red, red roses | elonna/quinn

[dars]

"You're an idiot!"

Red. It was all she could see anymore: squeezed fists and clenched teeth. Blood, blood, blood. Emerson's. Her own. Red. She sniffed down at Quinn, laying there in her bed.

"I hate you! I can't believe I ever looked up to you!" She didn't mean anything she was saying. She knew even as she said it. Why, pray tell, has it always been her innate response when hurting to make sure others hurt more? She'd heard that misery loves company but she really couldn't help herself. Especially when she was feeling this volatile. This wretched. This... alone. A wild animal, backed into a corner. It didn't ever feel optional for her to show her teeth.

She remembered being so relieved when she saw that her older cousin was okay- Paw Mace had already told them she was doing better, but Elonna needed to actually see her to know for sure. But then she realized that Quinn actually wasn't okay, she was just alive. Aged out of the reaping and still convinced it was her duty to be the death of the family. And the first thing she thought about was the fact that, because of Quinn's own actions, she almost wasn't alive. And now here they were, with Elonna standing over her bed, red-faced and with that annoying vein in her forehead bulging more and more by the second.

"Enzo moved away and Emerson died and everything is falling apart and now you're trying to go away as well! Is that what you want? To leave me here? All alone?!" She still had others, of course. But Eden didn't count, as he was her little brother and therefor not a person so much as an over-sized teddy who cried too much and did her chores when she threatened him. Her parents didn't count, either, because right now their only child was the one they had to bury and Elonna couldn't even be mad about it: it was the least they could offer him. Emerson deserved that amount of attention after-

She leaned down so that their faces were mere inches from one another. All her life, Quinn was the one person who got it, who understood how cruel it was to navigate this life being the person she was. How impossible it was for girls like them. Looking at her now felt like staring into the eyes of a stranger somehow. She could remember every detail of their time together, Quinn racing ahead and Lonnie trailing after her and taking notes, but now looking at her was like looking at Emerson in that box. All she saw was the shell.

Her two favorite people were only husks now.

Elonna squeezed her hand into a fist, maybe because she wanted to hit her. She thought she might for a second, violent images flashing in her mind. To punish her for being so reckless. Then, an instant later, she collapsed onto Quinn's lap and began to sob. "You can't do that anymore! You can't-" She sniffed, tears and snot and spit: "You can't leave me, too! Please! I can't be alone!" And that was the core of it: Elonna hadn't ever truly been alone. She'd always thought it's what she wanted but now, when it wasn't a choice, and when everything was being taken...

"Promise me. Swear it. Or I-" She couldn't think of a vile enough threat, so she scowled hard enough that Quinn knew whatever it was she was trying to threaten, it wouldn't be good. For either of them.