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Black shadows in the sky follow Lottie wherever she goes.
Through the snowflakes in her lashes, she peers up at the amassing clouds painting a bleak tapestry overhead. They are overripe and ready to burst. Time presses in on her.
“We’re pretty far out,” she calls ahead to Nat, who doesn’t slow her marching stride to accommodate Lottie’s slower trudge through the snow. “Do you think we should head back?”
“Scared, Lot?” taunts Nat. “You didn’t have to come out here with me. In fact, I wanted you to stay home. Remember?”
Nat’s gravelly voice is partly muffled by the cloth covering her mouth and nose but her resentment cuts through it like a fine blade. She made no bones about her disinterest in having Lottie join her on her hunt when the others suggested it. They argued that Lottie would bring good luck, and Nat argued that they should all go fuck themselves.
“It wasn’t my idea,” mutters Lottie.
“You could’ve just said no.” Nat picks over a gnarled root in the ground and checks briefly over her shoulder to make sure it doesn’t trip Lottie up. “Could tell them you’re not our fucking messiah.”
Lottie doesn’t disagree. Her connection to the wilderness is temperamental, complicated. Her presence alone will not fell a flock of birds or bring a bear to its knees. The wild demands sacrifice for its gifts, and the cost is rising. Lottie is afraid of what it will ask for next.
As they walk, the sky grows heavy on her back and bears down on her shoulders with the full weight of the heavens. Unusually, the trees today are quiet. They loom with bated breath. Nerves crawl like bugs under Lottie’s skin. She has learned by now not to ignore her instincts.
Before she can voice her concerns, however, a rustling over her shoulder has Nat spinning on her heels, rifle raised and eyes dark with hunger. Lottie moves out of her way as she creeps stealthily past.
Instead of looking out for prey like she should be, Lottie can’t take her eyes off the predator. Nat’s self-assured handling of the rifle is at once alarming and thrilling and Lottie is entirely taken by it. She falls deathly quiet and moves slowly and deliberately without breaking a single twig; her every ounce of concentration is consumed by the ancient and instinctive urge to hunt and kill.
Oh, to be the rabbit in her snare.
It soon transpires that whatever passed them by is long gone or well hidden. Nat grunts her frustration, slings the rifle over her shoulder, and sets off once again.
The trees aren’t silent anymore. They whisper things to one another in hurried, agitated tones. The leaves are whipped back and forth by an accumulating, toothy wind and the snow thickens in the air around them.
“Hey, wait,” Lottie stumbles after Nat. “We need to turn back.”
“Bullshit we do. I am not going back empty handed again. I can’t do that, Lottie.”
“Nat, please. Can’t you hear it coming? The storm? Just stop and listen to the trees.”
Desperate for Nat to hear her, Lottie grabs her shoulder. The second her fingers close around Nat’s jacket, Nat whirls around and slams Lottie up against the trunk of the closest tree. The branches shake and clumps of snow rain down around them.
“The trees aren’t talking to you, Lottie,” Nat seethes, fists curled in the fabric of Lottie’s coat. “You’re just crazy.”
“I am not crazy,” asserts Lottie. “Look up, Natalie. The sky is falling down around us and you’re too busy trying to prove something to yourself to notice.”
Nat looks mad enough to hit her. Lottie wishes she would.
“I’m trying to help. Nat. Trust me.”
But Nat is given no time to decide where her trust lies before a lone, chilling howl catches on the wind and sinks into their spines. It is soon followed by another, and another, until all the world becomes an opera of haunting, animalistic screams. It’s impossible to tell how near they are to the pack. It could be right behind them. It could be a mile away. It’s not worth waiting around to find out.
Cold with terror, Nat looks her dead in the eye. “Run.”
They take off at a sprint, back the way they came, but the storm has started in earnest now and Lottie can’t see more than a foot in front of her. They’re stumbling around in the blinding snow, holding one another’s hands because they’ll lose each other if they don’t. More howls compete with the wailing wind. Lottie feels like her ears are bleeding. There’s no way of knowing where they are or where they’re going or if they’re running around in circles.
“Fuck!” screams Nat, stopping, turning, searching for a sign. Lottie can feel Nat’s heart beating in her fingers, or maybe it’s the other way around. “Now would be a hell of a time for a miracle, Matthews.”
“Let’s just keep going,” Lottie stammers. Her lips are blue, teeth chattering. They have to find shelter fast.
Something finds them first.
