Nicer ways to go

FIFTY-THREE

SEAN

A stray curl of hair insists on repeatedly fluttering into my eyes, the clock flashing 6:30 in neon green from somewhere across the vast expanse of my double bed. It takes me a while, however, to figure out that the reason my hair keeps getting in my face is because someone's soft, gentle breathing is blowing it that way, the sound of air rushing between lips the only sound I'm able to hear besides the clock beeping. "Winter?" I prop myself up on one elbow and turn my head to look down at the blur of ginger auburn hair and ever so slightly tanned skin beside me. "Hey Winter?" I'm slightly relieved to find every item of my clothes accounted for on my body as she responds with a disgruntled moan. Not like it's that I don't want to do that with her it's just I would rather not be piss drunk when I do.

"Mmm?"

"I think we should try find Alexa today, and I think we should get up soon... I think we can end it today, Winter" and my voice is so hopeful, so tired and so, so very full of that stupid thing called hope that I actually begin to believe myself. She doesn't deign me with a reply, just drifts back into an easy sleep until I nudge her arm with my cold fingertips and she groans annoyedly. "Winter?"

"Mmm??"

"You think we should try find Alexa?" she must have drifted asleep again and I don't know what makes me poke to bloody bear again but I jab at the back of her sleeveless shirt to get her attention and she mumbles something incoherent that sounds a lot like 'Anything you want, just go back to sleep'. I can't help smirking as I look up at the roof, the dullest of the morning sun dancing across the grey paint. I get maybe fifteen minutes of silence before the door suddenly bursts open and I'm sitting up, eyes wide as I look around for something to hit whoever burst in with.

"I found her" to my relief it's just Shelby, her hair messy, a sheet clutched tightly to her body "I finally found her" she pauses to glance at Winter, her eyebrows darting upwards at the sleeping figure who's sort of nestled into my hip before I shake my head in a 'we didn't go there' action. Shelby merely nods her understanding and holds out her phone, the shiny blue case cold against my fingers when I grab it. On the screen there's a map of the surrounding London area, street names and roads showing up in a crazy network of grey blue and green. There's a green dot pinging at what I know is our location and a red dot if I scroll twice across the screen to an area I've never even heard of pinging away in a local pub.

"She's two hours away" I almost jump straight from the bed at that but Shelby swings out the arm not holding her sheet around her body and stops me "Woah, steady there, lover boy, you might not be hungover but she will be, and I don't think Alexa's going anywhere, especially not if she doesn't know we're here. I've checked, she's been in that same spot since the night she arrived, I don't think one day will make much of a difference" I glance back at Winter, who hasn't even so much as stirred in the time Shelby's been in here, her shoulders poking out through the low back of her jumper, her hair a copper birds nest.

"I suppose so, but as soon as she isn't dead to the world we're going" I concede and Shelby crosses her arms over her chest, raising a light eyebrow at me

"Drumer we need a rental car... And some of the pancakes I can smell in the hotel breakfast bar"

"Fine- we'll get a rental car later today" I sigh and she nods, finding it to be a decent plan and taking her leave. I look over at Winter and sag back into the welcoming arms of sleep.

~

The cold is so cold it's burning hot. There are snowflakes falling on my eyelashes, rain droplets battering my cheeks and wind cracking my lips as we make our way down the back alley of the street behind the highway, the keys to a black jeep jingling in Winter's hip pocket, her shoes scraping against the gravelly ground.