to cook breakfast,  but Dad doesn't make waffles.  He says Mom’s are better,  fluffier and lighter than his are.  That means he's not here.

The thought makes her move faster,  rounding the corner with eyes already scanning the room. 

He's not here.

“Morning,  Els,”  Mom greets from the oven.  “You hungry?”

“Good morning,”  it takes a few more scans for Ellie to enter the room completely,  tugging her arms over her chest.

It'd be silly to believe someone else was here,  wouldn't it?  That'd be dumb.  Plenty of kids wake up to people already gone, it doesn't mean what Ellie's trying to make it mean.  No one makes waffles in a hostage situation.

Even so she can't pretend to not be looking around when she takes her place atop the counter,  gnawing on her bottom lip.  This isn't right.  Something's wrong here.  The same sinking feeling she had years ago finds itself forming a crater in her stomach,  an unspoken emptiness she knows shouldn't be here.

“Ellie,”  Mom repeats.  “You good?”

“Where's Daddy?”

Is it rude to ask a question like that?  Ellie-Marie doesn't have a favorite between her parents, of course,  yet it feels cruel to ask regardless.  Luckily Mom doesn't seem to be too offended,  only shrugging halfheartedly.

“I think he went to get groceries.  He should be back in a little while.”

“Oh,”  her shoulders slacken a little bit at the news,  the assurance already bringing her guard down.  “So he's okay?” 

Mom turns from where she's been focusing on not burning the penthouse down,  a sympathetic sort of pain in her smile.  “He's fine,  baby.  He better be,  anyway-I've already got his breakfast made.”

Ellie giggles at the comment.  She should ignore the sinking feeling in her stomach,  really.  It's an aftershock that she needs to get used to,  that doesn't mean it's right.

She needs to learn the difference.

SHE KNOWS WHICH floorboards squeak.

This is a talent recently developed.  Their home has been plunged into a bottomless pit of silence that Ellie won't dare break, not even with a noise Mom probably won't be able to hear,  and she's not too fond of the idea that she's becoming a concern.  She's been holding her breath ever since Dad left,  never toeing the line,  never looking at the line.  For the first four weeks she lived in her room.  Now she slips in and out, head down like she can avoid replaying memories as long as she doesn't look too long at the living room.

It doesn't work most of the time.

Fortunately for her,  she's not leaving her room tonight.  All she has to do is tiptoe her way around the few floorboards willing to betray her,  make her way to her closet and get the door open without a hitch.

This has become a near nightly thing,  reaching for Dad's favored undershirt that she's folded into a shoebox.  A conversation from long ago was enough for Ellie to know he's had this for at least fifteen years and wore it a majority of that time,  washing it with his uniform when he could.

Maybe that's part of why it's so comforting.  It still feels like Dad when she tugs it to her chest, echoes of a hug when she needs it the most.

Right now she needs it more than ever.

SHE KNOWS WHICH floorboards squeak.

Not in her room, but the hallway is the one she's worried about anyway.  There are times she has to get water in the middle of the night and lands on an achy board,  waking her parents up and starting everyone's day at four in the morning.  It took two mistakes for her to decide that she had to get better at this whole sneaking thing, which is exactly why it's working now.

She wishes it wasn't.

Mom doesn't cry.  She hasn't cried in three years,  not since the hospital.  Before that Ellie doesn't know if she ever saw her mother cry, always the one who could be trusted to remain stonefaced at the worst of times.  Nothing seemed to break her.

She's crying now.

It's quiet.  Hiccupping sobs that sound painful are what emerge from Mom's spot in the living room,  each one wrenching out of her like she doesn't know exactly what she's doing.  For a horrifying moment Ellie-Marie remembers New York traffic,  thinks of how many ways Dad's trip home could have gone,  thinks of the promise of his death that's hung over her head this entire time.  Fear encases itself in her bones and she practically sprints from her spot in the hallway,  hurtling into the living room to wrap her arms around her mother.

Mom jolts where she sits.  This doesn't keep her from responding to the hug,  though,  and her arms wrap around Ellie tight enough for her lungs to struggle.

