#* ( 𝔈 ) · shauna shipman : interaction

[exilae-moved]

* , NOW SHOWING, exilae &* @lothews - i'm never gonna leave you .

there's a girl shaped hole in your heart... or maybe it's shaped like longing, or maybe it's shaped like love, who are you to decide? it, her missing-ness, changes every day and takes new forms. it's left something more gaping than you could have ever imagined. little did you know when smiling at jackie under the sunlit branches of the woods, how much she was a part of you. surely you could estimate, but it would've always been short a large percentage of where she had truly taken form within your girlhood. there's no way to replace it, not really, not ever, but the comfort lottie brings ( a different kind of comfort than that mari searches for, a more human and basic need ) is comfort enough as it is.

" will you... " your voice trails off as your hand finds the curve of your stomach, finds the motion of the life growing inside you threatening to ruin what little hope of survival you had for yourself, threatening to ruin what little hope of salvation you had for everyone else. how much more can you take and devour before you've taken too much? you had jackie... you had jackie, why do you deserve to ask for more? and yet, you continue on, " will you sleep where she slept? just for tonight. " round eyes bat viciously, as if quick blinking will make the girl before you disappear ( it surely stops any tears from spilling down rounded and freeze burnt cheeks ). " i keep reaching out and getting... i don't know. i can't sleep well, i know she used to be there. "

your voice is low, as if hiding the selfishness you find in taking lottie for yourself. you're not, you have to remind yourself, asking her for this small favor is not stealing her away from the girls who look to her like something you cannot understand: maybe they see her how you saw jackie. if anyone would hear, you're sure they'd think less of you, put you next on the chopping block no matter the benefit you bring to the winter that starves away mother nature just outside the rotted door. maybe, if you say nothing, lottie will say it was her idea when night falls... " you can't promise me you won't leave... jackie - " her name chokes in your throat and satiates your tongue as memories of that night dance in your head. " she promised the same thing, so... just like, for tonight? that way you won't have to promise anything more. "

[exilae-moved]

to look into lottie's eyes is to look at someone who believes, someone who believes something that you cannot even picture in the most glorious light. why... that's your question, the question you want to pry from her with hands that are never satisfied. why can you believe such a thing? maybe it's because there's nothing forming in her, nothing clinging onto her figure like a desperate parasite of life. ( can you even picture what you would've done if you were back in new jersey? would you still be pregnant? would jackie have torn you apart? ). her eyes are rounded and they pull you in, it's as if you can't even blink, it's as if she speaks to you with no words at all. it's not until her cold hand grasps yours that you're pulled from such a transfixition. no, you still don't believe what mari does, but that doesn't take away the power lottie holds... even when she doesn't try. " is it... is it laura lee? is that why you can't sleep? " you think you're overstepping, and almost bite down on the inside of your cheek, but if your pain is on their greatest pedestal, why can't you ask the same?

" i don't think they get it. " brown eyes trail over the sea of starving bodies hunched in the shadows of these four walls. your voice is nothing above a whisper, as quiet as you can afford ( you're done being a spectacle, you're done being a show animal on display ). " they were their teammates but... but that's it. " and that breaks your heart, no one could see jackie through your eyes, and maybe they never should... they would hate what they see, they would hate the devotion and the love and magnetism, it's easier to hate the dead girl than see her for what she was. a tight squeeze is given back in lottie's direction, though not one meant to comfort. it's akin to a twitch, to an internal reaction at the thought of such hope that spills from lottie's lips. it's not given as a promise, but it feels as such. " how... how can you - " and there you're back again staring into the abyss that is her gaze... you can't ask, you won't ask, but it hangs there in the silence between you two. let me see what you see, it's a quiet plead in the downturn of your eyes and knitting of your brows on your features. " i keep trying... i can't. "

they are all grief masquerading as girls.       women,       ghosts….       it is all blurred.       some of them have been touched by it more than others,       and that knowing hangs heavy most days.       when lottie had lost laura lee,       laura lee became apart of her.       (    a fragment of her legacy living on through lottie.    )       but for shauna…       the loss loomed over her.       and lottie knows.       she knows.       she reaches for shauna’s free hand gently as she speaks,       the one not occupied by him,       as added acknowledgment that she is listening.       “       if that’s what you’d like.       ”       she nods.       but a part of her gnaws away at her insides with the guilt of it all.       she can never be jackie,       and shauna can never be laura lee.       but what they can be for one another is present.       a state that seems ever fleeting in these woods.       lottie has not slept in months;       her eyes droop purple with the suggestion of it.       all of her being,       all the energy she can accumulate,       goes into protecting the group.       protecting shauna,       protecting the baby.       every blink is an involuntary act,       every yawn a threat.       but with shauna,       her guard falls ever so slightly with the longing of it all.       the possibility of human closeness,       of connectedness,       of something more,       of something simpler.       “       i…       i haven’t been sleeping well either.       ”       she whispers,       and it feels appropriate to admit between the two of them.       i don’t want to wake you up with the thrashing of nightmares and endless tossing and turning.       a melancholic smile presses to her lips,       candle lit and curling.       she lowers herself besides shauna,       staring at the girl parallel as the light of a lantern dances across both their features.       “       we’ll be okay.       i won’t promise it,       but i know it and i want you to believe it.       ”       it’s a big ask.       otherworldly,       potentially,       given their circumstances.       but lottie has found the grace to believe it,       (    and she wants nothing more than for everyone else to find that within themselves as well.    )       things are never as bleak as they seemed,       laura lee had showed her that truth.       her visions do not harm,       they save.       and maybe they can save shauna.       maybe they can save one another;       from the reality of their grief,       from their fates,       from it all.

[exilae-moved]

* , NOW SHOWING, exilae &* @ant1rs ... i bet you weren't expecting me, were you?

" oh my god... " the words come out as an exasperated sigh, one that hangs in the air almost as intently as the echoes that move around the cabin. you trusted her, to say the least, her gentle hands as they placed jackie's necklace ( the very one that dangles around your neck, acting each night as your own personal noose )... but trust can only go so far. do you feel what jackie felt? does it sting? " lottie i cannot fucking hear about my... about it being the savior or whatever bullshit you've created. " lips turn downwards, the words themselves acting not out of anger, you're too tired for that now - instead brown eyes seem to grow wider with a threat of frustration based tears. they're silently begging her to leave you be ( you wish jackie was here... you wish jackie was here... you wish - ). " please i'm so much more tired than any of you right now... and i'm terrified! i have to... push this thing out of me, so if you guys want to pray in your little circle outside, go ahead but for the love of god don't keep pushing your shit on me. "