Chapter Text
Abram gives himself two minutes, to breathe, to calm down, to remind himself what needs to be done, and then he climbs out of the car. At first, he tries to pull the body out of the passenger's side, he still needs a car after all, but the noise- almost like velcro tearing apart, almost, but meaty too- makes him stop, makes him gag, it's too much to listen to it, and also a good indication that this is the wrong way to continue. It's not really getting rid of the evidence if chunks of the body are still glued to the seat, better to get rid of the car too and find a replacement.
He leaves the body where it is, goes to grab their duffel bags instead, he empties hers out, quickly moving things over to his own bag. A bottle of vodka they'd been using as disinfectant, another roll of bandages, scissors, the money she'd kept in her bag in case they were separated, and lastly, her lighter and cigarettes. He tells himself the lighter is useful (and it is) and the cigarettes explain why he'd have it, making them a useful cover (also true), but underneath that is the knowledge this is the closest thing to a memento he can have.
There's no reason for him to have a woman's clothes, there's no jewelry to even think of keeping (and if there was, she’d have expected that he pawn it off, would have demanded him to, that was the only reason she'd taken her ring when they left after all), no perfume or soap to remember her scent (they'd used whatever was available wherever they went, nothing was consistent on the run, not even the flavor of toothpaste they got), the best that he has is the cigarettes, because taking her gun is pure practicality, any weapon you can have up your sleeve is a necessity when running from the type of people chasing them- chasing him.
He finds her phone in her bag as well, he takes it out and looks at it for a moment next to his own, and realizes there's no point in keeping either. He removes the SIMs cards from both, snapping them in half and tossing them into the sand, before hurling the phones into the ocean. He doesn't let himself think about it any further than “it's what she'd have wanted him to do” and forces himself to get back on task.
With her bag emptied and his repacked, he sets about the next step, soaking her clothes in their spare gasoline and pouring the rest on her body. He wedges the clothes into spots on the car that aren't particularly flammable, to help get the job done, before lighting a piece of driftwood on fire and chucking it onto her body, steps back as the whole thing erupts into flames and sparks and smoke, and waits.
He's not sure how long it takes, it feels like days, sitting in the sand, eyes stinging from the heat and smoke and salty breeze, but being too dry to well up. The sky, originally light gray, has grown dark, and the smoke from the fire blends in much better with the rest of the sky looking black now. A relief, since, until the job is completed, Abram sitting next to a burning car is very suspicious, even if no one else knows about the body.
Thankfully, no one approaches to investigate any light or smoke, or burning smell, and the fire eventually puts itself out, with nothing left to keep burning. Ideally, waiting another two or three hours would let the wreckage cool, before he has to get back into the car, but he's already been on this beach too long, he gives it one hour, and then opens the passenger door, the metal hurts his hands to touch, even through the layer of socks he put over them, but he still has to keep going.
Without anything holding her together, all the bones are piled together, her skull dropped into her ribcage, tiny finger bones resting in her pelvis, phalanges, metacarpals, and carpals all clustered together from where she'd been holding her side. Phalanges, metatarsals, and tarsals tucked up under femur, tibia, and fibula, where she'd had her legs curled up in the seat with her. Curled up in pain or in sleep, he'd never noticed a difference, had hardly registered that she was too quiet beside him, hoping she was resting and recovering from her injuries, unaware that she'd succumbed to them instead. How long had he sat beside her as she'd grown cold as ice, oblivious to her death completely? A question he'll never know the answer to, and so, one pointless to dwell on, he reminds himself, moving on. Always, always moving on, pushing forward.
Don't stop running, don't look back…
Piling the bones into her old duffle, and meticulously counting to make sure they were all there, is time consuming as well, but necessary, any trace of her here will lead someone one step closer to him. The duffel holds the bones surprisingly well, but she had always been on the small side, one of the few things they'd had in common. He'd had to ask, because she could see the colors, if he looked like her or his father, and had been bitterly disappointed to hear he was like a smaller copy, it had made being called “Junior” even worse.
Red hair and blue eyes, she'd told him, though the words themselves had held little meaning, since he'd never seen the colors properly himself. And asking her had always led to unsatisfying answers. According to her, Nathan's red hair was deep and dark, like blood, and the blue of his eyes cold like ice, and Mary should have turned away that first time their eyes met, but she'd been so overwhelmed with how vibrant and beautiful that the world suddenly looked, and, at the time, she'd felt like he was the most beautiful part of it.
She'd made sure Abram understood her mistake, Destiny didn't guarantee happiness, Fate didn't promise love or even kindness, just because someone was meant for you, didn't mean you weren't better off without them. That had been her youth, her foolishness, encouraging her to do the romantic thing and run off with the destined “love” of her life. As if such a thing could have been true. And now they knew better, Nathan was always going to be the “ender” of her life, that had been their Destiny.
