CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
DEEP DOWN

THE Cullens would be lying if they said they were fine. In a way, everyone was going their separate ways without realizing it, one by one, and it bothered everyone.

Both the Olympic coven and Denali coven sat in the living room. Consumed by the comfortable tunes of a violin, Eleazar and Carlisle were playing a game of chess. Rosalie sat on the couch, her head resting on Emmett's shoulders as they read a book. The rest listened to Carmen reveal her secret talent for playing the violin.

When Carmen finishes with a wide smile and a beautiful bow, the rest of them clap and chuckle. "I never knew you could play the violin." Esme stares in awe.

"When at the Volturi I would sometimes play for them, hours on end." Carmen explains, "I could do this in my sleep...if I could sleep." She giggles.

Esme's first instinct was to see Alice's reaction, but she was nowhere to be found. She turns to Jasper, knowing he will know where she is. When he gives her a sad smile and a faint nod, Kate notices. "Poor girl is worrying herself sick."

Emmett and Rosalie watched them discuss, they were both mute in sorrow over the absence of both Edward and Thea.

Jasper sighs, "Thea is one of the only things Alice has ever known, without Thea she's...not herself."

Carmilla places the newspaper in her hand, "Give me five seconds." She began walking up the stairs to Alice's room.

✸

Alice's teeth were clenched together as she sat in front of the open window, the sunset reflecting an orange hue on her pale skin. Her legs were crossed and her arms lazily placed on her knees as if she was meditating.

Focus. Alice repeats to herself.

A knock followed by the creek of the door was quick to make Alice lose focus. She huffs, "Why knock if you're just going to barge in?" She scolds harsher than she usually would.

"Because I know you would've told me to go away." Carmilla jokes, a faint smile on her face.

Alice snaps her head towards the door, confused at the sight of Carmilla, "I thought you were Jasper."

"I can see that," Carmilla examines Alice's mediating pose, "If I need to come back later, that's fine—"

"No," Alice stands up, "it's useless anyway."

"What were you trying to do?" Carmilla closes the door behind her, sitting on the edge of Alice's useless bed.

Alice sits down next to her, "I've been trying to use my ability to figure out what's going on with Thea. Something is not right, I know it. But I also don't want to make it seem like I'm not respecting the time she asked for."

"Have you gotten anything?"

"That's the problem." Alice's eyebrows come together as she reveals what's been going on, "Every time I try to look into her future, it's like mental static."

Carmilla shakes her head, "I don't understand."

"I can't lock in a clear path," Alice frowns slightly, "It's like I'm trying to tune into a radio station that keeps changing frequencies. And I don't know why it's happening but it's freaking me out."

"Wish I had the answers but I don't." Carmilla sent a tight smile the pixie girl's way, "But...you could call her, I talked to her earlier today and she sounded real..." She searches for the word.

"Happy." Alice finishes, something in her churned. Possibly guilt for being worried that her wife was becoming happy without her.

"Yeah," Carmilla nods, she then stands up, rubbing Alice's shoulder, "We're all downstairs, come down when you're done, yeah?"

Alice runs her fingers through her hair, "Sure."

✸

Harper was annoyed by Thea. She wasn't going to hide it, nor did she care to. She'd contacted Thea so that they could reconnect but a piece of her envied that she spent every second with her son. 

Harper didn't want her to abandon him of course, but more so to acknowledge they, as sisters, are working to rebuild a relationship as well.

Harper digs into the cooler, digging out a fresh blood bag to take her mind off of her emotions.

A phone rang on the counter, Harper realized quickly that it was Thea's and the ID caller read: Alice.

Harper hesitated before answering, "Hello, sister-in-law." She put on a false giddy voice.

Alice was silent on the other end for a second, "Hey, um...where's Thea?"

Harper wedges the phone between her ear and shoulder as she pops the cap off the blood bag, "Oh, don't worry, she's only hunting. She leaves her phone here so it doesn't get broken in case things get a little rough."

"Oh." She hears Alice peep on the other end.

Harper sips on the blood bag as if it were a slushy, "Yeah, all the trouble she has to go through just to feed? I mean, c'mon, it's never that stressful with a human. I tried telling her that but she's not acknowledging me at the current moment."

