Riley is seventeen years old. Her full name is Riley Aurora Peri. Her pronouns are she/her. She is bisexual. She moved to Wiskayok when she was 8 years old and started being friends with Jackie and Shauna. Her nicknames are Ri, RiRi, Rory, Rora
She lives with her mom and her older sister Naomi. Riley and Naomi are very close. Naomi owns a small cafe and is saving up for her own place. Riley sometimes works there for some extra money and as a starter job. And she thinks she might work there full time with her sister soon if she doesn’t go to college and continue with soccer.
She has one cat called Vada, after Vada from the 1991 ‘My Girl’ movie. Her two favourite stuffed animals, 2 bears dressed in her baby clothes, sit on her bed. They are called Sarah and Becky, after the 1995 movie ‘A little princess’ which is her favourite. She also has a dog when she was little called Romeo, he was a German Shepard.
They lived in a really nice big house when her mom and dad were still together. And then they got a divorce when she was 14 and he moved. They didn’t have the money to keep the house so they moved to a smaller one, that’s when Naomi started her cafe.
Riley is a very mutual friend to most people on the Yellowjackets team. But she is closest to Jackie and Shauna.
Riley is very enthusiastic about soccer so she always wants to talk to Jackie, her captain, about it. Just ideas here and there and such. Shauna is a little different but she loves her just the same, they watch movies together and they can both sit in silence and write or read together without needed conversation.
And maybe they kissed one time a month before school started… but the rush of highschool covered its tracks… mostly.
Most days after school, Riley went to Naomi’s cafe. Either to work or to do homework. Shauna often came with her, only if Jackie was with Jeff after school. When it was just them, they did manage to get all their school work done instead of doing something else.
A month before States, Riley dislocated her knee during a scrimmage. Probably the most pain she’s felt in her life so far. She was in the hospital and then she was home again. Ice, bandages, a brace and crutches. Apparently it was pretty bad and she was temporarily benched. No soccer. No running. No sports at all.
She still went to soccer, watched. Coach Martinez temporarily replaced her with Allie. The girl was talented for a freshman but Riley thought she wasn’t doing all that well with the pressure of playing with seniors. Riley would’ve talked to her, gave her tips and helped her out, but she was still really disappointed and annoyed about her injury and she didn’t know if she would be able to get back to full strength. Also the fact that Allie never stayed back after soccer, nor did she show up early. So there weren’t really any opportunities.
Shauna always went to the cafe with her now after school to help her out with doors and just to hang out with her outside of soccer to cheer her up. They also changed sleepovers and hangouts to just Riley’s house so she didn’t have to limp all the way up to Shauna’s attic room. They tried it once by Shauna giving her a piggy back up the stairs but it just hurt her knee more. They did try bridal style also, which did work, but Riley’s bedroom was on the first floor of her house so it’s ten times easier without the fuss. Minus the few steps in the front yard.
By the time states were coming up, Riley was working on walking without the crutches. Doing too much still hurt her knee but she was getting better at putting weight on it without her crutches. Which yay.
She had also taken up photography. Naomi let her have her old camera. She mostly takes pictures of the team during practice or in the halls. Sometimes just of the view… sometimes that view being Shauna on the opposite side of the cafe table studying.
Natalie had decided to teach her how to roll a cigarette. Riley doesn’t smoke them, she tried one at first and nearly coughed up a lung. She does like the act of rolling them and putting them in a nice little line so they all look nice together. Even though she admittedly spent more time decorating Natalie’s tin than making things to put in the tin.
Misty was all over her during that time. Asking about her pain levels, how much she could move it, she was always talking to her and such. Riley wouldn’t mind Misty if it wasn’t constant questions about the exact same thing over and over again.
By states she could walk mostly and run kinda again. Not good enough for soccer but she was practicing and doing therapy over and over again to hopefully be ready for states. She wasn’t. But she hoped they’d win so she could do nationals with them.
She was front row during states with coach and Misty, who was screaming in her ear most of the time. And when they won, despite Coach’s disapproving look and the pain in her knee, she still rushed onto the field to them all and jumped with them.
Riley was not in on the plan with Allie. In fact, she didn’t even know about it. When the screaming and the bone and the blood happened, she rushed forward. She just knew it was over for Allie. Seriously what is it with her number 11 and hurting legs? Was it some sort of curse? Though she did notice how Tai didn’t look at her in the locker room afterwards.
