Liminal Space | A Stardew Valley FanFiction

Chapter 15

The decisions I'd made the night before welled up in my throat—to nobody's surprise—as I gingerly made my way towards the farm. Fallen branches crunched beneath my heavy footsteps and scraped my ankles in passing; a familiar uneasiness boiled within me.

Sebastian had woken me with a gentle shake of my shoulder, the innate comfort of his touch yanking me from the grasp of sleep as though it were a butcher's knife caressing my skin. Safety felt so foreign that my body believed it was something to be feared.

The morning began before the sun said so, merely hours after the evening itself had ended. I had shoved two fingers into my throat and allowed the inevitable to take care of the rest, eventually trekking back into the abyss of the basement and allowing the night to consume me once more. It was the first time since my arrival that I'd slept between his sheets, the blanket of his scent coddling me through the hangover and threatening to fill my heart with something terrible and human and real.

I didn't know what the night before meant—as much as I longed to figure it out—there was not enough said to erase all of the vicious words and years of paralyzing quiet. There was something equally as terrifying as it was exciting stirring within me: the possibility of starting anew. The possibility of starting anew.

My thoughts ran wild. How do you talk about what was never said? Move on from the things that were? How do we even proceed from the events of last night? How—

My heart froze at the sight of the farm, the dirt path opening into what now looked like a debris-filled clearing.

I frantically scanned the area, searching for something that felt like me—like Grandpa—in the midst of the mess. The oak siding of the house was cracked and stained and, in some spots, non-existent—the interior had been infiltrated by the elements. Hoards of leaves and sticks littered the tile, mud soaked the once colorful rugs, and sizable branches laid haphazardly across empty flooring and furniture alike.

And the farm—the farm looked like the black and white photos Grandpa used to show to prove how much he'd done, to prove how far he'd come. The before. Ruined and neglected land stretched for as far as the eye could see, hiding fertile soil and the potential for better. There was nothing left.

There was nothing left.

The words echoed through my brain as I ran towards the fields, searching for something that I already knew was gone.

And then I saw it: the remnants of the one thing that mattered to me, that had mattered to me before anything else truly could. Its trunk sprawled across the grass lifelessly, rotting apples surrounding it. The stump stared through me.

And beside it, the rock covered in permanent marker that had managed to withstand decades, managed to outlive the very thing it was meant to honor.

Callie and Seb's Tree of Life

A searing pain electrocuted my foot as I kicked the rock, its weight barely shifting from the impact. I struck it until I was sure at least one of my toes were broken, cursing it for being there to rub everything in my face and cursing Sebastian's name for being on it and cursing myself for still holding onto it all. For simultaneously wanting more than a sorry and more than just a kiss. For wanting every part of him and wanting back everything that I'd lost and wanting to be anywhere but here and nowhere else all at once.

I bulleted back up the mountain, wanting nothing more than to scream how unfair it all was and get over it like I got over everything, to scream at him like he'd screamed at me and then utter the words I'd never been able to: I love you. To be swept into the darkness of his room and into the heat of his arms and the hell out of my own head.