Young Writers Society

Depression music? James had no idea what she meant by that, but she wasn't wrong about the tears. He was, of course, holding them back - but he was holding a lot back, all the time. She probably just thought he was being pitiful and drunk, and maybe he was both of those things, so why try to prove her wrong?

James sighed. Rita told him to keep an eye on Kate, but how was he supposed to do that when everything was moving slowly half the time? She was right, he needed to sober up, just not for all the reasons she probably thought.

"Okay," he said. "There's water in the kitchen. Do you uh... want to come..."

Kate waved him off, already turning to leave, "You do whatever. I'll figure this place out on my own." With that as her closing line, she headed back to the center of the noise, where she didn't stay long.

She needed air. Blood. The beginnings of the woozy light-headedness that came with hunger were already starting to make their evening debut, and she needed to get something to eat before they started their world tour, dragging her unwittingly into their ungraceful little dance by tilting and spinning the ground beneath her feet.

It was hardly difficult to leave the house without being seen, which was to say, it took half an hour to find and opening and she was still not even sure that she'd succeeded.

Regardless, she was in the woods now. The blood of animals was ridiculously unhealthy, but the alternative was draining and preparing the blood of someone from in that house. Now, she didn't give a shit about what they thought of her, but that still seemed like a very, very bad impression to make this early in the game. She was kinda sick of attempted murders, even ones done in good fun.

So she made her way deep into the woods and shrugged off her soaked jacket. She folded it as neatly as she could while still being lay about it and dropped it at the base of a tree. From there, it was a game of patience and timing to catch herself a rabbit.

The hardest part, really, was finding a way to prepare the blood to be at least a little safe to drink without having to go through all the trouble of starting a fire.

By the time she'd finished her meal, the sun was creeping up over the horizon.

She pulled her jacket back on and headed back to the cabin, finding a nice seat on the porch and taking a moment to rest.

James's head was throbbing when he woke up, but at this rate, headaches were normal for him - and not always because he was hungover. But in this case, he was very hungover.

James rolled out of bed with a groan, moving sluggishly as he threw on clean clothes and his faded blue jacket on top. His roommate was still asleep. Even when drunk James never got the pleasure of sleeping in. He figured four hours was probably the longest he ever slept on a regular basis, and at this point, his body had just adapted.

On light feet and with an aching frame, he left the room and gently shut the door behind him. He wasn't even near a window yet and the light filtering into the hall already felt too bright. Squinting, he turned away and rubbed his eyes before forcing them open into little slits. He sighed as he patterned down the steps and saw the usual shadow of someone outside the door.

He paused. There was someone else on the porch, a little further down. That was when the events of last night came back to him.

Kate. He'd found her in the woods in the middle of the night, soaking wet, and she'd pretty much refused all help when she'd come to the cabin.

He recoiled for a moment at the sunlight shining through the window before pushing through and opening the door to the front porch. Penny, keeping watch at the front door, only gave him a small nod of recognition as he crossed the porch to Kate.

She'd slept outside. He remembered that.

"Did you get any rest?" he asked, voice still groggy and growly.

She glanced at him. He still looked like shit. Did he even go to bed? She'd never seen anyone get a full night of rest and still wake up looking like what people tended to think she was supposed to look like. All pale and red-eyed, with suitcase-sized bags under his eyes and a distinct air of death about him. Whether that was just from him wishing death upon himself - which she guessed he probably did, judging by all that depression drinking he was doing - or from the nearness of the reaper, which was also probably because of the drinking. This guy had issues.

"I slept fine, did you spend the night drowning yourself in whiskey?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. The effect was lost by her glasses then sliding down her nose, and she shoved them back up in frustration.

James stared blankly at her for a moment as the question registered, and then furrowed his brows and shook his head ever so slightly.

"What? No." Not anymore, anyways. "After I talked to you - or - well - it's fuzzy, but I had a lot of water before I fell asleep." He sighed. "Whatever, anyways. I'm fine. Are you hungry?"

"Not even a little," she lied, rabbit blood was the potato chip of blood, she was still starving, she just felt a little gross now that she'd downed an entire rabbit like that.

"How long until the lady kicks me out?" she asked to change the subject, stretching her arms up and resting them on the back of her seat.

James stared at her again, but it only took a second for him to put together that she wasn't blind to the truth. Rita didn't want her around mooching off of them, and Kate didn't seem like the kind to do that anyway. She was already trying to be as independent as her current "lost-in-the-woods" situation allowed her by denying everything they offered and sleeping outside.

He decided not to play dumb. Kate was smart, and she didn't deserve to be treated less so.

"...Not sure," he said, lowering his voice a little. "Do you have somewhere to go?"

Kate snorted. He wouldn't believe her if she did tell him, and the second star wasn't visible here anyway. She checked. So no, she didn't have a place to go, but if she did, that place would be a little beyond his limited comprehension.