Beginning as a low snarl, hardly perceptible over the riotous symphony of the elements, the noise soon gives way to a fearsome growl and then a wet, guttural bark. Whatever it is, it’s right in front of them.
With shaking hands, Nat slowly reaches for her rifle, but Lottie knows she won’t have time.
Sure enough, no sooner does Nat slide the strap down over her shoulder than heavy paws start to pound the floor. Something huge and monstrous leaps through the air towards Nat. Lottie dives at her.
Their bodies collide and fall backwards through the air. They are suspended for a lot longer than Lottie anticipates, which is still only a few seconds but terrifies her nonetheless. When they do make contact with the earth once again, they don’t stop falling. They hurtle down a massive hill, grasping onto one another for lack of anything else to hold onto.
Nat yelps about halfway down but Lottie doesn’t have the breath or the sense to ask if she’s okay. Not until they hit the ground.
When it happens, they land in a tangled mess on top of one another. Nat is underneath Lottie, moaning, and Lottie is so winded and disoriented that she doesn’t get off her for a good minute.
“Dude.” Weak, Nat tries to shove Lottie off her. “I can’t fucking see. Are we dead?”
Lifting her weight off Nat’s body, Lottie pales when she sees her face. There’s blood pouring out of a gash above her left eyebrow and pooling in her eyes. Lottie hurriedly wipes away what she can but the blood keeps flowing, keeps sticking to her hands.
It gives her an idea.
“One second,” she grunts, rising to her feet.
“Where the fuck are you going?”
“Nowhere, just wait.”
Lottie feels around for the closest tree. When she finds it, she uses Nat’s blood to draw the wilderness’ symbol on the bark. It’s rushed and she isn’t sure she’s done it right, or if it will even help, but she has to try or they’re going to die out here.
“Okay, come on.” Lottie takes one of Nat’s hands and helps her to her feet, causing Nat to cry out in pain. “What is it? Are you hurt?”
“My ankle — shit.”
“You’re just gonna have to hold onto me, okay? We’ve gotta keep moving.”
Easier said than done. Lottie’s growing weaker and number by the second. Her feet are like blocks of ice and she’s lost feeling in her hands, but she’s got Nat to take care of. She has to save her.
“It’s no goddamn use, Lottie!” shouts Nat, limping by her side. “We’re fucked. We… are so fucked.”
“Just a little further,” gasps Lottie. “D—don’t you trust me, Nat?”
Nat’s teeth are chattering so fiercely in her ear that Lottie’s worried they’re going to break apart in her mouth. She glances at her. Bloody, pale, and only half-conscious. It doesn’t look good.
“Let’s just s—stop,” pleads Nat. “Just stop.”
“No.”
“Please.”
She’s begging to die, thinks Lottie. She’s giving up. How long do they have before it’s too late?
They stagger on until Lottie is practically dragging Nat through the snow. It takes everything in her. She calls Nat’s name but doesn’t get an answer.
“Natalie!” Lottie screams through her teeth. “Don’t you fucking dare!”
Salvation arrives just in time.
A break in the treeline directly ahead reveals a hole in the side of the cliff. It’s hard to tell for sure, but it looks deep. Lottie has half a mind to believe they’ve just happened upon a miracle.
“You really need to have more faith, Nat.”
A few more laboured steps and they’re falling through a curtain of snow into the black mouth of a dark cave. It’s only just taller than Lottie, but it’s wide and deep enough to offer the refuge they desperately need. Lottie could collapse, she’s so relieved.
Instead, she carries Nat to the end of the cave and sets her down with her back to the wall. Tenderly, Lottie touches her fingertips to Nat’s icy throat. She’s still breathing — and the bleeding has stopped.
“Wake up, Nat,” she urges, choking back a sob. “Wake up.”
After Lottie has tapped her cheek a few times, Nat’s eyelids slowly flutter open. She manages a pained cringe, bringing her hand to her forehead.
“Talk about a hangover. Jesus.”
Tearfully, Lottie musters a laugh. “Hey, welcome
back. How are you doing?”
By way of answer, Nat lolls her head to one side and presses her face into Lottie’s hand. Lottie doesn’t think it’s a conscious gesture, more than likely just a heavy head finding somewhere to rest it, but Lottie is happy to be that for her.
It takes time for her eyes to adjust and her fingers to thaw; when they do, she unpicks Nat’s shoelaces and removes one of her boots. Gingerly, Lottie runs a finger over her wounded ankle.
Nat hisses. “Watch it.”
“Sorry. I think it’s swollen.”
