Sitting Alone

Who: Olivia and Wicked
Where: Lakeshore
When: Late, late night

Olivia wandered farther than her hotel after leaving Mathias outside of the bar. Her feet simply wouldn't stop walking, and she knew if she went to her room, she'd simply pace all night, since she couldn't sleep anyway. The drinks she'd had slowed her down a bit, but she didn't care.

Instead she found herself walking along the lake shore, her shoes in one hand, her purse in the other. She had come to a small town to escape this kind of trouble and she was finding herself deeper in it now than ever. She'd tried hard to avoid complications. She'd been too afraid for too long to help people and the moment she thought it might be safe to try, at least a little, suddenly she's a conniving bitch being paid to leave town. She almost embraced everything she'd been running from in what, a few days? It was ridiculous! The whole thing would have been laughable had she'd not been drinking. Right?

Instead, it hurt and she didn't like the feeling. In fact, she loathed it. Her knees becoming too wobbly and her vision blurring, Olivia sat in the sand, not caring of the hour and stared out into the dark water. She pulled her knees up to rest her forehead against them, suddenly missing her dad. No, not her dad. Marcos. Whatever, whoever he was. He could come pick her up and take her home and away from all of this and she could go back to pretending to be normal. She didn't have anyone else. It never bothered her in the past, but now, when she felt like this? She regretted ever leaving home.

Digging into her bag, she searched for the cheap pay by the minute phone she had picked up after leaving Caleb the day before and dialed her father's cell phone number. She got his voicemail immediately and left a quick message, knowing he'd call her back the second he got it. He'd been looking for her after all. She could be gone by morning, surely.

Clutching her phone, she sat, waiting for it to ring even while impatiently blinking away tears that she pretended weren't there.

Wicked had spent the last few days slipping in and out being catatonic. Gabe would pull her out of it only for her to slip away a couple hours later. Which meant she still didn't know that the faith healer had skipped town. It also meant she had just been sipping blood from Gabe the last couple nights and was hungry for something else.

Upon waking earlier that night, Wicked had started walking from the lake house they had and kept going along the shore line until she heard it. The sound of a heart pumping blood. She followed the sound until she reached Olivia. "Lost?"

The voice startled her and Olivia looked up, quickly wiping away the wetness from her cheeks and in the process dropping her phone into the sand. The presence of another person was a bit unsettling, but then again, Olivia was here too, wasn't she? Surely she wasn't the only person in Marquette who had insomnia and it wasn't that late. At least she didn't think so.

"No, not lost," Olivia replied once she cleared the lump from her throat. It was embarrassing enough to be crying. More so to be caught crying. She reached down to grab her phone, brushing the sand from it's keypad, her hands shaking slightly. "Just...enjoying a few moments alone is all."

"Ah," Wicked said. Coming forward she sat down in the sand next to Olivia, not waiting to be invited or asking first. "Anything wrong?" A few days lost in her mind seemed to have snapped it back into place enough that she wasn't talking in nonsense tonight. Sometimes that made her more dangerous. And well, she really didn't care if anything was wrong. It just seemed to help put humans at ease if one acted like one cared.

Olivia instinctively stiffened when the young woman sat down. Maybe it was the alcohol inside of her, but she suddenly felt her stomach clench uneasily. She shouldn't have drank so much. She clung to her phone, however, in case it was really instinct and not the drinking.

"No, just a little tired is all," Olivia replied with a shaky smile as she looked at the woman. "You know, everyday stress. It's nice to get out and get some fresh air every now and then."

"It is. I've been couped out the past few days. Haven't gotten out. I think I almost forgot how pretty the lake is at night," Wicked mused, her eyes looking out at the lake in question.

Even as she looked out at the lake, her other senses were tuned into the woman. The slight raise in her heart beat and the slight unease coming off of her. Most of all she could smell the alcohol and Wicked wrinkled her nose at it. Did she really want blood with alcohol content?

Olivia nodded, shifting her gaze to the lake herself. "It is," she agreed, her heels digging into the sand as she relaxed slightly and her hand loosened on her phone. "There's much more mystery when you're looking out into darkness, like you don't know what's really under the surface and you don't know if you really want to find out."

Now she was just rambling. But there was no reason to be nervous. It was just another girl who didn't look too much older than she was. Olivia was just too tired and too paranoid. That much was obvious at this point.

Wicked was pretty sure Olivia wouldn't want to find out. The things that were under all that darkness weren't so nice. Like the one sitting beside, pretending to be human for the time being. Just another girl out in the dark, enjoying the lake.

"If you find out, then the mystery is gone and so is the allure. I like to think there's mermaids out in the water, looking up at the same moon." And well, there was mermaids in the water. At least one anyway. Not that either woman knew that. Wicked just knew that when you threw a body in, it normally didn't come back.

