The Way We Fall

Prologue

Ember opened her eyes in her new house, hating every small detail about it. She hated the way it just felt wrong. Everything about it was slightly off, and it was bugging her. It was the same desk she'd sat at studying for years. The same bed she'd slept in since seventh grade, but it still wasn't right somehow.

Every time she'd woke up in that bed, about six times now, she'd lost count, but every single time it'd felt slightly wrong. Maybe it was missing something. She had tried every arrangement of the few items of furniture she managed to tell her dad to retrieve from their old house, but nothing ever really worked.

She walked up to the wardrobe, buried in the corner of her room, too small for all the clothes she went and bought the other day, so all her new clothes were strewn on the floor, the tags still on. She wasn't a messy person, in fact, her desk was the tidiest thing you'd ever see, and so was her bookshelf.

However, with her parents' massive argument and the haste in the move, she hadn't given herself time to stop and tidy the clothes she'd bought.

When her parents first fell out, she knew it wasn't going to last much longer. When her mother had decided on something, there was no way to budge her. Not even Ember's father could do that.

Ember yawned, wishing she hadn't stayed up so late last night, selecting a matching set of a cropped top and leggings for the gym that morning.

She went down to the kitchen, where her father was already up and working even though it was only five o'clock.

Ember's father was a tall, wiry man with tidy hair and plain glasses that always perched on the edge of his nose making him look wiser than he really was. He usually wore suits, cycling between a few different ones, never really adding variety to his life. He kept himself to himself and Ember liked to think she was his best friend.

They were both early birds and liked to make the most of the light outside. Ember's dad loved to watch the sun come up, he was always up and working by 4 a.m. at the latest. And while Ember's father worked, Ember went to one of her favourite places in the whole world. The gym.

She didn't bother bringing a coat today, it was far too warm for that, drinking a disgusting health smoothie on her way that she tried her best not to taste. She walked down the quiet road, the entire village asleep.

The lady at the desk, Marjorie, greeted her enthusiastically as usual, offering her a free pre workout snack, which Ember politely turned down.

She ran her hands along the small selection of weights the gym had, deciding to start small. There was nobody else in the gym to judge her except Marjorie, who most likely couldn't lift the lightest weight the gym had without a struggle.

Ember put her earphones in and turned her songs up to full volume, an Arctic Monkeys album flooding into her ears. She let the sound completely fill her up, moving around the gym slowly, spending a few minutes on different things.

She decided to finish her workout with some high intensity cardio, setting the treadmill to 8.5 mph, aiming for a 22 minute 5 kilometre time, not her personal best but certainly a challenge.

The music was so loud she didn't even hear the gym's only other regular customer walk in.

Hunter Love was her high school's star athlete. He was known for spending all his time on sports, he wasn't really fit for the popular life he'd somehow fallen into. He never attended parties, never skipped school with his friends like he was expected to.

Ember and Hunter were known for being the best athletes in the school, Ember was on the track team and the volleyball team, Hunter mostly doing soccer and basketball.

Hunter set up the treadmill next to him, setting the speed to 8.5 mph too and matching Ember's pace, one of his earphones hanging down next to him as he ran faster than he thought he ever could.

Ember didn't even look at him, and he guessed this wasn't her usual pace. He was comfortable at this speed, but she looked like she was pushing as hard as she could not to fall over or pass out.

He kept sneaking glances over at her to make sure she was okay, and she wasn't receptive to them at all. She just kept pressing on, knowing there were only 4 minutes left until she'd completed a 22 minute 5k.

She kept running, completely ignoring Hunter next to her. She'd noticed him coming in but decided to ignore the guy. Him and his friends weren't exactly the type of people you wanted to become friends with, and she knew that.

It was common knowledge in her high school that Hunter was the best one of the group he was in, and even he was someone you didn't want to cross, let alone the rest of the group.

Hunter's best friend was especially renowned in the local area for his wild parties, none of which Hunter attended. Brad was known for supplying drugs and alcohol at these parties, smoking weed and often coming into school high.

Ember couldn't understand why Hunter was still friends with the guy who broke the law on a daily basis when Hunter had always been a nice guy and had probably never broken the law, even with Brad as his best friend.

Ember finished her run and gave Hunter a quick nod of acknowledgement, not pausing her music to talk to him, just saying a quick goodbye to Marjorie and picking up the drink she'd left with her. She took a couple coins out of the pocket on her leggings and paid for a quick snack for the walk back.

Hunter stayed and completed a 10k in the end, not being quite as polite as Ember had been to Marjorie and leaving wordlessly, not stopping for a snack.

He walked straight out the door and called a taxi on his phone, too tired and out of time to walk or run back home at that point.

The taxi showed up and Hunter got in, unaware of what was about to happen.

He unknowingly told the taxi driver his address, then went and checked his Instagram, his post at the gym already having hundreds of likes.

He saw Ember had liked the post, then checked the girl's almost identical gym post with only 8 likes. He sighed, hating the way he'd been thrown into a life where his comment section was all the girls in his year group thinking he was obsessed with them.

When the taxi was closer to his house, Hunter turned his phone off and looked out of the window. The driver had the radio on loudly, which was odd, but Hunter ignored it and stared at the views. He was so lucky to live where he lived, he thought, and he was glad he had time to sit back and appreciate the natural beauty here.

The driver took a quick turn, then saw a deer lying dead on the road. In an attempt to swerve past it, the driver yanked the wheel in the opposite direction to avoid a crash.

It would've been fine if the driver could've heard Hunter's frantic yelling, the screaming from the backseat. Maybe, if the music hadn't been so loud and there wasn't a huge truck coming in the opposite direction, the driver would still be alive, and Hunter would've made it home that day.

But there's no use in saying "if" and "maybe", because what happened had happened.

The taxi swerved violently onto the other side of the road, where a massive truck was fast approaching. The driver was too busy looking at the poor deer's mangled body to turn back in time. 'Stop!' Hunter had yelled from the backseat, but the truck was too close.

'For god's sake, sir, stop, please!' Hunter yelled, closing his eyes tight and getting ready for impact.