entrancelogs | A good-bye is only painful if you know you'll never say hello again

Entry tags:

A good-bye is only painful if you know you'll never say hello again

Who: Erica & Various - OPEN TO ALL
Where: Various Locations, Closed @ beach with Cora to say goodbye to Boyd
When: 4/22 - 4/24
Rating: PG-13 - R for Vault discussion with Cora to be safe
Summary: Erica dealing with the huge bomb Isaac dropped on her - details under cut
The Story:

Erica will be wandering around Wonderland, trying to distance herself from her pack while she deals with her emotions. After the fight with Isaac, she's lost her sense of self - struggling with the pain of the deception by the people she trusted and cared about. She understands why they lied, but it doesn't take the sting away. Withholding the knowledge of her capture by the alpha pack that led to not only the death of one of her best friends, but herself is kind of a big deal.

She'll be spending a lot of time with Cora, in the library falling back to old habits of losing herself in books before the bite, and out on the grounds in the garden and beach. Feel free to run into either in the library or on the grounds - if you want to meet up with her in a hallway or somewhere else, just specify. She's not locked into those locations - just put in the date and location in the subject line.

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It was time.

It was time for Erica to start letting go of Boyd, start getting some closure and putting the pieces back together. She needed to start grieving for the death of her friend and get some answers. She was grateful to Cora for letting her crash in her room, needing some space away from Isaac. She hadn't been ready to hear the details of their time together in the vault - couldn't handle anything else then.

She was ready tonight, though - at least that's what she thinks.

They'd gathered up the supplies for their night - some food, a few paper lanterns, a couple blankets, and some matches. The beach was beautiful - the perfect place for them to say goodbye. Erica lays out one of the blankets on the sand before handing Cora one of the unlit lanterns with a hint of a smile. She picks up the matches, wordlessly moving towards the water's edge.

This is going to be hard.

Cora takes the unlit lantern and follows Erica. Her toes curl in the sand when the water brushes up against the shore. It's like a calming caress, like one her mother used to give her when she'd been too shy or too timid to do things on her own. She'd always needed Laura to hold her hand (or do it for her). But where she would call upon Derek to handle this, Cora finds herself quite capable. Erica isn't the girl she knows from the vault — she's free and she's unchained and she's alive — but she's still her friend, even if her memories don't remember their bonding. She's not going to push Erica away simply because she doesn't remember how the three of them had sunk their claws into one another and formed their own pack. She'd done as Isaac had asked — she hadn't said a thing about her death or Boyd's — but now it's Cora's time with Erica.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Cora doesn't ask with me? She's not so insecure that she expects Erica — this Erica, not the one who has experienced the vault and had died — to want the rest of the pack here with her. She wants to make sure Erica's not simply steamrolling through her grief in a bid to make everything feel better. Cora still hasn't managed to bring herself to say goodbye to Boyd, even though it's been months since she last held his body in her arms.

Erica hesitates at answering the question. She wasn't ready for this - didn't want to do it. It still really hadn't sunken in, everything that was going to happen - what everyone else had experienced. It was surreal, being the only one not fully in the know, but her grief for Boyd is real.

She knows if she ever returns to her own timeline, what will ultimately be waiting for her. This is her chance to let him go, grieve for his death before it becomes a reality for her, like her own death. This was as much for him as it was for her - something tangible. She doesn't trust her own voice, just nodding yes at Cora's question. She hesitates as she goes to light the lantern, letting out a shaky breath.

"Do we say something? I don't even..." Her words die off as a tear finally escapes. She almost asks if they should call the rest of the pack, but stops herself. She didn't want them here, too stubborn to ask for their support. The fight with Isaac is still too fresh in her mind to even begin to think about forgiveness. She can understand why he asked everyone to keep it from her, but it didn't make it okay.

She looks to Cora, a few more tears slipping out as her walls continue to fall. She wanted the support, needed them more than ever right now, but they couldn't answer the questions - didn't share this part of her future.

This is going to be a lot harder than she'd expected.

Natasha's been exploring when and where she can. Her new location of confinement isn't immense, but it's large enough that she's taking her time poking her nose into all the nooks and crannies that she can find. She's making a mental map of her temporary home, but it doesn't help that things keep moving and she was quite certain she'd been in the library the day before, an entire floor away. And it was bigger now too, which made even less sense, but what was she supposed to do about that?

Other than come inside with an exasperated exhale huff and start to look around, trying to guess if this was the same place or an entirely different library altogether. It's not too big of a setback - she'd intended to come here at some point today anyway, to see what information she could find hidden in the shelves. Now seems as good a time as any to see what she could find here.