"Mermaids?" Olivia asked, her voice full of doubt, though she couldn't help but laugh a tiny bit. Conversations about mermaids was much better than anything else she'd gotten lately. And in Olivia's opinion, this girl was harmless compared to any of the Lockwood brothers.

"Well, you never know. To be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if there were." Setting her phone down next to her purse, she felt relaxed again, the tension easing off of her. "There are stranger things roaming around in the dark, so I doubt the water is any different."

For now Wicked was enjoying actually talking to someone for a change. Yes, you shouldn't play with your food but that had never stopped Wicked before. So why not have a chat with it for a change before her mind snapped and left her talking in ways that only she understood sometimes.

"The world is supposed to be covered with more water than land, so if there's odd things up here, there's got to be something lurking down below right?"

Olivia would have agreed with Wicked - at least in regards to conversation. The last few actual conversations she'd had had been designed to make her feel like a complete idiot, so this mindless chatter was a welcome change.

"I think so, yes. Why not mermaids." Stretching her legs out now, she swept her gaze along the water's surface where the moonlight was reflecting pleasantly. She was noticing it now that she was actually paying attention. Sighing softly to herself, she reached a hand up to brush her hair out of her face. "Though I have to think anything under there has got to be better than what's up here."

Wicked had to stop and think. It had been so long since she had been mortal and had mortal troubles that she had to think on what to say to that. Had life been so horrible? It wasn't know, not when she did as she pleased and if something bothered her she normally took care of it by killing the annoyance.

"I'm not sure I'd want to eat fish and kelp all the time," was what she finally replied with. Now if she knew that mermaids actually liked to eat people, that may have changed her mind.

"Kelp...no. That'd be disgusting I think. But I think if eating fish and kelp were the worst extent of my worries, I wouldn't mind it at all," Olivia admitted with a shrug and then fell silent as she stared out onto the lake. Was she even making any sense at this point? Her mind was getting fuzzy and the numbness was quickly kicking in. She wanted to bury the hurt quickly. Fuck Mathias. Fuck Caleb. Hell, fuck Dorian too. Ungrateful bastards. Ah, the healing qualities of vodka.

She thought briefly about going for a swim then remembered...bad things lived in the water. Is that what they were talking about? She couldn't quite remember, and unless she wanted to pass out on the beach, she knew she had to think about getting back to her room.

Wicked almost felt sorry for the poor, drunken human. If life was really so horrible than maybe she should help her out and just drain her dry. Wicked wrinkled her nose at that. She really didn't care for alcohol in her blood. She could always just snap the girl's neck and be done with it.

"Why keep going if it's so horrible?" Cause Wicked really didn't understand.

Olivia blinked twice, unable to form coherent words. Was she asking her why not...what? Kill herself? It wasn't as if the thought hadn't crossed her mind before, but if she had really wanted to die, she would have just gone against her family's curse a long time ago.

The alcohol and exhaustion from the past few days dulled her senses enough that she didn't find offense at such a blunt question. She'd asked worse after all.

"Because I keep thinking that in the midst of all the horrible, eventually I'll find something, or someone...not so horrible." Did that even make sense? It did in her head. "But every time I think that I have, it backfires and turns out to be just another disappointment." Olivia reached down to grab her phone while considering her own answer. She released a bitter laugh. "So, to answer your question, who knows? Maybe I'm just a coward. Who knows, maybe I'll get lucky and have an accident."

Humans were...depressing. Had she been like this as a human? No, she didn't think so. But the memories drifted out of her reach. There had been the magic. Yes, that's what she had lived for. Not someone to come sweep in and save her. Had Gabe been like that before she twisted and broke him? If he had she didn't think she would have worked so hard to break him.

"You have to crack a lot of eggs to make an omelet." Wicked paused, not sure where that came from but shrugged it away. "All this misery over a guy?"

The analogy was strange, and maybe it was because she was tired, but Olivia wasn't even sure where it fit. Lifting an eyebrow, she glanced at the girl, confused.

"I never said it was over a guy," Olivia pointed out, hating that she sounded so defensive. "It has nothing to do with a guy." Okay, so now she was lying. But she did that more often than not. The conversation was getting uncomfortable for Olivia because the last thing she wanted to do was discuss Mathias, or anyone, with a nameless stranger. "I think I should get back to my hotel...it's getting...late."

Wicked didn't bother to point out that she had mentioned someone along with something while rambling and then disappoints so it left one to think a guy.

"It is late," Wicked confirmed. "Probably best if you did head back. I should go myself." Since she had decided she didn't want any wine with her dinner.

Olivia managed to get to her feet, taking her phone and purse with her even as her head began to swim. "Thanks. It was nice to meet you..." Did she even get her name before? Somehow it didn't seem to matter.

She turned and walked along the sand, not too gracefully, but that didn't matter much at this point. If she could just make it back to her hotel without injury, Olivia would be happy enough with that. She had to stay awake anyway for her dad's call. Nothing else mattered now.