“Momma,”  she manages,  squirming slightly for more air.  “What's wrong?  What's going on?”

Silence.  Mom seems more reluctant to answer than Ellie-Marie was to ask,  one hand smoothing over her long hair.

“Momma?”

This earns her a choked sound,  wounded in a way she's never heard Gale sound before.  “He’s gone.”

He’s gone.

The statement doesn't want to register in Ellie's brain.  She's not sure if she wants it to.  Her body reacts before she can,  a retching noise pulling out of her at the implications of one simple word.  Gone.  Gutted like Maddie?  Stabbed like Rebekah?  Tortured like aunt Tatum?  Gone?

“No,”  she forces out,  pushing against Momma's hold.  “No.  No he's not,  he isn't,  he's fine-”

“Not dead,”  Mom corrects,  the tiniest sliver of relief tucked away in the reassurance.  “Not dead.  Gone.  He- he left,  Ellie.”

She feels like she's been slapped.

He didn't leave.  He wouldn't leave them.  She knows her Dad,  knows he loves them more than anything.  He makes it known every day,  kisses her head every morning and always treats Mom like a queen,  even when he's making quips her way.  He loves them.  He adores them.  He wouldn't leave.

Not without a goodbye.  Not without a hug or a kiss or at least having the decency to tell them.  He wouldn't do that.  He's better than that.

“He wouldn't…”  she breathes out,  voice tiny.   “No.  Momma,  he wouldn't do that.  He wouldn't.  It's a mistake,  it's gotta be.”

Wordlessly Mom pulls away from the hug they've shortly become tangled in,  turning on her phone to display the receipt onscreen.

It's a plane ticket to Oakland,  California.  It's thirty minutes away from Woodsboro,  the same city with the airport they originally left home from.

He’s not coming back.

HIS SHIRT IS the one thing Ellie-Marie kept for herself.

He knows it's missing.  She knows he does,  he has to.  He's had this thing so long that it's probably become a second skin to him,  and with everything she sent to auntie Abi’s house,  this isn't one of them.

(Everything was sent with letters signed by her,  swooping letters of the cursive Lulu has taught her.  Daddy hasn't responded.  Only Abi.)  

She can't bring herself to part with it.  Daddy hasn't even called in the last six weeks,  hasn't answered her letters,  hasn't even asked for anything back that she's heard.  The reality started closing in a few weeks ago,  the dooming realization that there's only one thing that could have prompted him to leave so abruptly.  He's been with Mom for nearly twenty years, after all,  and hasn't spoken to her once.  Hasn't even acted like he wants to.

It goes against everything Ellie-Marie holds onto so tightly.  It goes against every memory of him brushing her hair, of her being smaller and him chasing her around the living room despite his nerve damage,  of riding her bike outside and him crying when she fell off.  It goes against the memories of showing up to the police station just because she and Mom were wanting to see him for lunch,  goes against the family days with Abi and Lulu,  goes against going to Buffy's house and the two of them braiding Dad and Randy's hair with what little material they had to work with.  It goes against the way he still tucked her into bed when she'd have a day where her anxiety flared up,  goes against the little daddy-daughter dates,  goes against the drives he'd take her on when Taylor Swift would release a new album.

It goes against everything.

But it's her.

She feels like she doesn't have a right to keep anything he left.  He doesn't want her to have it,  she knows,  but this is the one thing she can't bear to part with.  She wants so badly to know if he actually hates her,  if she's the reason everything fell apart,  but she doesn't know if she could even hate him for saying yes.

He was her best friend.  She's seen him as her hero ever since she was a little girl.  She still needs his hugs when she has nightmares of that night,  and it's why she curls into his shirt now.  Her face is buried in the fabric the same way she'd tuck against him after another bad dream,  blankets tucked tight enough around her shoulders to almost feel like a hug.  Even with everything,  she doesn't know how to feel better if she doesn't have the person she believed to be her protector right there with her.  Her tears dampen the fabric the same way they would dampen his nightshirts,  an ache forming in the root of her heart.

It's just like they say,  she supposes.

Old habits die screaming.