Raindrops

Quicksilvre

Big ups to everyone who's reviewed; it is much appreciated. Sorry for waiting so long between updates, things have been crazy recently.

)-)-)-)

Summer chopped the last bunch of plantains from the tree, put them into her basket, and started her walk back. Jai was being kind to her by asking her to do nothing but picking for a few weeks–no chopping or digging. A bunch of fairly burly gentlemen had come through in the last couple of nights, and Jai got plenty of work from them. In fact, in the next few days, he planned to put some new saplings in the newly cleared earth.

The walk from the grove to the inn was short and easy–much easier, to be sure, than it had been when she first arrived. Summer undoubtedly had grown stronger during the months there, and her whole body was growing ever more cut.

Summer burst in through the front door. "Hello? Jai? Sonn? Got some stuff here for lunch–oh, hi, there..." Summer spotted Jai, standing next to a gentleman she had never seen before. She let her voice trail off.

The gentleman was uniformed, wearing the same thing as the cloud pilot she met when she first died.

"Uh, hello." She guessed he wasn't going to check in.

"Miss Summer Roberts, formerly of Newport Beach, California?"

"Yes?" The formerly part made her blink.

"Do you know a Marissa Cooper, also formerly of Newport?"

"Yes...oh my god, 'formerly'? Is Coop..."

"Please come with me."

)-)-)-)

"Coop! Coop!"

It was as hot as hell.

Correction...it was hell. Or, Summer guessed it was–she figured it had to be. There were puddling pools of lava all around, and even the dry spots were elastic from the heat. The air was suffocating, full of sulfur and heavy with choking mist. One could only see a few feet ahead, as the whole place was hardly lit at all. Even the flames around her were black.

"Coop! Cooper! Marissa!" Summer had been brought down by the messenger, just for a visit–according to regulations. Everyone got one last visit as their punishment began, and then, that was it. No one else would see them until their incarceration ended. If it ended.

"Coop!" Summer stepped a little too close to a pool of lava and recoiled back. She had been given a tracking device by the messenger, in order for her to find her way back after she tracked down Marissa. She clutched it with both hands. This, she thought, would be a really bad time to get lost.

"Cooper!"

"Summer?" The voice came back, weak and strained.

"Marissa!" Summer looked all around, trying to see where her friend was. "Where are you?"

"Here!"

Summer followed Marissa's cries. "Marissa, I'm here for you." She jogged in the direction of the voice. "Marissa hon, where are you."

"Summer, I'm right here." Summer could hear Marissa sob out the last word.

Summer took a few steps more, and then spotted Marissa. She looked dreadful–her always gaunt figure had been further slimmed until she was emaciated, her bones sticking out horribly. All along her body, cuts shallow and deep bled onto her ragged dress, and every square inch of her appeared cherry red with burns.

"Oh, Marissa baby..." Summer looked over. Marissa was surrounded by what appeared to be a very shallow pool of lava, too broad to step over. Taking a deep breath, Summer took as quick a hop in the pool as she could and stepped to where Marissa sat. She gasped from the burn and clenched her eyes shut, but made it across.

"Summer." Marissa's voice came out as a weak gasp. As Summer bent down to her, she wrapped her arms around Summer and squeezed–not hard, but Summer guessed it was as tightly as Marissa could manage.

"Don't worry. I'm hear." She hugged Marissa close to her. The pain made Summer keep her eyes tightly shut, leaving her only to hear Marissa's ragged breathing and smell burning flesh.

Marissa's flesh.

"Summer. It's..." Marissa couldn't complete her thought before she collapsed into sobs.

"It's okay, baby. It's all going to be okay." Summer rubbed her back, trying to do anything that might comfort her. For a second it worked; Summer could hear Marissa's breath become more calm. But then, all of a sudden, Summer could feel a burning sensation come from Marissa's body. It was at first gentle, but it grew in intensity every second. It felt like Marissa's body was dissolving into flames.

Summer grit her teeth and held on tighter. "Don't worry, Marissa. It'll be okay."