Abram was quiet as he dug into the sand, as deep as he could without a proper shovel, and shoved her bag into the hole, confident he'd dug deep enough that no one casually playing in the sand would find her accidentally. He made quick work of covering her up, and then he walked into the tide, furiously scrubbing off sand and blood and the smell from the arson he committed, salt water stinging his cuts the whole time, and then he grabbed his bag and set off.
Once he got a new ID, once he dyed his hair a new color, once he got new colored contacts, everything about his last alias would be dead and gone, and he'd be someone else. He'd need a new backstory, a new answer for any questions anyone asked him, now he'd need a reason for why no one would met any family at all, so used to covers that involved moving with an aunt or his mother, perhaps this time both his parents have jobs that keep them far away from home and too busy to check in, if his new ID lists him as eighteen no one should care that his family has left him alone, he'd be an adult.
He knows he's near a coast in California, he'll have to find a map and possibly ask for directions to get a proper idea of where he is, if he asks for directions to Las Angeles he can get a good idea of how to get to Las Vegas instead without leaving behind a witness who knows where he's heading, from there he can hit up one of Mary's old contacts, get new papers and find somewhere new to go.
With a plan in mind, it's easy to set out, focusing solely on the goal in mind and ignoring the grief threatening to crest over him and drag him down.
Abram makes quick work of stopping into a shop for hair dye, all the shades look gray to him, so he goes for something darker than what he got last time to be sure it covers up the previous color, black should work. He tucks the dye into his bag and buys a bottle of water at the counter, before finding the nearest motel to stay in.
He trashes his contacts, better to be the original color for now, than to be the color it was when he was last found, and pulls a beanie over his hair, covering it completely before getting a room, as soon as he gets in he locks the door and makes quick work of dyeing his hair. As long as he wears the beanie on the way out, no one who saw him earlier will know anything has changed.
He digs out a protein bar and chokes it down too quickly to taste, the easiest way to eat on the run, and prepares to sleep, a quick rest, and then he'll buy that map and be out of this town before sundown tomorrow. In a week's time he'll be someone else in a new town, a new state, a new life. He'll be safe again, for a little while.
He curls up with his arm under his pillow, holding his gun, and pulls his blankets over himself, laying down and getting comfortable, before closing his eyes to sleep.
His eyes have slipped shut for what feels like only a second before he's jolting up, wide awake, heart racing, breathing hard, he wrestles the gun out from under his pillow and clutches it desperately. Wondering what set him off, a noise of some kind maybe? A scan of the window, the door, and the air vents tells him nothing is here, but the feeling of terror doesn't let up, not even slightly.
He presses back into the corner, relieved to feel two walls at his back, but it's not enough to relax or sleep, the walls mean nothing is behind him, but there's no guarantee nothing will come after him when he's sleeping, there's never been a guarantee, but at least with Mary…. There was someone watching his back, someone else to wake him and drag him away from danger, now, if something comes, he's all alone….
He pushes that thought away immediately, doesn't have time for it, Mary would have never let him dwell on it, on anything so pointless, instead he should refocus his thoughts and energy, if he can't sleep then he can plan.
He stays up all night working out where it would be best for him to go, after getting new papers in Nevada, he'll head through to Utah and pick up a cache they left there, then down to one in Texas, before looping back up into Arizona, the route should be nonsensical enough to throw off anyone tailing him. He'll steal a map of Arizona tomorrow too, so he can look into where exactly he wants to settle down for a few months, without leaving a witness here to know where he was looking to go.
Ideally, no one who's seen him here can see colors anyway, making their memories of seeing him even less reliable, and any pictures of him harder to identify. But, worst case scenario, if the only information they have is a kid buying a map of the state they're already in, and giving him directions to a place he's not even going, that should lead his pursuers in the wrong direction entirely, so hopefully he drops off their radars for a long time.
Before he leaves town, Abram stops at a diner for breakfast (although black coffee isn't really breakfast), and has to apologize to the waitress when he snaps at her about not wanting cream or sugar, tells her he's just tired, and she softens a little at the sincerity in his tone, and probably from catching sight of the bruises on his face. He rests his head on the table after she walks away, kicking himself for being more memorable than he should, but he is tired.
He'd been unable to sleep the last two nights before they'd fled Seattle, Mary had been restless and paranoid about the place, eager to leave it, pacing and planning all night and keeping him awake, then the day they'd been leaving they were ambushed, he'd had to drive them away, through the evening into the next morning, and then he'd spent hours on the beach leading into evening again, and been unable to sleep last night. This is only four days without sleep and he's making mistakes, Mary would kill him herself if she could.
