Schism: the Beginning [NYE] The cold air dissolved into a state of nothingness. At first, Eden just felt nothing. Confusion, perhaps, but nothing tangible or articulate. Her head swam with a series of “why?” and “how?” and the overwhelming demand to know who let this happen. Cosmically, or else literally. God or her siblings, or anyone else involved in the lies and deceptions she’d been living for so long now.
And then the rage came: a white hot rage that burned her beneath her layers of winter defense, that made her skin sticky and her blood boil. Jake told her everything - everything - and she was furious with everyone. With her siblings for lying about the circumstances of their father’s death, of who did what and why. She hadn’t known any details, had been too young to tell the truth, apparently; she had known it was Arnold - a lie now, it appeared - and that the circumstances were complicated. But she hadn’t known about the way her father treated his previous family, or that he had actually attacked Sally. For that, she was angry at her mother. And most of all, she was angry at Desiree, for knowing all of these things and keeping them from her, and at Jake, for pulling the trigger.
Which meant being at the apartment shared by the two of them was the literal most repulsive idea she could even imagine right now. She shoved Jake out of the way (not noticing or really caring in the heat of the moment how he wobbled near the railed edge of the balcony) and ran inside. She threw herself into Sally’s arms, because of her siblings Eden felt the most for her in the moment: a sisterhood strengthened by the blood they shared and by Sally’s victimhood in this whole matter, not dissimilar to how Eden felt in the moment. And she unleashed involuntary, heavy sobs into her chest, nearly spilling her sister’s champagne in the process. The gaiety of the room came to an instant stop, and Jake rushed into the room behind a moment later.
In the frozen silence, Sally glanced with knowing terror between all of her siblings, then wordlessly handed off her champagne to Braxton to free her arms, which wrapped around her crying sister. Though everyone seemed horrified, she did not miss the look on Desiree’s face, which held something else as well. “Do you want to go home?” The eldest asked softly.
Eden shook her head immediately. “Can I stay with you tonight?”
Sally glanced to her boyfriend for confirmation before making any promises, but Braxton’s nodded response was swift and reassuring. Sally stroked Eden’s hair. “That’s fine,” she promised. “Come on now. Let’s go.” The Aladren alumna looked to Jake to offer a nonverbal apology for the departure, but he refused eye contact. Internally, she sighed. Someone else would have to take care of him. She couldn’t do it all.