“Oh, you think?”
“I’ll get some snow for it in a minute. For now, just rest it.”
Lottie’s every shivering bone protests when she shucks off her coat and folds it underneath Nat’s ankle. She looks around her. There are piles of dead leaves and twigs blanketing the cave floor.
“I’ll get a fire going.”
The task is more grueling than it should be. Partly because Lottie’s corpse-blue hands take a long time to reanimate, and partly because Nat is watching her movements so closely that she stumbles at every turn. Eventually, however, the fire takes and Lottie slumps down beside Nat with a sigh.
Nat wipes a little crusted blood from her brow with the back of her hand, and then wipes her hand on her trousers. “Hell of a good luck charm, aren’t you?”
“You would have been mauled out there without me. Or you’d have frozen to death.”
“Yeah, well, I’m sure you all would’ve had a commemorative barbecue in my name.”
“Don’t.”
“What? Too soon?”
“That’s not funny, Natalie,” snaps Lottie.
Where she can help it, Lottie tries not to think about Jackie. She doesn’t think about the bacchanalian manner in which she and her fellow teammates feasted on her flesh; how they ripped it from her body with their bare hands and swallowed chunks of her without chewing. She doesn’t spend her nights torturing herself because of the euphoria they shared that night, the gluttony and the bloodlust and the ecstatic barbarism. She doesn’t remind herself how Jackie tasted so good that, for a while, they forgot she was a person once. They forgot she was their friend.
Nat puts a hand on Lottie’s shoulder. “Hey, I’m sorry. I guess humour’s just how I cope with all the fucked up stuff that goes on around here.”
Pulling her knees up to her chest, Lottie stares into the heart of the fire.
“Lottie? Are you okay?”
“I feel responsible, Nat.”
“For what?”
“Everything.” Lottie worries a cracked lip between her teeth. “You. Them. All the bad stuff we’ve done.”
Nat lifts a brow. “Lottie, you’re like the least bad person I know.”
“I told Jackie that she didn’t matter.”
The leaves in the fire crackle when they burn. Lottie watches the embers rise towards the roof of the cave and disintegrate somewhere along the way. The smell of smoke makes her sick and hungry at the same time.
“We’ve all done and said some seriously messed up stuff out here,” Nat reasons. “No one’s gonna hold it against you.”
“Maybe they should.”
“You wanna be punished?”
“No,” says Lottie. “I just don’t want to be their saint.”
“You don’t?” asks Nat, dubious.
“No, Nat, I don’t. I don’t want them all to put their faith in me and end up like… like Laura Lee.” It still hurts to speak her name. Lottie knows it always will. “She thought my visions were God talking to me but I wasn’t receiving revelations, Nat, I was seeing death. I saw her death. I saw the light around her head when she baptised me but I didn’t understand what it meant at the time. I didn’t know how to save her because I didn’t know she needed saving.”
Nat clearly doesn’t know what to say to that. Lottie knows she doesn’t believe a word that’s coming out of her mouth but she’s already made her peace with Nat’s skepticism.
In the end, Nat says, “You miss her.”
Lottie nods, heartbroken. “I miss her all the time.”
More than that, there’s a god-awful guilt cannibalising her from the inside. Voices in her head telling her that she failed, that she wasn’t good enough to save her friend and she won’t be good enough to save anybody else. The weight of everything breaks her back anew each day.
Why does she have to carry it all?
“Can I tell you something, Nat?”
“Go ahead.”
“Whatever’s happening to me out here, it’s not the first time.” Lottie picks a twig up off the floor and traces circles in the ground absently. “I’ve had these feelings since I was a kid, like I could sense bad things coming before they happened. My dad hated it. Used to look at me like he didn’t recognise me. He started medicating me so he wouldn’t have to deal with me.”
“How young were you?”
“Young.”
Nat shakes her head with contempt. “Dads are the fucking worst. You’re better off without him, Lot. Believe me.”
“He made me feel…”
“Worthless?”
Lottie looks at Nat and Nat must see the answer written on her sober face.
“Sounds like your dad and my dad should’ve started a club. They would’ve had a lot to talk about.” Nat nudges Lottie’s arm with her shoulder. “If you want to be a freaking messiah, Lottie, do it. Don’t ever let a man tell you who you should be or you’ll spend your whole life as a nobody.”
Lottie figures Nat’s sudden, impassioned hatred of her dad must be a projection. When Nat’s own father died, there was a lot of speculation around school as to what went down, but nobody ever really knew the truth and Nat never, ever spoke about it. She missed school for a couple of weeks and then, when she came back, she had changed. Lottie noticed it because she had a habit of noticing Natalie.