He's alone now, he can't afford to fuck up like this. He needs sleep as soon as possible, before he falls apart. But first, his coffee, and getting to Las Vegas, he needs to find another car to steal… or maybe it's best to get public transportation for a bit, to blend into a crowd? Or maybe he should hitchhike? He's done that before, and in the worst-case scenario he's got his gun tucked into his waistband, if the driver tries anything crazy he can-
Although does he really want to deal with another corpse the day after the last one?
Maybe he should-
“What are you doing?” Mary hisses at him, and Abram looks up immediately, he knows better than to ignore her when she's angry, and there she is, sitting in the seat across from him. “Why are you still here? Get a car and go, you idiot, do you want to be found?”
Abram glances around, but no one else is looking at them, then he looks back at Mary, Mary, who is very dead, Mary, who should not be talking to him, Mary, whose bones he buried just the day before. Mary, who looks so alive she might just reach across the booth and hit him.
“Fuck I need to go to sleep…”
“No, that's wasting time, what you need to do is leave town, did you retain nothing I taught you?” Mary scowls at him, “Forget the coffee and the waitress, you've blown this already, just leave, it doesn't matter if she remembers you running off, she has no clue where you're going.”
He opens his mouth, though he's not sure what he wants to say to her, but it doesn't matter, the waitress comes back with his coffee, placing it on the table with a soft “here you go dear” before walking away again, and when Abram looks back across the table, no one is there.
Of course. Mary never cared about being rude.
He drains the coffee as quickly as he can, slaps his money down on the table, and leaves. He needs to get out of this town and he needs to find somewhere safe to sleep.
He starts walking down the street at a moderate pace, hurrying but trying to look like he isn't, he needs to find transportation, and fast. There's no real ideal conditions for stealing a car, there's no perfect targets or anything, there's always a chance that even a shitty car that looks abandoned will be reported stolen quickly, and, even if it isn't, a car that falls apart on you when you need it most could get you killed on the run.
So, if he's stealing something, it needs to be fast enough that he can get away with it, and, if he can get it without being detected right away, that's just a bonus. Maybe he can snag someone's car from the motel parking lot tonight… if he takes off with someone's car while they're sleeping, someone passing through too, a tourist the local crime would target, it might take a while for anyone to start looking for him.
But that would mean waiting even longer to leave town and that's not ideal either, maybe he should just-
Wait.
He turns, slowly, hoping to go unnoticed, is that…?
Could it be-?
Lola Malcolm is across the street.
She isn't looking at him, but she's looking around, and it's only a matter of time before she spots him if he stays where he is.
Abram starts running, he's not even thinking about where he should be going, he's panicking. Lola can't be here, she can't have already caught up to him, right? Sure, he just saw her in Seattle with his father, but he shook off the cars following them long before reaching California, there's no way he's already been found, right? Surely he can go more than a single day on his own right? Mary didn't die so he could be grabbed the next day, he can't let them get him, not this soon.
He turns a corner, and then another, glances over his shoulder and spots Romero Malcolm running his way, horrified Abram sprints even faster, making impulsive turns and darting around, trying to lose Romero in his confusing flight path, and forcing himself not to flinch at the sounds of footsteps gaining on him and instead to just run faster.
He turns another corner and nearly runs straight into someone.
Abram reacts instinctively, stopping so fast he trips himself and falls on his ass. From his new spot on the curb he has a good view of black boots, and dark gray jeans that could be a variety of colors. He looks higher up, meets the eyes of the young woman he almost knocked down and-
Oh….
Is this what Mary experienced? The whole world changed in an instant, color, where previously there had been nothing but dull gray everywhere….?
“Oh!” His soulmate reacts as well, eyes widening but never straying from him, “I'm sorry I-” she frowns, “are those bruises on your face?”
Abram wonders if he should lie, he should, right? Why is it even a question? Mary has told him time and again that soulmates mean nothing at the end of the day, and she'd definitely tell him to jump right back up and leave.
But the warmth in those eyes has him pinned to his spot on the ground, somehow feeling just as intimidating as any glare he's ever gotten, the feelings he's experiencing are just as new as the colors he's seeing, and he doesn't know what to do with them.
“Are you okay?” She asks, crouching down before him, still meeting his eyes, seemingly just as unable to look away as he is.
You're fine, Abram, tell me you're fine!
“I'm fine.” But he says it too fast, too defensively, too automatically to be anything but a lie, even though he doesn't think it is, he is fine, he's just a bit tired, and a bit sore, and the stitches on his shoulder blade feel like they might've ripped open at some point while he was running for his life.
She gives him a skeptical look, “I don't think I believe you.” But she says it with no judgment, reaching down and pulling him back to his feet, she doesn't let go once he's standing again, clearly worried he'll fall over.
