0000. PROLOGUE
— no happy ending in sight

THIS IS NOT THE STORY WITH A HAPPY ENDING, LIFE IS NEVER GOING TO BE CONDUCIVE TO A HAPPY ENDING. Because a life worth living is not one that will end happily, no one's life ends happily. Death was not a particularly happy ending. But it was the expected one. An ending that everyone was supposed to meet one day (though, the jury was still out on whether or not that part was true), some got to meet a peaceful end after a long life but then there were others who were ripped from their lives far too soon. Verity Harlow found out at too young of an age that there was no story with a happy ending, hell, if she were being true to herself she would argue that happiness wasn't the main storyline for anyone's story.

It certainly wasn't the overarching plot for her.

She knew that the moment she sat in the backyard of her mother's childhood home, staring out at the now darkened Appalachian mountains as the pink hues faded into the night sky, tears gently gliding down her cheeks. There was no happy ending. How could she have a happy ending when her mother was gone? This wasn't what was supposed to happen. They came out to the mountains to be there for her grandmother's final moments — supposed to be there to help her reach her end. Her mother was not supposed to die. She was not moved from her home, from the town she grew up in, to be attending not one but two funerals. How was she supposed to move on with life when she felt so hollow?

No story would have a happy ending, she was certain of that much.

But life moves on, it always does, and people are forced to live with the reminders of the past. And Verity Elenanora Harlow found herself moving back to Forks, Washington with more baggage than what she left it with. A dark cloud of grief trailing above her, gloom hanging behind every corner waiting to drag her down and down and down and down. There was no hope. No joy. Nothing that the little town she grew up in and once loved could do to help her. Nothing that made her feel better. No, Verity was stuck with the memory of the one person she wished were with her more than anything. Her mother was etched into the walls of her childhood home, Verity was stuck living with the memories from her first twelve years on this earth spent with her mother. Times where she and her mother would be cuddled with each other, a young girl finding comfort in her mothers arms while the soft light from the bulky television in the corner of the living room spread across them both. The laughter that would spill from their lips as her younger brother wriggled his way between them, content with being squished between two of his favorite people. And when her father came home to see them all asleep on the couch just like that. Verity could remember the smile that her father had on his face after a long twelve hour shift, he would stand there and take in the scene before kneeling and placing a hand on his daughter's face. Gently coaxing her to go back to sleep before he would wake his wife and get them to bed.

Now, as Verity Harlow stood in the same spot in her living room, with a suitcase in her hands she couldn't help but stare at the couch. Closing her eyes, hoping, wishing, waiting for her to go back. To be back in the same body of the nine-year-old girl who had nothing but hopes for the world and not in the body of the sixteen-year-old who didn't believe in the world being a kind place for anyone. But when she opened her eyes, the couch was still empty. Her living room still felt cold. The pictures of a happy family hanging across the beige-painted walls in the room staring back at her seemed like a distant memory, a vision that would haunt her for the rest of her life. At least, that's what she thought it would do. It's still what she thinks it'll do. She didn't care what her father told her, what everyone told her. Her mother was dead.

She was stuck to living. To moving on and never having her mother there to give her opinion. Every time she closed her eyes, Verity found herself thinking about the life accomplishments she would have throughout her life. Thinking about how she would wish for her mother to be there to see how far she could make it in life. About how Verity Harlow would keep checking over her shoulder expecting to see her mother right behind her with the same big smile, cheering louder than any of the other parents around them. So, no, Verity did not believe in happy endings. She didn't even believe in the happy middles. If this was life, there was no happiness waiting for her. She couldn't believe that happiness would be waiting for her, she couldn't imagine being happy with the knowledge that her mother should have been there to see her smiling in such a way. Yet, she wasn't. And Verity has smiled many times since her mother's death. All fake. All hiding herself behind a mask to help other people digest her easier. Because she never wanted to be a problem, and telling people about how she was feeling would make her exactly that.

It was easier to make everyone believe she was doing okay. Perhaps it was her coping mechanism, returning to Forks as the girl who moved away was bad enough. But returning to Forks as the girl with a dead mom who was buried not even a day after she returned to the city. To the state. That was different. Everyone in Forks (well, not everyone but for a town with only three thousand people in it, it is not that hard to believe that nearly everyone knew who she was because of her dead mother) saw her return on the second worst day of her life, there was no coming back from that. She had already been marked as the girl to watch. The one to keep an eye on and make sure she was doing okay. Verity Harlow did not want anyone to hover over her, she did not want people to worry about her. Because she would make it through this, though not in the way that she wanted to she was sure of that. There was no coming back to the girl she used to be and there was no coming back to that blissful world she used to reside in. But the most she could do was make herself easier for everyone to swallow.

