☂ 𝑳𝑶𝑺𝑰𝑵𝑮 𝑺𝑰𝑮𝑯𝑻 || 𝙵𝙸𝚅𝙴 𝙷𝙰𝚁𝙶𝚁𝙴𝙴𝚅𝙴𝚂 𝚡 𝙾𝙲 || 𝑩𝑲. 𝟑 ☂

09. MANIA LANE

Author's Note:

I know, so weird I'm doing this at the beginning of the chapter rather than the ending, but I felt it was appropriate. Just wanted to state a few things before jumping in.

First, Idk how many of you caught wind of the announcement I made for the first book of the series and how it's basically being revamped. Well, in the editing process, I've decided to age up Five and Elaina to 16 years old, with Elaina being closer to the 17 side of it. 

This means I might start putting that change into effect moving forward so it'll be easier to edit later once I finish the first book and once I skim through the second book and this one for the update. 

So this moment moving forward, our teens are now 16, not 13 and 14. Hell, I might even bump Tony up to 19 so there's still that gap.

And secondly, this is a warning about this chapter.

We will be going a little deep on the subject of mental illness and wanted to make that disclaimer to you all. I'm not adding this topic as a gimic, this is something I was slowly leading up to when it came to Elaina and it's just starting to come into floriation. As someone who suffers from their own demons, I felt this is something realistic that would occur to someone, especially someone in Elaina's position.

Well that's all I really wanted to share with you guys.

I know these chapters have been a little wordy and more having do with Elaina, but I hope it has at least been interesting enough to keep your attention while we move on with the plot. ❤

Now, on with the story!

*~*~*~*

Isn't the world a funny place?

No seriously, it's fucking hilarious. Not like haha funny, but just tragically entertaining. Can't say it's boring. Nope, definitely not boring. How could it be? Right when you think shit is finally going well–that God or Buddha, whoever the hell was in charge of this trainwreck called life was courteous enough to finally take pity on you and allow you to have a day of happiness–shit decides to go sideways.

Just. One. Fucking. Day. of. Happiness. A full 24 hours.

Was that seriously too much to ask for?

A small maniacal laugh manage to escape Elaina's lips while she sulked in the backseat of the car, thinking of all the times life had failed her and couldn't help but find humor in it. After all, this always happens. Right when the girl thinks that she can breathe and let her hair down, life shows her rearing ugly face and knocks her down a peg or two.

Of course, now would be no different.

After pushing down the burning, giddy feeling in her throat, Elaina's brown eyes traveled slowly to the car window on the opposite end of the vehicle. There she watched Five utilize the red marker, you know, the one they recently used to mark the trail to their next roadside attraction. However, it was now being used to write out long and complicated equations on the exterior of the car in order to try and find an answer to their problem.

Five's forehead creased with concentration, mumbling to himself every once and a while when he was stumped on a particular mathematical problem. He's been doing this for the last twenty minutes or so, right after the disappearance of the herd of cows. Taking one good look at the focused teen was enough for Elaina to know that whatever bubble of seemingly untouchable joy that surrounded them earlier had popped, and now they were back in world-saving mode.