No Midnight Mercy ☾ (gxg)

24-care

TW: blood

"What the fuck does standard deviation even mean?"

Eden talked to herself as she sat at her kitchen island, attempting to do an assignment that she was supposed to turn in weeks ago for one of her classes. She had let her grades drop during all the commotion in her life, but she somehow managed to persuade most of her professors to let her make up most of her missing work. If she were to fail any of her classes, she would most likely lose the grant that was paying for her college—not that she even knew what she was going to do with her life, anyways.

She had actually cooked for once, having used the money from her extra shifts at the store to buy groceries. She'd made a homemade lasagna since it seemed to be one of the easiest and cheapest "fancy" things to make. Gen and Oliver had come over and enjoyed it with her, but she scurried them out at around 9 p.m. so she could get to work on schoolwork.

As she stuck her fork into the lasagna and took a bite, she suddenly heard noises outside in the hallway. It wasn't so unusual to hear noises late at night, with all the sketchy characters coming out once the sun went down. But then she heard another noise, and this time she knew it was right against her door. She perked up, her heart throttling as she listened attentively. It was silent for a few moments, but then there was suddenly another loud bump right against her door that shook from whatever had hit it.

Quickly setting her lasagna down, she jumped off the stool and quietly scurried across the room and through the maroon curtain, reaching under her bed and grabbing the metal baseball bat she kept under there. She used it to part the curtain and slipped through it, nearing the doorway slowly. There was another bump that sounded like it hit the other wall across the hallway. Eden swallowed and gripped the handle of the metal bat. She hadn't seen Ruth since the few days before when she told her they would be "in touch." She also hadn't heard anything from Gen's mom. She suddenly realized she had too many enemies.

She neared the door, pressing her ear up against it and listening. Suddenly, whatever it was hit against her door again, startling her and causing her to shriek and swing the door open, holding up the metal bat and ready to knock out whatever was behind the door.

What was behind the door both relieved her and made her even more scared to begin with. She gasped, eyes widening as she froze, still holding the bat in the air.

It was Cecilia. She was leaning against the wall across from the door, holding up a whiskey bottle to her mouth and chugging it down. The woman apparently hadn't even heard the girl open the door, because when she finally lowered the bottle from her lips and burped, she stared blankly at the floor with half-closed eyes.

It was then that Eden could see her face clearly under the pale light in the hallway, and she saw the fresh blood oozing from the corner of her head and covering most of her forehead, some of it even dripping over her eyebrow and onto the white coat she was wearing. Her makeup was smeared, leaving her eyes black and smudged.

"Cecilia," Eden stammered, lowering the bat and looking with worry at the woman she hadn't seen in a week and a half. The blood was coming from a deep gash in her head, and some of it was even dripping on the floor. The woman looked pale and sickly, as if she hadn't eaten in days.

Cecilia looked up through her squinted eyes when she heard her name being called. "Oh," she mumbled. "Helllllo," she slurred, her body swaying as if she was trying to keep her balance on a boat toughing out rocky waters. She kept leaning over to one side and then straightening herself up again, overdoing it and leaning more to the other side and repeating the process.

"What the hell happened to you?" Eden inquired, watching Cecilia bend over and then stand back up again, mumbling to herself incoherently.

"Want-ed to say helllllo," she said, chuckling at herself and the way she said hello. "Helllllooooo," she repeated in a high-pitched voice, giggling to herself.