@motherwyatt We apparently have a new child living here. Don't know where he came from. All Isabella has said is that she "found him". I may have a fucking stroke.
There were many things Braun could be accused of, but being super observant had typically never been one of them. He had a reputation of hitting first and not bothering to ask questions later. But things had started to change after Bray’s death. He found himself being more watchful. More observant. Maybe it was the realization that someone had to do it and he was about the only one capable of it. Elena had gone from walking around like a ghost to just crying over the smallest things. She wasn’t in any state to do it. And Erick seemed just completely shattered at this point. He had always been closer to Bray and Brodie than Braun had been. This loss had perhaps been the final straw for him.
So Braun watched. And tried to do shit he thought could help. But mostly he just watched because he wasn’t like Bray or Brodie, who always seemed to know what the fuck to do. And in his watching he found himself fixating on Isabella.
If he was going to be honest, the sixteen year old hadn’t exactly been “normal” for a long time. Traumatic events combined with witnessing the worst of Bray’s battles with drugs and mental illness had aged her far beyond her years. But something had fundamentally changed in her after they lost Bray. He had witnessed her coming back from the woods one morning with a buzzard flying over her head and a dead behind the eyes stare. He had tried asking her what had happened but she hadn’t spoken to him. She barely spoke to him at all unless it was to snap at him to leave her alone.
She spoke to others though. Barking out orders and lashing out violently if they weren’t followed--and doing what she shouldn’t be able to do given her size and strength and taking down grown men. The ones that didn’t fight her seemed to earn her favor and she sat and talked with them, winning her over in the same kind of way Bray charmed folks into joining them. That similarity had become even more startling when upon Elena’s departure to return to work for the first time, she emerged from the bathroom with brown hair--the same shade of brown that had been Bray’s natural color.
But this wasn’t the first time she changed her hair after some emotional meltdown. Braun tried to tell himself that was just something she did. She had cut it all off before in a fit, which was something that Bray had mourned and complained about until it had grown back. There was another time she had dyed it half black and half white after some bullshit happened. This wasn’t new. Nothing to worry about.
Even with that in mind, Braun couldn’t push aside his concern. The hair on its own would have been one thing. But the way she marched around the compound--and the way the others were starting to follow her--that was concerning. The dead behind the eyes stare that had remained ever since she had come back from the woods was even more concerning. It was like she was there but wasn’t. It was her on the outside but not the inside.
And sometimes, in her fits of anger, he could have sworn he saw flashes of yellow in her eyes. And a cold sense of familiarity would sweep over him because he knew he had seen those eyes before. He had seen them when he fought HIM. When he fought the Fiend. But that couldn’t be right. That couldn’t be what it was.
For the third morning in the row, Isabella found herself rushing to the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before she started throwing up. Much like she had in the woods, she vomited up black goo, the taste of it so rancid she still hadn’t gotten used to it. She tried to be quiet as she heaved, but the knocking on the bathroom door told her she had been heard.
“Isabella?” Fucking Braun. He went ahead and opened the door without waiting for her to answer, giving her barely enough time to flush the toilet and wipe the back of her mouth before he saw the goo. “Fucking Christ.”
“I’m fine.” She forced herself to stand up and go to the sink. She rinsed her mouth out with water and then mouthwash, hating that she still couldn’t get the taste out of her mouth. She did her best to ignore Braun the whole time, but the weight of his stare made her sigh and finally look at him. “What? What the fuck do you want?”
“You’re not fucking pregnant again, are you?” The bluntness of his question didn’t surprise her. He was never one for beating around the bush.
“What? No. Jesus fucking Christ.” She wiped her mouth again, self-conscious of having any remaining goo on her lips. “I’m fine. My stomach’s just upset.”
“For three days?”
“You listening to me in the bathroom now? Do you have some sick freak fetish I don’t know about?” The absolutely appalled look on his face came accompanied by a stunned silence, one that she used to her advantage to slip past him and storm out of the room. She went downstairs and through the living room and kitchen, ignoring everyone else around her as she went out the back door and slammed it shut behind her.
Tell the others. That’s what she needed to do. She knew that but she still hadn’t done it. How could she explain the things she had seen in the woods with the Fiend and Abigail? How would she explain to them why she had been there in the first place? They would let her get as far as admitting she went to the woods to kill herself and they would never let her hear the end of it. She would be watched like a hawk and put on the same kind of lockdown Bray had been put on when he would get caught hurting himself. And she couldn’t have that.
And HE wouldn’t like it.
She flopped down on Bray’s rocking chair that was on the back porch and stared out blankly across the compound. Even though he hadn’t manifested yet, she could still feel Fiend inside of her, sinking its claws into everything inside of her. It should scare her. She knew it should scare her but it didn’t. In fact, she hoped that once he was done, there would be nothing left of her. The sooner it used her and discarded her, the sooner she would be to the end. And with that end would come her being reunited with Bray.
She watched as the Family emerged from their cabins, starting their morning routines while looking like they were in a daze. That was what their lives had become. They were all simply just existing, going through the motions without any real purpose. She couldn’t help but think it would be a mercy to take them all out of their misery. But could she do it? She wasn’t sure if she was that far gone yet.