Riley changed her mind, it’s not her number 11 that has bad luck with legs, it’s the whole team clearly. She’s never turned around and covered her ears faster when she saw Misty approaching Coach with a damn axe.
Riley would normally look towards Naomi when decisions need to be made. She’d nod or shake her head and Riley would know the answer. She hates making decisions but voting to go to the lake seemed like the right one. Shauna agreed with her despite the kinda betrayed look Jackie gave them. Riley doesn’t understand, obviously they should go to water right? The multi mile walk did start getting to her knee about half way through and she ended up on Shauna’s back. But she has no right to complain when Coach is literally missing a leg.
She knew she wouldn’t be a hunter. It’s really not her thing, she’d hesitate too much and they’d lose whatever animal they’d find and they fall starve and it wouldn’t be great.
Riley loves bears, baby bears sure, child bears sure, scary adult bears? No. So she didn’t care when everyone saw her take a step up the cabin steps, then another, then another and keep going until she was behind everyone. She doesn’t want her friends to be mauled by a bear, she doesn’t want to be mauled by a bear. Cut her some slack.
When Riley was 14, her mom told her to stop getting involved in everyone’s business and to find a solid friend/group of friends to have instead of being a friend who’s friends with everyone/thinks she’s friends with everyone. Riley couldn’t help it, she likes being social, being a part of something. Multiple things. So she did join hands with everyone else, even if she didn’t understand it, and prayed to the dirt or whatever they were doing.
Riley is not a fan of cold weather. She hates being unable to move her fingers properly, having to wear layers and layers and thick shoes out in the snow. It also does not help her pain at all, just makes everything stiff and more painful.
Despite that, she picks up harder jobs. Things the others don’t really want to do. Mostly outside things. The guilt over letting Jackie freeze outside consumes her a bit during the winter and she doesn’t feel as though she has the right to stay in the warmth all the time.
Riley eats Jackie’s shoulder/the top of her arm. She remembers all the times she’d lean her head on it or put her hand on it in pictures.
She joins the prayer circles. She isn’t sure what else to do. Nothing she does is helping Shauna, Natalie is always hunting with Travis looking for Javi, she feels like the world is crumbling around her. She didn’t know how to deal with any of this, the cold, the grief, the guilt, the starving. To her everyone else seemed like they had some knowledge about it. She would often lean on Naomi during the bad times, but Naomi wasn’t here.
She was right there with Shauna during her labour. Nothing mattered when her best friend (are they still that?) was bleeding and in severe pain right in front of her. She had no idea what to do. Absolutely useless in her opinion. She prayed and prayed with everyone else with tears streaming down her face, she couldn’t lose someone else.
She perked up a bit during the spring like most of the others. Shauna was pushing her away. Again and again. Riley found herself sitting with Natalie, their new leader, more often than not. Despite Lottie making Nat leader at the end of winter, Riley doesn’t think she feels the same way the others do.
She thinks it does help Nat to have someone who doesn’t see her as a leader but as a friend. Someone normal. Well, kinda normal. And no matter how many times Natalie denies it, Riley knows she likes her stupid jokes. She knows that face she makes when she’s trying not to laugh.
The ache in her chest didn’t leave just because the weather got warmer. But she could be herself, look like the happy version of herself before everything went wrong. The animals helped.
She loves the animals. She could sit with them all day. They’re so cute. Even if she does end up eating them which makes her feel kinda bad so she makes sure they are as loved as possible before that happens.
Riley decided that the team is cursed. First it was her with her dislocated knee, then Allie with her broken leg, then Coach with losing his leg and now Mari with her own dislocated knee. She was extremely jealous when Mari’s knee seemed to heal fine and kinda quick. She did just fall in a hole meanwhile Riley was half tackled to the ground at a seriously odd angle and it wasn’t set straight away.
She voted Coach not guilty. She couldn’t find herself to be intimidated by Shauna. It was Shauna. Her Shauna. Just because it’s a different version of her doesn’t mean it’s not her.
Riley couldn’t help but stand and stare at Shauna and Melissa like an idiot after they went off to Shauna’s hut covered in blood. Is that what she’d been doing this whole time? She was starting to think that maybe she was wrong about her.
