Rachel lives only a couple of blocks away from Jake's house. So, sometimes, when she strides out of her home early enough that she'll just be waiting pointlessly at her block's bus stop, she'll take the time to walk those few extra minutes to where she knows her cousin is waiting for the bus on his own.
Well, he's not really on his own; there'll be other kids there. They're decent enough to wait by for those few minutes, but they're not really the type of kids Jake talks to all that much. Not because he doesn't like them or anything; he's not some stuck-up prick like some of the boys and girls in Rachel's neighborhood. He's just never really talked to them that much before, not when he was too busy arguing with Marco about whether Spiderman or Batman would win or some other stupid comic book dispute like that.
But Marco doesn't live in their neighborhood anymore, so Rachel walks those few extra minutes so that Jake doesn't spend the whole time quietly staring at the road.
The cool morning breeze plays with a few locks of her hair as she strides up to the bus stop. Jake's already there, staring off away from her. Even in profile, she can see that his eyebrows furrow. One of his hands grips the black straps of the bulky black backpack which rest discordantly against the navy sweatshirt that he threw on this morning.
"Jake." Her cousin startles at the sound of her voice before turning his head to look at her. His alert dark eyes fix onto her.
"Jake," she repeats, her tone exasperated. "What's this?" She waves a hand at his offending color palette as she comes to a stop to his side.
He looks down, and he has to know what she's talking about because a little half smile curls for a second on his face. "My sweatshirt."
"No, Jake, these are two colors that are never meant to go together."
"What?" His eyebrow raises. "Tan and navy?" he asks, referring to the pants/sweatshirt combo that's not too bad.
Oh, that dork.
"No, that dorky backpack and boring sweatshirt." The backpack is honestly okay. The sweatshirt, though, is too baggy.
"You thought the backpack was fine last week."
"Not with that sweatshirt, it's not," she shoots back.
The bus pulls up just then, cutting off their banter as they both glance up in surprise. Usually, they have a few more minutes to verbally spar back and forth. The other kids rush up the steps ahead of them, not that Rachel minds. She was already planning on hanging back behind Jake anyway.
As they tread onto the bus, she discreetly looks to the side. Cassie sits alone in her normal spot, staring out the window with a tired expression on her face.
That exhausted look won't last long, of course. Not after Jake starts talking to her.
"Hi, Darlene," Rachel says to a girl in the third row. "How's your project with Jason working out?" As the girl who sits next to her in math starts up about her crush, Rachel glances at Jake, who moves ahead to where Cassie sits.
She smiles to herself, knowing that those two dorks will spend the entire ride stumbling over each other's words while embarrassingly making eye contact for brief moments before quickly glancing away.
But then Cassie jerks when Jake greets her. Her wide eyes stare right up at him before drooping to close as his question hits Rachel.
"Cassie, are you okay?"
Rachel stands up, leaving Darlene and her half-finished response behind. She rushes past the seated children as she strides forward.
"Why wouldn't she be?" Rachel demands to know as she pushes past Jake and leans over to her best friend.
Cassie jolts as Rachel places her hand on the shorter girl's forehead. The sweat sticks to Rachel's palm, but she doesn't pull away as she stares into Cassie's paling face.
Rachel's demand to know what's wrong with her friend falters under the tears that stream down Cassie's face. A sob hiccups out of Cassie who tightly grabs the hand placed on her forehead.
Rachel's stomach drops as the other girl's trembles creep through her wrist.
"Cassie, hey, why are you crying? Jake, what did you say to her?" Rachel glares at her cousin with suspicion as Cassie's grip on her hand tightens even further.
"I don't know! I didn't do anything." Jake holds up his hands. "She's been acting really weird since I got here."
"R..Rachel." Cassie gasps between sobs.
"Hey, what's wrong? What happened? Tell me what's wrong." Rachel grabs her friend's shoulders while resisting the urge to shake her.
"I...I don't know. Rachel, I don't know." Cassie moans as she stares at her with tears still flowing down her face.
"What do you mean you don't know?"