She kept watching as the last cabin door opened and Glenn emerged. Glenn was an elderly man, and one that looked more and more frail every day. He was going to be the next to die. He should have been before Bray, but there was nothing that could be done about that. She watched as he struggled to walk about ten steps away from his cabin and then turn around, his bony shoulders sagging in what seemed to be defeat. She almost felt bad for him, but couldn’t muster the pity. Instead she got up and turned to head back into the house.
This family is your father’s legacy. We simply will not allow it to die.
Abigail’s words echoed inside her head, making her stop.
The only way to him is through.
Isabella scowled. She had thought a lot about what Abigail had said in the woods and had grown to hate the dead witch more as time went on. Bray had grown to resent the burden the Family had put onto him. He had wanted to be free of it. But his love for Abigail had made him endure it and now her love for him made her turn around to do Abigail’s bidding. Being reunited with her father was the carrot on the fucking string. Abigail knew it. Fiend knew it. Monster and witch worked side by side to keep this Family alive though Isabella didn’t know to what fucking gain. One was dead and the other was a fucking swamp monster.
Maybe it was to drive her fucking as crazy as Bray had been at times. And if that was the case they were certainly going to end up succeeding.
“Glenn.” She called out the man’s name as she strode across the yard. She walked past other members of the Family without giving them so much as a second look. But she felt their eyes on her as she went. She feels like they knew something was off about her. Braun knew. Maybe he knew better than anyone, which was surprising. She would have attributed it to how much he had been around Fiend, but so had her mother and she hadn’t seemed to notice…then again, Elena had been pretty distracted by crying her eyes out lately. Perhaps that was part of the problem.
The old man turned to look at her. “Isabella.” He tried to shuffle towards her, tripping over his own feet and nearly falling, only not hitting the ground because she reached out and caught him. “Oh. Dear girl. You’re so strong.”
“The hell are you doing out here without your cane?” The question was asked more sharply than necessary. But that was all she was anymore. All sharp edges and a poisonous rage that didn’t care who she hurt with it.
“I can’t find it,” he confessed. “I set it somewhere and I can’t remember where.” He pointed towards his cabin. “And my roof…it rained something terrible last night. Did you hear?”
“Yeah. I’m not fucking deaf. She looked towards his cabin. “What’s wrong with your roof?”
“It’s leaking. There’s water everywhere in there. Bray…he promised he would get someone to fix it. I talked to him about it the night before he…well…” Glenn’s voice trailed off, the word “died” lingering heavily in the air.
Isabella stared at the cabin, giving it some thought. “I’ll take care of it. You go to Isaac and get another cane. And stop goddamn losing it.” She didn’t wait to see if he would obey. She just strode across the compounding, heading over to where Braun was now standing. He was talking to Cliff, Russ, and Elijah, though the conversation came to a halt as she came closer.
“What’s the matter?” Elijah was the one to speak to her first, frowning as he saw the look on her face. Did she look angry? Probably. She was perpetually angry these days.
“Glenn’s roof is leaking.” She spoke mostly to Russ and Cliff, who were better at the carpentry stuff than Elijah and Braun. “It needs fixed.”
“Oh.” Cliff blinked and looked at Russ. He was still a somewhat newer member of the Family--only been around for about a year. “Well we were gonna--”
“I don’t care what you were gonna do. You’re fixing the roof today.” The order came out with an ease and confidence that surprised even herself.
Braun raised his eyebrows but didn’t say anything. Elijah looked a bit surprised but also impressed. Russ and Cliff exchanged looks, and she could tell neither one of them seemed eager to follow her order. Maybe it was her age or maybe it was her being a girl. Maybe it was both. Russ had the sense not to say anything though. Bray was gone, but being his daughter still had enough weight on its own for her when it came to the longer tenured members of the Family.
Cliff though, was a different story.
“Look, sweetie, I don’t know who put you in charge--”
The condescending nature of his words made a rage sweep through her like fire. She didn’t let him finish, kicking him between the legs as hard as she could. He doubled over, his cry of pain barely more than a grunt due to the wind being knocked out of him. She grabbed his head before he crumpled to the ground and swung her knee upwards, catching him right in the nose, and she felt it break from the force of the blow. Braun and Russ were yelling but she could hardly hear them. The rage swept through her like a fire, and it wasn’t just her rage at this moment. It was HIS, and he gave her a strength she wouldn’t normally have.
She pushed Cliff over onto his back and moved over him, one hand gripping his long, dark beard while the other pulled her gun out of its holster and placed the barrel against his head. “I said…you’re gonna fucking fix that roof.” She leaned in closer for the next part, keeping the other men from hearing her. “And if you fucking call me “sweetie” ever fucking again, I’ll fucking blast your fucking brains out and paint my room with them. Do you understand me?”
He looked at her, silent and dumb for a second before the fear took over. And while she couldn’t see herself through his eyes, she could feel what he was seeing. It wasn’t the face of an angry teenage girl he was seeing. It wore her face, but simmering underneath the surface was the monster. The monster that was rising and would help her do what she just promised without the slightest bit of remorse.
“I said, do you understand?”
He finally managed to nod.
“Good.” She let go of his beard and straightened back up, putting her gun away as she did so. Braun tried to say something to her again, tried to grab her arm, but she wrenched herself out of his grip as she walked away. She didn’t have time to deal with whatever conversation he wanted to have.
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