How was that fair? It was her mother that died. She was the one struggling with it all. She was the one who had her entire world collapse within itself, she's the one stuck trying to dig herself out of the grave she was buried alive in. Why did she have to make her grief easier for everyone to handle? Why did she feel the need to make everyone else feel better about the things happening around them? It wasn't right. She deserved to be the person who was able to depend on her friends. Why did she force herself to put on such a brave face when all she wanted was to be crumpled up in a ball on the floor and let time continue to move as she stayed right there? But, instead of that, she found herself sprawled out across the twin-sized bed in the bedroom she grew up in. The walls were painted a bright shade of purple that she had chosen at the age of nine, with the zebra-striped bedding she picked out when her parents were letting her redecorate her bedroom. Her blonde tendrils splayed around her, fogging her vision as she turned on the bed, hugging her knees into her chest.

No, there was no such thing as a happy ending. If there were, she wouldn't be staring blankly at the wall as she tried to forget about the times her mom would sit on the edge of the bed and run her hands through her blonde hair. She wouldn't be stuck remembering what it felt like to have her mother coax her back to sleep, her thumb would brush against her temple softly, and the two would stay up telling each other about their days until her father returned from work (if he were coming home at a time decent enough for her to stay up until). If she closed her eyes she could almost feel her mother there, hand beginning to reach out and comfort her in the same way she always did. Verity Harlow wasn't entirely sure what she should think of that. What was she supposed to find comfort in? The fact that her mother's still living strong within her own memory? Because she sought comfort in that, she sought comfort in the living mirage of her mother that she had. But, she knew she couldn't rely on her memory to help her forever. Memories fade. Memories will always fade. As the large hands of time click, click, click their way through the circle, minute after minute, hour after hour, time will continue to move forward and with that Verity Eleanora Harlow could feel her mother's memory fading from her mind.

Shaking her head, Verity sat up, something had to change. She couldn't keep living like this. She had to do something, she needed to stop thinking. Her mother wouldn't have wanted this for her. Verity knew that much. School was starting back in just a little over a week, that would help her. She'd get to see her friends again. Everything could go back to normal. She could ignore the sense of dread she felt with time passing. She would have something else to focus on instead of the days passing by, she could throw herself back into her school work like she had done in the past. Not necessarily a great coping mechanism, but it was a coping mechanism nonetheless.

Nathaniel Harlow leaned in her doorway, a sad smile on his lips as he brought two of his fingers up to knock on the wood. Verity turned to look at him, letting out a sigh as he spoke, "Dinner's on the table, c'mon, Ver."

"I'm not hungry," Verity leaned her head back down onto the pillow, looking away from her dad.

Nathaniel huffed, shaking his head as he walked into her room, "It's the third night you've skipped dinner in a row."

"Haven't been hungry," she shrugged.

With a tilt of his head, Nathaniel frowned, "Sweetheart."

"Dad," Verity looked over to her father again, moving to lie on her back. Nathaniel raised a brow, a silent invitation for her to keep going with her thoughts. If he were speaking, he would have said everything that he wanted to say for the past week, he wanted to let her know it was okay to not be okay. But it wasn't okay for her to be like this. Verity let out a soft sigh as her eyes welled up with tears, Nathaniel put his hand onto her shoulder to try and comfort her. Her lip wobbled as she spoke again, "This isn't fair."

"It's not," Nathaniel had no place to argue with it, he knew it wasn't fair. Hell, he was struggling with making sense of it all himself. He just lost his wife and in the process his daughter seemed to be pulling away, shrouding within herself as if she were afraid to live her life whatsoever. And then there was Avery. Avery, who found himself living within his father's shadow trying to make sure that he wouldn't leave him too. Nathaniel moved his hand from his daughter's shoulder to wipe away the tears that were flowing down her face. He smiled sadly, "None of this is fair, I know. But your mother would have never wanted you to do this, Ver. You and I both know how she would react if she found you like this."

Letting out a wet laugh, Verity shook her head, "She'd tell me to pick my head up and get moving on with my life."

Nathaniel nodded, picking up her chin in the same way her mother used to do, "She'd tell you that 'Babygirl, there's no point in wasting your life away because I'm not here'. Verity, you can't keep skipping meals. You can't keep hiding yourself up in here trying to avoid your life happening around you."

Verity huffed, "I just can't stop thinking about her, dad. Everything left in my life that I'd want to turn to see her at and it eats away at me that she won't be there for them. And I don't know how to explain it, but something feels so off. Like a deep, dark, pit in my stomach that I can't get rid of."

"Grief does weird things to people, sweetheart," Nathaniel responded. "But you need to try, at the very least, to get out of this room. Not for long. But long enough for you to get some sunlight, get some Vitamin D."

