𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐅𝐔𝐋 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐎𝐖 ➵ 𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝗱𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗲𝗺𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗶

𝕻𝖗𝖔𝖑𝖔𝖌𝖚𝖊: 𝔴𝔢'𝔳𝔢 𝔞𝔩𝔩 𝔤𝔬𝔱 𝔰𝔱𝔬𝔯𝔦𝔢𝔰.

     WILLOW COULD FEEL the past catching up to her like a sudden breeze that seemed to come from nowhere, suspicion at every corner. The feeling of insecurity crept up on her whenever she left home, looking over her shoulder was instinct, routine. She lived half her life that way. There was the immovable feeling of danger everywhere she went, but this time it was different. The inevitable never felt so close, the past is calling to her. Willow sits at the town's bar, exhausted from her life on the ranch.

    She wants to reminisce, to taste the burn of whiskey, to try to recollect all her life choices and put them back together like a puzzle. She always expects someone to come asking, poking, prodding about the Van der Linde gang and everyone who disbursed from Dutch's dying dream. She feels that burn blaze down her throat and exhales. This bar is new, and very unlike the saloons of old when her and the gang would go to get drunk and start trouble. They were good at both, they gave her the best and worst years of her life, all of which she wasn't sure she's glad for.

     One thing for sure: she knew she'd be dead without them.

On her third shot of whiskey someone approaches. "Is this seat taken?" A woman's voice soft like cotton, inquires from beside Willow. She glares the woman up and down, and scoffs.

    "It's a free country, isn't it?" Maybe not for my people, Willow thinks in her head before she averts her gaze.

     The woman nods graciously before she sits down at the stool right next to Willow, Willow gives the woman an icy glance. "Thank you, Miss... you are more hospitable than they say."

     Willow stops before she can down her shot, she puts down the glass and glares at the woman. "What did you say?"

     The woman suddenly realizes what she'd said, she gulps. "D-didn't mean any offence, Miss. I was just saying-"

     "So who was it? The someone that told you I wasn't hospitable?" Willow stares in a hostile tone, pretending to want answers out of the woman. The woman trembles, glancing around her field of vision to release tension from Willow's stare. Willow's smile breaks through, and she snickers. "I'm just messing with you." She drinks her shot and turns away, she gives a hearty laugh. "Girl, this place'll eat you alive." She shakes her head at the thought. "Maybe you should leave before you piss off anyone else."

The woman takes a deep breath, as if to prepare her for the next words she will say. "My name is Penny Hudson. I'm from New York, I'm a writer you see."

     But Willow doesn't care. "Mmm." She just wants this woman to stop talking, but knowing entitled women from New York- she won't.

     Penny continues, nervously swallowing. "A-and well, there's talk of you."  Willow stops sipping her whiskey.

     She frowns. "What kind of talk? From who?" Willow's nervous and tries to hide it, but she's ready to pick up and move.

She has to be prepared for anything.

"N-nothing like that, Miss! People around town say that you look like you have a story. There's nobody here that really knows you, during town meetings you just listen in, going shopping you don't talk, they rarely see your family out with you..." Penny tries to explain.

Willow scoffs and shakes her head. "Well, it's nobody's business in what I do or who I am. I'm just a woman with a job and a quiet life. No story here." She lies.

Truth is she has people to protect, and she isn't about to risk their safety over someone else's entertainment. She had worked too hard to fix and mend from the past. It took years to get where she was, to crawl her way out of the dirt and make a life for herself. It didn't matter what people thought about her, because she knew they would never understand. Willow doesn't know the true intentions of this woman.