Nat had always been a little unpredictable, but this was different. She became even more aloof, reckless, and self-destructive than usual.
Lottie recalls one specific night after Nat’s dad died.
Nat turned up to a party already reeking of cheap liquor and weed, started a fight with a couple of players from an opposing team, broke a glass, and then tried to kiss Lottie when she went to check on her. But Lottie pulled away.
Lottie pulled away, Nat left, and neither of them ever mentioned it again. In all likelihood, Nat didn’t remember a thing anyway.
In the months since, Lottie has often wondered what that kiss would have been like if she hadn’t stopped it from happening.
Sloppy.
Clumsy.
Holy as hell.
“Truth is, I’m glad my dad died,” Nat confesses out of the blue, setting Lottie’s reverie ablaze. “I watched it happen, did you know that? And I stood there waiting to feel something about it, but I just felt so fucking numb. The worst part is that it was my fault, and I do feel guilty but not because he’s in the ground. I feel guilty because I don’t care.”
In a moment of bravery, Lottie puts her hand on Nat’s thigh. “You feel how you feel, Nat, and you can’t make apologies for it. Some people just don’t deserve your heart.”
Nat glances at Lottie’s hand. “But it makes me feel like a monster.”
“You’re not a monster, you’ve just looked monsters in the eye.”
Their faces are so close.
Even like this — dried blood plastered to pale skin, unbrushed hair framing ghostly hollow cheeks, lips so chapped they’re broken and scabbed — Nat is a vision. Firelight climbs inside her eyes and lights them up and Lottie has never wanted to be taken by a flame so bad before.
“How do you stay so kind, Lottie?” whispers Nat.
“I don’t know. The world can be mean, but we don’t have to be.”
Sadness dampens Nat’s firelight. “I’m sorry I called you crazy earlier. And probably a bunch of times before that.”
“That’s okay.”
“It’s not. I was being a dick and I’m sorry. You’re not crazy.”
Lottie smiles. Nat watches the smile form on her lips with a measure of intrigue. She moves her head closer and Lottie lets herself believe, for a second, that Natalie really wants the same thing she does.
Her misguided hope is soon tossed out into the storm when Nat rests her head on Lottie’s shoulder and closes her eyes.
Lottie tells herself it’s enough.
—
White tunics and golden laurels plague Lottie’s dreams. She sees herself and Nat seated on thrones side by side, drinking blood from decadent goblets and feasting from a silver platter of tender, succulent meat. They wipe the juices from one another’s chins, lick their fingers, and laugh with manic abandon.
They are gods together.
When she wakes, Nat is softly sleeping on her shoulder. It’s dark out and the snow is still coming down heavy.
Wiping the sleep from her eyes, she notes that the fire is dying. Gently, Lottie rests Nat’s head against the wall and leaves her side to rekindle the fire. She blows on the flames and stokes them with a charred branch, tossing a couple more twigs in when it starts to get going again.
Suddenly, a shadow flits across the edge of her vision. The knife is in Lottie’s hand quicker than she can blink. She waits, motionless, for it to happen again, while her knuckles turn white around the hilt.
When a lizard scuttles out of the shadows, Lottie’s muscles soften. It has a nervous disposition but makes a beeline right for her, hastening to flee the blizzard outside. She watches it come to a stop right in front of her, where it looks her square in the eye and waits.
“Thank you,” she whispers, and brings the knife down through its skull.
By the time Nat rouses, the lizard has been skinned and skewered and Lottie is now roasting it over the fire. It’s not much meat to go on but it’ll get them through the night.
“Holy shit,” croaks Nat, voice hoarse with the remnants of slumber. “Where’d that come from?”
“It was an offering,” cracks Lottie.
Nat rolls her eyes. Lottie laughs. They exchange childlike smiles.
Once they’ve devoured every last bit of meat from the lizard’s small body, they both feel a little better. Nat sucks her last bone for every morsel of flavour, tosses it aside, and licks her fingers. Lottie remembers her dream and her cheeks turn hot.
“Fuck,” groans Nat.
Fuck, thinks Lottie.
Worried that her telltale face has flushed crimson, she excuses herself to get them some water.
“Be careful,” Nat calls after her as she ducks out of the cave.
Lottie doesn’t go far. Using a large, waxy leaf she brought with her, which she fashions into a makeshift cup, she scoops up a heap of snow and heads back in. Once it melts, she lets Nat have the first drink, and then gets some more for herself.
