Chapter Text
I.
It goes without saying that the world is loud.
Running cars, waking birds, angry children. The shout of a broken window, the laugh of a newly divorced accountant. Traditional chaos taken for granted. A phone rings. A pen clicks. A knuckle pops.
Life is loud, and the world demands it. Hoards it. Embraces it.
Noise is not only commonplace, it is expected. Such, it is impossible to separate the hard fact that is life from its stubborn bride, sound.
That’s why when the world ends, there is no bang. No clamor. No noise.
No warning.
II.
Depending on who you ask, the world never really ended. Others would tell you it never began at all. And like most deceptions, there is a thread of truth in each.
The day Seth Gordon’s world ended, thousands of others had yet to begin.
Not surprisingly, Seth’s last day was a beautiful one. In fact, it was rare to find any days that physically reflected the young man’s internal turmoil. Clear skies and apple scented air was standard weather. Sunshine as warm as honey was routine.
Seated in central South Carolina, Foxborough University--Seth’s current and only real home--was a prepossessing campus. To him, it was the height of grandeur. Though, that wasn’t saying much. The young man didn’t have much to compare such a title—if one counted run down children’s homes and sterile hospitals as worthy of comparison. The picturesque landscape was the first and only sight Seth ever fell in love with. And on his last day he was, for once, sober enough to appreciate it.
“Sunset.”
Seth turned to the voice. Its owner was almost as beautiful as the view before him. Lemon hair, eyes like fire. Sunset, he agreed quietly. Allison Reynolds, a goddess in the humble flesh. If Fate or God or the Universe had granted him more time—one more week, perhaps one more day—he may have fallen in love with her too. But neither would ever know. He didn’t have more time, and he didn’t know that either.
“I missed you in class today,” she continued when he didn’t speak.
He shrugged. “Which one?”
On average, it takes around five minutes for the sun to fully set in the fall. Seth wondered what forces, if any, could make the inevitable finish faster.
“Econ. French.” Her lips quirked in a near smile. Oh gods, he’d kill for that smile. “I figured by lunch you weren’t going to show.”
Seth answered in the safest way he knew: another shrug. If he vocalized anything, he’d only hurt her. Pain is a vicious cycle, with talons and hooks and webs. It destroys more than the one who wields it; even more so, those who try to control it. Seth was done controlling.
“Will you come inside?” Allison asked. She shivered slightly in the breeze, but they both knew it was for show. My beautiful actress.
“I’ll join you later,” he found himself saying before he fully decided to do so. “I just need some space alone. To think.”
“‘Think’?” she laughed. The sound was as bright as bells. “Since when?”
He didn’t return her amusement. Instead, he stared back out at the sprawling fields before him. The balcony on the fourth floor library was a prime spot on campus, and it wasn’t because of the book selection.
When she realized he didn’t plan on talking, she composed herself and made to leave. The princess of a crooked kingdom, he was the only person she accepted rejection from. Her hand rested gently on his forearm as she murmured a goodbye.
Goodbye, goodbye. Adieu, ma tempête. The breeze may have been cool, but where her hand lingered, all he felt was fire. It burned his bones and churned his insides like a stewing cauldron. The air was a furnace, and she his stoker. He couldn’t breathe past the heat until she let go. Despite this, after she’d left, he craved that fiery touch stronger than the powder.
Sunset came, of course, five minutes and forty-six seconds later. There was not a fraction of noise to interrupt the star’s descent. And with it, the burning boy fell too.
By the time they found his broken body meters below the balcony, there was no question it was too late. It wasn’t yet sunrise, but it was obvious he’d been there awhile. The scene was quickly cordoned off and classes halted for the day. Students were ushered to avoid the library like a plague.
The boy had been dead long enough that the night chill had seeped into his clothes. But strange enough, as the medic carefully laid a sheet over Seth’s crumpled form, she could have sworn the air around him was hot to the touch. The medic was unfortunately used to death, but that didn’t mean each case made it any easier to deal with. When she went home that night to the soothing arms of her wife, she let herself cry for the young boy who’d never finish growing up. And the next day, when she helped assist a doctor to deliver a crying set of twins, her tears flowed again, unashamed.
Pain is a vicious cycle, but life’s is stronger.
Years before Seth Gordon took his last breath, a dangerous woman took her’s. That horrid day, the day Mary Hatford’s world ended, her killer’s life continued. Ut solet.
Unlike Seth’s, this day was cold and unforgiving. Gray-grease skies worthy of a Dostoyevsky rendition mocked her shaking limbs. In this monochrome world, she left behind a body’s worth of blood and bones, and one hollow son.
“Ma-ma.” It was a whisper. A plea. A demand. “Ma-ma!” He spoke her name like a mantra. She did not answer.
When he burned her on the shores of California, he did not cry. There were enough tears in the ocean already. The crashing of the waves, brutal and objective, drowned out the sounds of his own heartbreak.
Crash. Pull. Crash. Pull.
It was not long after when the boy realized he was no longer whole. On that California beach, two people did in fact die: the wife of a mobster and the son of a devil. But only one was reborn.
The day Nathaniel Wesninski’s world ended, another man’s life began.
And to his grudging surprise, the beginning was not as bad as the end. It was chaotic, sure. Bloody, of course. And so, so very loud.
The sirens came first. Then the gunshots. And finally, shaking in the chill of the desert night, a saving voice found the remains of Nathaniel Wesninski.
III.
Depending on who you ask, when the boy arrived to the Academy, it was not the beginning.
For most of Foxborough’s students, it was late November. Exam prep season. In other words, hell. The beginning was just as distant as the end.
For Seth Gordon, it had been the end for quite a long time.
For Allison Reynolds, there was no more timeline. Only Before and After. She didn’t know which part was worse.
For Kevin Day, it was the middle of everything. Middle of life, middle of class, middle of another crisis.
And for Andrew Minyard, well.
There was no beginning. There was no end.
The story hadn’t started yet.