Club None

X.

The faint midday drizzle that had swept the two almost-friends, beyond-acquaintances to breakfast turned to a steady downpour. Ellie had run, run, run, to the camper, where rain beat against the roof, ratatating at the tarp-covered windows. Now she was huddled in the corner of the kitchen. Cabinet handles pressed into her spine. Her knee was swollen and bruised from where she had fallen. Her fingers had gone bloodless at the tips from holding ice to the purpling skin.

Her phone sat where she had left it three days ago: on the lip of the bathroom sink, buzzing softly, inflating with voicemails and messages and emails and missed calls. Urban Everywhere sent her out to the desert to promote, make videos, attend glorious parties. The closest she had come to luxury – by choice – was lukewarm shower water. She hadn't uploaded new content in weeks. Her followers were turning to threats. Now even her agent was leaving her pseudo-kind warnings.

She pressed her hand against her stomach. Indigo chose that moment to kick her fingers, and she shut her mouth around the gasp that arose. Tears steamed in her eyes.

The festival was a suicide mission. It was an escape. Now, it would become both.

Ellie tried to keep her breathing even. If she upset Indigo, she would start kicking again, harder. Alice and Rowan were gone. The musician her older step-sister met after Friday's show had sent her VIP tickets for a birthday bash. Garish, overdone. She had planned on going until this morning, in the junkyard, where Chanden found her.

Chanden Chanden Chanden. His hair was the exact same color as her dead mother's. Blonde, dandelion-fine. Like Frederick's, like Frederick's. Ellie clamped down on the thought.

She had thought –

Eyes screwed shut, she drew her heels closer to her body. The rain had begun to sounds like footsteps on the front step, knocks on the doorframe, hands rustling the makeshift windows.

You can't escape me, Duane had said the night before she left. Don't even try.

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Lightning shattered the air, a sound like glass breaking. Ellie awakened with a start. Stiffness tightened her neck and shoulders. Rubbing her face, she looked up, across the cramped kitchen.

And came face-to-face with Alice, emerging from the outside.

"Hello, A..."

Lips pinched, her step-sister moved aside to allow Rowan to enter. Both were bedecked in glitter, clothing rumpled, hair skewed around their face. Mascara streaked their cheeks. They stared at her – their feckless, naïve, ignorant baby sister, curled in a ball, fear looking out from her eyes.

Had they been alone, they might not have carried through with their betrayal. Perhaps they would have offered her a towel, or tea, or comforting ankle rub while she cried out the rest of whatever misery had befallen her.

But that was the trouble – they were not alone.

Duane leered over the eldest's shoulder. "Hello, Elle. Miss me?"

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