Prologue
"Let's just wait it out. You know, we can be all poetic and just lose our minds together."
Ellie smiled.
A sad, worn, weary smile.
Her hand found Riley's, her palm wet, sticky, warm, clammy... bloody. But it was hers. Hers. And that was all Ellie needed - all she would ever need.
It was all she ever wanted.
With their damp fingers intertwined, the two girls looked at Ellie's forearm, seeing the pale skin was smeared with hot blood, teeth marks rooted deep into the flesh to scab over before mending together into scarred tissue. Riley squeezed Ellie's hand, turned on her heel, stepped over a corpse, and began to walk.
Ellie didn't speak, didn't question where they were going, how they were going to get there, what they were going to tell Marlene. She didn't say a word. She was silent.
She was always silent in her dreams.