Abram opens his mouth to thank her, and becomes aware that there are no sounds of footsteps behind him. He glances back around the corner, but no one is there.
It's a relief, but only for half a second….
This is a huge problem, him hallucinating his pursuers, he can't keep running himself into the ground fleeing from his imagination, that'd leave him too vulnerable, too exhausted to run when the threat is real, but he has to run every time he sees them, what if that time they're really there?
He turns back to his soulmate, a lie on his tongue about being in a hurry and needing to go now, when all the words stick in his throat and the blood drains from his face.
Romero Malcolm is here, he just circled around the other way. Not a hallucination then. Fuck.
Romero looks down at their joined hands, and the grin that lights up his face is full of the kind of glee that leads to the worst kinds of torture.
And yet, the hand Abram holds grips him tighter, and subtly his soulmate shifts him behind her.
“Who's this, Junior, did you finally get a girlfriend?” Romero moves closer, slowly like a predator closing in on prey, taunting and smug, “I thought Mommy Dearest didn't let you hang around with girls, could it be you're hiding it from her? What a bad son you are.”
Abram doesn't bother trying to insist they don't know each other, when had his father or any of his circle cared about innocent bystanders getting hurt or killed? No point, not when it wouldn't do any good.
Instead, from his partially hidden spot, he goes to draw his gun, Romero spots it anyway, whipping out a knife and throwing it without hesitation.
And also without hesitation, his soulmate takes the hit, the blade sinking into her back as she shields him.
It would be easy to think that from there Abram gets confused, thinks he's back with Mary in Seattle, to assume in his panicked and exhausted mind he thinks he's trying to rescue his mother again.
But that's not the case. Mary always taught him to look after himself first, to prioritize his own survival, she'd never want him to take a hit for someone else, the same way she never took one for him. Not even once.
Abram is very aware, as he grabs his soulmate and pulls her up into his arms, as he takes off running with her, despite her slowing him down, that this isn't Mary, isn't his mother, and it doesn't make him want to save her any less.
If anything, he runs faster, has to get her somewhere safe, because he doesn't even know her name yet, and she can't die for him when he doesn't even know her name.
He feels her hands on him, reaching for his waistband, he only has a second to be confused, before he feels her draw his gun and turn to peer over his shoulder.
Despite Romero being a moving target, despite them moving as well, even despite the fact that she's probably never fired a gun before, she tries. The gun fires, and remarkably, she doesn't drop it.
Abram stops running when he hears Romero hit the ground, “Pass me the gun.” He says, and is quietly pleased with how quickly she complies, that she trusts him in this situation, despite everything.
Abram doesn't bother to set her down, he merely turns so he's facing Romero and she's not, and then he fires three more shots. One to the head and two to the chest, just like Mary always taught him, to make sure Romero doesn't get back up and keep coming after them.
“Sorry,” He tells her, “I wasn't trying to get you involved in this.”
“That's okay,” She laughs, and the sound is wet with tears and edging on hysterical, reminding him how much pain she must be in right now, “I didn't have any plans today.”
Abram holds her tighter, immeasurably thankful for her help, and also so very sorry he ever ran into her, and then breaks the news that it isn't safe to take her to a hospital.
He promises himself to patch her up and send her away as soon as possible, it's what's best for her.
But later, after he gives her the vodka, after he's cut her shirt off, after he pulls the knife from her back, as he sews her up and she babbles with lips loosened by alcohol and lingering fear, he changes his mind.
After she tells him of running away from her own house of nightmares, of having nothing and no one, but knowing going back would be a death sentence, after hearing her talk about wanting so badly to live, and knowing the only way to do it was to get far, far away from the people who made her want to die just to be safe from them, Abram understands.
It feels like looking in a mirror, their circumstances aren't the same, not really, but they are, at their core. He can't go home either, not to Baltimore, or his father, the fate that would await him there would make him want to kill himself instead of being subjected to it. And Abram has always just wanted to live.
He makes a new plan, they'll stay together as far as Las Vegas, he'll get new identification for both of them, he'll leave her with enough money to get by for a while, and then they'll go their separate ways. Still strangers, names never exchanged, not real ones anyway.
Soulmate or not, he can't imagine they'll really stick together for longer than they have to, can't imagine anyone choosing to be involved with him when they could so much more easily walk away.
Yeah, Abram thinks, eyes slipping closed and finally, finally, staying closed, safe and secure with someone sleeping at his back again, with arms wrapped around him holding him together, yeah, we'll split up after Las Vegas.
If it feels like a lie as he thinks it, it's only because he wishes it was, it would be nice to have someone stay with him, to have someone to stay with.
But that's about as likely to happen as him getting to play Exy again.
—-------
Neil Josten let his cigarette burn to the filter without taking a drag.