✖ More Than A Roadblock
Veronica stands in the wake of Joey’s cry. Allows it to wash over her, penetration through her. Her own pain identifies with parts of the sound that comes from deep inside the blonde but also acknowledges that there’s more in the auditory release of her trauma that Veronica can never begin to understand. But she doesn’t dismiss the cry, refuses to speak through it. Instead the healer keeps her arms around Joey and lets the moment sit with them.
When Joey breathes in after the shout she cast to the swiftly darkening horizon, Veronica waits. Each action the blonde puts forth can’t be anticipated right now, only heeded.
With a nod, the brunette lets her arms slip from the embrace, fingers passing over skin in a light caress that promises support. She might be parting from her now for the sake of what must be done but she won’t ever go far. Veronica looks down at the man still and losing warmth with the cold of the night seeping in. “Yeah we can do that. Get it over with.”
Safe. That’s what they both need. To feel safe. But Veronica begins to wonder if safe will find them. As her feet crunch in the dirt toward the dark sedan, she considers Joey’s words again. I did this alone. I liked it. She can’t know what she would feel had their roles been reversed but she knows she would have done whatever it took to get free, to get to Joey. And that’s what her girlfriend did.
Slipping into the driver’s seat of the sedan, the healer lets out a sigh to see the keys settled in the ignition. She would have done it but she’s relieved she doesn’t have to dig for them on one of the officer’s persons. The engine turns over with a purr and Veronica rests her hands on the steering wheel but doesn’t move to put the car in drive immediately. Cars, death. She’s reminded for a moment of what happened to Celeste. The one she couldn’t save. And a sinking realisation strikes the woman.
She would have gladly taken the lives of the two paramedics who came and refused Celeste service if it had meant bringing her girlfriend back. At seventeen, she’d even debated going after the drunkards responsible for the horror she was haunted by.
There are times when taking a life feels better than refraining.
With that thought echoing in her skull, Veronica shifts the car into drive and guides it slowly over to where the second body lies. Throwing it into park but leaving the engine running as she climbs out, the door hanging open.
“Lets do this.”
Joey stands over the body, steadfast. The engine coming to life behind her is neutral input, neither motivation nor discouragement. The tormented expression burned into Joey’s features melts away, her mind no longer stuck between confrontation and flight. A faraway look crept into her face to replace the distress, a momentary, extraneous serenity - as if she could have merely been contemplating the evening twilight. The fear in her heart morphed into something else, at least temporarily – a breed of unflexing resolve. It seemed the best, perhaps the only way, to keep a lid on the terror wrought by her own actions.
While the engine roaring to life held little consequence on Joey’s action, the sudden silence that enveloped the field had an equal and opposite reaction. The time of day was practically imprinted in her blood. And though she did not feel the pressure of the werecat seated at the back of her eyes, she still felt compelled to complete the task at hand. To put some distance between this turning moment in her life and whatever future existed beyond this. Beyond this night. Beyond this field. Beyond the sickening scent of stale blood tainting the air and burning itself into memory.
Notions of right and wrong had slipped away by this point, draining to irrelevance. When the world was crumbling around you, Joey supposed, it was best to set yourself on a few simple tasks. Something to distract. Something occupy the brain from dwelling and delving into dangerous territory. The dangerous territory of the particular way that long, chunky strings of coagulated blood stretched between the body and the grass when Joey attempted to move it. She couldn’t get a good grip. It was all the blood. Her hands were now greasy with it. The weight slipped from her grasp and fell to the earth with a heavy thud. Joey chewed with dour discipline as she squatted and readjusted, leveling herself with the consequences of her lapse in control.
Joey moved the body past Veronica into the still open door of the vehicle, and threw it into the front cab; a long stride backwards put some much needed distance between the blonde and the bodies. A lone leg hung out at an abnormal angle and the conviction to complete the task somehow was not enough to stimulate Joey to touch the body yet again, not when her own feet did not feel entirely moored to the earth anymore. The effort it had taken to perform the simple task had seemed to drain what should be an endless supply of power.