"Nope," she said, shoving those pesky glasses back up her nose. She much preferred it when Tallulah dealt with the things, usually by tossing them off to the side so Lully could see her 'fire-eyes'.

"Where's the closest place where I can get on a ship?" she asked. It was always possible to get back to Neverland by ship. She'd just have to commandeer one for a little bit.

On the bright side, it'd be the start of that fleet she didn't realize she wanted until now, and the cloudy side, she'd have to put someone else in charge of a whole-ass ship. No way that could go wrong with any of her crew of drunks.

James frowned. He could feel Penny's curious eyes drifting over to them without looking back at her. Even if it was paranoia, he was sure that she might be trying to eavesdrop.

'Liam' had never been on a ship. James had.

"Well, if you need to get on a ship you'd have to make it to the coast," he said. He was beginning to think Kate had absolutely no idea where she was. Most people in their area would've known they were landlocked and a good distance away from the isles. "From here, that's at least a week's journey."

"Great," she muttered. Landlocked and a week away from even a chance of getting home. There was no way she'd survive that long on the blood of little forest creatures.

Fuck.

"Do you happen to know what a transfusion is?" she asked. Transfusions were probably not invented yet in this crummy old-town world, but if they had been, maybe there was a blood bank somewhere she could rob.

James blinked slowly. Liam would have no idea what one was, but he had a base level understanding of it, though not enough to do one. Why was she asking? Questions like that weren't ones you asked out the blue. Either Kate had serious health problems that weren't obvious upfront, or she knew someone who did. Transfusions were something only the wealthiest of the wealthy had access to, and things got more complicated when magic was taken out of the process. Of course, he'd never seen it with his own eyes (with or without magic), but he'd read about it.

He drew a little closer and pulled up a chair to sit beside her so he could speak quietly without worrying about being heard - though he didn't doubt her hearing as much as his own.

"Why?" he asked quietly.

She scowled at him, "Answer the damn question."

Why did everyone have to question shit? Couldn't she just have a weird question once in a while? It was bullshit that she couldn't just get an answer every once in a while.

James smiled, just a little.

"Yes. I do."

She gave him a quick once-over to see if he was lying or something, but ultimately only succeeded in confirming that yes, he was a lot closer than she'd realized.

She scooted over in her seat to make more room for him and went back to looking out at the woods. "Hm," was her only response.

James knew she was hiding something, but he didn't press it. He didn't need to know her secrets, and he didn't feel like dealing with the inevitable fight she'd put up against any prodding.

He could see why Rita didn't want her around. People who were as tight-lipped as Kate were hard to trust, and if trust couldn't be bought or earned then Rita's carefully crafted sense of stability and authority could be challenged. Personally, James wasn't worried so much about Kate challenging the status quo as much as he was concerned about Kate being mistreated the longer she stayed here.

Rita had said she was welcome, but everyone knew she was not. Kate had not pledged loyalty, or allegiance, or had anything to offer. That meant to everyone in the gang, she was both useless and a nuisance, at best.

James sighed as silence fell between the two. They'd be called in for breakfast soon anyway, but he didn't feel like moving. His head was still throbbing from his hangover and he was slowly (and painfully) adjusting to the sight of the morning light. He scooted his chair a little further from Kate and leaned back into it, comfortable not having to keep a conversation going any further.

If there was ever a time people didn't expect him to be chatty, it was in the morning, when he was hungover. He didn't have to worry about living up to whatever standards he'd made for his persona.

He wasn't sure how much time passed, but it couldn't have been much. The sun was still low in the sky, yet to rise very high, painting the sky in an orange-blue hue. Someone came to the front door with heavy footsteps and opened the door. James knew without seeing that it was Hoss - or at least, it should've been - but when he looked to the door, Rita was standing there. She looked... different.

He'd never seen her quite like this. He couldn't say she was frazzled, but something felt wrong. A sinking feeling grew in his stomach as Rita turned and made eye contact with him.

"You. We need to talk."

James could see Hoss peek out ever so slightly behind the door.

Sometimes in his life, he had moments where he felt like he was watching himself before walking into a trap, but he didn't know what to do to stop it. If he ran now, he'd get caught, and him running would only make him look more guilty. But if he didn't try, was he just walking into the jaws of the beast? Shouldn't he at least go out with a fight?

But he didn't know exactly what was happening. He only had a gut feeling, and he was usually right about those, but he found himself paralyzed with indecision.

Rita's eyes bored through his skull.

"Come on," she ordered. "I don't have all morning."

Penny, at the door, didn't seem that phased. She just stood and watched, looking bored. Penny also didn't know what he knew Rita knew.

James spared a brief glance at Kate. If this didn't end well for him, he didn't know what would happen to her. He tried to communicate that in one brief glance, with his eyebrows pinched up and together.

"Okay, okay, coming," he said as he got up from his chair and followed Rita and Hoss inside, down the hall, up the stairs, and all the way down the next hall to the very last room. Rita's room.