One-shot. Audrey-centric. Takes place between Season 1 and 2, in the wake of the murders. Promotes Emrey to a degree, but otherwise stays pretty true to canon.

Thanks to anyone who reads, bookmarks, and/or gives feedback. It's really appreciated.

…

Piper,

The people here get drunk every night. I'm talking completely trashed. It's disgusting. They don't even have good reasons.

…

She kisses Zoe Williams at a bonfire down near Belmont Farms. They're at the Summit, which, in terms of elevation, is the lowest of the low points in Lakewood. Audrey hasn't been there in years. It's a place she typically associates with the lowest of the low points in her life. The dried-out, dead-grass valley hasn't changed a whole lot. It's still right next to a small river, and it's still full of sharp rocks and loose roots—it's still one of the stupidest places to get drunk in Lakewood.

The flames there still start off bright and lose light as the night goes on, just like they always used to.

The Summit isn't on the farms, just near them—Audrey thinks, anyway. She'd never been to Will's house, obviously, but Brooke said that Jake wasn't going tonight. He doesn't like going down to the Summit anymore. Addy and Carl Belmont always used to complain about the noise on Saturday nights. When Audrey raised her eyebrows, Brooke just said, "It makes him a sad drunk."

"What are you looking at?" Zoe's words are soft and silvery, like the smoke she breathes out with them. They're sitting on two fold-up chairs, a few yards away from the fire. Audrey's holding her beer on her lap because it kept tipping over in her chair's cup holder. She rolls the cold, condensing neck of the bottle between her clammy palms.

"Huh?" Audrey realizes now she's been staring up towards the higher terrain—black hills, rolling and warping in the fire's glow. She wonders if Addy Belmont is complaining about all the noise, but then she's picturing Addy just lying in bed, looking up at the ceiling, listening to a party her son would probably be at if he was alive right now.

She grips the neck of the bottle tighter. "Nothing," she murmurs.

Zoe offers her a joint, and she takes it. Audrey looks like a stoner, she knows—or, at least, like someone who doesn't give a shit—but, in reality, she hasn't smoked for a few years now. Not since she started hanging out with Noah. It was just that brief, intensely fucked-up period of her life right between the Emma and Noah Eras—otherwise characterized by her mom seeing more doctors, Christianity suddenly seeming like a real shitty idea, and Proactive not fulfilling any of its free-trial guarantees. Right around then was when she was visiting the Summit on a nightly basis.

Audrey only ever smoked weed and shrooms. She drank, mostly. She didn't like how much control she had over herself while she was high, didn't like remembering blurry people and fading flames later. It was the conscious state of it all that got to her—the moments, however soft and fuzzy they were, when she'd watch the river, thinking about how easy it would be to just stop breathing.

Black-out drunk was better for her. Black-out drunk was safer.

Audrey takes a puff and coughs when the fumes hit the back of her throat.

"First time?" Zoe chuckles.

"Yeah," she says. For some reason, lying seems like the only way to keep herself from crying right now.

Zoe is watching the side of her face with glistening eyes. Audrey has a feeling that the girl is about to say something that means a lot, but probably doesn't matter. Then: "It's fucked up, what happened to you guys. It's fucked up what happened to this whole town, but … well, you know."

Audrey doesn't say anything. She likes Zoe enough—and has all these years—but the problem is, Zoe's the type of person who you can just tell invented herself—a too-good-to-be-true version of herself. She decided to break the rules and not choose between smart and cool. She decided to listen and not judge. She decided to be hot and confident. She decided to pull it all off simultaneously—planned it out, executed flawlessly, never slipped up.

People like that make Audrey feel hollowed-out inside.

Then again, everybody makes her feel hollowed-out inside anymore—no one more than herself.

Zoe watches the side of her face again, while Audrey watches the flames. They're dimming. Then Zoe—hot and confident and non-judgmental—says, "Audrey, do you want to just kiss me?"

Audrey coughs, and wipes some water out of her eyes, and says, "Yeah."

…

It's not right that you and I have to know so much pain—not while they party it up in mansions, go to schools practically owned by their parents, step all over people like you and me. They deserve to know how it feels to lose something. They deserve to know how it feels to be scared every single day.

…

A few nights later, she wakes up choking and sobbing. Immediately, it turns to coughs—the hard, violent kind that make your throat sore and drive out all this weird, excess water from your eyes. The room is dark and tear-blurred. She closes her eyes painfully tight and waits for her body to still.