Verity laughed, her eyes rolling at her father's words, "We're not in North Carolina anymore."

Nathaniel looked at her, mouth agape for a moment as he glanced out the window at the rainy weather and gasped, "What? What do you mean? This is North Carolina, we have plenty of sunlight for you here."

Shaking her head, Verity let the air suck between her teeth for a moment, "Wow, so you mean if I step outside right now I won't look like a drowned rat?"

"Never a rat," Nathaniel laughed. "You would be drenched though."

"Damn, that blows the Vitamin D plan, then."

"Well," Nathaniel shrugged, "dinner is on the table. Do you think I can coax you away from your bed to join your brother and me down there for dinner? Or do you want me to bring a plate to you? Even if you just pick at it and only eat a couple of bites."

Verity sat up on the bed, hugging one of her knees as she looked at her dad, "Dad."

"C'mon, we can watch a movie or something together."

The blonde smiled at her dad, clearly taking notice of him trying to make her feel better, trying to do something to help some semblance of normalcy for her. Trying to keep it together not for himself but for his two children who were just thrust into the world completely unarmed for the fight that would be coming to them. Nathaniel Harlow had only tried to do that for his children. And he wasn't going to stop that now just because he was grieving as well. He needed to keep it together. He needed to be strong. He had to be someone they could go to and trust with whatever they were feeling. Verity Harlow saw that, she saw her father struggling. She could see it across his face and in his bloodshot eyes — and in some strange way, she swore she could feel his pain. Not much unlike how she swore she felt connected to nature when she collapsed to her knees in the backyard after finding out her mother had died. It was an intrinsic thing like she felt the mountains cry with her like she felt the wind blowing against her to comfort her not much unlike her mother's hugs. And with her father, she felt a strange connection. Like she knew exactly how he was feeling without needing to say a word. Without him ever needing to speak about it. She felt the same way with her brother — another reason she often found herself hidden away in her bedroom. It was all too much to be around them and see them putting on brave faces meanwhile she was dying on the inside. Then again, so were they. And they were doing the same thing she did to make everyone else accept her better. So maybe they were all just doing the same thing anyway. Maybe that was just how people coped with death.

Verity stood up giving her dad a soft smile, trying to ignore whatever sense of dread was settling at the bottom of her stomach, "What do we have on the menu for tonight."

Nathaniel laughed, his knees letting out a soft crack as he stood up, "Stouffers."

"Lasagna?" Verity looked over at her father with a sigh, "Didn't you make that two nights ago?"

"Well," Nathaniel shrugged, "I'm not a chef."

"So? Learn to be one," Verity rolled her eyes. "Can't be that hard."

"Yeah, no, sure. I'll get on it, maybe in between patients."

Verity giggled, "You could always ask your patients for tips, I'm sure they'll know more than you."

"Right," Nathaniel carried the joke on.

"I'm being serious, I'm sure your patients would know more than you when it comes to cooking." Verity looked her dad dead in the eyes when she spoke her next sentence, "I'm sure I know more about cooking than you do."

"I'm sure you do," Nathaniel spoke honestly. "You always spent time with your mother when she would be cooking dinner. Even when you were little, your mom would sit you down on the island and you'd be asking her questions about what she was doing while making dinner. Or, your personal favorite, when she was making her Christmas cookies and your birthday cake."

Verity smiled, blonde hair bouncing as she walked down the stairs to reach the kitchen, "Yeah, she would kick me out of the kitchen once the cake was pulled out of the oven. Keep me away from seeing what the cake would be decorated like." A sad smile pulled onto her lips when she thought about her birthday, turning seventeen two days after her mother was put to rest one last time was not how she thought it would happen for her. Christmas had come and gone, the first one without her mother, her first birthday without her mother. It had all been an adjustment. And it wasn't one that Verity Harlow was happy to make. "I missed having that this year."

Nathaniel nudged her shoulder, dispelling her spiraling thoughts, "Maybe tomorrow we can go to the diner, and get you some of the cobbler and ice cream? I know it's not the cake you're used to and it's not your birthday anymore but."

"I'd like that, Dad," Verity smiled.

That did nothing to settle the pit in her stomach, nor the anxiety that swarmed her brain every second she was awake. But she was certain that nothing could settle that. No story can have a happy ending. And for some odd reason, Verity Eleanora Harlow believed that that tied directly into her deep-rooted fear of something she couldn't even name.

AUTHORS NOTE

well well well

after forty million years tlom makes her resurgence the world is HEALING everything is SO good. we MOVE. on the other hand i really feel like their story is not going to be as long as i planned for it to be originally (you guys will see lmao) so I hope to bunker down and actually pre write and write for them in general!

anyways!!! let me know your thoughts!!