“Do you think the others are okay?” wonders Nat as Lottie settles down beside her. She’s staring hopelessly out through the maw of the cave.
“They’re okay,” Lottie says, certain.
“Travis was headed to the cliff when we left.”
“He’s okay.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do.”
“Right,” drawls Nat. “Like you just knew with Javi.”
Lottie avoids Nat’s scrupulous gaze, drinking the last few drops from her leaf and then pocketing it. “I thought you and Travis weren’t a thing anymore, anyway.”
“We’re not. I mean, it’s complicated. He thinks I’m the reason we didn’t find Javi sooner.”
“That wasn’t your fault,” frowns Lottie. “You have to know that.”
Nat shrugs. “I don’t know, maybe if we had kept looking—“
“You looked everywhere. Every morning, hours before dawn, you were out there searching for him in the dark and the cold just because he asked you to. He can’t blame you, Natalie.”
“Well, he does.”
Lottie scoffs. “You can do so much better than him.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Nat demands, suddenly defensive.
“No, I just mean, like, the way he treats you sometimes. It’s like he uses you as a punching bag when things go sideways. You don’t deserve that.”
“Or maybe I do and you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.” Nat’s furious and Lottie doesn’t understand how this happened. “I messed up, okay? I lied to him about his brother being dead. He can treat me however the fuck he wants.”
“No, actually, he can’t.” Lottie scrambles to her knees and places her hands on Nat’s shoulders, seeking her out with earnesty and intensity. “You need to understand that nobody gets a free pass to treat you like you don’t matter. You are worth so much, Nat, and you should be with someone that makes sure you know it.”
Lottie isn’t referring to herself, and it’s an accident when her gaze falters over Nat’s mouth, but she’d be a liar to say she never once wished she’d gotten there first.
She could have shown Nat the kind of gentle love she is worth receiving.
She could have been kind to her.
In the war of emotions taking purchase on Nat’s features, confusion is soon usurped by dawning realisation. She sees Lottie’s eyes hitch themselves to her mouth. She knows what it means.
Shrinking further against the wall, Nat clears her throat and casts her gaze to the side.
Lottie blinks. Catapulted back into their reality (the one that’s a tragedy, not a love story), she releases Nat’s shoulders and sits back. There’s a lump in her throat the size of a fist and she begs it to rip her tongue out of her mouth.
She showed Nat her cards and lost the game. What now?
After agonising in silence for a fraught beat, Lottie says, “I’m just trying to look out for you.”
To which Nat says, “I can take care of myself.”
Lottie isn’t sure she believes her.
In need of a distraction from the terrible discomfort between them, Lottie busies herself collecting more snow for Nat’s injuries. She starts by packing some around her swollen ankle, which Nat fails to pretend doesn’t hurt, and then brings more in for her face.
She cleans Nat’s wound delicately with a strip of cloth torn from her sleeve, rinsing it in the melted snow often. It’s slow going. The leaf is only so big so she has to keep going back out to get more snow. While the gash itself isn’t too deep, there’s a dark bruise blossoming around Nat’s eye like a black rose, and the blood has crusted thick and stubborn. Lottie tries not to hurt her. Nat winces now and again but doesn’t speak a word.
For some time afterwards, they sit on opposite sides of the fire, watching it as intently as if it were a rerun of their favourite show.
It’s not long before the bitter wind picks up, blowing an arctic gust through the cave. The fire flickers and Lottie can’t control her shivering. With Nat’s ankle resting on her coat, she’s short a layer and she feels it’s absence.
“Lottie, you’re shaking like a leaf over there,” sighs Nat. “Just get over here.”
Following a reluctant pause during which Lottie entertains her other options (there are none), she scoots over to Nat and lets herself be pulled into her. Nat opens her coat and Lottie squeezes into it, nestling as close to Nat as possibility will allow. All in the name of warmth, of course.
So long as she ignores her violent tremors and the breath misting in front of her face, Lottie can almost pretend they’re hugging.
“It’s alright, Lot,” croons Nat, rubbing Lottie’s arms to generate a little heat. “The snow’s gotta stop soon.”
Gradually, Nat’s extra layers and body heat succeed in warming Lottie some. She stops shaking so vigorously and settles more comfortably against Nat’s side. She thanks that Nat doesn’t remove her arm from around her shoulders.
“Hey, do you remember that time you twisted your ankle during a game ‘cause that bitch from the other team fouled you?”