"I can't...I don't know, Rachel. It's not there. It's just not there." Her voice trembles as the words whisper by the only two people who can hear her.
The inaudibility of the words doesn't stop the other kids from craning around in their seats and staring at the spectacle behind them. Rachel would glare at them if their existence even entered her world, but the sight of her friend breaking down takes up every bit of her focus.
Something has made Cassie upset, and it isn't Jake staring at them with open concern. Something that isn't here...
"Cassie, did something happen in the barn?" Rachel keeps her voice steady even as worry churns inside her. Years ago, Cassie came to her, sobbing, because a pigeon that she helped her dad care for weeks for had died. There were times after that, where Cassie would come to her with tears in her eyes that took hours before they dried up. But those times grew fewer as her friend strengthened herself against the inevitable deaths that happened under a vet assistant's care. For Cassie to come crying to her like this, it must have been bad and unusual. Like maybe her friend screwed up, gave the wrong meds by accident or something.
Dread pools in Rachel's stomach at the thought. Cassie wouldn't forgive herself for a mistake like that.
"Hey, whatever happened—oomph!" Cassie's arms, strong from years of shoveling the barn clean every other day, wrap tight around Rachel's lean frame. Her short, black hair bristles against Rachel's chin as Cassie's body presses tightly against hers.
"Rachel, you're okay," Cassie whispers before crying into her blouse.
Cassie only releases her hold once the bus stops and the other kids except for Jake have long since vacated the vehicle. The driver looks a bit lost as Rachel manages to pull Cassie down the aisle; but, he does offer to take the two of them back home as the girls descend down the steps, even if Rachel isn't sure if he's allowed to do that.
She leaves Jake to deal with giving the polite decline. She's too busy watching the way Cassie wobbles when she steps onto the asphalt. Cassie's eyelids droop as she leans against Rachel, but then she shakes herself awake and looks back to Jake who now follows after them.
With one hand still gripping Rachel's arm, Cassie grabs ahold of Jake's wrist and just holds on to them both as they lead her to the side of the school building facing the forest across the field. As long as they avoid the windows, no one will see them leaning against the rough brick as Cassie looks at the woods with shining eyes.
She isn't crying, but this silence might be worse if it keeps stretching on like this.
"I had a really bad dream."
Rachel jolts from the roughness in Cassie's voice. Her friend sounds as worn down as the old gravel that leads to her barn.
"Oh, what was it about?" It's not that Jake's voice is nonchalant, but the calm tone that barely covers his wariness earns a sharp glance from Rachel. Cassie wouldn't be crying from some stupid dream, so there's no point in asking about that. They need to know what's really wrong, not let Cassie deflect.
"I think, I think everyone died."
Half-formed words wither away in Rachel's throat as she stares wide-eyed at her friend. She looks so tired with her shoulders slumped against the brick of the building.
"Everyone...died." The false calmness in Jake's tone has fled, leaving an open wariness that matches the cold sweat tingling along Rachel's shoulders.
"Who's everyone?" Rachel asks, the sharp question scraping at the sides of her throat that threaten to close up.
"All of us...I don't know. Just all of us." Cassie leans her head back against the rough red wall.
Jake meets Rachel's eye. Electricity ripples through her arms and into her fingers as something passes between them.
"It was just a dream, though, Cassie." Jake swallows back the open anxiety and Rachel can almost pretend that the steadiness of his voice is real. "We're okay, see." His free hand clutches the grip Cassie still has on his arm.
"Yeah, it wasn't real. We're alive, we're fine," Rachel states because right now they are.
"Even if you weren't?"
The Drode smiles, his words slipping low under dear Rachel's conscious mind. He leans close enough that the breath from his green-rimmed lips should flutter the girl's golden hair. The heat of his purple-black skin should cause Rachel to turn, to stare in horror at the monster who grins by her ear. But he keeps his touch on reality light, more insubstantial than even a ghost. It wouldn't do to bend the rules of the game too much and to be banned from observing things this closely. Oh, but is that his wondrous imagination at work or did the essence of the girl shiver ever so slightly from the unreal truth whispered in her ear?