Try {One | Alaric Saltzman}

Try

She couldn't peel her eyes from the white ceiling as the obnoxious beeping of her alarm clock filled her bedroom. Morning light flooded through the windows behind her desk, bright and uninvited, nagging her to get up. But she stayed frozen, willing herself to sink deeper into the mattress, determined to put off the day for as long as possible.

Footsteps echoed down the hall. A soft knock came at her door.

With one last glance at the room around her at the overturned books, the picture frames facedown, the walls the lightest shade of blue now stripped bare, Abigail closed the door behind her. It was the only response she had to give.

Nothing was the same.

Not since May.

In the mirror above the bathroom sink, she caught a glimpse of herself. Abigail Gilbert: blue eyes from her father, dark brown hair from her mother. She couldn't hold her own stare for long.

She was on a mission to feel anything other than what she had for months now.

But even she knew it was an impossible task.

It had been four months, to be exact, since the car accident that had taken their parents and made her, made them, orphans.

And the loneliness was bone-deep, even with her younger siblings still filling the house.

Her sister, Elena, had turned to her best friend. Her brother, Jeremy, had turned to the town's stoners. And Abigail had turned inward, hiding in her room, while their Aunt Jenna moved into a life she hadn't signed up for.

As she made her way downstairs, Jeremy brushed past her on the steps, his shoulder knocking against hers in a wordless kind of anger.

The first floor wasn't quiet. Not at all.

The news blared from the living room television, half-packed lunches cluttered the kitchen counter, the smell of burning toast mixed with the sharper scent of coffee, and Jenna's laughter rang out from somewhere behind a stack of number two pencils.

But the noise was wrong.

The noise was different from the kind she had grown up with.

For a moment, she could almost hear her mother's voice calling up the stairs, smell her father's aftershave clinging to the morning air. The memory pressed against her chest, sharp and fleeting, then gone just as quickly.

"What am I missing?" Jenna's voice cut through, too loud, too bright, as she shoved her laptop into an oversized tote bag.

Elena tapped the countertop rhythmically with the lid of her coffee cup. "Don't you have a big presentation today?"

Jenna looked at her watch and grimaced. "I'm meeting with my thesis advisor at—" she cut herself off, eyes widening. "Now. Crap!"

"Then go," Elena said, managing a quick, easy smile. "We'll be fine. Bonnie's giving us a ride."

The moment Jenna rushed out, her laughter and heels echoing through the house, the smile dropped from Elena's face. She turned to Abigail with the same expression she had worn all summer. An expression stitched from hope and exhaustion.

"Today is a fresh start," Elena said softly. "So try. It's the only way we can make it through."

Abigail swallowed against the weight pressing down on her chest. "You're right."

Her gaze drifted toward the front door just as it clicked shut behind Jeremy.

"You okay?" she called after him.

He didn't look back. "Don't start now, Abigail."

"What am I missing?" Jenna asked as she shoved her laptop into her oversized tote bag.