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There's nothing outside anymore except for snow, sheets of pristine white blanketing every inch of what was once solid ground. Air thinned and sharpened until it's nothing but an attack on skin. Has trudged through enough deadly Winter Wonderland to know the feeling well, how cold peels back whatever flesh's clinging to bones ; pale beige turned red and raw before hints of blue settle in. Exposure limiting any pain she might've felt before, her toes and fingers and hollow cheeks numb in the way she'd get when a bottle or two in. Completely empty but buzzed with liquid courage, an easy haze trapped above bleached hair she brushed by hand, which is meant literally. Quick and easy, sharpie coated nails tangled in dead and uneven locks, shaped into something other than a total mess. The same hair that lays limp and stringy on slumping shoulders now, except this time she's not bothering. Hands remain clasped together despite how jerkily they shake, because there's no sense of courage inside her. She's dry-mouthed and sober and probably freezing, and the only thing warm in her belly isn't spiced or contraband. What's buried down there is cooked. It's what Natalie can't stop staring at beneath clumped lashes, weighted by bits of snow or the sting beating against two eyes.
What remains of Jackie Taylor lies in barely held together pieces on a makeshift, shitty pyre. She didn't think about it before, how poorly made it all was. Things thrown together fast for the sake of getting it over with -- which doesn't matter for people who are gonna be cremated. They'll be ashes, Nat knows, body torn apart by hungry embers until nothing remains. Pieces of bone churned to tiny hard bits, blackened and scrubbed of white. Felt fitting to see her Dad melt away like that, seated solemnly at her Ma's side while they waited for him to burn and burn right. Cheaper than real funerals, even if not by much. But she listens to the rhythmic noise of blood slipping off bone to wet the land below it and thinks : this isn't right. This isn't death done the Jackie Taylor way. And it's so fucking silly she almost chokes on some echo of a laugh, ensnared like a bear trap in her souring throat, because who thinks that? Natalie isn't in the nasty habit of imagining caskets full of dead teammates and how their services would be. Doesn't sneak looks at slender hands and picture bone, or try to stomach the idea of rot eating away at once kiddish and pretty features. Honestly, she's never even thought about the Yellowjackets going gray in the hair. Never felt right, a personal line outstretched too far for her to reach. Wasn't like she'd be there anyway. When highschool finished up, they'd disperse as fiercely as they collided together ; silently and intentionally, a decision made over and over again, when everyone else realized they had to survive real life. People get busy, they get dead, but Nat didn't think she'd be around to see it.
It's all she can think about now, and it looks nothing like this. Jackie's parents would go all out on a showing, always fussed with a view to maintain. Rich people are like that, shallow and blooded green. So there'd probably be really fancy flowers Natalie hasn't ever heard of, vibrant colored with super deep meanings that don't actually mean anything. Flimsy sentiments spoken and some gorgeous portrait of their soccer captain standing tall despite a tiny corpse being what's left. Her hair would look shiny and soft in the picture, freshly done for whatever event Jackie just needed to show off for. Strawberry lipstick done so expertly it'd have that funny side effect of making any and every other teenage girl feel ugly just from one look. It comes a little late, brain sluggish cause of too many things to name, yet she realizes which photo she's seeing. The senior year photos. Didn't think she could still recall it that vividly, but maybe staring too hard and too long at useless shit has life long health issues. Jackie had worn this pricey, flowery blouse she paraded and bragged about to anyone who unfortunately had two ears. A day of rasped screeching and shoving hands because nobody was going to ruin this perfectly curated outfit for her. It's pretty, it's not at all humble, and Nat just wants it there. Though nobody would've asked for her opinion. The Taylors would choose, or maybe Jackie's definitely boring husband, or maybe it'd be Shauna. Who has a better chance at choosing Nat's pick so she's hoping -- she'd hope -- that it would fall to her.