After her little impromptu memorial service the previous night and finding out just what had happened in the vault, she's right back to feeling overwhelmed. She'd thought answers would help, make it easier to deal with it all, but it had just made it that much more difficult.

She's not really sure what had brought her back to the library, an old habit that never died. Before the bite, she'd been a creature of forced solitude, seeking solace in books - one of the few things that didn't run the risk of possibly triggering a seizure. She could easily get used to this little trick of Wonderland, the way it seemed to mold itself to her desires - her needs.

She's perusing the shelf, eager for a familiar distraction from the hell that's become her reality, when she hears the sigh. She looks at the woman, unable to even fake a smile. She prays her eyes aren't as red and puffy as she thinks, clearing her throat before speaking.

She tries to keep her tone as emotionless as possible, almost robotic. She doesn't trust herself enough to be herself - whoever that was anymore.

"If you're looking for something in particular, I can leave - you probably won't find it while I'm here."

She'd spotted the girl as she entered, cast her a curious look long enough to know it wasn't someone she'd met yet and she might have left her to her own perusing if she hadn't caught sight of her face, or been called out to first.

Abandoning her exploration of the library for a moment, she turned and wandered towards the young woman instead, more interested in her than the books the room held.

"Not something in particular, no. I wasn't even expecting to find myself here, to be honest," Natasha gives the room a cursory, curious glance. "Is this... a different library than what's downstairs? Sorry, I'm still new here and trying to get my bearings, but this one looks bigger than the first one I was in."

An inconsequential start to a conversation, but an easy way to ease into one.

She gives a small lift of her eyebrow at the woman's words, understanding the unintentional draw of the library. She chuckles lightly at the comment about the changing of the library, the sound almost foreign to her.

"From what I understand, it changes depending on what you're looking for." And with her love of books and need for comfort, it had grown and filled itself with her favorite things, "That's why I asked if you were looking for something specific."

With how high her emotions were running, she was sure it was feeding into the power of the library and it would be pretty much useless for the other woman if she wanted anything in particular. She gives the woman a once over, softening slightly. There was no need to be a bitch to this woman - it wasn't her fault she was going through everything.

"I'm Erica. I've been here almost a month."

"Natasha," she introduces herself with a crooked smile, close enough now that it's not odd to hold out her hand in greeting to the young woman. "And I've got all of two days under my belt, I'm afraid, so you're an expert in comparison."

"An interesting explanation about the room though," Natasha adds, glancing around at the huge room filled with books. "It works the same as the closets and kitchen then? Good to know."

Although it also hints at something else and she glances back to Erica with an assessing look. "So does that mean that either you're looking for a lot of things or just a little distraction?"

"Isaac and Stiles are the experts - not me." She'd barely been keeping herself together, let alone learning about this place. Any info she'd gotten had been from mainly Isaac and a few other people.

She was still adjusting to the idea of everything being infused with magic, accommodating to their every whim and need - though not always so graciously as right now. It got easier to use and command every day - less and less mistakes.

The way she looks her over is unsettling, as if she's reading her like one of her favorite books. She doesn't even try to lie, too fried to pull it off. Her 'resting bitch face' as she'd come to call it, also known as her emotional barricade, was down and broken.

"Both."

There's a chance that Derek is one of the last people that Erica will want to see, after everything that's happened. And, truth be told, he wouldn't blame her if that were the case. But all the same, he's going to seek her out, because she certainly shouldn't feel alone right now. Not with what she's learned, and the foreignness of this place to new arrivals.

When there's nothing inhibiting his senses, like the walls of the vault had, it's not that difficult to track his beta down. She's traversed many places in Wonderland, it seems, but the freshest trail leads out to the garden. He's come this way more than once, himself, and he can understand the appeal of it. There's a kind of quiet to it that really lets you get away from things.

"Erica?" he calls, first, once he's near enough that he can hear the thrum of her heart. It seems better to give her the choice as to whether she wants to see him or not, as well as alert her of his presence so she doesn't startle.

Fresh air.

There was something so stereotypically comforting about being out in the fresh and open air. She hadn't been back to the beach since the night with Cora, not ready - not yet. The garden had been a surprising escape, enough privacy for her to read and think, but not so isolated that she felt paranoid.

She'd just settled in with her book when she realized she wasn't alone. The idea to bolt had crossed her mind but then he called out to her. She was still upset, but she was more upset with Isaac than she was with Derek. Putting down her book, she rises from her unintentional hiding spot, meeting his gaze. She doesn't offer any words for him or greeting, just a look.

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A good-bye is only painful if you know you'll never say hello again

[Closed to Cora] Evening of 4/22 at the Beach

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4/23 in the library (with the monkey wrench)

:D

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hahaha thanks gmail - here have a SUPER late response - sorry sorry sorry

4/24 I'd say

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