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Chapter 01: Woe.
I can see the ground far below; I have this breathe, and I hold it tight and I keep it in my chest, with all my might… "Between Two Lungs," by Florence + the Machine.
It had been nearly seventy hours, (and counting) since the ashes of Isas Perry had been relinquished to the forest. Four years had passed; a long coming verdict leveled, in response to his gruesome passing. His widow, Mona, had calmly led their only child – a seventeen year old daughter – to the property, where his remains would rest. Mona had found inner peace, long ago, at the vice of her bakery. It had accompanied his career; the danger.
Isas had been a good officer; serving with some of the best men in Beacon Hills' county, under the watchful eye of their good friend, Sheriff Stilinski. His death was not in vane, in the end. It only pained Mona that their baby girl, Gail, was forced to face her father's absence.
Consumed by the chill and musky scent of the forest, the ashes had slipped smoothly from between Gail's fingers; swept up the fall breeze. A deep anguish; laced with paranoia and panic, had blossomed within her chest. It had not passed, with time. After the emotional scarring of her father's death, she had been frequently plagued by panic attacks; no amount of medication or therapy able to rid them. With time, they became infrequent, but the final farewell to her father had brought them back, full force.
Curled up in bed, swaddled in her favorite pajamas, Gail shifted at the beep signaling an incoming text. Reaching for the small device, on her side table, she opened it smoothly and felt slight relief, at the sight of a text from one of her best friends. Scott McCall had been one of her best friends, for years; Mrs. McCall and Mona members of the same book club. He had become distant, in the past year; preferring the company of their mutual best friend Stiles and the pretty, new girl, Allison. Scott asked Gail to meet him at Stiles locker, listing the number and an: I promise, we'll be there.
Responding; she agreed and rolled over, snuggling into the confines of her bedding and awaiting sleep. She wasn't ready for the next day; for going back to school, facing another year of bland classes and early mornings, or marking off another year of lost youth.
The first day of school came strenuously, foreboding mundane promises.
"Welcome back to Beacon Hills, Miss Perry," Goaded the Vice-Principal, grimacing at the cherub-faced ginger in trepidation. "Do try to avoid my office, this year."
Gail winked; her thin lips quirking at the edges, pronouncing her dimples. "No promises, ma'am, but I'll try my best."
"I'll hold you to that." The Vice-Principal murmured, turning on her out-dated kitten heels to approach a nearby teacher watching the bus students arrive. Gail hissed under her breath, swiftly sticking her tongue out at the elder woman's back, before hurrying into the school at the sight of the approaching mass of students.
Looking around for her friends, she hiked her purse strap higher up her shoulder. The first day, and they were already later than they'd promised. Rolling her eyes; she reminded herself that boys were never to be relied on to be punctual, consider she was rarely on time, herself. Her best friends had been acting strange for months, though, and it was starting to grate on her nerves. The previous school year, she hadn't been too bothered by their absence, it kept her away from less trouble than she naturally attracted, but she'd grown lonely without their company or confidences.
She'd felt like a third wheel, since all of the secrets had started.
Leaning against the locker she had already been informed as Stiles', she allowed gravity to pull her down, into an ungraceful seated position. The Golden Trio, as Scott's ex-girlfriend Allison had called them, were not quite as golden as they had been. After the secrets had begun, so had last minute cancellations and being stood up. Scott and Stiles always seemed to have time for Allison and Lydia, but Gail reasoned that as their supposed "other" best friend, she came last on the list of priorities. Despite her highly obvious assets, she never registered beyond being a "bro" to them – it was a moot point, to try and compete with those gorgeous girls.
While Lydia's personality was the polar opposite of her appearance; Allison was as sweet as she was beautiful, and too kind for Gail to find a fault large enough to dislike. Groaning softly, she pulled her purse around her side to her lap, and reached in, sifting through it for her schedule. She may as well try to memorize her classes, while she waited for somebody she knew to show up. Being friends with Scott and Stiles, for years, had left her oblivious and vaguely unaware of the numerous unfamiliar faces passing her. Were there really that many students, at Beacon Hills High School?
Gail couldn't recall; Stiles had always been the apple of her eye, she felt almost weary to admit to herself. Highly stimulated, anxious, sloppy Stiles; the freaky, immature guy, who frequently paraded around her house, wearing her bras over his shirt, taunting her about her feminine decolletage and insinuating that she dress to display her bust better than she did, because she was "stacked like a brick house," as he had crudely stated.
Why she had come to feel such a deep, sincere love for him… She didn't quite know. While he pranced around after Lydia, who conveniently shunted his advances at every turn, Gail was left to pick up the pieces and bite her tongue, every time that Stiles felt the need to confide in her that it did, actually, bother him that she treated him the way she did. Oh, but he always crawled back, falling right into old habits. It wasn't like that, anymore, though.
Stiles hadn't spoken to her about anything of consequence in months. Long before Summer Break had approached, not long after everything had begun to swirl into a strange conundrum of unanswered questions and half-assed excuses. The text messages had become infrequent, Stiles only texting her when he needed something, and Scott hadn't texted her that entire Summer, until the night before school began, when he'd asked her to meet them in front of Stiles locker, like they had every year, since they began middle school. She hadn't even seen them, during the Break. Not around town, not at her mother's bakery, (a place they used to frequent, in search of being Mona Louis-Perry's personal taste testers) and not at either of their houses, when she'd dropped by, concerned. Sheriff Stilinski hadn't been around, when Gail had visited the house, nor had Stiles'; Mrs. McCall had been home, when she went by Scott's, but she knew nothing of the boy's shunning of their other third and had only offered Gail a cup of tea and biscuits, alongside the company Gail had missed from her friends.
