Griffin James Sanders, he'd always been the kid they'd pushed out of the building first, not because it was under threat but because they personally didn't want him to take or use any of their air space up with his breathing. His entire existence had been an annoyance to the people who were supposed to love him the most.
It was around when he turned six and his Ma and Pa were gone in the morning, that's when he'd been nabbed by the Social Service lady. He'd ran upstairs excited to show off something positive he'd achieved in school that day, a Stupid family drawing that he got praised for, and they were just gone. Nothing there to prove they even existed, sometimes he had trouble knowing if they did or not.
He'd been pushed around from home to home 'till he had just about had enough of everyone, he'd done packed up everything he owned and stuffed it into a bag, it wasn't anything much. Just that day it seemed to be in his favor, down a mile or so from where he was placed he'd walked and watched as a girl 'round his age, she was pretty and looked cool, not like the girly girls he was used to seeing his whole life, just normal...sorta like him he guessed, but she was kickin' an' cursin' at this car.
Now he couldn't remember how it all went down but he remembers himself askin' her, "Are you stealin' this car, young lady?" a-an' her replying with somethin' like, "I'm not stealing it if i already did, but is that a problem to you?" So he shook his head no, and grabbed his backpack straps pullin' em until they squeezed so tight his arms were just about to fall off.
T-Then he stumbled on as his just-turned-teen-but-not-quite-manly-enough-to-not-voice-crack self to ask her, "Mind if I join ya?" an' she asked, "You running away from home?" So Griffin, he nodded and looked around when she did, she peered like a bird lookin' for its pray and h-he'd know, he liked to bird watch.
"You?" His dumb voice had cracked so bad his face turned pink.
"What'd you say?" She had asked him, the car was runnin' now all ol' and busted but still ready to just go off into the future, a different world maybe, he'd like a different universe at his age.
"I-I meant, are you runnin' off too?" Griffin had all but jumbled his voices, clashing and colliding with each other embarrassingly in-front of the pretty girl who had stolen the ol' car right there in front of him.
"I was trying to, you any good with cars...?" Now the pretty girl stood in front of him, her arms all crossed and made him feel intimidated but Griffin he knew, he knew about cars a whole lot, so he'd shook his small head and rushed to aid the car.
His thirteen year old self had fixed that car in under ten minutes, and got it runnin' again without the keys for the girl because she was just so intriguing a-and he was just tryina Help, But he also didn't wanna overstep and ask to come with but she'd done did that for him alright.
"My name's Dallas, and if we're going to take off in this car together I'd like to know your name as well. It's only fair." The girl-Dallas her name was, such a infatuating name that was. He liked it, so he did what his Ma had told him to do when he met company or new friends of her and Pa's and stuck his hand out for a shake.
Dallas had warm hands.
"I-I'm Griffin, I can come with you?" He'd been dumb he'd been. The girl had already subtly said yes to his question but he hadn't realized that at the time.
"We can be partners, you and I, it'll be fun Come on." Dallas had gotten in the car she did, he followed on after her and squished into the seat next to hers. His backpack went to the backseats, it was empty so that had worked out.
That first night they drove, well Dallas had driven and driven farther and farther away from not-home and each more miles he saw switching numbers on the mileage on the car Griffin felt freer then he ever had his whole life.
She'd pulled over into a stop for the nigh', Stars were out yonder and shinin' bright and beautiful they were, he watched as she crawled on through to the back seats and lay down.
"Well come on, you don't want to get a crick in your neck from those seats, they hurt big time." That Girl now she pulled him to the back, it was bigger than he thought from glancing once, he landed on soft blankets by where the feet go.
"Thank ya." He'd relished in that blessing.
"No need cowboy, it's nice to have someone to talk to now." He could just hear her smile, he couldn't describe it but it was like a sixth feeling he'd gotten when he met this girl. Like he'd gotten attached already and knew he didn't want to let it go anytime soon.
It was times like now that Griffin wishes he could just turn back his watch and have time go along with it too, that he could just be on the road traveling with Dallas and wake up with her leaning on him or vise versa. Just a safe bubble they had since they met, even now waking up with her leaning on his shoulder where he'd fallen asleep in the waiting room.
A sense of peace. A-A freedom she could only give him, Griffin just wishes he wouldn't get so attached to people like Cooper. Because now, there was one more person he cares about, one more person to think about, one more person to watch out for.
He believes that maybe he gets his ambition to be careful because he doesn't want to lose or get attached to people he cares for now. Not again, and not no more in the future. Because the moment he sleepily watched the Doctor stroll up sulkin' an such, Griffin knew he was not bearing anything good with him.
"Dal, wake up, the Docs here." Griffin lifts her head off his shoulder slowly and gently, he'd never hurt her.
The Ice pack slides off her face, he catches and gives it back to her though it's mighty squishy and not ice anymore. She feels this too because she tosses it to the table where the magazines with them pretty women advertising furniture were. They stand.
Griffin doesn't feel weird when he grabs her hand.
"I'm so sorry we did everything we could, he didn't make it."
It was different than being left behind by family who he'd loved and tried to impress or give them a reason to love them back than someone who'd stuck by his and Dallas' side for years, fully supporting them and appreciating their existences. This feels way worse than being abandoned, it feels cruel and not right.
T-They has to be lyin', Cooper was just–he was just talking to them in the car not but five hours ago, no, he was sittin' up in a hospital bed waitin' on them to bring him junk to eat–he wasn't, he couldn't...
"You're lyin'."
Dallas' hand felt like an anchor, it didn't hurt, he'd never hurt her.