She was on team go. Right behind Natalie. She wanted to go home. Needed to go home. They all did. She couldn’t survive another winter out there. She wanted all of them to go home and go back to normal. But she knew it never would.
Riley confronted Shauna after she shot at Melissa. That wasn’t Shauna. She needed to stop relying on the people around her, she needed to be her own person with her own thoughts and decisions and act on them instead of waiting for someone to tell her it’s okay. Maybe she shouldn’t have. Maybe she should’ve stayed how she was. Maybe would’ve been okay.
After that, she stayed the night with Natalie. They talked, about rescue, going home, some sort of plan to get out. Riley didn’t feel as though she had to think about every single person whilst doing so. It made the ache in her chest heavier, but she couldn’t help Shauna, she couldn’t help Lottie. She wishes she could but she can’t and it was killing her.
They talked about after rescue. Everything would be different. Riley knows Natalie doesn’t have much to go home to, so she started talking about her own home. Her sister, her cat, her stuffed animals, her mom. Natalie liked her cat apparently. Riley offered her visiting rights that were really more of a you can come and stay with me and my cat if you like?
The plan didn’t work. It was snowing again. Riley didn’t think there even a point in trying anymore. Maybe she should just take a step back out of everyone’s business like her mom said. Stay in the background, stay with a few people and live. Until Natalie told her about the new plan that is. Then she really had no choice. Did she mind? No. They could get out. Well, depending on how the card draw went.
She didn’t know what was going on with the cards but she didn’t chase after Mari. She couldn’t anyways. Running through thick snow? No way. Even if she wanted to, she didn’t, her knee wouldn’t allow it. So she stayed at camp to keep an eye on things whilst Natalie went up that mountain. Which Riley thought was kinda dangerous because of the snow and ice but rescue yknow?
Natalie hadn’t come back yet. Riley was terrified for her. What if she was dead? Froze? Did she even manage to call someone? She hates not knowing.
Shauna knows she had something to do with it. She had been hanging around Natalie way too much and she refuses to say anything on the matter. Shauna can be mad at her all she wants, they’re hopefully getting out of there. Everything will be okay, she’s just gotta hold out. Be patient.
All the animals were dead from whatever happened to them. Akilah was missing. Natalie was missing. Travis was definitely not going hunting. Gen wasn’t taught to hunt in the snow and there probably wouldn’t be anything anyways.
They were having another hunt. It didn’t feel like it was for food, punishment maybe? She was terrified, it could be anyone. But there was a relief that it 100% wouldn’t be Natalie this time.
Riley doesn’t think she’d ever felt as real and alive as she did whilst staring down at that stupid card in her hand. A damn card. There was no option to run away or to go again or hide it. It was in her hand and that wasn’t going to change. Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe it wasn’t. She’d never know.
She couldn’t run. She couldn’t even try. It wasn’t worth it. She remembers times as a kid when she thought she was gonna die, in a nightmare or when she choked on a piece of candy when she was eight or when she had pneumonia when she was 10, she went over every person she cared about in her head saying I love you to all of them. Like they’d hear her or something. She knows they don’t, but it’s the only comforting thing she had in those moments.
Everything goes through her head as that knife gets closer and closer to her.
Vada is never gonna see her again. Will Natalie still go to her house when rescue comes? She hopes so. Will Naomi be okay managing the cafe? Will her mom keep Becky and Sarah or will she put them in a yard sale like she did with her some of her toys when they moved? Will Shauna be okay in the end?
Did she tell her family she loved them before getting on the plane? She doesn’t remember. She thinks so but what if she didn’t? Will they ever know how she died? Will Natalie see her before she isn’t whole anymore? Will Natalie ever know that there are people out there that love her? She has to know that. Did she do a good enough job for her to know that? She doesn’t want to die. She wants to go home.
Riley didn’t blame any of her friends that could do nothing but stand there and watch. She could have. But what’s done is done. They know that. They know her.
And they should’ve buried something softer than bones.
This definitely isn’t short. Oops.
Do not get me wrong I love my wife Shauna Shipman (I swear I write this in multiple of my oc notes), this is just how it ended up ending.
Uhm…I love her and she deserves to be out of my drafts finally. This is a miracle in action.
I haven’t slept so if there’s mistakes that’s why.
And I’m tagging people because if I have to suffer you have to suffer. I don’t make the rules.
Riley moodboard • Playlist • Naomi Peri
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