“Yeah,” chuckles Lottie. “Then you got yourself a red card for lunging at her.”
“Gotta protect our own, Matthews.”
Except it wasn’t so much protection as it was unprecedented fury.
Lottie went down hard when a six-foot, boulder of a girl on defence slammed into her, sending her over on her ankle and taking her out of play for the rest of the week. No sooner had it happened than Nat dragged the girl away from Lottie by the back of her jersey and shoved her so hard she ate dirt. No minor feat for a girl so small.
“Keep your fucking hands off her!” Nat had screamed, whilst being forcibly removed from the field by the rest of her team.
Though Lottie was in a lot of pain at the time, Nat’s reaction sort of made it worthwhile. They even went out for milkshakes afterwards and Nat felt bad about everything, so she bought Lottie a strawberry shake and some fries and spent the whole time trying to make her feel better. Nat was usually amicable with Lottie, but she’d never shown her this much attention before.
Lottie became intoxicated with it. It carried her home on a cloud. She half-wished her ankle had been broken instead. What lengths might Nat have gone to then?
“You’re lucky that girl didn’t launch you across the field,” laughs Lottie. “She was a beast.”
“Hey, I might be short but I know how to pack a punch,” Nat winks. “I just can’t believe she had the nerve to show up to that party afterwards. The hell was she thinking?”
“Party?” Lottie falters.
“You know, the one at Mari’s place. I got wasted and tried to fight her again?”
“No, I remember.” Of course she remembers. It was the very same party in which their almost-kiss almost happened. “I’m just shocked you remember anything. You were so drunk.”
It’s bait in the water.
The muscles in Nat’s cheeks flex and Lottie watches her go somewhere. She wishes she could follow.
“It’s kind of a blur.”
What a cop out.
“Do you remember me finding you out on the balcony?” prompts Lottie.
“Uh…”
“Do you remember trying to kiss me?”
“Shit,” sighs Nat, massaging the bridge of her nose with a repentant grimace. “You never brought it up and I just kinda thought you’d forgotten about it.”
“I never did,” admits Lottie.
“I should have apologised to you for that a long time ago. I was on a downward spiral, angry and drunk and stupid, and then there you were. Lottie Matthews. You were looking at me the way you always do and I wanted to take advantage of it. Of you. Christ, I just wanted to feel like somebody wanted me. So, yeah, I tried to kiss you.”
Put plainly like that, the whole thing sounds so sleazy and pathetic. Lottie feels like she’s just been gutted.
Nat had been trying to use her.
That was the long and short of it.
“Luckily, you did the smart thing and turned me down.”
“I only turned you down because you were so wasted and upset. It wouldn’t have been right.”
“You’ve always been a better person than me, Lottie,” Nat chuckles weakly. It comes off as forced.
Body turning slack, Lottie slumps against the wall. “So, that was it. You just needed… anyone. You were just filling a hole.”
Guilt weighs upon Nat’s hanging head. She doesn’t deny it, which is her way of admitting it. Lottie prays for the floor of the cave to open up and eat her whole. She feels so vulnerable, so rejected.
All this time, Lottie let herself wonder if Nat might have been betraying herself that night; if she might have accidentally let slip the truth in a drunken moment of desperation. Is it so unbelievable that Nat might want somebody like Lottie? Of course it is.
“Lottie—“
“Hey, look.” Lottie nods towards the cave’s entrance, where the snow is slowing to a stop and day is finally breaking. “We should get out of here before we get trapped in again. You alright to move?”
Nat hardly glances at the snow. Her shoulders sag and she nods, somber. “I can move.”
After stamping out the fire and pulling themselves together, Lottie pulls Nat’s arm around her and they hobble towards the edge of the cave. They stop. Curse. The snow is up to their knees — no chance Nat will be able to limp through it with her ankle.
“You just go ahead and get the others,” says Nat. “I’ll wait here.”
“That’s not happening,” dismisses Lottie, contemplating. If they wait around, there’s no telling whether the storm will start up again or if something other than a lizard will find them hiding there. Their only option is to move now. “I’m gonna have to carry you.”
Nat barks a dry laugh. “Yeah, right.” Then, catching Lottie’s eye, she reels. “You’re not serious?”
Without a word, Lottie takes the rifle from Nat’s shoulder, slings it around her own, and holds out her arms.
“Lottie—“
“Get over yourself, Natalie. Come on, quickly.”