Shaking the train of thought from her mind, Gail yanked her schedule swiftly from its spot, jam-packed between two thick notebooks. Unfolding it carelessly, she sighed, staring dismally at the morose year that was likely to be her last year of high school. Five AP classes; Chemistry; Dual-Enrollment English; Study Hall… her mind ached, at the thought of all the work to come. Wasn't senior year supposed to be fun and enjoyable, rather than strenuous and mind-numbing hard work? Rubbing her eyes tiredly, she didn't bother about the little make-up she had bothered to wear, already regretting the end of Summer Break.
Not to mention, where the flying fuck were Stiles Stilinski and Scott McCall? They needed to arrive, quickly, or they were dead men walking. Gail glanced at her wrist watch, sighing. Three minutes to the bell, and still, no sign. Pulling herself from her seat in front of Stiles' locker, she stuffed her schedule back into her purse and squared her shoulders, taking a deep breath and mentally trying to build her self-confidence.
She didn't quite know what to do with herself, without Stiles and Scott, but… She damn well was going to do it neatly, and in style. Or else, her thoughts clenched out, her own teeth grinding. Gail Perry was not going to be boring, ignored or friendless. Not for her last year of high school, even if it meant befriending one very frivolous, overbearing Lydia Martin.
Sliding her hands into the slim pockets on the side of her well-fitted jersey wrap skirt, she put one foot in front of the other, her wedges thudding dully with each precarious step, and consciously hoped that she looked half-way as good as Lydia did, when she strutted around like a goddamn runway model in her designer clothes and perfect everything.
Don't be a jealous cow, Gail reminded herself, forcing an oblivious smile and arching her eyebrows confidently. Chin held high, cheeks held higher. Time to be grown-up Gail, not timid girl Gail…
Entering her first class, she slid into a seat in the middle, eyeing the teacher patiently as the bell began to ring. Students filed in, small clusters forming around her. Gail frowned, looking her classmates over curiously. She recognized one of them from the Lacrosse team, but she couldn't recall his name, and she didn't know anyone else, in the class. He wasn't someone that Stiles and Scott were particularly fond or disdainful towards.
The final bell rang, and Gail felt a wave of sadness lap over her, at the realization that Stiles and Scott had broken another one of their many promises. She hoped that it had been worth it, because she wasn't quite sure how much longer she'd be capable of handling their crap. Accepting the syllabus from the student in front of her, she passed the stack back, vaguely aware of the smarmy teacher's introduction and mundane lecture.
It was going to be a very, very long day. She could already tell. Leaning forward, she propped her head against her hand and tried not to doze off, staring aimlessly at the peeling area of wall above the whiteboard.
I'm sorry, was the only thing Gail had received, in a text message, by her last period. They hadn't shown up at lunch, and they were nowhere to be found in the one class she had with them: Chemistry. What's worse; was that it hadn't even been Scott to apologize, who had made the promise, to begin with. It had been Stiles, and a hastily sent one, at that. He hadn't even used his usual proper grammar, or punctuation.
Stiles, who hadn't spoken to her in months, had given her two crappy, misspelled words as a form of repentance.
Slamming her AP Psychology textbook, Gail huffed, crossing her arms over her lace camisole, wrapping her pastel cardigan tighter around herself. She'd worn the stupid outfit for Stiles, in a last minute attempt to bring forth approval, and to rectify what little of a bond they still shared. She thought he'd have been proud of her, wearing an outfit she'd never have previously even glanced at. She felt that she'd come a long way from ratty tennis shoes, ripped skater jeans and unflattering T's, of previous years. It had taken her all Summer Break to collect her new wardrobe, with her mom's acute eye to guide her into the realm of "feminine", something Gail had rarely dared to venture.
She knew that other students were gossiping about her, too. It wasn't kind things, but the sort of things that Gail had used to scoff at, before the gossip had become a reality. "McCall's second lost lamb," a sophomore had rudely mocked her as, in the library. The girl hadn't known that Gail was present, just one aisle over. "What a loser, I mean, just look at her – where did she get her outfit from, Lydia's cast off pile?"
Gail wasn't quite sure what had hurt more, the first girl's off-handed comment, or the reply from her friend that hit sharply and made Gail feel as if she could cry. Gail Perry did not cry, ever, in front of people. Gail Perry rarely cried, at that. And, only when alone, like the time she'd broken her foot and dislocated her hip, during Track season, or the time that Stiles had taken Lydia to the previous Homecoming as his date. It took a great deal to make her cry, and a snide remark should not be one of them.
Blinking away tears, Gail swung her bag onto her shoulder and scooped up her textbook, rushing out of the library. She was done, for the day. Vice-Principal be damned, she was ready to go home and take a long shower.
Rushing out to her car, she unlocked it quickly and slid into the older Volkswagen, slamming her door and jamming the key into the ignition. Gail only vaguely remembered the rest, her mind only catching up to her body fully, once she was inside her house. She felt as if the bright blue walls of the foyer were taunting her, closing in on her, swirling around her in clandestine wave lengths. Dropping her bag on the grey bench, she kicked her wedges under it and carefully stepped on the cold granite, tiredly wobbling into the darkened kitchen. The walls still caved in on her, shifting and moving, the pale yellow and white wallpaper swerving in front of her eyes, panic ballooning in her chest.
Gail reached for the counter top her hands sliding past it, her head knocking against the cabinet. She stumbled back, trying to find her balance. Slipping on the floor, she fell onto her behind, tears welling on her eyes.
It felt like nothing, at all, was alright.