And while the room would've suffocated everyone and it'd be lame enough for her to blow off, it would've been right. Not what Jackie would've wanted ... But a real send off. A warped reflection for the guests to stare into. Pretty and dull and lifeless and uneventful. If the shoe fits? You wear it, your whole life and then some. No matter who you were or what you could've been.
There is no portrait. Natalie wants there to be one ( did Jackie want one? Is that something people can even choose? ) but there can't be. It isn't like there's a casket ... Or a body. There isn't shit to honor because they took everything themselves ; pieces caught between yellow teeth, heated blood drowning sore throats, and it's -- when she sees Jackie dead, it's normally not because Nat fucking killed her.
Two months ago out here becomes a lifetime, turbulent fall weather and sun on exposed skin is more like a dream than anything tangible. Back when starvation was just an incessant nip that's now become an engulfing bite, all teeth and no warning press of lips beforehand. Natalie's black roots hadn't grown back and her eyes were wide and opened, saw things crystal clear and didn't have to falter against physical exercise made ten times harder from unmovable piles of snow. But one night stuff got fucked up and with her boyfriend's hand safely secured in spindly fingers she looked at Jackie for the last time, huddled mess of shivering parts, and blue eyes went hazy with hatred and they haven't cleared since. Saw her beneath fogged moonlight, the effortless way she still existed -- honey brown hair curled naturally, letterman jacket slipped back on like she could've come helping but chosen ( snottily, Nat had thought then, which made it worse ) not to. Too caught up in Travis, Travis, Travis to care about how she had helped, just as effortless, last night. Like some part of her brain pushed those events far into a corner, classic time out style, and didn't watch as neglect withered the memory and made it see-through. Natalie had been so angry, so childishly and stupidly angry, because all she could see then was soft, unburdened hands splayed on Travis's chest, him letting Jackie watch him unfold despite shying away from Nat everytime she tried peeking ; how Jackie Taylor had, and had, and had, until there was nowhere pale hands could go where her hands hadn't been already. Natalie, for a selfish fucking second, just wanted to be a girlfriend. Something she couldn't even do without Jackie's help. Couldn't save Travis without the assist like this was some warped soccer field they were playing on, two against an entire team, the ball Travis's life. She should've done it alone. But the truth had pressed knife sharp to her skeleton neck the whole night as she called hoarsely for Javi, which is that she might've scored the winning goal, but it was Jackie's lightning quick footwork that led her to it. Travis could've died and Natalie wouldn't have known, so yeah, turns out she was every bit the bitchy slut her captain claimed her to be.
( “Girls like that just don't make good girlfriends!” Jackie's voice bounced off the tiled walls of the showers, annoyingly peppy after a game. “It's like, they get a taste and it's all they want forever. Just no care for romance.”
And Natalie almost ripped her towel with how aggressively she had grabbed it, red faced from steam and humiliation. Jackie hadn't been talking to her, probably didn't even know she was still there, but it sunk in deep. Hurt, when it wasn't supposed to hurt anymore. Stormed out and has lamely attempted to not think about it everyday since. Guess she'll admit to failing on that front. )
At least, she thinks that's what it must have been then. Can't actually understand the feeling anymore, as it's echoed into a whisper of a thing. Doormat and still inside her janky ribcage. Washed out dirty laundry style until there's a chasm where the anger used to sit. Cheeks burn, beneath layers of wind-whipped flesh, at how meaningless it was in hindsight. Selfish, entitled. There wasn't a world where Nat's allowed stuff as simple as typical girlhood rights : jealousy, vitriol, her own boyfriend. Knew that well in highschool when everyone whispered about her constantly spreading legs, her piss poor grades, and the trailer trash clothes. Leered at by randoms most days, but sometimes it'd be her so-called teammates joining in for a well timed elbow. After a while that kinda bullshit bounces off you in ways bullets don't, cause petty remarks don't compare to the crush of your Ma's spine beneath heavy duty boots. To your exposed and bumpy spine or how 'always up for a good time' basically became your middle name. Should've been above it, she was above it, matured and aged in her face as much as she was inside. Charred and empty, painfully aware of violence and how it slithers deep into everyone she knew and knows. Never fit in with conversations about sleepovers, Lilly P., and who's gonna be who's next boyfriend for a few months. It just wasn't her ... No matter how many times she wished it could be, a shameful acknowledgement Nat keeps a tight leash on. Even now she can't say it, can't confess like some patron saint of honesty, despite Jackie mangled before her. Can only sullenly decide that if anyone gets this secret, it should be the girl she sacrificed for a moment of having those things. Allowed to be mad and shallow, just one time, about everything the world threw at her.
