Author's Note: Videos for characters canon and original, can be found on my Youtube channel via the link on my profile.
Long Hours & A Few Dying Flowers
Marianne stood at the side of the road, hood pulled tight over her head, arms wrapped around herself as she nervously waited for a likely looking ride into town. The rain had been falling steadily for the past half hour, soon soaking her to the skin. A couple of cars had passed in the meantime, travelling at top speed as they went by, their occupants either ignoring or not seeing her. Not that it made any difference. She was damned either way, stranded out here in the boondocks, a fate almost worse than polka-dots.
Teeth chattering, Marianne strained to see past the sheet of rain further obscuring her blurry eyes. She wasn't crying, and she wouldn't cry. If she hadn't been jonesing so badly, she would have been convinced this was just another pot-addled dream. But seven hours later she could still feel Cain's sweaty hand sliding up her shirt and hear the echo of her stepmother's cold voice, you lying little whore... The memories made the air catch dangerously in her throat, forcing Marianne to focus her turbulent thoughts.
Home was a seventeen-bedroomed mansion with a private cinema and Olympic pool, but after the death of her father five years ago, life had become a living hell despite the luxury. Her stepmother, Catherine, had made sure of that, along with her son, Cain, whom Marianne's father had formally adopted upon their marriage. The root of this particular evil was as always, money, Marianne due to inherit the majority of her father's fortune upon her twenty-first birthday, much to her stepmother's fury. Until then Marianne was under the jurisdiction of the executors of her father's estate who just happened to be Catherine and her son.
Marianne took a long, deep, shuddering breath, struggling to stay as calm as somebody with nothing but fifty crumpled dollars and an old rucksack to their name could be. She'd fled the mainland for the Outer Banks on nothing but a wing and a prayer, catching two Greyhounds, and then a ferry before hitchhiking the rest of the way to here. The journey had eaten up most of her secret cash stash, which had been small to start with, but her luck had shakily held until now. The only ace she still held was a much-used map that had belonged to her father, an old wedding photo and a coffee-stained postcard depicting the Redfield Lighthouse.
Half closing her eyes, Marianne bowed her head, nails digging into her palms. She couldn't go back - even if she could, she wouldn't. If it had just been Catherine, maybe. Marianne was a veteran of that particular conflict. But Cain was another matter altogether. Until now, he had never done or said anything inappropriate, but whenever they'd been together in the same room, he'd always stood that inch too close to her, his breath warm on the back of her neck. She had endured years of uneasiness with Cain and she wasn't going to go back and have all her worst fears finally brought to life by him.
Straightening up, Marianne tried to get her shit together, brutally brushing aside the tears that fell despite herself. If the weather had been dry, she might have chanced walking the twelve or so miles into town, even if she'd pay for it afterwards. She'd been a cross-country champion for three years in a row before she'd began her benders to escape reality. It was a straight road and she had the map anyways. From there, she could then figure out her next move. But as the rain continued to ruthlessly beat down, it washed away whatever hope left to her.
How could you let something so good
Go to waste
And let the colours bleed out?