Following a petulant huff, Nat pulls the cloth up over her mouth, grabs onto Lottie, and lets her scoop her up bridal style. All Lottie can see of her is her eyes, in the twin forests of which a different kind of storm now rages.
The journey home is excruciatingly slow. Lottie is strong but hungry and weak, so they are forced to take regular breaks on tree stumps and boulders. Fortunately, however, Natalie gets her bearings fast. She knows the woodland well and is able to guide Lottie in the right direction.
By the time they make it back to the cabin, it’s after noon. Lottie breaks into the clearing, sweating despite the cold, where her teammates greet them with panic, and then relief, and then embraces and tears.
Lottie doesn’t put Nat down until they’re inside and waiting for the others to make them a bath. She props Nat against the wall, drops to her knees, and removes her boots so that she can examine her ankle. Meanwhile, Travis is lingering at the door asking a thousand questions, but when Lottie looks up, Nat’s eyes are on her.
Once the bath is ready, the others have the good grace to leave Lottie and Nat alone.
The room is deathly quiet.
Lottie, perched on a wooden chair, studies her fingernails while Nat undresses. She hears a frustrated sigh.
“Lottie, can you…
Head snapping up, Lottie sees that Nat has only managed to take off her shirt. She’s leaning against the tub, arms crossed over her chest and trousers unbuttoned. Lottie understands what is being asked of her.
Delicately, she peels Nat’s trousers off without upsetting her swollen ankle too much. When they come down, she averts her eyes and pretends she can’t hear her own heart beating in her ears. Lottie helps Nat into the bath and returns to her chair, keeping her eyes low to grant her a simulacrum of dignity.
“You gonna ignore me forever?” asks Nat. “‘Cause that’d be pretty lame.”
“I’m not ignoring you.”
“Well, you aren’t talking to me, either.” Nat crosses her arms on the lip of the tub and drops her chin onto them, studying Lottie.
“Have you just been laughing at me all this time, Nat? Was it funny to you?”
“What? No, not even close.”
“That’s what it feels like.”
“Will you look at me, Lottie? Please?”
Jaw clenched, Lottie lifts her eyes. Nat’s looking at her with pity and she hates it. Give her anything but that.
“My head wasn’t screwed on straight back then,” explains Nat. “I was grasping at anything I thought would numb the pain, if only for a few seconds.”
“You wanted me to be your daily dose of morphine, is that it?” Lottie surmises bitterly.
“Yeah,” Nat reveals with the decency to sound remorseful, “and there’s a reason I chose you.”
“Because you knew how I felt.”
“Because I felt the same.”
Lottie’s chest tightens. Rage climbs up her throat like bile. “Don’t do that, Natalie. I don’t need you to throw me a bone because you feel bad for me. I’m a big girl, okay? I can handle it.”
“Lottie—“
Rising to her feet, Lottie takes the rag folded over the edge of the tub, dips it into the bath water, and wrings it out.
“Sit back. That cut on your head needs a proper clean.”
Shockingly, Nat does as she’s told. Wide-eyed, she sits and stares as Lottie dabs the cut on her head with a set jaw and furrowed brow. Lottie hears Nat swallow, and it almost makes her feel vindicated to see how nervous she’s become.
“I’m not lying to you,” Nat eventually murmurs. Watery blood runs down her cheeks and splashes into the bath. She doesn’t notice.
Through gritted teeth, Lottie says, “You have to be.”
“Why?”
“Because you saw how I looked at you. You’ve always seen it, haven’t you? So if you felt the same, you would have done something about it. You’d have said something to me instead of letting me torture myself every single day. Right, Nat?”
Lottie dunks the rag back into the water, wrings it to within an inch of its life, and reaches for Nat’s face.
Nat closes her hand around Lottie’s wrist to stop her. “I’m not perfect, Lottie. I fuck up all the time, you know that. You see what I am.”
“And what are you, Nat?”
“I’m a fucking bomb. I’m an explosion waiting to happen. Come on, you have to understand. You’ve always been so perfect. Best player on the team. Top grades. Rich daddy. I was only ever gonna bring you down — and you had a long way to fall.”
Leaning back, Lottie narrows her eyes at Nat. “You expect me to believe you never said anything because you thought I was too good for you?”
Nat laughs. “You are too good for me. Shit, of course you are. You’re so beautiful that it actually used to piss me off. I’d get mad looking at you because all I wanted was to have you, but I knew I was no good. I was semi-alcoholic trailer park trash and you were… you were just you, Lottie. I’d never let myself stain you like that.”