"I'm extremely sorry for your loss, please accept my condolences." The dumb faced looking lyin Doctor smiles with sadness.
People don't lie with sadness, you cant fake sadness.
"Griff, he's telling the truth Coop didn't make it." Dallas squeezes his hand now, yes she does, the anchor is now sinking through his heart and rips it in half tearing each side to shreds.
People who love you back aren't supposed to leave.
Now that's what she'd said to him all those years ago when he'd been all upset about his Ma and Pa again. Now it's a lie, it ain't truth, Griffin didn't know truth no more.
He turns to her, he needs to know, "People who love you back Aren't supposed to leave, right Dal? You said that, you did."
His eyes burn, they never do that, liquid fills his vision, Coop can't be dead—he just can't be. It's not right because HE CARES. HE CARES HE CARES HE CARES.
"He didn't want to Griff, you know that come here." Dallas takes his body and hugs it, SHE CARES SHE Always cares...she's always here, and she cares. Her words are still truth. They're still right.
Her body shakes, she's cryin' and he's cryin', she cares and he cares they care together and that makes them truth. That makes what they say, what their friendship is real and right and alive.
He doesn't want to be here with that Doctor man he decides, because he's still standin' there sulking and pityin', Cooper always said there ain't nothin' worse than a pity party and he believed just the same. Especially when people ain't so subtle about it, it's awkward and embarrassing, they'd been just fine on their own for about 3 years. They don't need sympathy or pathetic pity.
"Come on, les' get outta here." Griffin says, he glares at the Doctor Pity Man through his hurt and state of what books call it grief. He grabs that ice pack he'd seen Dallas usin' before, because she might still want it.
"Just leave it here Griff, it's melted all the way anyways." Dallas is wipin' her face with her sweater, swiping away all the pain it seems. Her face is set, it's just her eyes that are givin' away how she feels, he'd know. He's known for a while how she hides in herself. It's why he's softie and she's worrisome because she'll do somethin' rash if she's scared or upset.
Griffin abandons the pack back to the table, and swings his arm around her shoulder just as he always does when she's upset or he's upset or if it's the both of em like right now, the Doctor tries to stop them to get more information out of them goin' on about relatives or family members, but Coop hadn't got any of them. It was just the two of them and him and Travis and Johnny back at the building.
He feels the doctor touch his arm on the right side of his jacket, he just wants to leave and go anywhere but here right now and this Doctor won't leave them be, it's rash but Griffin lets go of Dallas and pushes the Doctor back.
"Leave us be! We're leavin' ta get Dal a new icepack for her face, them assholes done messed it up for her okay? Do you want to be an asshole in my way." He snaps, it was wrong of him but he couldn't help it much. Thinking through Coop talked about having a sister, "He has a sister Olivia Jones okay? We weren't nothin' but friends anyway."
Coop was so much more than that, but he couldn't let Dallas and himself be stuck here now with questions being tossed, Olivia can take care of it now. They'd find out when the funeral was gonna be, he knew they would. This man has no reason to keep them here, and they don't wanna stay neither.
"Alrighty Griff deep breaths remember, I'll drive us, Give the keys here." Dallas leads him away from the man he wouldn't mind fighting with now, the freezing air meets him, it's cold, they get inside the car, the car is warm.
Dallas pats the keys out of his pocket now, and drives away from the hospital, now leaving with one less person with them.
She must've drove two hours before the car stops, it stops in a parking lot a empty one except them for the time being. The suns rising over the horizon now, he sees they're at a beach, the sand is so close.
"Come on cowboy, let's go." She gets out of the car now, his eyes follow but his body stops a moment before complying and getting out too.
They walk side by side, she takes her shoes off, then the socks, his come ripped off too. They abandon them in the car, and walk for the sand.
It's colder than he thought, "Why?"
"You always talk about how much you love the beach, I picked up that you were a sucker for sunrises too with all our late night races going into morning sometimes." They find a spot and sit, the ocean is singing but the birds remain asleep.
"That's not what I'm asking." He clarifies.
Dallas sighs, her eye must be hurting her, her hand keeps rubbing at it.
"Why people die?" Her eyes are kind of everywhere but his.
"Mhm." He mumbles, kicks at the sand beneath his feet and watches the grains blow in the light wind.
"They just do, I guess. We don't really get to know that, I mean we know how it happened, but why today? I have no answer for that, they come and go and we make ourselves better for their sake because they don't get to have a chance to try anymore." Dallas lays back in the sand, she'll get it in her hair and he'll have to hear complaints later, maybe it feels better for her eye to feel the wind from down low.
"What do we do now? What's the after of all this?" He lays back copying her, he too will complain when the time comes.
"We won't forget him–"
"No We won't—"
"We just keep him in thought, and keep going with our lives really. Time keeps moving, and it does so with or without you. So are you going to keep moving through the future with me?" She lays it down heavy.
"I'm still gonna be hurtin'." He admits like it's a crime to feel anything negative.
"That's okay, it's normal, I feel the hurt right now too. We just can't let it eat away at us, I don't want to lose you to that." She admits.
Griffin feels his own smile, the sun smiles back down on him in response, feels like Cooper is telling him it's alright and that he's fine where he ended up, "Don't worry, I'm not goin' no where."
The sun rises, "Your face still hurts don't it?"
"It does, but it's not too bad, I'll live." She says like it's nothing.
"You took care of me while I was sick it's only fair I treat you to some ice, come on." He lifts her up when she gives in and he himself feels the weight of loss being outweighed by his compassion towards his friend.
"All right cowboy, let's do it."
"Right this way, AC/DC."