Not like it was worth it. Being Jackie fucking Taylor for some stolen, precious seconds would always pale in comparison to the real thing. Nobody could nitpick how Jackie could -- be as insanely entitled by weaponizing words like 'my' and being too perfect for a lowly thing like contributing. Too focused and fixated on her one and only ( and Natalie does wish that sounded less bitter ) best friend to give a shit about others or survival as a concept. Couldn't even be assed to come inside, and how crazy is that? Nat would've come back in since she can actually see beyond herself, sometimes. But as she sits there on the cabin porch and stews and thinks, there's not a shred of hate behind a single word. Because they won't have the real thing for the rest of their lives, however short that'll be, and Nat's heart aches and aches and hell freezes over. She'd do anything to take it back. Would've dragged Jackie kicking and screaming inside if she had to. For Shauna and for Shauna's incoming baby, for whatever greater good that remained then. Maybe for herself, another portion of Jackie stolen, because everyone's falling for Lottie's woowoo bullshit and she could really use a team pep talk soon. Something like, 'Line up! Yes, we've decided to eat our friends, but things are gonna get a lot better out here!' Fuck, the things you miss. Nat almost snorts in a hysterical fashion. Keeps yearning for a giggle, clawing for a sign she's still alive and breathing and not a mirror image of a girl eaten to bones. But she can't. Feels her face pinched and frozen, her heart squeezed to a breaking point in her rapidly moving chest ; and she can't stop rocking a bony knee, can't close damp eyes, despite the hours that've passed. Might've passed. Who knows out here? The sun hardly rises anymore because winter is an unmoving creature killing them all. An animal Natalie can't put down fast enough. If she had just caught something already, they wouldn't have touched her. There'd be no need and nobody would've moved in to circle her like a pack of wild things. Jackie wasn't an animal, she was -- she was human. There isn't much Nat could've given someone with everything but she should've given her that.
Okay, okay. So, Jackie Taylor's dead, and it's all Natalie's fault, and there's fucking bits of the girl in her needy stomach, and she's let down someone in every possible way. No take backs. No do-overs. Nat wheezes while trying to suck in a breath, stomping down on the tickle of panic ( of a wound prodded over and over again ) to decide on the right thing for once in her life. When she can move and scrape the frozen wetness off her face, Nat will move her. Far, far away from a nest full of stinging Yellowjackets who couldn't even utter a thanks to someone who's fed them. Will steel her stomach and touch at bones, hold dead arms and trend delicately, and Nat won't think about how it'll be the most she's ever laid a hand on her their whole lives. Definitely won't let her brain wander there, because she'll just feel more shitty than she already does and that's doing nothing for nobody.
When Nat gathers herself at the sound of girls yawning and stirring, she'll lovingly wrap Jackie in blanket and rope and trek across acres of snow to find somewhere peaceful for her to forever sleep. Won't make up for what they -- for what Nat did, but it's what she's gonna do. The sky will gently clear and Natalie's gonna carry Jackie somewhere safer, away from the stab of snow and murderous teammates. It's what she should've done at the very beginning. Slowly allows resolve and determination to feed her at the weak thought, an emotion she hasn't felt since cutting deep into the skin of her leg.
There's a lot of shit Nat's paying for.
But some part of her hopes that whatever karma hits her with for Jackie, it'll be something she can hold.