In the moments after Nat’s confession, her chest rises and falls heavily. Fearfully. Lottie can’t take her sad eyes off her.
“I never cared about any of that stuff,” she insists. “You were struggling, Nat, and you were crying out for help. That doesn’t mean you were beneath me or anybody else.”
“Nah, I would have fucked you up.”
“Or I would have helped you.” Lottie gets to her knees beside the tub so that she is eye-level with Nat. She clasps one of her pale hands tight. “Don’t you know it’s okay to lean on people? Most of the time, they only ever want to be there for you.”
Nat looks down at the murky water she’s bathing in and shrugs. “Not historically.”
“Then fuck your history,” argues Lottie. “Fuck your dad and fuck the world. We’re a million miles from anyone that would ever judge you. It’s just us. What are you afraid of?”
“I just…” Nat exhales shakily. “I don’t deserve you. Everybody sees it, Lottie. You’re special. There’s something in your blood that makes you different than the rest of us. How do I make myself worthy enough?”
“I’m not a god, Nat, I’m a teenage girl,” Lottie reminds her. “And I’ve been waiting to kiss you for a very long time.”
And so she does.
Lottie surges forward and captures Nat’s lips with her own. Both are brittle and chapped. Both part eagerly and without restraint. Whatever hang ups Nat harbours, they disintegrate in the heat of Lottie’s breath and die silent upon her tongue.
Grunting, Nat tangles her fingers in Lottie’s dark hair and yanks her closer.
The intensity between them festers like a deep wound, bleeding out through the cracks in their lips and the gaps in their teeth.
It’s a gasping, wanting, famished kiss.
It’s a buffet for the starving, hot flesh in the fanged mouths of savages.
Lottie tastes blood and her stomach hungers. She’ll be picking the bones of this kiss from her teeth for days to come. Curling her hands around Nat’s neck, she idly wonders what it would feel like to apply a little pressure.
“Lottie,” growls Nat. “Get in.”
“What?”
Nat breaks away from the kiss and pulls her head back an inch. Lottie finds herself face-to-face with a hunter, a predator, a killer with her prey in the crosshairs. Lottie stares down the barrel of her gun.
Rabbit, meet snare.
“Get in,” Nat repeats.
And so she does.
—
Come sundown, Lottie and Nat are keeping warm by the fireplace while the others prepare for bed around them. Lottie smiles to herself because none of them know what transpired just an hour ago.
They don’t know the needy, shameless sounds Lottie drew out of Nat like blood from stone. They don’t know how Lottie begged and Nat delivered, or the depraved things they whispered to one another in the waning light and the filthy, cooling water.
Nat eyes Lottie and grins. “What are you smirking at?”
“Nothing,” whispers Lottie, rubbing her hands together over the fire. Her smile persists. “I guess I’m just happy.”
“Yeah?” Nat glances over her shoulder to make sure nobody’s in earshot. “I was that good, huh?”
“Don’t be cocky. I wasn’t the one whimpering like a—“
Nat smacks Lottie’s shoulder, prompting a devilish laugh. They settle again into comfortable silence. The world feels different to Lottie now. Brand new and steeped in hope.
Shauna and Van walk by, conversing quietly. Lottie waits for them to pass.
“You better not run from me, Nat,” she murmurs.
Hugging her legs, Nat rests her cheek on her knee and looks at Lottie. Her countenance is soft, stripped of the facade she usually wears.
“Thank you,” Nat says.
“For what?”
“For never giving up on me.”
Lottie shuffles closer so that nobody can see her take Nat’s hand and thread their fingers together. “Like I said, you deserve someone that makes you feel like you matter. I’m telling you, Nat, you matter.”
Nat doesn’t even bother to check nobody’s watching when she brings Lottie’s hand to her lips and kisses her knuckles. She’s looking at her with so much adoration. Lottie’s veins flood with warmth; her electric pulse fizzles.
“You might not be a messiah, Lottie, but you are a goddamn angel.”
Lottie snorts. “That’s so cheesy.”
“Hey, I’m tryna be nice, you little bitch,” chuckles Nat.
“Guess I’m just not used to it.”
“Well, get used to it.” Nat hooks a finger over the collar of Lottie’s shirt and pulls her close.
Smiling shyly, Lottie leans into a gentle kiss.
All the wild things could break down that cabin door right now and Lottie wouldn’t bat an eye. Let them maul her, let them kill her, let them feast on her frail bones — but they can never have her heart.
That belongs to somebody else.