In her dreams, she held shaking people. At first, they were just bodies, and she just held them, not knowing who they were, not asking. Things happen so fast and fluidly in dreams, they never make sense. But then she was holding Noah the night Riley died. She was feeling his body tense, his veins writhe under his skin, as he jerked himself into the pathway of a police officer. "'Protect and Serve' my ass!" He was screaming, "Where were you? She was right here!" And then he was wilting into her. She was feeling his shoulders heave and hollow out. "She was right here," he was murmuring again and again and again.

And then it was Emma in her arms, on the dock. And she could feel it all again—the salty tears on her face, the chalky, sticky blood washed all the way up her forearm, that damn sliver starting to edge its way into her hand, pressed so hard against the wooden planks, it's turning purple.

She wakes up choking and sobbing and clutching her hand, still scarred from that stupid, fucking sliver.

…

Nothing means anything to these boneheads. Nothing is important. I swear, it hurts to grow up here.

…

"Thanks for this," Emma murmurs, watching stilly and softly from her bed as Audrey, awkwardly balancing on a chair, strings up the last of the lights. They're old Christmas ones that Audrey picked up from the Duvalls' shed this morning. Emma wouldn't let her buy new ones. (She said she knew exactly which bulbs were out on the ones at home, and she'd know if Audrey tried to buy her new ones. Audrey thought that was probably a bluff, but she hadn't wanted to risk it.)

Now, Audrey is careful to catch her breath before saying, "No problem."

"It looks a lot better," Emma says. Audrey takes a step back, trying to decide whether Emma means this or is just saying it. Despite the quilt on the bed and the pictures on the walls and, now, the old Christmas lights, the room still feels empty. It still feels like the sharp-white, waxy-clean room of a hospital.

"It really sucks that they don't let people visit more often," Emma sighs. Audrey tries to ignore the washed-away sound in her voice, certainly doesn't look up to see the washed-away look in her eyes.

"Yeah, it does," she sighs back. "But, hey, we can write back and forth as much as we want."

"Yeah. Back to the basics."

For a moment, they're both quiet, studying the dangling lights—trying to forget about where they are or trying to accept it, Audrey's not sure. Risking a glance at Emma, she sees that her eyes have gone dull and unfocused. They're glistening at their corners.

Audrey swallows hard.

She remembers this one time, like four years ago, right before the Emma Era ended. Mrs. White—an old lady who used to live down the street from Emma—had this huge garage sale. She'd put up a big sign on her front lawn that said, "I CAN'T TAKE IT WITH ME." Emma and Audrey spent all day there, talking to Mrs. White about candleholders and collectable figurines, and Emma bought a huge stack of old, rotting posters from the 50's. That night, they cut around all the fraying edges and used Maggie's machine to laminate them. They hung them up all over, especially above Emma's bed—the bare spot on her wall she would always complain about.

Audrey just remembers standing back from it all at the end, admiring their hard work. Beside her Emma giggled, and outside, the streetlights had the same glow as firefly jars, and down the street, Mrs. White made her son dinner, and nothing hurt. Nothing hurt at all.

It's the first time she's thought about the moment since it happened. It's the first time she's thought about any moment from back then, really—not the good ones anyway, not like this. Then again, it's not like there's ever been a time for it. The only two life phases separating then from now are the I Hate Your Guts Phase and the We're Friends Again, On the Run From a Murderer—It's a Long Story Phase. The truth is, they haven't talked about the old times or the in-between times. They never exchanged apologies for any of it. There were always just more painful things going on.

For some reason, right now is when it hits Audrey at all her worst angles—right now, looking at a hard-washed white wall with strings of burnt-out Christmas lights dipped over it, awkwardly and unevenly. Right now, she'd give anything to go back to that time, one of the last good days of the Emma Era. It wouldn't matter the pain that was to come after it—she'd go through it all again, hundreds of times—if she could just relive that day, that moment even, one more time.

But it's gone, and Emma's crying, and streetlamps in Lakewood are just eerie, and Mrs. White is dead. It's gone.

I'm so sorry, she thinks, to the girl who walked beside her at the garage sale four years ago, to the girl whose shaking body she held in her dreams three nights ago, to the girl watching Christmas lights flicker out with washed-away eyes right now. I'm so sorry.