"What do you mean she's not acknowledging you?" Alice worries.

Harper rolls her eyes, "Oh, like she hasn't told you."

"Told me what?" Alice's voice grew on the other end.

Harper's eyes spark up like a kid seeing presence on Christmas, "Holy shit, she hasn't told you?" She burst out into a fit of laughter.

Alice huffs, "Harper, what is going on?"

Harper began making static noise, "Hey are you—kchcuhck—you're breaking up, are you there?"

"Harper." Alice groans in frustration.

Harper hangs up the phone, placing it in her pocket before jumping onto the counter, and swinging her feet happily. "Good to know I'm not the only one being ignored." She mumbles to herself.

Just then, Thea came through the back door in a dirty white wife beater. Thea looks up at Harper, smiling faintly, "Hey."

Harper squints, "Hey? We haven't spoken in three days and all you have to say is hey?" Harper's voice didn't drip with malice, only worry.

"I've been more happy than I have in a long time, I'm not doing to apologize for it." Thea walks straight past her and up the stairs to change her shirt.

"Wait," Harper stops her in her tracks, "I understand and I'm not asking you to apologize, I would just love it if you acknowledged my existence."

"You say as we're are literally in the middle of a conversation." Thea chuckles.

Harper rolls her eyes, "I'm serious, Thea. You've been completely absent."

"No, I haven't." Thea denies it, beginning to walk up the stairs when Harper stops her again.

She'd hop down from the counter, taking slow steps towards the stairway, "You've been absent emotionally, mentally...and physically."

Thea points at herself, "I'm standing right here."

Harper grins, pulling Thea's phone out of her back pocket, "Your wife begs to differ."

Thea was taken aback, her vampire speed had her standing in front of Harper in just nanoseconds. "You talked to my wife? Why do you even have my phone?"

"She has a cute little voice, you know that? Of course you do, she's your wife." Harper chuckles, "But anyway, you haven't told her you found your son?"

Thea snatched her phone back, "That's none of your business." She marches up the stairs.

"Thea, you're too close," Harper admits.

"Excuse me?"

"You're getting too emotionally involved with Arthur." Harper sighs, "It won't end well, Thea, and I think deep down you know that."

Thea takes a step forward, making Harper take a step back. "I never got the chance to do anything with my son for years and you stand here and have the audacity to say I'm too emotionally involved. If anything I'm not involved enough." She storms away.

"Where are you going?" Harper rolls her eyes for a second time.

"Arthur wanted to go to the art gallery opening tonight in town and I'm going with him." Thea doesn't even bother turning around, "So if you'll excuse me, I need to get changed."

✸

Thea changed into an all-black outfit, her hair tied back in a low ponytail.

"You're getting too emotionally involved with Arthur. It won't end well, Thea, and I think deep down you know that."

The words rang through her head repeatedly. "No. No everything is fine." Thea says out loud, almost trying to convince herself.

As Thea walked to her son's home, her phone rang, and Thea was quick to answer it at the sight of it being Alice's name in the Caller ID. "I was going to call you back, I'm sorry." She opens without a hello.

Alice smiles on the other end, "It's fine, Harper told me you were hunting. What are you doing now?"

Thea was hesitant to tell her but did, "I'm going to an art exhibit."

"Oh?" Alice was taken off guard by her answered, "Is thing some kind of bonding thing with your sister?"

"Yeah, she's persistent." Thea kept her answers short and sweet.

Alice chuckles, "It's funny because Harper said that you were...well...not acknowledging her."

Thea stood directly in front of Arthur's home, confused that he wasn't standing outside ready to go like he usually was most days. Thea snapped her attention back to Alice, smiling tightly, "Did she now?"

"Yeah, but clearly that's not true," Alice replies.

Thea hums, "Right." She was seconds away from knocking on the door before seeing something out of the side of her eye.

Thea examined his open window, seeing Arthur lying on his living room floor, unresponsive.

Thea's grip loosened on her phone, letting it smack against the cement.

She kicked his door down before speeding his way, she listened closely, still hearing a heartbeat, "Arthur? Arthur?!"

ragerwrites, Y'all already know I had to bring some kind of heartache into this act, sorry not sorry 🤷🏾‍♀️

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