The Thing About Timing (The Becoming of Elliott Goode)

Chapter 5:

Later that night, Cordelia had finally gotten into bed after getting Elliott acquainted with the house and settled into her room. Luckily, one of the girls had just moved out, meaning Elliott had the room to herself. The girl hadn't said much since her agreement at the store. During the short house tour, she nodded her head when prompted, but she didn't speak until Cordelia dropped her off at her new room, offering a small "Thank you", barely audible to the supreme.

Now sitting up in her large bed, the supreme sat up replaying the day's events. Physically, she was exhausted but her mind was wide awake. There was so much she didn't understand about the girl. Cordelia had never felt so conflicted over one of her girls in her life.

She had never seen a witch, especially a young, untrained witch, be able to turn someone to ash. Fiona had been able to do something similar, but even she didn't have the power to do it so instantaneously. The power Elliott had was dangerous if she couldn't control it, and probably even more dangerous once she could. Elliott's ability was rooted in anger, and even though Elliott seemed like she had a good heart, Cordelia knew better than anyone that good people can do very bad things.

Despite it being 4am, Cordelia decided to postpone her much needed sleep in favor of going to her office to do some research. The supreme chose to leave the door open. After all, the girls were all asleep, or so she thought.

Down the hall, Elliott had yet to fall asleep, and she wasn't planning on it. It had been a long time since Elliott had a room to herself, or even a bed for that matter. She hated it, she felt trapped, like the room was a cage or some sort of solitary confinement. She sat on the floor beneath the window and stared at the closed door across from her, her backpack thrown on the bed beside her. Everyone was asleep, she could easily slip away into the night and leave town. She had enough money for the bus, she had a new burner phone she bought in case of emergencies, she gave David and Sarah the number. She could leave, so what was stopping her?

Maybe it was some moral obligation to David. After all, her hurting him was the only reason she agreed to come here in the first place. Would he be upset if she left? If he wasn't upset by her leaving the school in general, at the very least he would be upset that she left him in New Orleans. They vowed to stay together, although right now Elliott was seriously regretting it.

So she was staying, that much was decided. But, she still had to get out of that house, and especially that room. Elliott hated feeling out of control, and right now she was (figuratively) powerless. So she did what she did best, she ran. She ran right out of that room, past the open door of Cordelia's office, down the stairs and out the door. She realized about halfway down the stairs that someone was in fact up, as the lights illuminated the stairs so she didn't kill herself, and once outside she quickly ran to the back of the house and looked for a place to lay low. Across the yard she spotted what looked to be a greenhouse, and after scanning the front of the yard to make sure no one was coming, she quickly sprinted towards the glass building, turning to close the door behind her. She sat for a few moments with her hand on the knob and her forehead pressed against the door.

Once she had made sure she didn't hear approaching footsteps, Elliott let go of the knob and turned around, immediately bumping into a potted plant. The greenhouse smelled earthy and almost comforting. Elliott expected it to be stuffy, but it was surprisingly cool. The room was almost pitch black, just far enough away from the street that the only thing illuminating it was the moon, which was doing a pretty shitty job if Elliott was being honest.

So Elliott was left with what little sight she had and her own two hands and feet. She had already bumped into one potted plant, so she kicked around to see what else was around her feet. She bumped a few other potted plants, then decided to try and bump them away from her, kicking at them with more force. However, instead of her hitting a potted plant, her foot instead went through what Elliott believed to be some sort of canvas with a loud rip. Elliott outwardly cringed and swore under her breath, quickly pulling her foot back. She tried going in the opposite direction of the object she couldn't see, but definitely broke, trying to step around the minefield of potted plants.

Meanwhile, back at the house, Cordelia was definitely alerted by the girl running down the stairs. She had dealt with her fair share of girls sneaking out of the house at night, but usually they tried to at least be quiet about it. Cordelia had a feeling it was Elliott who ran, and Cordelia tried to move as quickly as she could after her. The supreme ran out the front door to the front of the house and tried to scan the street for Elliott. Like Cordelia thought, the girl was out of sight, so after briefly panicking, she quickly walked back inside and went in search of her car keys upstairs. Elliott's open door confirmed Delia's suspicions, but as the went to walk by something caught her eye: Elliott's backpack was still on the bed. Cordelia didn't know much about the girl, but she knew enough to know that Elliott wouldn't go far without her belongings.

While Cordelia was still slightly panicked as to where the girl had gone, her panic about Elliott leaving the coven had subsided. She wasn't running away, it was more likely this was all too much for her and she ran. Cordelia used to do that also when she was her age, but it was mostly running from her own mother. Knowing what she did, Cordelia laughed at the similarity. Maybe Elliott was a lot like her after all.

Cordelia had given up on searching for her car keys, Elliott wouldn't go any farther than she could walk back. Her main concern now wasn't bringing Elliott back, but she did want to make sure Elliott wasn't along the main road outside of the house. Often times people who didn't think very fondly of the witches would drive by at night and she didn't want to risk someone harming the young girl.

Cordelia walked back down the stairs and out the front door, once again scanning the main road for the girl, and breathing a sigh of relief when she didn't see her. If she was walking along the road, chances are by now she was far enough away no one would bother her. But Cordelia knew how smart this girl was, and she didn't really think Elliott would be out in plain sight. She turned around and headed towards the back of the house scanning the tree line, again catching no sight of her. She walked towards the far back of the yard and was about to turn around when she heard a definite clang come from the greenhouse. The greenhouse was supposed to be locked, but one of the girls must have put something in there for storage and forgotten to re-lock it. Delia crept closer to the corner of the greenhouse, out of sight, to listen for the girl. A few moments later, the supreme heard another clang and the girl swear under her breath, "Jesus Christ it's like being fucking blind in here."

Delia almost burst out laughing at the offhanded comment, knowing just how true that really was. Now that she knew where the girl was, that she was safe, Cordelia crept back quietly towards the house and went back to her work, only to fall asleep at her desk.

After Cordelia had gone back inside, Elliott was still trying to make her way across the dark greenhouse, kicking almost everything as she went. She had never really been the graceful type. After breaking about 20 potted plants and maiming a few other objects, Elliott found a small, empty crawl space between the two legs of the table and sat down, banging her head as she went. Once she was on the ground, she breathed put a sigh of relief. She thought about waiting until early morning when everyone was asleep and going back to the house to grab her things, then taking off before anyone could notice, but with as much trouble as she had getting into the greenhouse, getting back out in the dark really wasn't an option. She thought about telling Cordelia that she didn't really want to be here, but she found she kind of did. The thought of having a group of girls that all were connected was kind of nice, in theory that was. But Elliott knew she wasn't like the rest of the girls, she didn't have a family that cared enough about her safety to send her here, she was forced here because she did too much damage, because she WAS damaged. Elliott felt like she owed it to Cordelia and to David and Grace to stay, and she hated feeling like she owed people anything. As much as Elliott hated to admit it, she was stubborn and selfish. She didn't want to do anything for other people, she just wanted to do things her way. She wouldn't intentionally do things that hurt others, but she also wasn't going to make things harder for herself so others would feel better. She was the only one who was looking out for herself, so it kind of had to be that way.

Elliott sat lost in her thoughts until the sun started to shine in the greenhouse. By this point she was too exhausted to bother untangling herself from the mess of potted plants and broken ceramic around her, so she fell asleep right underneath that table, deciding she would stay a day and then leave the following night.