…

I can't find people that care or matter. I feel like fucking Holden Caulfield. You ever read that book? I'm telling you, Piper, you'll hate it here. Everyone and everything is phony.

…

They write an article about Rachael eventually. It's more of an Indie thing though—put out there by some blogger girl from St. Mary's, Lucy Halsten, who writes well enough and researches and cares, but, by then, no one looks up Rachael Murray anymore. Lucy emails it to her, says I'm sorry about everything. I didn't know her well, but I wish I had.

That's all. Didn't ever ask to interview Audrey. Doesn't ask to meet her. Just writes that.

It would have burned Audrey up back then, back when pain just rumbled under her skin—bursting from her broken-pipe veins, pounding through her hard and fast. She remembers that feeling sometimes, can sort of remember how it felt to be just lucky enough to be pissed off about a lot of little things. These days, nothing really pisses her off anymore, and it's not because Rachael wouldn't have wanted it to. It's because her veins aren't bursting anymore—they're just wilting.

Audrey writes back, No, you don't.

…

Is it sick of me, to just want them to pay, just a little bit? I used to think all this shit would catch up with people someday, but I think I was wrong. I don't think the world is fair or right. I think, if you want it to be, you have to make it that way yourself.

…

Boston is too clean of a city.

After all, that's what it is—a city, where cars honk, and homeless teenagers sleep eight to a one-bedroom flat, and old men with yellow teeth spit, and disgusting guys drop pills into drinks, and people like her mother slowly die in hospital rooms. It ought to stop pretending. It's just like every other city, just like every other place in this world.

"She's so happy you're okay, Aud." Her father walks just a little behind her, watching the sky and the skyscrapers with gray, gentle eyes.

"Don't call me that," she snaps, You haven't done it in years. There's no reason to start up again now.

It always starts this way. It always hurts out in the sunlight and the bright concrete, in the stainless-steal elevators, in the sanitizer-scented halls. All that always makes her want to scream.

It's when she sees her mom that everything is okay. Not right the first second, when she is just a jumble of wires and tubes and beeping machines. But when she sees her eyes, and hears her voice, and gets to that place in her mind where it's okay, she's okay, she's breathing, she's here, and yeah, maybe it's not fair that that's all I get, but it's just the way it is, and it's okay.

The moment comes slow today. More than the wires and tubes and machines, Audrey is bothered by the grayness in her mom's face, the chipped-ceramic-looking bones in her hands. Audrey sees her eyes, but she can't stop looking at the purple, hollowed-out bags beneath them. She hears her voice, but she can't stop focusing on the crackling in it, as if her mom's throat is raw. Maybe, this is the day it sinks in. Maybe, this is when everything stops feeling so numb.

Her mom doesn't say anything—just pulls Audrey to her chest, strokes her hair, kisses her forehead. Audrey stays stock-still, pressed against her ceramic bones. She stays stock-still when she feels the tears, dripping off her mom's chin onto her cheek.

Her throat hurts. The more she tries to swallow away the pain, the heavier the tears in her own eyes become.

"I love you so much," her mom says, soft enough that the crackles are gone. "I'm so proud of you."

Audrey starts to sob.

…

I just want a little bit of justice.

…

She should have known there was one more dream, one more shaking body. This time, Audrey knows she's dreaming. She just wants to wake up, sobbing and choking and coughing. Please just let her wake up.

The blood is gone, and the sliver is healed, and Lakewood High is just like it's always been—weathered-out on the outside, dingy-bright on the inside—but Emma is on her knees, whimpering, "no, no, no, no …" and Audrey is feeling her wither into nothing. Emma is breaking apart like beads scattering across a hard floor, like that night between Eras when Audrey ripped her mom's pearl necklace.

She's holding Emma so hard, scrambling to pick up all the pieces, all the beads. Because, here she is, after all of this—here she is, holding Emma Duvall in her arms, pressing her tight to her chest. Here she is, saving that girl. Just like it was always supposed to be. She holds Emma's shaking body to hers and buries her head in Emma's neck and thinks, This is it, right now. This is where things start to change, where all our mistakes balance out. This is where the world makes everything fair and right.

But then Audrey remembers that she never found all of the beads to that necklace. Hell, she never even came close.

…

I just want them all to know.

Your friend,

Audrey.