It felt like she was embracing an inferno. "I'm here for you."

Summer could feel Marissa's body soften in her arms. "I'll always be here for you."

"Summer..." Marissa's voice was barely a whisper. Summer opened her eyes despite the pain, just in time to see her friend collapse into a gooey heap. A few seconds longer, and nothing was left of Marissa except a bubbling, black pool.

A mist rose from the bubbles. For a second, Summer could see the could turn into a face–Marissa's face. She hissed, "Save me," and then evaporated into the air.

For a second, Summer sat there, stunned. Only as the flames began to lick the black pool did Summer start to cry.

)-)-)-)

The officials had assured Summer all of her burns would heal in just a couple of days. The flames were there to punish those who deserved it, not her.

She didn't care. As soon as she was bandaged up and sent back, she went straight to her room at the Tongau, wrapped herself in her sheets, and howled in despair.

Marissa was too good for hell. She didn't do anything wrong. It was Newport that had killed Marissa, not the fall–but those managing the afterlife sentenced her to ten years anyway, plus however long it took her to find heaven.

Newport killed her. The parties and the people and the money killed her.

And Summer killed her too.

Coop! Look what I snuck in. Eighty proof. You like?

C'mon Coop, it's just cards and a little money. Everyone does it.

Lemme guess, Coop–it was a little painful, really awkward. Don't worry, it's much better the second time around.

Summer deserved to be in Marissa's place, and Marissa in Summer's. No–Marissa deserved better than that. She deserved to be on a cloud, playing a harp, and Summer deserved to melt and burn. For all of eternity.

Marissa had a mom, and a dad, and a sister–for a long while, at least. She'd spent most of her years in the ideal nuclear family. Summer had a father who was out most of the time, a mother who had walked away years before, and a step-mom who was high on her meds whenever she wasn't drunk out her mind or calling Summer a spoiled bitch.

And she was just that. Jimmy Choo, Donna Karan, Hilfiger, Prada...those were the words around which her life turned. No substance, just material things.

Marissa maybe wasn't perfect, but she was something. Summer was nothing.

She could hear her door swing open. She snuggled her face deeper into her pillow.

"Summer?" It was Jai. "We're getting worried. I want you to start speaking."

Summer said the first thing that came out of her mind.

"I'm...nothing."

She could hear a sigh. "Summer. I don't know what happened to you or the girl while you two were on earth." (Summer's blood boiled at his mention of Marissa as "the girl.") "But you can't just sit around."

"Yes I can. You going to kick me out?"

"Summer...you can make yourself into a better person. You have–I've seen you. You're much more serene and cooperative and friendly than you were when you first showed up."

Summer stayed silent.

"Listen. You're angry about your friend and that's fine. But you can't do anything about that. It's over and out of your control." Summer thought for a second he was done, but Jai kept going: "Unless you get your butt out of that bed, then the only affect your friend has on the afterlife is you wasting your time. That's her only legacy. If you want that to be, fine. When you want to start living again though, I'll be up front."

Summer heard footsteps away from her, and the door shutting.

For a few minutes, Summer stayed in her bed as she was, wallowing and thinking. "Marissa." She began murmuring to herself. "You don't deserve it..."

She rolled over, letting her head escape its cloth prison. Jai's words echoed in her head, and no matter how many times she tried to shake them, they only grew louder.

For a second she pouted. "No. That's not all to her."

Summer tried to think about everyone in Marissa's family...there was Jimmy, Julie, Caitlyn, and now, Caleb. None of them were dead...Summer was sure she had met some other members of her family.

Marissa couldn't possibly have such a small family.

Summer strained her mind, trying to think up a face from the Cooper family, but she was frustrated. No one.

She thought for a moment longer and sighed. She slid the sheets off of her body, and slowly laid one foot onto the floor, then the other. Summer pushed up–stiffly; her body still ached from the burns. Tentatively, she shuffled to the door, where she put her hand on the doorknob, took a deep breath, and opened her door.